What the hay is Cait up to? — April 2025 Newsletter

It’s April 1st, and no foolin’, here’s what the hay is going on in my life!

What the hay? Voting to nominate works for the Prix Aurora Awards closes on April 5?

Wow, time flies when the world around you is a dumpster fire, doesn’t it? Well, as I always say, my life is never awful without the awesome, so what’s awesome for me is that I have two short stories that can be nominated in the Best Short Story category for the 2025 Prix Aurora Awards:

“Bev the Hacker Does Time,” first appearing in Laughs in Space (Ed. Donna Scott). A teen girl begins her community service at a seniors residence after hacking the intragalactic network to route all sexy searches to display laxative commercials. But for some weird reason, there doesn’t seem to be any “old people” anywhere! Read it free here!“Courier of the Skies,” first appearing in Spring into SciFi 2025 (Ed. Andrew Farrel, Cloaked Press). An undercover disabled pilot defies a eugenics governing system to courier much-needed cargo to the Network, but the “Welliams” are onto her. Read it free here!How the hay do you nominate my short stories for a Prix Aurora Award?

If you are a Canadian or Permanent Resident, you can become a member of the Canadian Science Fiction and Fantasy Association (CSFFA) for only $10 CDN! What’s cool about being a member is that you not only get to vote for your faves for the Prix Aurora Awards, but you also get free reads of the nominated works that end up on the final ballot! You can learn more about the CSFFA by clicking here.

What the hay? The Disabled Crone trailer is up?!

After flip-flopping to myself with the “Should I? Shouldn’t I?” I went for it! I’ve been recording six amazing episodes for the first season of my new podcast for the Spoonie Authors Network called The Disabled Crone. That’s me! I’m that crone! A youngish crone, but I know I’ll grow into it. The seasons will be short with six episodes, which I like. Easier for me to produce because I am doing all of this on my own, and it leaves me with time to work on my writing and other projects. My hope is to record Season Two’s guests over the summer!

But check out this teaser trailer on the Spoonie Authors Network’s YouTube channel! You can also find the podcast on iHeart Radio, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and Amazon Music!

What the hay? I can’t stop making crafts!

I currently rekindled my relationship with my Cricut Explore 3 machine and discovered the “print then cut” feature. It works great for making stickers and little inserts for reusable acrylic button. Dianna Gunn, Canadian Dark Fantasy author and founder of Weeknight Writers, asked if anyone would share a vendor table with her at CanCon 2025 in October, and I said yes! We’re going to have a blast.

I wanted to offer something fun to customers other than my books (which are also fun), so I put my crafter hat back on. Stickers, buttons, and maybe other writery-editory crafts will be for sale. I’m starting now because of my disability. This gives me pots of time to go at my own pace! But I am totally obsessed! Cricuts are fun. I’m not a salesperson for them or anything; I’m just saying that I love mine!

What the hay? I’m still not eating cake until April 20???

CN: for religion

Oh man, I really don’t love myself. As I mentioned in my last newsletter, I haven’t practiced the tradition of giving something up for Lent in eons, and decided I would give up… yes, it’s true… baked desserts. WHERE WERE ANY OF YOU WHEN I WAS THINKING THIS? WHY DIDN’T ANY OF YOU STOP ME? My “fast” started on Ash Wednesday. Feel like I made an ash out of myself with that decision, to be honest.

Sigh. Never ever, ever again. But the countdown is on, now that April has begun. In the meantime, I am going to stare at this photo and cry.

What the hay am I watching these days?

Content note: mentions of murder, incel ideology, misogyny, femicide

I think I will be haunted by Adolescence for some time. Jamie Miller, a thirteen-year-old boy is arrested for murdering a Katie Leonard, a girl in his class in this disturbing yet brilliantly acted short series. It brings to light how young boys can be radicalized by incel propoganda on the internet and social media, and how parents can easily have no clue this is happening right under their noses. In my opinion, it’s a must see, especially for teachers, mentors, and parents of teens. My hope is that it sparks some serious but meaningful conversations with adults and young folks of all genders who are under their care and influence.

Owen Cooper plays Jamie Miller, and my mind was blown by how he transformed through the episodes. This young actor is one to watch. The series is filmed in what’s known as “one shot,” and this makes you feel like you’re living everything in real time. That’s what makes it so riveting, disturbing, and profoundly sad.

Here’s the trailer for the series:

What the hay am I reading?

In March, I began reading Reverence, by Milena McKay, and I’m almost finished! It’s a sapphic romance and historical fiction about Juliette Lucian-Sorel, a prima ballerina of the Palais Garnier who is known as the Princess of Paris. Juliette meets a Soviet ballerina known as Empress Katarina, and “rescues” her. It’s a slow-burn — very slow-burn — romance with a huge miscommunication trope, but I looked forward to reading it every night. It gets twisty and turny, and that is only a pun you will understand if you read the book!

Here’s the link on the Zon, if you want to learn more about this work. I found out about it because it is a Book of the Year nominee for the 2025 Indiverse Awards.

What the cockaliedoodlie-doo is happening with my writing?

Work has resumed on my upcoming anti-capitalistic, mid-life, awkward space opera romance that nobody asked for! (But that I sorely needed.) I’m reading Hot Wings and Sauciness to my critique partners. I kinda got stuck for a while, so I am taking advantage of being unstuck. Cover reveal in early 2026 with plans to publish it in the summer of 2026!

When a cock-a-doodle-do seems like a cock-a-doodle-don’t… keep calm and try not to molt? 
Meet Colleen O’Donnell, a 50-something neurodivergent and disabled electromechanical technician serving We’re Greater Than’s space hospitality division. She’s sweary, blurty, singy, and goes nowhere without her constant companion—Fiona, her rollator.

Colleen’s dear friend ’Brina is marrying Sharon. The couple plans to hold their hen party at the Coq of the Walk exotic dance club and rotisserie, which boasts the best wing sauce in the solar system. A little weird, sure, but Colleen nearly flies the coop when she discovers they all have to dress up as actual hens!

Meanwhile, folks seem to be in an uproar over Captain Joshua Speers, renowned war hero, who’s returning to the stations. Messages of “Captain Hot Wings is back” are everywhere. Squeals abound!

This means absolutely nothing to Colleen. She’s single and fine that way. Hot Wings can dip into someone else’s sauce, right? What are the chances she and Fiona would even bump into him? And if they did, would it amount to anything?

This book originated with a dare. I told people not to dare me to write a romance because it would be so awkward and be called something like Hot Wings and Sauciness. And then people dared me.

And I am loving this book so much. Colleen O’Donnell is as much me as a character could ever get. I would react probably the same way in every scene. There’s also something so great about an ND and disabled female lead starring in a romance. Especially one in her fifties. Crone Lit for the win!

Thanks for reading and following!

Hope you enjoyed my update! You also can follow me on Bluesky, Instagram, and Threads by searching for caitgauthor! Cheers!

Cait Gordon is an award-winning Canadian speculative fiction writer and anthology editor who advocates for disability, mental health, and neurodiversity representation in written works. She is the author of Season One: Iris and the Crew Tear Through Space! and the co-editor (with Talia C. Johnson) of the Nothing Without Us and Nothing Without Us Too disability fiction anthologies. Cait is autistic, disabled, and queer, and really loves cake.