Mourning Baba Yaga, Fiction, Issue 56, September 2021

Behind the Brambles, Flash Fiction, Issue 65, Winter 2023

Having studied English at Oxford, Megan has now moved on to a Masters in Creative Writing. She likes fairytales, fraught family dynamics, and unreliable narration; she does not like Twitter, but can be found @meginageorge. Her published work is all available at https://meganspublished.tumblr.com. 

Get to know Meagan...

Birthdate?

I was born on the 28th June, 2002.

When did you start writing?

As soon as I could get my hands on paper! 

When and what and where did you first get published?

Probably one of the Young Writer's anthologies when I was in primary school, although I'm not sure that those count. The first piece of writing I was actually paid for was a student article in the Uni Bubble, earlier this year. ("Mourning Baba Yaga" was my second publication. and "Behind the Brambles" will be my third.) pu

Why do you write?

I think that storytelling, at its core, is instinctual. Perhaps one of the reasons I'm so attracted to folklore is because it makes us part of this long winding tradition, all the way back to handprints archaeologists have found on cave walls; there's a sense of identity to be found in that.

A lot of the time, I use it to make sense of things, because everything is easier with words and on paper. I use it to let things out (whether those things are feelings or ideas) and to cope. But I think most of all I want to write because I know how profoundly reading has affected me, and I'd love to have that kind of positive impact on other people.

Why do you write Science Fiction and/or Fantasy?

For me, fantasy is the default - it's how I've processed and understood things since I was young. It gives you black and white, good and evil, so you can try and define those lines. It expands the realms of possibility, and when that happens, whatever's troubling or confusing you doesn't have to make sense. And, of course, if you're telling the story, it's a place where you can take total control. People say they enjoy fantasy for escapism, but I don't think it's escapism at all - the sense of distance is completely artificial. Fantasy is projection; you won't expect it, but it will suddenly hit you that the dragon of the story is wearing something else's face.

Who is your favorite author? Your favorite story?

Angela Carter, and my favourite story of hers is 'The Lady of the House of Love.' Her use of fairytale has a strong influence on my own writing, and her prose is very elegant and inventive. Whenever I've got writer's block, one of the things I do is read her work; it reminds me that I love language. 

What are you trying to say with your fiction?

I'm not even sure that I'm actually trying to say something - I write more to try and figure out what I'm supposed to say. My fiction tends to be very character and relationship driven, and when it comes to that there's very rarely easy or clear answers.  We're all connected, although some people try and resist that; there's no way to do life on your own. If I'm trying to say anything, it's probably that we have to treat those connections as gently as we can, whilst making sure that we're not taking on more pain than they're worth. 

If you could write your own epitaph, what would it say?

Look for me in the clouds.

Do you blog?

I do! I've been blogging my poetry since I was about fifteen on Tumblr, @meganspoetry. It's both embarassing and interesting to look at my earlier posts and see how much I've progressed. My second blog, @meganspublished , has only just launched, and I'm using it to keep track of my professional work!

Charles Edward Tuckett's Yuletide Message, Flash Fiction, Issue 45, December 15, 2018

Robert Bagnall is an English writer who has completed four undistinguished marathons, but holds a world record for eating cream teas. The two may be related.

His speculative fiction has appeared in a variety of magazines, websites and anthologies since the early 1990s. His words also very occasionally cropped up on radio, in newspapers, and out of the mouths of UK government ministers, for whom he was briefly a speechwriter.

You can find his musings on science fiction and writing at meschera.blogspot.co.uk, and his non-fiction book 127a - Diary of a Self-Builder on Amazon. His science fiction novel ‘2084’ is available from Double Dragon Publications or online booksellers.

Get to know Robert Bagnall...

Birthdate?

Some time between the Beatles breaking up, and grog being last issued in the Royal Navy.

When did you start writing?

Very young; joined up letters slightly later

When and what and where did you first get published?

Supposedly comic verse in a school publication for charity

Why do you write?

To quote Fats Waller, if you gotta ask, you ain't never gonna know.

Why do you write Science Fiction and/or Fantasy?

It requires no research whatsoever

Who is your favorite author? Your favorite story?

Too many to pick one, and it'll probably be a different list tomorrow, but today I'd say Philip K Dick, JG Ballard, William Gibson, and Kazuo Ishiguro.  I've always had a soft spot for 'The Red Room' by HG Wells, and 'The Brass Bar' by Louise de Bernieres.

What are you trying to say with your fiction?

I don't have any particular message; I'm just trying to stare into the fog of the future and see the iceberg a moment before everybody else.

If you could write your own epitaph, what would it say?

Never bet on favourites.

Do you blog?

meschera.blogspot.co.uk

For Patrick's bio please click here

Forgolatten, Fiction, Issue 56, September 2021

Vrinda Baliga is the author of the short story collections 'Name, Place, Animal, Thing' and 'Arrivals and Departures'. Her work has appeared in And Lately, The Sun (Calyx Press, Australia, 2020), The Best Asian Speculative Fiction 2018 (Kitaab International, Singapore), Asia Literary Review, Himal Southasian, The Indian Quarterly, The Bombay Review, and Commonwealth Writers adda, among others. She has won prizes and recognition in the Bengaluru Review Short Story Competition 2020, Katha Fiction Contest 2017, the FON South Asia Short Story Competition 2016 and the New Asian Writing Short Story Competition 2016, and received residency fellowships from Sangam House, India, and The Wellstone Center in the Redwoods, California. Vrinda Baliga lives in Hyderabad, India, with her husband and two children.

Get to know Vrinda...

Birthdate?

5 July, 1978.

When did you start writing?

I started writing as a child, filling notebooks with ghost and mystery stories that I fortunately did not show anyone :) Then came a long hiatus during my high school and college years. I returned to writing when I took a break from my tech career after the birth of my kids. The career break ended up becoming rather too prolonged and I switched tracks to writing and editing full-time. 

When and what and where did you first get published?

I think it was a short story in a now defunct lit. mag called Cezanne's Carrot back in 2007. More short and flash fiction pieces followed, and a couple of contest wins in 2010 and 2011 gave me my first taste of success in writing and motivated me to keep going. 

Why do you write? Why do you write Science Fiction and/or Fantasy?

Because mere reality is too shallow a cup to hold all the concoctions brewed up by the imagination :)

Who is your favorite author? Your favorite story?

Alice Munro in short fiction. George R.R. Martin in epic fantasy. Ted Chiang in science fiction...many others. 

One of my favourite SFF short stories is Ken Liu's 'The Bookmaking Habits of Select Species'. 

Garden of Stars, Flash Fiction, Issue 51, June 2020

Ashley Bao is a Chinese-Canadian-American high school sophomore. She spends her

time writing and dreaming, mostly about cats. Her poetry and short fiction has been published/is forthcoming in Liminality, Strange Horizons, and Cast of Wonders.

Get to know Ashley...

Birthdate?

November 6

When did you start writing?

Around 6th grade

When and what and where did you first get published?

Blue Marble Review, December 2019

Why do you write?

It's fun and something that relieves stress from school.

Why do you write Science Fiction and/or Fantasy?

My sister wrote fantasy a lot when she was younger, so I've always been exposed to speculative fiction. I love the idea of exploring unreal things in my work, whether it be creating a new world or finding magic in the one we already live in.

Who is your favorite author? Your favorite story?

N.K. Jemisin. A Guide to the Fruits of Hawai’i, by Alaya Dawn Johnson

What are you trying to say with your fiction?

To be honest, I'm still figuring that out.

If you could write your own epitaph, what would it say?

A poem is a gesture toward home.

For Tara's bio please click here

For David's bio please click here

iLove, Poetry, Issue 23, June 1, 2013

Diarmuid de Barra lives in rural County Cork in Ireland. He is rediscovering the joy of writing speculative fiction and poems. He is happily married to an artist and is the proud father of two.

Get to know Diarmuid...

Birthdate? April 1972

When did you start writing? I started writing in my teens and continued for a few years but I have had a twenty year hiatus when life just got in the way.

When and what and where did you first get published? Now, this and here! 

What themes do you like to write about? I love Speculative Fiction, be it SciFi, horror, Fantasy or some wonderful mishmash. I'm not writing long enough to have deciphered my favorite themes, so far the theme emerges from the genre, however, one theme I have identified is innocence versus the Big Bad World.

What books and/or stories have most resonated with you as an author? Why? How do these stories and their characters find expression in your work? My favourite two books are To Kill A Mockingbird and The Lord of The Rings. As I've touched on in the previous question, I love the idea of momentous events happening through the eyes of innocents. 

The Thrilling and Sensational Flock Lifestyle, Fiction, Issue 68, Fall 2024

Get to know Michael....

When did you start writing?

I started telling stories as soon as I learned how to talk. Honestly, I have no

memory of ever not telling stories.

When and what and where did you first get published?

I got a few articles published in school papers, but the first thing I published that I

was really proud of was my short story “The Surviving Legend, “ which appeared

in Miracle Monocle. It was a story that had been living in my head for quite a

while, and I’m very happy with the way it turned out.

Why do you write?

I’m always chasing the sense of flow I receive when a story becomes something

organic and takes on a life of its own, when the characters/world tell me what’s

going to happen next rather than me pushing them around. I’ve achieved this with

every story I’ve ever published, including this one.

Why do you write Science Fiction and/or Fantasy?

I love pushing the boundaries of my imagination, but what I really love is

combining the fantastical with the mundane. Most of my stories take the surreal,

horrific and otherworldly and place them in kitchens, family settings and office

cubicles. This juxtaposition is what draws me to speculative fiction (and stories

in general).

Who is your favorite author? Your favorite story?

Back when I was in late elementary school I randomly came across a book in the

library called The Devil’s Doorbell by Anthony Horowitz (who would later go on to

write the Alex Rider series, as well as create the TV series Foyle’s War).

This wasn’t the first book I ever enjoyed but this was the first one that struck me

on a gut level. Up until that point, most of the books I had read on my own or for

school were sanitary and educational with clear-cut lessons and adults who were

always there to save the kids. The Devil’s Doorbell was one of the first works of

horror I ever read. Most of the adults were trying to murder the kid protagonist.

There were demon dogs who didn’t have flesh around their bellies so their rib

cages were visible (a detail my pre-adolescent brain clung onto) and a scene

where the dinosaur bones in a natural history museum came to life and tried to

eat the heroes.

Overall, it was unlike anything I had ever read and nurtured my burgeoning love

of horror. In some ways the book was ahead of its time, having more in common

with the YA books of the 21st Century. In fact it was later “re-booted” in 2005, now

titled Raven’s Gate, which started off Horowitz’s Power of Five series.

What are you trying to say with your fiction?

This greatly depends on the story. “The Thrilling and Sensational Flock Lifestyle”

more or less speaks for itself about my fears regarding where this country is

headed.

Most of the rest of my stories have to do with exploring human relationships and

characteristics when they are thrown into surreal and fantastical situations. What

would it be like to have a sibling who was constantly destroying the world?

If you could write your own epitaph, what would it say?

Michael Barron

He wrote a lot of stories, lived with a lot of cats, traveled to a lot of countries.

Do you blog?

I sure do: michaeljbarron.com/

The Cycle of the Sun, Fiction, Issue 18, March 1, 2012

The Perfect Instrument, Fiction, Issue 26, March 1, 2014

The Music of a Soldier's Soul, Fiction, Issue 41, December 2017

Your Call Is Important to Us, Flash Fiction, Issue 66, Spring 2024

Barbara A. Barnett is a writer, musician, Odyssey Writing Workshop graduate, occasional orchestra librarian, coffee addict, and all-around geek. In addition to NewMyths, her short stories have appeared in publications such as Beneath Ceaseless Skies, Lady Churchill's Rosebud Wristlet, Cast of Wonders, Weird Horror Magazine, and GigaNotoSaurus. Barbara lurks about the Philadelphia area, where she lives with her husband and a pantsless stuffed monkey named Super Great. You can find her online at www.babarnett.com. 

Get to know Barbara...

Birthdate? November 19 

When did you start writing? I was about 8 years old. I remember pestering my mother to come watch as I made my stuffed animals act out an adventure I had created for them. Busy mom that she was, she told me to go write it down. So I did. After that, writing down all the crazy ideas that popped into my head seemed like the natural thing to do. 

When and what and where did you first get published? My first published work was a satirical, Douglas Adams-inspired science fiction story called "Harvey Benson and the Search for the Meaning of Life," which appeared back in 1997 in a little zine called Story Rules. But it wasn't until several years later that I finally started writing, submitting, and selling stories with any kind of consistency.

 What themes do you like to write about? It'd probably be easier to list the themes I don't like to write about. I'm all over the place.  

 What books and/or stories have most resonated with you as an author? Why? How do these stories and their characters find expression in your work? My tastes as a reader are pretty eclectic, but one book I can always point to as a huge influence is Peter Beagle's The Last Unicorn. The prose is just gorgeous; I still tear up whenever I read the opening paragraph. But what strikes me the most is how Beagle manages to pack so much into such a deceptively simple story: whimsy, magic, satire, action, love, friendship, and a ton of other things, all wrapped up with a beautiful and bittersweet ending. If any of that has found expression in my own work, I'd say it's in my attempt to do a lot with as little as possible and to capture that balance of magic, laughter, and heartache. How successful I've been, of course, is another story entirely.

Publisher, Executive Editor of NewMyths.com

Interview with Author: Justin Gustainis, Interview, Issue 5, December 1, 2008

Interview with Illustrator: Toby Cypress, Interview, Issue 5, December 1, 2008

Interview with Author: Barbara Campbell, Nonfiction, Issue 10, March 1, 2010

Writers' Workshops (with Bob Sojka), Nonfiction, Issue 11, June 1, 2010

The Constitution, Fiction, Issue 49, December 2019

A graduate of the Odyssey Fantasy Writing Workshop, Scott T. Barnes' short fiction won second place in the Writers of the Future Contest, 2011. He has published short stories in over a dozen magazines, including BuzzyMag.com; History and Horror, Oh My!, Niteblade; Bewildering Stories; The Lamppost Literary Journal; Trail of Indiscretion; and more. 

He grew up on a farm/cattle ranch in California and has worked in marketing, sales, teaching English as a foreign language in France, and commercial real estate. He holds an MBA from the Claremont Graduate School and a BA in Journalism/Spanish from CSU Fresno. He also attended La Universidad Iberoamericana in Mexico and La Sorbonne University in France. He is the editor of NewMyths.com and former Director of the American Christian Fiction Writers-West. More on Scott, including a complete bibliography, can be found at scotttbarnes.com.

Castles in the Air, Flash Fiction, Issue 53, December 2020

A storyteller from the time she could talk, as soon as E.L. Bates learned to write she began putting her stories down on paper and inflicting them on the general public. Stories of magic and derring-do have been her favorites from almost as young. She is a firm believer in Lloyd Alexander's maxim that "fantasy is not an escape from reality; it is a way of understanding reality." Also, it's a lot of fun to both write and to read.

When not writing, Bates works as a freelance editor. In her spare time, she enjoys knitting, sewing, reading (always reading), and hiking with her family.

Get to know E. L. Bates...

Birthdate? 03/14/1982

When did you start writing? About as soon as I learned to hold a pencil! My mother still has stories packed away that I wrote in first grade, and an essay from second grade where I stated my intention of becoming an author when I grew up.

When and what and where did you first get published? My first publication experience was in college, where a poem and a short story of mine were accepted into the university's literary magazine. I was so proud!

Why do you write? The short answer to this question is "because I can't not write." The longer answer is because I believe that stories help us understand ourselves and the world, and show truths that can't be grasped in any other way.

Why do you write Science Fiction and/or Fantasy? Science fiction and fantasy capture the imagination and sense of wonder at the world as no other genre can do. Once you've stepped through the wardrobe into the realm of magic, you never really leave it behind.

Who is your favorite author? Your favorite story? Has any reader ever been able to pick one favorite? I'll try to stick to three, each from a different genre: Lloyd Alexander, Jane Austen, and Agatha Christie. As for a favorite story, that's even harder! The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, by CS Lewis, and Gaudy Night by Dorothy L Sayers are the first two that spring to mind, though LM Montgomery's Anne of Green Gables is hard on their heels.

What are you trying to say with your fiction? If I knew exactly what I was trying to say with my fiction, I wouldn't have to write an entire story to get it out! The most common themes that come through in my work are hope tied to perseverance, the importance of community, and the value of individuals for who they are, not what they do.

If you could write your own epitaph, what would it say? "She loved well"

Do you blog? I blog at StarDance Press

Project: Terminated, Fiction, Issue 33, December 1, 2015

Sara Dobie Bauer is a writer, model, and mental health advocate with a creative writing degree from Ohio University. She spends most days at home in her pajamas as a book nerd and sex-pert for SheKnows.com. Her short story, "Don't Ball the Boss," was nominated for the 2015 Pushcart Prize. She lives with her husband and two precious pups in Northeast Ohio, although she would really like to live in a Tim Burton film. Her novel Bite Somebody has been accepted for publication by Red Moon Romance and will be available in 2016. 

Her blog is, saradobie.wordpress.com 

Her Twitter is, @SaraDobie

Get to know Sara...

Birthday? June 6, 1982

When did you start writing? As a fetus, I imagine, although I don't remember.

When and what and where did you first get published? A short story called "Kenny G Can Blow Me," based on my aunt's date with a narcoleptic, published in the Spring 2012 edition of Blue Guitar Magazine.

What themes do you like to write about? Love. It's always love, whether it's happy, cheerful love; down and dirty love; or love that you fight and fight and fight ... Oddly, I also write horror.

What books and/or stories have most resonated with you as an author? Why? How do these stories and their characters find expression in your work? The first story that really smacked me in the face was "The Yellow Wallpaper" by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, maybe because I suffer from mental illness and I never wanted to end up misunderstood and locked in a room. (Stephen King stories have always left me similarly unhinged.) I have written extensively about mental illness in my non-fiction, but where fiction is concerned, I like to escape completely into characters and scenarios unlike my normal day-to-day writer's life. Authors like Gilman and King do affect my style, however, as I'm a firm believer in the rule: If you want to become a better writer, you must first become a better reader.

Love Factor #9, Poetry, Premier Issue, December 1, 2007

Birthdate? May 18.

When did you start writing? Oh, let me see...I guess in my twenties-say 24.

When and what and where did you first get published? In my twenties - a play review in a local newspaper.

Why do you write? Joy. Creation. To feel important.

Why do you write Science Fiction and/or Fantasy? Habit, plus the power the images and metaphors offer.

Who is your favorite author? Your favorite story? Favorite author? Robert Parker or Lois McMaster Bujold.

Your favorite story? That I wrote? "Next Year in Buffalo Commons" (not yet published).

That I've read? Where the Wild Things Are or Those Who Walk Away From Omelas.

What are you trying to say with your fiction? Alas, there is no coherent or conscious message; maybe that joy is possible.

The King of Dogs or Dog Days and Wolf Nights, Fiction, Issue 22, March 1, 2013

Chantal Beaulne, Ask anyone of her family members or friends and they will tell you that that Chantal Beaulne grew up in a small town in southern Alberta, Canada. Ask Chantal herself and she will tell you she grew up in Neverland, Narnia, Middle Earth, Camelot and Wonderland. She is currently studying Animation at Emily Carr University of Art and Design in Vancouver. 

Get to know Chantal...

Birthdate? I’m a Rooster in the Chinese Zodiac, my birth month is named after the goddess of peacocks, and the day is the atomic number of cobalt. 

When did you start writing? I was telling stories long before I’d memorized even half the alphabet. Not very good ones, but learning to read eventually helped me to embrace subject matter beyond puppies, kittens and kangaroos that turned into butterflies. 

When and what and where did you first get published? In the Abstract Quill, with "Household Gods for 20 Occasions," the September 2012 issue. 

What themes do you like to write about? Unclean Godliness, the average monster next door, reality gone-out-to-lunch and people who  have to deal with that and their more pedestrian problems. I like to put normal people in abnormal situations or abnormal people in normal situations, as its a good way to question what is normal anyway. ‘King of Dogs’ is a good example of this, as what starts as a boy-and-his-dog story is interrupted by a creature who doesn’t belong on Earth, let alone in a seemingly peaceful small town. Rex is a monster even before he turns into a gigantic wolf, an unwelcome personality in a place that doesn’t approve of a single inch of him. He's both the disagreeable modern punk and a figure from an ancient religion that’s fallen out of favour. I like dichotomy and the coming together of past and present, especially as expressed by violent, ignored characters like Rex who have to find a reason for their being in a world that increasingly doubts the existence of a script.

What books and/or stories have most resonated with you as an author? Why? How do these stories and their characters find expression in your work? Television was a banned substance in my childhood, so I naturally turned to other mediums for a growing girl’s daily amount of adventure, violence, love, murder and sex--that is, the big ol’ book of Mythology. It was the protagonists of the stories that influenced my future writing. Well, them and the monsters. And people turning into monsters. That was definitely rooted there but it was also some of my earliest examples of the imperfect hero. They had more than single fatal flaws, they made mistakes at every turn and their mistakes cost lives and and friendships. Yet they were somehow charismatic enough to keep you reading until their next horrible error and so on and so forth until they died unhappily. The bleached-of-anything-even-remotely-offensive protagonists of many modern novels bored me after that.  Now I usually set out to create characters who are so human they make the page smell funny. 

The Red Shoes, Flash Fiction, Issue 41, December 15, 2017

Sarah Beaudette is a native of the Pacific Northwest, and a nomadic traveler currently living in Mexico with her husband, two small sons, and a cat named Pye. Her fiction has appeared in Word Riot, Necessary Fiction, and The Jellyfish Review among other publications. When she's not reading, she spends most of her time getting lost in strange cities and mispronouncing her pastry orders at the cafe.  

Biography Questions

Birthday? March 4th.

When did you start writing? I've been annoying my parents with rambling epic fantasies since I learned to talk, but the first one I remember writing down was when I was ten. Our city had an ice storm, the likes of which had never been seen before or since. Everyone was without power for weeks. Our third grade class wrote stories about what we did during the storm. I believe I stretched the truth in mine, but it won a local young writers award and I still have the ruffled yellow ribbon. 

When and what and where did you first get published? After college, I didn't do much creative writing until I was thirty. A story of mine about a girl who can talk to animals and a mother who can read her thoughts won the NYC Midnight Short Story Challenge in 2016, and is published there now.

What themes do you like to write about? Apparently I often write about parent/child relationships, though I don't set out to. I also like a healthy dose of death and the macabre, because who doesn't?

What books and/or stories have most resonated with you as an author? Why? How do these stories and their characters find expression in your work? Jeez, how much time do you have? This weekend I'm rereading old fall favorites: A Wrinkle In Time, The Uninvited, Rebecca, and I'll admit it, A Discovery of Witches. I have eclectic reading tastes, and also dip my nose into Junot Diaz, Karen Russell, Ray Bradbury, and Salman Rushdie as often as I can. My favorite writing is rich and delicious--it makes me rub my hands together in anticipation like my husband says I do before a good meal. Whether it's horror, fabulism, or literary fiction, good writing makes you want to bite down hard and cleave to its emotion as you disappear inside the universe. I strive for this level of reader enjoyment in my own writing. 

Website? theluxpats.com

Twitter? @sarahbeaudette

Ice Rider, Fiction, Issue 45, December 15, 2018

Equus Caballus, Fiction, Issue 48, September 15, 2019

Tiah Marie Beautement is an American-Brit living on the South African Garden Route with her family, two dogs, and a flock of chickens. She is the author of the award-nominated This Day )2014, Modjaji), Moons Don't Go to Venus (2006, Bateleur), and numerous short stories. She is the managing editor of the TSSF journal, teaches writing to all ages, and freelances for a variety of publications, including the Sunday Times and FunDza. In her spare time she has been spotted riding horses, as pillion on a motorbike, and belly dancing. https://tiahbeautement.wordpress.com/

Get to know Tiah...

Birthdate?

12 / 12 / 77

When did you start writing?

I'm not sure. For as long as I can remember, I have made up stories in my head, played make believe. There was that time in 4th grade where a friend and I tried to write a novel that was a complete rip-off of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. Obviously, it was a failure of a project.

When and what and where did you first get published?

Moons Don't Go To Venus, was the first piece published after I graduated university. My then agent couldn't find a publisher for it in the Western traditional press, but an in-law of mine in the South African textbook industry heard of an opportunity via the South African government. The RSA government was looking for new, contemporary fiction set in post-apartheid South Africa. The book was submitted and, despite not being YA, it was accepted as an approved text for the then Grade 11 English literary curriculum.

My first short story, "Gas Station Growing Pains" was published about a year after that, to an American online flash fiction zine which has since closed. A pity, because they paid.

Why do you write?

A question I often ask myself. I have discovered over the years that I am more miserable when I don't write.

Why do you write Science Fiction and/or Fantasy?

For a long time, I didn't think I could, actually. It was pretty much the only genre I wrote in as a child, and my stories from that time are terrible. Also, a lot of the fantasy and science fiction – speculative fiction – have complicated plots, where my best tales tend to focus on the quotidian. But I admire many stories and writers from the genre and a few years ago a couple of my own attempts trickled out into the world and were received with encouragement. Eight months into 2016, I left a five year stint at an African literary not-for-profit and found I had time to write – really write – and decided to use it as a chance to start writing outside my comfort zone, from writing YA to trying all things science fiction and fantasy. The past two years have been a steep learning curve, but I've relished the challenge.

Who is your favorite author? Your favorite story?

It would feel like a betrayal to answer this question. I read in abundance, and widely.

What are you trying to say with your fiction?

For the reader: Allow me tell you a story, a story I hope to tell well, by painting a picture for you with words. I hope you'll enjoy it, that it will create some empathy, perhaps go, "Oh, yes, this is me too," and, lastly, perhaps make you think.

For me: My writing, as a whole, creates a conversation with myself, about ideas, challenges, themes, memories, and even politics that people in my everyday life might not wish to discuss in depth or find interesting. So rather than babbling to myself, I make up characters and have it played out through them.

If you could write your own epitaph, what would it say?

In 2014, in honour of Thanksgiving, Isabella Jernigan, then eight, proclaimed: "I’m thankful for all the dead people because at least they tried."

How fitting, since that is all we really do at life – try and then try again. So when I die, I hope my loved ones can say of me, "She tried."

Do you blog?

I keep a blog, mostly of quotes I've pulled from things I've read, but other items find their way on there too: http://tiahbeautement.wordpress.com/

Before the Gloaming, Poetry, Issue 26, March 1, 2014

Lee Beavington is an award-winning author of fiction, nonfiction and poetry. His novella, "Evolution's End," appears in Writers of the Future XXII, and his book Common Plants of Greater Vancouver is a required textbook for both science and arts students. In addition to teaching ecology, cell biology and genetics in the biology lab at Kwantlen University, he also served as primary photography for three of Lone Pine's nature books, including Wild Berries of British Columbia. His doctoral research explores the intersection of creative process, nature experience, storytelling and transformational change.

Get to know Lee...

Birthdate? May 18. 

When did you start writing? At age ten, after I read The Hobbit and wanted to craft my own adventures. 

When and what and where did you first get published? In grade 8 I was painfully shy. Entire school days would go by--bus, class, lunch, class, bus--where I would not utter a single word. My mom circled a writing contest listed in the school newsletter. Here was a place I could be heard. I entered and placed first. "Avar's Quest" was published in the Surrey School District student anthology Breakthrough II.

My first professional sale was in Writers of the Future XXII in 2006.

What themes do you like to write about? Journeys. Discovery of self. Our increasing detachment from the natural world. Finding your voice. Wonder as a cure for apathy. Killer space cells. The more-than-human world. 

What books and/or stories have most resonated with you as an author? Why? How do these stories and their characters find expression in your work? At the impressionable age of fourteen, after reading dozens of DragonLance and Forgotten Realms novels, I got tired of the same plots being retold in one derivative fashion after another. I asked my parents for books to read. My mom threw Holocaust memoirs my way, which had a profound impact on my sense of social justice and doing right in this world. Morality and redemption often crop up in my written works.

Meanwhile, my dad--who owned a single shelf of books compared to my mom's collection that spilled throughout the family home--gave me two books:  Aldous Huxley's Brave New World and Robert Heinlein's Stranger in a Strange Land. Both The Savage and Valentine Michael Smith explore their respective worlds in a genuinely naive, innocent and heartfelt way. There is a scene in Heinlein's book where the Man from Mars is horrified that someone is stepping on grass--a living entity. That shook me up. I started to understand perceptions other than my own as both valid and enlightening, which is a motif that resonates throughout my stories.

The Best Deal, Flash Fiction, Issue 36, September 1, 2016

Jackie Bee, Born and raised in Russia, Jackie Bee lives in Israel now, with her husband and two children. Her fiction has appeared in Sanitarium, Phobos, Kzine, Fiction Vortex, and Literary Hatchet, among other publications. 

Her facebook is, https://www.facebook.com/jackie.bee.3785. 

Get to know Jackie...

Birthday? 1981

When did you start writing? I’ve written short stories as a child (cute stuff like how Soviet children got kidnapped by aliens and started a revolution on an alien planet). Then I took a break, and only began to seriously write in my early thirties (around 2012).

When and what and where did you first get published? My short story "Hallo" was published by Sanitarium in 2013.

What themes do you like to write about? All kinds of themes in Sci Fi, literary and horror genres. 

What books and/or stories have most resonated with you as an author? Why? How do these stories and their characters find expression in your work? I tend to like post-apocalyptic and dystopian fiction (such as 1984, The Handmaid's Tale, The Day of the Triffids, to name a few). Naturally, the 'end-of-the-world-as-we-know-it' topic appeared in some of my stories.

The Bog Witch's Brew, poem, issue 54, March 2021.

Since before she can remember, R. Jean Bell has devoured any available reading material. In recent years, books--averaging one a day--have proven the most effective relief from chronic pain. Although born and raised in the US, she's spent the last twenty years in Denmark.

Her poetry took second place in the BSFS Poetry Competition in 2019 and has appeared in Parabnormal Magazine and Scifaikuest.

Get to know R. Jean...

Birthdate?

I'm a bicentennial baby, although I doubt that expression is used much anymore. I was born in 1976.

When did you start writing?

I poked at it a time or two when I was younger, but I first did any serious attempts at writing in college. Then I stopped for several years, started again when my health failed, got frustrated because of my health and stopped again, then finally got seriously back to writing in 2017.

When and what and where did you first get published?

I did have some stuff in my college lit journal, but I don't really count that.

I had a few things around the same time. A flash piece in Cast of Wonders that placed in their contest, a poem in Parabnormal Magazine, and a poem placing second in the Baltimore Science Fiction Society competition. All of them came out in the spring of 2019.

What themes do you like to write about?

This is a tricky one. I'd like to think my work varies a lot, but it doesn't really. Death shows up a lot, as in this poem (my mother died in 2018 and I've been dealing with my grief in my writing). I also have a lot relating to defying cultural norms and expectations and dealing with health issues and depression. Also various forms of abuse.

Kakitso, Fiction, Issue 19, June 1, 2012

Desert of Trees, Fiction, Issue 21, December 1, 2012

Transatlantic, Fiction, Issue 31, June 1, 2015

M. Bennardo's short stories appear in Beneath Ceaseless Skies, Asimov's Science Fiction, Shimmer, Lightspeed Magazine and others. He is also editor of the Machine of Death series of anthologies. The second volume of the series, This Is How You Die, will be available from Grand Central Publishing in July 2013. He lives in Cleveland, Ohio.

His website is, http://www.mbennardo.com

Get to know M...

Birthdate? May 13, 1980

When did you start writing? I've been writing regularly since I was about 15 years old. Luckily for editors at that time, my first hundred stories were written by hand on loose-leaf paper, and no attempt was ever made to sell them. In college, I started sending a few out for consideration here and there. Though I managed to sell a few over the years, it wasn't until another ten years passed before I felt like I had any idea what I was doing. Sometimes I still have doubts about that.

When and what and where did you first get published? My first paid sale was to a short-lived online fantasy magazine called Elysian Fiction in 2002. My first sale to a market that's still around was to Strange Horizons a year later.

What themes do you like to write about? I'm very interested in history, so I often find myself writing historical fiction. Although "Kakitsu" isn't set in any particular time, it's historical in the sense that I wanted to explore a non-contemporary storytelling mode. I'm not a scholar of myths or fairy tales, but when I read them it often strikes me that they derive from different impulses than the popular stories we write and read today. "Kakitsu" concerns a story that was designed not to entertain, but to reinforce a shared set of unusual values among the monks. Even so, I couldn't resist including the possibility that not every monk may feel exactly the same about those values.

What books and/or stories have most resonated with you as an author? Why? How do these stories and their characters find expression in your work? I particularly enjoy original accounts of the explorers of frontiers -- whether the frontiers are geographic, scientific, or social. In a lot of ways, it seems that these frontiers aren't truly conquered until the account is written down. After all, Lewis & Clark's expedition or Captain Cook's voyages would have been of little note if they hadn't gone on to tell the world about what they had seen and done. Fiction is largely about characters confronting what are at least personal frontiers. Even when characters have access to the accounts of others to guide them, there is almost always a moment of risk, in which they must take a step into the unknown.

Infrost, Photograph, Issue 17, December 1, 2011

Perfect Ground, Photograph, Issue 25, December 1, 2013

Eleanor Leonne Bennett is an internationally award winning photographer and visual artist. She is the CIWEM Young Environmental Photographer of the Year 2013 and has also won first places with National Geographic, The World Photography Organization, Nature's Best Photography and The National Trust to name but a few. Eleanor's photography has been published in the Telegraph, The Guardian, The British Journal of Psychiatry, Life Force Magazine, British Vogue, Harper's Bazaar and as the cover of books and magazines extensively throughout the world. Her art is globally exhibited, having shown work in New York, Paris, London, Rome, Los Angeles, Hong Kong, Copenhagen, Washington, Canada, Spain, Japan and Australia amongst many other locations. She was also the only person from the UK to have her work displayed in the National Geographic and Airbus run See The Bigger Picture global exhibition tour with the United Nations International Year of Biodiversity 2010. In 2012 her work received coverage on ABC Television.

Her website is, www.eleanorleonnebennett.zenfolio.com

Get to know Eleanor...

Birthday? 24 February 1996

When did you start doing artwork? 3 years ago this June just gone.

When and what and where did you first get published? When I was 13 one of my photographs was placed in a contest as highly commended run by National Geographic and Airbus. The photo was shown outside the UNESCO building in Paris, in the Canada Cultural Center for the Winter Olympics , Outside of the Retiro park in Spain and the 50th Hamburg Harbor festival, among many other places listed in a press release on the Airbus website.

Do you use reoccurring themes or images in your illustrations? Yes, often. Mainly around the theme of destruction is a strong emotion for me. Self defense, fragility of life and finite matters and emotions.

What media do you like to work in? Why? Photography but also mixed media. The use of natural objects in urban scenarios.

I like things to be out of place and for them to still seem composed. I enjoy most forms of art, I would like to work in a lot more mediums in the near future.

What artist's work do you most admire? How has this artist's work influenced you? There are so many other photographers I admire. I am constantly discovering more and more. I enjoy the work of National Geographic photographers like Reza and Joel Sartore. I would eventually like to take photographs that mark something of history, to leave a deep impression on peoples consciousness.

I like a lot of contemporary artists' works. I love the paintings of Graham Coxon. I myself would like to grasp the opportunity to do cover artwork in the near future. Especially as music greatly influences a lot of my images. I would say that is another theme if you look hard enough into my works so far.

To Hold a Soul, Fiction, Issue 47, June 15, 2019

T.J. Berg is a molecular and cellular biologist working and writing in Sweden. She is a graduate of the Odyssey Writing Workshop. Her short fiction has appeared in Talebones (for which it received an honorable mention in The Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror), Tales of the Unanticipated, Electric Velocipede, Daily Science Fiction, Caledonia Dreamin', Sensorama, Thirty Years of Rain, and Tales to Terrify, and is upcoming in Urban Crime and Diabolical Plots. When not writing or doing science, she can be found stravaigin the world, cooking, or hiking. She can be found on the web at www.infinity-press.com.

Get to know T. J. Berg...

When did you start writing?

I have been writing stories since I could put words on paper, but it became a real passion around 11 years old when I started actually spending my free time trying to write stories.

When and what and where did you first get published?

My first story was “To Crown A Sand Castle Just Right” in Talebones.

Why do you write?

I have stories constantly running through my head, and probably started writing them because I enjoyed them so much. As I’ve gotten older, I’ve begun writing partly to learn about others, partly to learn about myself, to explore and dream and—I can’t deny—fight what I see as the injustices of the world as I try to understand them.

Why do you write Science Fiction and/or Fantasy?

I enjoy reading them! But also, I love the freedom of genre. Any tool you want to explore something is available.

Who is your favorite author? Your favorite story?

I have never been able to answer “favorite” questions! This upsets my 4 year old son quite a bit.

What are you trying to say with your fiction?

If there was an underlying theme to my fiction it would be about our shared humanity.

If you could write your own epitaph, what would it say?

I don’t think I would want to.  I would be extremely curious to know what others wrote about me though, because I’m nosy that way, and maybe self-centered that way? But then I’d worry they were lying anyway, because I’m dead.  So I guess maybe I’d have to say “Don’t believe a word of it” on my gravestone.  Or maybe I’ll just live in denial until I die, since science fiction has promised me eternal life in some form or another.

Do you blog? 

I have website at which I, very, very occasionally, write something.

For Amanda's bio please click here

The Magician, Poetry, Issue 6, March 1, 2009

Unfolding, Poetry, Issue 22,  March 1, 2013

Matins, Poetry, Issue 62, Spring 2023

F. J. Bergmann has no literary academic qualifications, but hangs out a lot with people who do. She is the poetry editor of Mobius: The Journal of Social Change. She lives in Wisconsin and fantasizes about tragedies on or near exoplanets. She was a Writers of the Future winner. Her work has appeared in Abyss & Apex, Analog, Asimov’s SF, and elsewhere in the alphabet. Her most recent chapbook, A Catalogue of the Further Suns

(Gold Line Press), won the SFPA Elgin Award. She thinks imagination can compensate for anything.

Get to know F.J.

Birthdate? 10/6/54

When did you start writing? Um...this question might need to be more rigorous. I believe I learned to make letters at age 3 or 4.

When and what and where did you first get published? 1971; a poem in a national high school poetry anthology--a bleak poem about madness, as I recall.

Why do you write? It entertains me, and appears to entertain others.

Why do you write Science Fiction and/or Fantasy? It offers a much broader spectrum of possibilities than "real" literature.

Who is your favorite author? Your favorite story? My favorite author right at the moment (this changes regularly) is Iain M. Banks. My favorite story: a three-way tie between Isaac Asimov's "The Ugly Little Boy,"  Thomas Disch's "Descending," and Ursula LeGuin's "Mazes."

What are you trying to say with your fiction? I'm torn between giving readers a good time, and freaking them out.

Do you blog? Where? http://fibitz.livejournal.com/

If you could write your own epitaph, what would it say? "You won't believe what I'm doing now!"

things to do if you are the air, Poetry, Issue 56, September 2021

Sarah Berti is a mythmaker, editor, ghostwriter, and former director of Mulmur Hills Camp. She is the founder of Bright Leaf Literary and the author of the forthcoming Helix Library Mythos. Trained in outdoor and experiential education at Queen's University, Sarah has worked with neurodivergent populations at summer camps where the focus was the intersection of games, storytelling, and the wilderness of the Real. Her recent poetry has been published in Reliquiae Journal, RIC Journal, Mythic Circle, and Luna Arcana. She can be found in her off-grid sanctuary in the precambrian wilderness of Ontario, Canada, under the stars. You can connect with her via @elfhood_ on twitter or at her websites: thehelixlibrary.com and brightleafliterary.com. 

Get to know Sarah...

Birthdate?

February 1

When did you start writing?

When the lunar body was in Scorpio and the moon mares galloped past my open window at the witching hour. (About age seven).

Why do you write?

To create new perceptions of Reality and open new wings in the Library of the Mind.

Why do you write Science Fiction and/or Fantasy?

I try to write the Real and these genres seem to allow for the exploration of what realities, truths, and possibilities exist under the Masks Of Things.

Who is your favorite author? Your favorite story?

Impossible to answer. Some beloved authors include: David Mitchell, Jorge Luis Borges, C.S Lewis, Guy Gavriel Kay, Sean Kane, Alan Garner, Robin McKinley, and Madeleine L'Engle. Randomly chosen, two recent stories I adored were "The Secret Horses of Briar Hill" by Megan Shepherd and "Piranesi" by Susanna Clarke.

What are you trying to say with your fiction?

Living in the wilderness of the Real, I sense my neurodivergence has offered unique relationships with other-than-human intelligences. In not all but in some of my work I attempt to represent their voices in writing that is true to their natural polyphony – not to co-opt them but to show they engage in a common reasoning and affect fundamental to sentient life. 

Do you blog?

Not regularly, but on the new moon in Aquarius, when the Coyotes sing, or after the Raven Travels across the Seventh Direction, you may find new material at thehelixlibrary.com

Goldfish, Fiction, Issue 5, December 1, 2008

Laura Bickle has worked in the unholy trinity of politics, criminology, and technology for several years. She and her chief muse live in the Midwest, owned by four mostly-reformed feral cats.

Her work has been published in Midnight Times, Down in the Cellar, MicroHorror, Theaker's Quarterly Fiction, New Voices in Horror, Ballista , Byzarium, a Blog-O-Novella office soap opera for True Office Confessions, and Aoife's Kiss. She was also the subject of author interviews in Midnight Times, New Voices in Horror, and SNM Horror Magazine. Laura has forthcoming work appearing in the second Cat Tales anthology. Her most recent project is a series of dark fantasy novels.

Her Website is, http://salamanderstales.angelfire.com

Get to know Laura Bickle...

Birthdate? I'm a summer baby. I love the sunshine and warmth of summer, and really dislike the short, lightless days of winter.

When did you start writing? I think I've been writing since I could hold a pencil. One of the virtues of a rural childhood is learning the ability to entertain oneself. I told stories to my stuffed animals, to the dogs, to my dolls. Make-believe was very tightly integrated with my real world.

I've just started trying to get my work published in the last couple of years. It occurred to me that other people (besides the dogs) might enjoy reading what I've written.

When and what and where did you first get published? My first story, "The Highwayman," was published in Midnight Times in Spring, 2007. It's a story about a highwayman who discovers the remains of the victims of a raid in the frozen forest. While stalking more victims for his own purposes, the highwayman teases a greater predator than himself from the shadows: a woman who appears to him as the very incarnation of sunlight in the winter woods. 

Why do you write? I think that, for most writers, it's hard to imagine not writing. Ideas get lodged in my head, and the only way to get them out and make room for more is to get them down on paper. It's a constant process of turnover...my head is always bubbling full, my pen's always spewing, and ideas are getting poured in the top.

Why do you write Science Fiction and/or Fantasy?Fantasy gives me nearly-unlimited leeway to bend the rules, to create something that hasn't been seen before. As a genre, I think it's the most exciting because it has the most fluid boundaries. The author is free to add a pinch of this, a dash of that, stir, and see what comes out of the brew. If it sprouts wings and flies, it's a success!

Who is your favorite author? Your favorite story? My favorite author is Robin McKinley. Ever since I read her "The Hero and the Crown" as a kid, I was hooked on fantasy. It was the first book I'd read in the fantasy genre that featured a powerful female protagonist. It goes beyond the traditional hero-slays-the-dragon tale into the emotional sacrifices made along the hero's journey, exploring the things the hero must leave behind.

What are you trying to say with your fiction? Most fantasy deals with archetypes and enduring images -- the hero, the magician, and the dragon, for example. I like to play with these ideas, to examine them in a slightly-different light of modern situations and conflicts. Sometimes, that light's a bit harsher than the traditional tales, but the old symbols will always have power to move us and tell our story, just in a different milieu.

Do you blog? Where? No blogging at the moment, but I do have a website at http://salamanderstales.angelfire.com It links to many of my online fiction pieces, interviews, and biographical info.

If you could write your own epitaph, what would it say? "Here lies Laura...loved by cats, feared by humans."

Dreaming Up Fairy Tales with Feral Bots, Fiction, Issue 51, June 2020

Bio

A. Katherine Black is an audiologist and a writer. She adores multi-colored pens, stories featuring giant and/or friendly spiders, and almost anything at 2am. She lives in Maryland with her family, their cats, and her overworked coffee machines, surrounded by very tall and occasionally judgmental trees.  Find her at flywithpigs.com or on twitter @akatherineblack.

Get to know A. Katherine Black...

Birthdate?

When I first wake up in the morning, pre-coffee, I feel like I was born in 1895. When I catch my second wind, around 11pm, I feel like I was born in 1995. So, I’m thinking the real date must be somewhere in between.

When did you start writing?

I knew in my early 20’s that I wanted to write, but I kept setting that dream aside and focusing on other things. Something finally clicked (or maybe snapped?) when I turned 40, and that’s when I began writing in earnest. I took several writing courses, had an excellent mentorship experience with Paul Witcover, and then attended the amazing Odyssey Workshop, run by Jeanne Cavelos. Today I can’t imagine doing anything else. I tell people this was the best kind of mid-life crisis - instead of emerging from it with a sports car or something, I’m reaching the other side of this strange phase of life with the tools to set my imagination down in words, and I couldn’t be happier about that.

When and what and where did you first get published?

My first published story is the only one I’ve published that doesn’t have a speculative element, that isn’t horror or sci-fi, that doesn’t have anything like a giant spider or a few lovable robots. The story, titled “Green,” grew from an assignment in a short story writing course. Published in Bethlehem Writers Roundtable in 2015, it’s about a woman visiting her mother’s house just after her mother has passed away. I was beyond thrilled to see that story find its way into the world.

Why do you write?

That’s a great question, and I have too many answers! My motivations seem to shift slightly as I make my way through the writing process. When I’m first imagining a story, building the world, defining the characters, I’m reveling in the escapism of it all. I just love exploring other places and times, real or imagined, and I find it so very satisfying to create new places in which one might escape. When it comes to the mechanics of writing the story, of building the plot, describing the characters and settings, and refining the narrative voice, there’s a sharp sense of satisfaction when it all finally comes together. I’d say it’s a similar feeling to reaching a really high score on Tetris. (Which I play every single day. Yes, I do.) When I’m fortunate enough to find a home for a story, a magazine or anthology where it will be published, my hope is that it will provide an experience the reader is looking for, whether that be escapism, excitement, or a tiny bit of happiness.

Who is your favorite author? Your favorite story?

So there’s this odd thing about me – I don’t really do favorites. When people ask what my favorite food is, my favorite color, tv show, or almost anything, my answer is usually, “it depends.” Depends on my mood or on the season, on the time of day or on how many cups of coffee I’ve had. But I can say one of the authors who left a big impression on me as a kid was Isaac Asimov. His books, “Caves of Steel” and “The Naked Sun,” both about a robot and a human working together to solve crimes, were early favorites. I especially loved his story “Bicentennial Man,” about a robot wanting to understand what it means to be human. Sometimes I even carried a photo-copy of that story around with me, as a teen.

If you could write your own epitaph, what would it say?

Jeez, how do people answer that question? I can’t even begin to summarize myself or my life in a handful of words. Where’s Hemingway when I need him?

Do you blog?

I do have a blog, but it’s received little attention in the past couple of years. I’m so impressed with regular bloggers, who are comfortable sharing their thoughts in such a direct manner with the world. I’ve discovered that I’m much more comfortable expressing myself through fiction. If I’m in a bad mood, for example, I’m less likely to write directly about how I’m feeling and more likely to write a little piece of horror, with a nice and scary monster chasing some poor person down a dark corridor or something. To be clear, I’m more likely to identify with the monster than with the person it’s chasing.

The Search for Intelligence, Fiction, Issue 54, March 2021

Tommy Blanchard lives in Winchester, Massachusetts, with his wife and

two bunnies. By day, he works as a data scientist. Previously, he was

a postdoctoral researcher in neuroscience at Harvard. He holds degrees

in computer science, philosophy, and neuroscience.

Get to know Tommy...

Birthdate?

July 9, 1987

When did you start writing?

Around 2010, when I was working on my Master's degree. I had just read about how Asimov had started his career as a writer selling short stories. It sounded so easy, so I thought, "I could do that!" I wrote some truly terrible stories, got promptly rejected everywhere, and was so discouraged I stopped writing fiction for about 7 years. I switched

from science fiction to science studies for a while as I worked through my PhD, and found that publication process much easier. Eventually I returned to science fiction and have been trying to figure out how to be a competent fiction writer since then. I hope to get there some day.

When and what and where did you first get published?

2013, "Postreward delays and systematic biases in measures of animal temporal discounting", published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. But that's probably not what you're asking about.

My first fiction story was published here, New Myths. It is titled "The Search for Intelligence."

What themes do you like to write about?

Minds, brains, and ethics. I think there are a lot of deeply weird things about the mind, who/what we are as conscious creatures, free-will, purpose in life, existentialism, and how all that intersects with ethics. I love science fiction as a medium for exploring that weirdness.

What books and/or stories have most resonated with you as an author? Why? How do these stories and their characters find expression in your work?

Lately I would have to say Accelerando by Charles Stross and Blindsight by Peter Watts.

I love how these stories weave really deep concepts about the mind/brain into their stories. They're deep idea books, the best kind of science fiction in my opinion. Blindsight in particular is amazing−it's like Watts took a psychopathology textbook and found a way to weave the contents of every chapter into the story, but did it in such a way that it still feels like a cohesive whole. It's incredibly speculative and wild, but grounded enough in what we know to feel plausible. It tells a compelling story, but in a world that really makes you question what the mind is. Plus it has vampires in space.

The Role of the Sidekick, Nonfiction, Issue 18, March 1, 2012

Brenta Blevins lives and writes in the Appalachian Mountains of the United States, where she enjoys hiking with her husband. Her short fiction has appeared in such markets as ChiZine, Daily Science Fiction, and Sword and Sorceress. In addition to NewMyths.com, her nonfiction has appeared in Strange Horizons and Clarkesworld.

Get to know Brenta...

Birthdate? I was born in the era between computers being powered by pterodactyls (requisite Cory Doctorow allusion) and the awesomeness that is 1980s music.

When did you start writing? I started my writing career in second grade while practicing my handwriting; instead of writing "The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog" over and over, I wrote Martian News reports. Alas, my teacher did not approve of my creative decision, thus introducing me at a young age to the cruel world of editorial rejection. Despite that early setback for both my writing and Martian journalism, I persevered and continued writing.

When and what and where did you first get published? Some of my first publications were actually radio plays performed on American public radio that were later re-broadcast in such countries as Australia and South Africa. 

What themes do you like to write about? My fiction ranges from ghost stories and apocalyptic themes to exploration, the latter ranging from space to the self. My nonfiction covers such topics as traveling to speculative fiction filming sites to literary analysis.

What books and/or stories have most resonated with you as an author? Why? How do these stories and their characters find expression in your work? As a student and teacher of English literature and writing, I've enjoyed reading everything from the earliest works in Old English to Middle English dream visions to speculative fiction stories published today. My fiction contains allusions to literature, especially Beowulf, and I've even published a story told from the perspective of Franz Kafka's Gregor Samsa.

Deciduous, Fiction, Issue 25, December 1, 2013

S. Hutson Blount is the unconvincing pseudonym of a former US Navy sailor who stopped meddling with government owned nuclear reactors in 1992 to return to his native Texas. Upon discovering that it was still as inhospitably hot as he remembered, he fled with his young and infinitely patient wife to the San Francisco Bay area. After being exposed to the Clarion West writers workshop and (possibly mutagenic compounds) he developed the uncontrollable urge to tell lies in exchange for money.

Get to know S. Huston...

Birthdate? April 12th, 1968

When did you start writing? 2005, after Clarion West

When and what and where did you first get published? My first story was a golden-age pastiche called "The Coming of the Space Crawl" which ran in issue #24 of Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine.

What themes do you like to write about? I don't set out to write to a theme, but if I had to distill one, I'd say it was order versus disorder.

What books and/or stories have most resonated with you as an author? Why? How do these stories and their characters find expression in your work? David Drake's Hammer's Slammers books were probably primarily responsible for me deciding to write, with added blame going to John Varley's Gaea trilogy and Glen Cook's Black Company books

Spread of the Kobold's Wings, Fiction, Issue 37, December 1, 2016

Our Song, Fiction, Issue 46, March 15, 2019

Hell is the Morning Star, Fiction, Issue 53, December 2020

Gustavo Bondoni is novelist and short story writer with over three hundred stories published in fifteen countries, in seven languages. His latest novel isTest Site Horror (2020). He has also published two other monster books: Ice Station: Death (2019) and Jungle Lab Terror (2020), three science fiction novels: Incursion (2017), Outside (2017) and Siege (2016) and an ebooknovella entitled Branch. His short fiction is collected in Pale Reflection(2020), Off the Beaten Path (2019) Tenth Orbit and Other Faraway Places(2010) and Virtuoso and Other Stories (2011). 

In 2019, Gustavo was awarded second place in the Jim Baen Memorial Contest and in 2018 he received a Judges Commendation (and second place) in The James White Award. He was also a 2019 finalist in the Writers of the Future Contest.

His website is at www.gustavobondoni.com

Get to know Gustavo Bondoni:

Birthday? December 19th, 1975

When did you start writing? I started writing seriously in 2003.

When and what and where did you first get published? My first published story appeared in JupiterSF in 2005. It was a science fiction story.

What themes do you like to write about? I am a bit of a magpie in this sense. I like to write about anything that seems shiny at any particular moment, which means that my fiction is all over the place. One recurring theme seems to be the loss of individuality and individual freedoms in modern society... but it was never a planned thing.

What books and/or stories have most resonated with you as an author? Why? How do these stories and their characters find expression in your work? I guess Asimov and Douglas Adams are the men who taught me to love the genre. One because he laid the foundation in my pre-teen mind, and the other because he taught me that subverting things and not taking them overly seriously is a perfectly acceptable way of writing.

Japanese Crane with Chinese Pine, Cover Art, Issue 43, June 2018

Thanapoom Boonipat grew up in Bangkok, Thailand. When he was 11, he had an opportunity to go to Beijing, China, to study Chinese. He had the opportunity to learn Chinese painting then, and became enthralled with the method. 

He continued to paint and learn from different teachers ever since then.

Hagstone, Poem, Issue 54, March 2021

Robert Borski's writing has appeared in Analog, Asimov's, F&SF, and Strange Horizons. He's also written two volumes of poetry, BLOOD WALLAH and CARPE NOCTEM. Now retired at the age of 70, he continues to live in Stevens Point, Wisconsin.

Get to know Robert...

Birthdate? September, 1950.

When did you start writing? In grade school I used to write one page stories based on my favorite cartoons and comic books, and would put my friends in them. (Unlike in real life, I always got the girl in the end.)

When and what and where did you first get published? David Gerrold bought and published my first short story, "In the Crowded Part of Heaven," in 1975 (SCIENCE FICTION EMPHASIS #1, Ballantine). Marge Simon -- then editor of Star*Line -- accepted my first two poems in 2006 (I did not begin to write poetry until I was well into my 50's) -- but they were beaten into print by a later acceptance, "Kitchen Carcharodon" (Strange Horizons).

What themes do you like to write about? I have a very macabre and irrepressible sense of humor that is most often seen in my poetry. But I am also degreed in biology and like to use it whenever possible.

What books and/or stories have most resonated with you as an author? I'm a language maven and most often appreciate freshness of voice. Favorite poets include A.E. Stallings and Amit Majmudar. Favorite writers include Hillary Mantel, David Mitchell, Michael Chabon, and Adam Roberts.

Parachuting Dudes, Illustration, Issue 23, June 1, 2013

Douglas Bosley was born and raised in the upper Mojave Desert of Southern California, Douglas Bosley eventually found himself in rainy Washington by 1997. He graduated from Western Washington University in 2009 with a bachelor’s of fine arts in printmaking an MFA from University of Wisconsin--Madison in 2012. His work has been shown in numerous juried shows nationally and internationally including shows in China, Italy, Japan and New Zealand. He is a recipient of several awards including an Illustrators of the Future award and he was recently awarded first place in the prestigious National Society of Arts and Letters National Competition in Printmaking for 2013. In addition, his work is held by several collections including Southern Graphics Council Print Collection and Archives and the Wisconsin Union Art Collection. 

Get to know Douglas...

Birth date? 1983

When did you start doing artwork?  I have been working in my primary graphic media of intaglio and lithography since 2007.

When and what and where did you first get published? My work was first published in the Writers of the Future Volume XXV for Emery Huang’s story "Garden of Tian Zi."

Do you use reoccurring themes or images in your illustrations? The corpus of my work forms a historicized account of a future landscape and uses current events as a launch pad for discussions about the implications of social, technological and environmental trends.

What media do you like to work in? Why? Lithography and Mezzotint are my primary mediums. These techniques lend themselves to the creation of detailed imagery and dynamic lighting which I use to lure people into the narrative world I have constructed.

What artist's work do you most admire? How has this artist's work influenced you? I am most heavily influenced by the old masters and especially print makers such as Rembrandt, Goltzius and Goya. Contemporary artists who work in narrative and inspire me are William Kentridge and Trenton Doyle Hancock. With all artists I am looking for ways in which to master my craft and the particular ways in which they tell stories.

For Bruce's bio please click here

Tyler Bourassa

An Orphan at Eventide, fiction, Issue 32, September 1, 2015

Tyler Bourassa, I have a BA in Psychology, which I put to great use while working in the IT department for an insurance company. I currently reside in Saskatchewan with my wife and somewhat irritable guard cat, where I enjoy reading, writing, and slaying monsters in video games. My fiction has appeared in Liquid Imagination, Bards and Sages Publishing, and Youth Imagination.

Get to know Tyler...

Birthday? My birthday is February 19th, 1984.

When did you start writing? I started writing around 2 years ago. It was really casual at first, just some characters that I'd been thinking of and different interactions between them. Eventually I turned my ideas into a short story and tried to get it published. It was universally rejected, of course, but the feedback was really helpful for future stories that I wrote.

When and what and where did you first get published? I was first published in November 2014 at electricspec.com. It was a story called "Plight of the Magi."

What themes do you like to write about? I really enjoy writing about different characters perceptions on what is good and normal, or even what is real. In many stories I've written I've had the protagonist learn that just because they grew up believing in something, doesn't mean that it is necessarily true.

What books and/or stories have most resonated with you as an author? Why? How do these stories and their characters find expression in your work? The Dragonlance series by Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman is what really brought fantasy alive for me. When I first picked up Dragons of Autumn Twilight I was transported to this amazing world where you could be a hero (or a villain), magic was real, and dragons let you soar through the skies on their back.

Raistlin and Caramon in particular resonated with me. I was really taken aback by their dynamic and the idea that their relationship constantly walked the line between bitter hate and self-sacrificing love.

In more recent years I've enjoyed anything Joe Abercrombie or Brandon Sanderson write. I feel like they're both masters at what they do and their writing really sets my imagination on fire. I try to emulate their ability to construct interesting worlds with believable characters as best I can in my stories.

Huckleberry Juju, Fiction, Issue 38, March 15, 2017

David Bowles is a Mexican-American author from south Texas, where he teaches at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley. Recipient of awards from the American Library Association, Texas Institute of Letters and Texas Associated Press, he has written several titles, most significantly the Pura Belpré Honor Book The Smoking Mirror. Additionally, his work has been published in venues including Rattle, Strange Horizons, Apex Magazine, Metamorphoses, Translation Review, the Langdon Review of the Arts in Texas, Huizache, Concho River Review, Eye to the Telescope, Asymptote and BorderSenses.

Get to know David...

Birthday? February 27, 1970

When did you start writing? When I was a teenager, about the age of 15.

When and what and where did you first get published? My first poetry and stories were published in Gallery, the literary magazine of the University of Texas Pan American, in 1989.

What themes do you like to write about? I tend to write about the efforts of marginalized people, particularly Mexican-Americans, to rise above harrowing circumstances through solidarity and cultural traditions (which often take the form of magic in my fantasy pieces). These efforts are sometimes successful, but are also often frustrated.

What books and/or stories have most resonated with you as an author? Why? How do these stories and their characters find expression in your work? The fantasy and magical realism of writers like Octavia Butler, Isabel Allende, Jorge Luis Borges and Haruki Murakama has always been a guiding star for me. But my recent work is more informed by the character-driven, diverse fantasy of authors like Daniel José Older, Nnedi Okorafor and Guadalupe García McCall, whose often young characters face danger and tragedy with great faith and the power of community-anchored courage. 

Vanished, poem, Issue 41, December 15, 2017

Lisa M. Bradley resides in Iowa but grew up in South Texas, before the construction of the Border Wall. Her short fiction and poetry, always inflected by her queer latinidad, have infiltrated Strange Horizons, Uncanny Magazine, Cicada, and other publications. She loves gothic country and Americana music, broken taboos, Spanglish, and horror films—evidence of which you'll find in her collection, The Haunted Girl (Aqueduct Press). To read more of her work, see her website, www.lisambradley.com, or follow her on Twitter (@cafenowhere), where she tweets about writing, resistance, art, animals, Latinx issues, immigration, and disability.

Biography Questions

Birthday? July 15

When did you start writing? 1st grade

When and what and where did you first get published?

I don't remember, but it might have been a poem, "Sun's Stroke", in Dreams and Nightmares 50, 1998.

What themes do you like to write about? Borders, taboos, culture contact, the unknown and unknowable

What books and/or poems have most resonated with you as a poet? Why? How do these stories and their characters find expression in your work?

The works of Shirley Jackson and Edgar Allan Poe taught me that "crazy" people can tell their own stories and that the uncanny is always whisper-close to what we call the real world. Like Jackson and Poe, I choose to focus on the marginalized, the outsiders.

Website? www.lisambradley.com

Twitter? @cafenowhere

Birds of a Feather, Fiction, Premier Issue,  December 1, 2007

Karen Bradley is a freelance writer and jewelry designer who lives and works in sunny San Diego. In an alternate reality, she also does accounting work for a furniture and interior design company during the day. Although she mainly focuses on speculative and science fiction, she has been known to venture off into any literary avenue that presents a challenge. Her work has appeared in Flash Shot, Bewildering Stories, Damned Good Writing, and Poor Mojo's Almanac. She is currently working on several writing projects.

Get to know Karen...

Birthdate? 1724

When did you start writing? I took a couple of classes in college and then let it go for several years, before getting the bug to write again, about 3 years ago.

When and what and where did you first get published? It was a very short, sick and twisted story for Flashshot. They published it in 2006.

Why do you write? I write to release ideas that want to come out into the world.

Why do you write Science Fiction and/or Fantasy? I write sci-fi and fantasy because it has been my favorite genre to read since a teenager.

Who is your favorite author? Your favorite story? To name one author is difficult. However, in this genre, I might have to say Neil Gaiman. A particular favorite book of his that I enjoyed was American Gods. I also loved Neverwhere.

What are you trying to say with your fiction? Not with this particular story, but in the future I hope to write philosophical fantasy and science fiction that deals with alternative concepts in regard to time and space and human consciousness.

If you could write your own epitaph, what would it say? Who says I'm going to die. I plan on achieving physical immortality. LOL!

Do you blog? Where? I used to have a blog of my own. However, I didn't have time to keep it up. So, it doesn't exist anymore. However, I have been a guest blogger on a site called Spiritual Visitations.

Black Torus Run, Fiction, Issue 67, Summer 2024

Get  to  know  S. R. ....

Birthdate?

4/3/63 

When did you start writing?

I didn't seriously start until around 2007 

When, what, and where did you first get published?

The book was "Sword and Illusion" and it was with a small press. It's no longer in business and the book is currently unavailable. 

Why do you write?

These characters keep entering my head and wanting me to tell their stories. 

Very likely it's some kind of brain disease. 

Who is your favorite author? Your favorite story?

It's hard to say. I'm a big fan of Murderbot by Martha Wells, Dresden by Jim Butcher, and Inferno by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle. But I have lots of other favorites. 

What are you trying to say with your fiction?

I am not trying to advocate any particular ideology or agenda. I think doing that consiously hurts your story. 

If you could write your own epitaph, what would it say?

Hey, if you read one of my books, maybe I'll be alive again in your head for a while. Do a corpse a favor. 

Do you blog?

I've tried... but no. I try to say witty things on X from time to time. 

Maybe this counts though... I have an ongoing Kindle Vella story, "The Netherworld Central Railway." I've been posting an episode there once a week since the platform came into existence.

A Robot Eats Fruit, Poem, Issue 61, Winter 2022

I'm a youth services librarian living in Pittsburgh with my husband. I enjoy reading and gaming when I'm not writing. My work has been published by, or is forthcoming in, Asimov's, Space & Time, The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, and others. I think more adults should ask each other about their favorite dinosaurs, so I'll tell you that mine is stegosaurus.

Get to know Megan…

Why do you write Science Fiction and/or Fantasy?

I've always enjoyed reading speculative fiction and poetry because I want the world to be full of magic and amazing things. That's why I was drawn to writing in those genres. 

Who is your favorite author? Your favorite story?

Some of my favorite authors include Erin Morgenstern, Neil Gaiman, Douglas Adams, and Kate Milford. I can't decide on a favorite story, but my favorite poem is “The Tyger” by William Blake.

Do you have a blog?

I have a Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/MeganBranningAuthor/

Invasive species, Poetry, Issue 56, September 2021

Bethany F. Brengan is a freelance writer and editor who splits her time between the Olympic Peninsula and the internet. Her poetry has appeared in Tiny Spoon, Claw & Blossom, The Gordon Square Review, The 2015 Poet’s Market, and CV2: The Canadian Journal of Poetry and Critical Writing. She can be found at www.brenganedits.com and https://medium.com/essays-no-one-asked-for.

Get to know Bethany...

When did you start writing?

I used to draw pictures and then make my mom write the words for me so that I could staple the pages together into "books." I think one story was about sea animals escaping sharks? (I had been given a set of underwater-themed rubber stamps for my birthday.)

When and what and where did you first get published?

Paducah Community College no longer exists, but I still have my copy of PCC's The Open Door, which gave freshman-Bethany her first poetry publication.

Why do you write?

Because I never grew out of the make-believe stage.

Why do you write Science Fiction and/or Fantasy?

It's not purposeful. But I read and watch a lot of fantasy, science fiction, and speculative fiction. And it keeps sneaking into my own work. You get to ask old questions about morality and humanity in new ways when you can unmoor your stories from pure reality.

Who is your favorite author?

It depends on the day you ask me, but right now, my favorite author is Mary Doria Russell. She always breaks my heart and then somehow makes me thank her for it.

If you could write your own epitaph, what would it say?

I hope it can say, "She was honest, and she was kind."

Do you blog?

I have a (possibly abandoned?) blog at http://readingwritingraptures.blogspot.com/, and a very alive but occasional blog at https://medium.com/essays-no-one-asked-for.

The Me of Perfect Sight, Flash Fiction, Issue 58, Spring 2022

Bio: Marie Brennan is a former anthropologist and folklorist who shamelessly pillages her academic fields for inspiration. She recently misapplied her professors' hard work to The Night Parade of 100 Demons and the short novel Driftwood. She is the author of the Hugo Award-nominated Victorian adventure series The Memoirs of Lady Trent along with several other series, over seventy short stories, and the New Worlds series of worldbuilding guides; as half of M.A. Carrick, she has written the epic Rook and Rose trilogy, beginning with The Mask of Mirrors. For more information, visit her website, her Twitter, or her Patreon.

When did you start writing? Like many kids, I was always making up stories. Unlike most, I never really stopped. I got serious about my writing when I arrived at college and found the SF/F club had a writers' critique group; that prodded me to finish my first novel, and several more after that.

When and what and where did you first get published? It went in stages, really. My first monetary success was with what is now the Dell Magazines Award for Undergraduate Excellence in Science Fiction and Fantasy Writing (at the time it was the Isaac Asimov Award for etc.), which I won in early 2003 with a short story, "Calling Into Silence," that I'd written before graduating the previous spring. My first short story sale was set in a different part of the same world: "White Shadow," which I sold to Julie Czerneda's anthology Summoned to Destiny later that year; that was published in the fall of 2004. And then I sold my first novel right after that, with Doppelganger (now called Warrior) hitting the shelves on April Fool's Day, 2006.

Who is your favorite author? I can never pick a single favorite for these kinds of things, but I can say that Diana Wynne Jones is the author who made me a writer. I read her novel Fire and Hemlock when I was nine or ten; in the book, the two main characters are creating a story together, and I distinctly recall putting it down and thinking, "I want to be a writer."

Do you blog? Yes, though somewhat sporadically! I post about what I've been reading, and weekly links to my Patreon essays (which are free to read online), plus other things from time to time. You can subscribe to my blog and get email notifications when a new post is up.

Fiddler and Bear, Fiction, Issue 64, Fall 2023

Tom Brennan is an Irish-British writer who lives beside Liverpool’s River Mersey with four cats (all related) and enjoys watching the ships glide past, particularly at night; he also enjoys reading and creating a wide variety of fiction and his stories have appeared in the UK, Australia, Canada and the US.  

Get to know Tom...

Birthdate?

9th May 1965

When did you start writing?

I first started writing in 2000 but after a flurry of short stories I effectively paused for a decade or so, due to work and life, and only really restarted in 2017.

When and what and where did you first get published?

A small site called Peridot Books in 2001, with ‘Angel Station’, an SF story about a sentient off-world mining facility struggling to survive.

Why do you write?

Mainly because I enjoy reading so much and I’d like to entertain readers as I’ve been entertained over the years; I enjoy stories and those moments of being completely absorbed in someone else’s world. 

Why do you write Science Fiction and/or Fantasy?

Both fields are so wide and full of possibilities and there is always room for something new, something original. Imagination is limitless.

Who is your favorite author? Your favorite story?

That’s a very difficult question since there are so many: Neil Gaiman, Stanislaw Lem, Pat Rothfuss, Iain M Banks, I could go on. But one I return to repeatedly is Gene Wolfe and his novel ‘Free Live Free’, which I find so imaginative and delicate and humane.  

What are you trying to say with your fiction?

Look at the world and those around you in a slightly different way, because wonder is a positive quality and to be encouraged.

If you could write your own epitaph, what would it say?

That I loved cats, wrote as well as I could and searched for the best when faced with the opposite.

Commiseration with the Embarrassment of God, Flash Fiction, Issue 36, September 1, 2016

Jim Breyfogle currently resides in Pennsylvania writing fiction and gathering an army of terra-cotta warriors with which to aggravate his English Mastiff. Thus far, the dog still wins.

Get to know Jim...

When did you start writing? I’ve written stories since I was very young, but only in the last six years started taking it more seriously.

When and what and where did you first get published? I first published “The Adventures of Sandwich Man” in a locally sponsored comic collection. The art was bad and the puns worse.

What themes do you like to write about? Sometimes I’ll start a story to work around a theme, but mostly I’ll try to craft a story and any themes evolve as a part of that process.

What books and/or stories have most resonated with you as an author? Why? How do these stories and their characters find expression in your work? I have to tip my hat to Ray Bradbury and Alexander Dumas. For those still among us I especially like Neil Gaiman and Maggie Stiefvater. They set the bar high for the rest of us.

A Satyr Mourning a Doe, Poetry, Issue 56, September 2021

To date, Roger Brezina has written over 10,400 poems that as hardcopies make a stack 3 ½ feet high.  Some are factual, some fictitious, some fanciful, some historical, some hysterical, some are serious, some delirious, and the volume is ridiculously unmanageable.  His poems have appeared in Byline, The Saturday Evening Post, Poetry Quarterly, Yesterday’s Magazette, Amelia, Verses, For Poets Only, The Moccasin, Senior Perspective, The New Prague Times, The Leading Edge, The James-Younger Gang Journal, and 3 anthologies.  Roger grew up on a farm in south central Minnesota and graduated from Mankato State University (as it was called in 1977) after he had complicated his mind with physics, math, and astronomy. After 5 decades of various engineering and technical positions, he now resides on 5 acres of the old homestead trying to uncomplicate his mind.  He has 5 grown children and 6 grandchildren who reside in his heart.

“In the photo which is a few years old, that's me on the right.”

Get to know Roger...

Birthday?

September 18, 1949

When did you start writing?

As soon as I was old enough to.

When and what and where did you first get published?

Not counting "in memoriam" poems in my hometown newspaper, I was first published in an anthology in 1989. It was one of the memorial poems about my father that appeared in hometown newspaper. It received an honorable mention and was published their WORLD TREASURY OF GOLDEN POEMS.

Why do you write?

Because I'm literate and writing is an opportunity to prove it.

Why do you write Science Fiction or Fantasy?

It's more believable than the news.

Who is your favorite author? Your favorite story?

My favorite author is Emily Dickinson.

My favorite story is "The Lord of the Rings." (Isn't it everybody's?)

What are you trying to say with your fiction?

That Reality is a prison that we can't escape from except through fiction.

If you could write your own epitaph, what would it say?

If he comes back to haunt us, then he'll badger us worse than when he was alive.

Do you blog?

No, but I slog in the fog and it rhymes with blog.

SCE to Aux, Non Fiction, Issue 55, June 2021

Darrin Bright works as an accountant by day, and scripts missions for starship bridge simulators by night. The smell of petrichor and rotting tomatoes reminds him of home (Woodland, California). His current physical manifestation is a carbon-based biped that resides in Cleveland, Ohio, which is not currently on fire. He wears a lot of purple, which is fortunate for him because it's his favorite color.

Get to know Darrin...

Birthdate?

September 18th, the day right before International Talk Like a Pirate Day. I share a birthdate with Jason Sudeikis, Jada Pinkett-Smith, and the late Fred Willard and June Foray.

When did you start writing?

4th Grade, in Mrs. Edwards' class. One of our classroom exercises was this thing called a "scribble", a random squiggly or curvy line or two on a mimeographed white sheet of paper. You were supposed to draw something using the scribble, and you could write something about it if you wanted. So I'd create a monster, unicorn, or spaceship, and write something about it.

When and what and where did you first get published?

My first professional publication in print was a scenario called "Fast Forward" that I wrote for In Your Face Again, an anthology supplement for the Feng Shui RPG, published in 2001 by Atlas Games. I had previously published some gaming articles online, but In Your Face Again was the first book that I could pick up on a bookshelf and see my name on the cover.

Why do you write?

After high school, I went to California State Polytechnic University: San Luis Obispo to pursue a degree in Architecture (Weird Al Yankovic's Alma Mater, in fact). Five years later, I stumbled out of there with a Bachelor's degree in English Literature. So I guess you could say, "Because I was really bad at architecture."

Why do you write Science Fiction and/or Fantasy?

Oh, the usual reasons: my brain is a swirling vortex of 80's cartoons, comic books, Dungeons & Dragons statblocks, and pop-culture movie references. But if there's any purpose to writing, I like to think of it as the ancient Hindu parable of the blind men describing the elephant. The universe is this unimaginably immense elephant, and it's our job to describe our little corner of the elephant as best we can. In my particular case, my portion of the elephant is much more interesting if it's got electro-plasma cannons and enchanted elvish longswords on it.

Who is your favorite author? Your favorite story?

I started with Robert Heinlein and Larry Niven. More recently, I've been reading a good chunk of Seanan McGuire and Ursula LeGuin. If I had to pick a favorite, then I'd say Douglas Adams. There was no subject he wasn't afraid to break apart into little pieces just to poke around and see how it works: religion, science, politics, philosophy, psychology, war, music, or moist towelettes. Nothing is sacred, nothing is safe, and it's all really, really funny if you look at it from just the right (or very wrong) angle. My favorite story is _Snow Crash_ by Neal Stephenson. I read that book over two decades ago, and I'm still thinking about how that book broke my brain open.

What are you trying to say with your fiction?

With my fiction, I like to subvert genre tropes and pick apart how stories are put together. Part of that is my English degree trying to deconstruct how and why the stories work the way they do, particularly when the characters in the story are self-aware of the tropes and are either trying to avoid or subvert them as part of the story. If the main character runs into Death and Death says OH, I'M SUPPOSED TO MEET YOU IN SAMARRA TOMORROW, can that character, knowing how that story ends, use the tropes to find a different ending? But another good chunk of it is so I can make cheeky jokes about the tropes at the genre's expense.

With this non-fiction piece about "SCE to Aux", I really love reading about disasters and accidents, particularly anything that involves airplanes, power plants, or spacecraft. Oddly enough, it helps calm my brain down when I'm feeling anxious. I was doing a deep dive on some of the things that went wrong in the Apollo program, and when I got to Apollo 12, I was just flabbergasted that no one had written very much about this mind-blowing incident, and all of the sources I could find on it were contradictory or appeared to have fictionalized parts of it. After doing a bunch of research, I finally asked myself, "Well, why don't you write something on this, and try to straighten out the fact from the fiction?" 

If you could write your own epitaph, what would it say?

Either "My wife warned me this would happen", or "So I guess the cleric forgot to prepare raise dead this morning?"

Do you blog?

No, which makes it frustrating when I write a long "blog post" about something I really care about, and then I don't have a regular place to post it, so I throw it on Facebook or an online forum somewhere.

The Final Song of the Firebird, Fiction, Issue 64. Fall 2023

Jennifer Brinn proudly writes in cursive with fountain pens, knows many useless facts, and loves putting stickers on things.  Her greyhound and corgi let her pretend to be leader of the pack as long as she provides snacks.  

Her writing has appeared in the "Misfits of Magic" anthology from Three Ravens Press.  You can find out about upcoming releases and more information at her website https://www.jennifer-brinn.com/

Get to know Jennifer....

When did you start writing? 

I'm one of those "has been writing my whole life" but I didn't actually realize I was doing it because to me authors were Those People.  Then I had a free period in high school and I had to choose between art and creative writing, and I knew I couldn't draw.  Thus because a lifelong love affair with words.

Why do you write? 

I write to help me make sense of people and the world.  I love to look at events and time periods through the lens of fiction.

Why do you write Science Fiction and/or Fantasy?

SF and Fantasy allow us to magnify human emotions and relationships beyond what we can see in standard non-speculative fiction.  The unreal makes us see the real in new ways.  

If you could write your own epitaph, what would it say?

She was never boring, no matter how hard she tried.

Do you blog?

I am Writing Out Loud at https://www.jennifer-brinn.com, mostly about my dogs and their antics. 

The Woodsman's Son, Poetry, Issue 9, December 1, 2009

Jeremy D Brooks has worked as a code monkey, product manager, amusement park ride operator, and burger flipper. He received his MBA from EWU, where the only creative writing he learned was crafting business plans for unfunded startup ventures.

He has published fiction with NiteBlade Magazine and Abandoned Towers, and will appear in the Fall 2010 WW Norton Hint Fiction Anthology. His non-fiction business journal work can be found Examiner.com. Currently, he

is finishing a novel that will hopefully be ready to shop around in early 2010.

He lives in Las Vegas, NV with his wife and two daughters.

Get to know Jeremy...

Birthdate? December 14, 1972

When did you start writing? I've been writing casually since I was about age 23. I began my quest to get published at age 34, about two years ago.

When and what and where did you first get published? My first published work was a short story full of paranoid delusions and evil circus-folk called "Billy Don't Like Clowns", which can be found in the NiteBlade print Anthology "Lost Innocence", published September of 2008.

Why do you write? Ever since I was young, writing has been a compulsion. To say I love writing would be like saying I like to sleep at night, or that I really like to eat food when I'm hungry. I do love it, but my need to write

almost drives itself.

almost drives itself.

Why do you write Science Fiction and/or Fantasy? I write in the genres I enjoy reading, and my reading habits are all over the board. I grew up on the standards like Asimov, Clarke, Tolkien, and Lewis, and although I

haven't read much sci-fi or fantasy in a while, those works still inform a lot of what gets spawned in my imagination. I think every other story I write is in a different genre.

haven't read much sci-fi or fantasy in a while, those works still inform a lot of what gets spawned in my imagination. I think every other story I write is in a different genre.

Who is your favorite author? Your favorite story? This changes constantly; I just finished Marilynne Robinson's "Gilead", and was blown away by her flawless storytelling. If I had to pick one story of everything I've ever read, it would probably be Arthur C Clarke's "Childhood's End". I read that book a dozen times when I was young.

What are you trying to say with your fiction? Writing has always been an emotional/intellectual outlet for me, which means that a lot of my work is driven by strong feelings that I'm trying to get out of my head and onto

paper: frustration with people, confusion, anger at political figures, fascination with massive concepts like time/space, etc. I always try to be cognizant of if my audience will empathize with what I'm trying to convey,

but at the end of the day, a lot of writing--at least for me--is kind of a selfish act, and I just have to make it as palatable as possible and hope people will like it.

paper: frustration with people, confusion, anger at political figures, fascination with massive concepts like time/space, etc. I always try to be cognizant of if my audience will empathize with what I'm trying to convey,

but at the end of the day, a lot of writing--at least for me--is kind of a selfish act, and I just have to make it as palatable as possible and hope people will like it.

Do you blog? Where? ttp://gristleandsmoke.blogspot.com

If you could write your own epitaph, what would it say? That my greatest efforts--raising my family, making a career out of writing--were not in vain.

Bear Skin, Smoking Mountain, Fiction, Issue 40, September 2017

William Broom lives in Melbourne, Australia. While he writes fiction to pay the bills, his true passion is running an ironing delivery service. Or it could be the other way around. He likes to play board games, collects cassette tapes, and occasionally performs occult rituals to bring himself good fortune. His fiction has previously been published in Canary Press Short Story Magazine, The Never Never Land anthology, and (forthcoming) in Beneath Ceaseless Skies.

Birthday?

3rd of June 1992.

When did you start writing?

I remember I wanted to write before I was old enough to understand how to work a computer keyboard, so my mum used to type out stories that I dictated to her.

When and what and where did you first get published?

My first published story was in the Canary Press Short Story Magazine. It was called "Restaurant" and was only about 200 words long. It presented an alternative idea about where babies come from.

What themes do you like to write about?

Religion and spirituality fascinate me, especially in the context of fantasy fiction. What does it mean to come into contact with the divine in a world where supernatural phenomena are tangibly real? I also like to draw inspiration from history, and to show my characters existing within the context of larger forces and events.

What books and/or stories have most resonated with you as an author? Why? How do these stories and their characters find expression in your work?

I think a lot of the fiction that I love most comes from several decades back. Ursula LeGuin's Earthsea novels and Gene Wolfe's Book of the New Sun represent the Platonic ideal of the fantasy novel for me. What they do so perfectly is to create the feeling that their stories are only small windows onto a much larger and more complex world. That's what I strive for in my own work.

For Want of a Toilet, Fiction, Issue 67, Summer 2024.

Victoria Brun is a writer and project manager at a national laboratory. When not bugging hardworking scientists about budget reports and service agreements, she is writing stories you can find at Little Blue Marble, Nature Futures, Factor Four Magazine, and beyond. She’s also the editor of the microfiction zine 100-Foot Crow. Find all her stories at victoriabrun.com/.

Get to know Victoria....

When did you start writing?

I’ve been writing stories since I was a child. In elementary school, I wrote little stories about my stuffed animals going on space flight adventures. However, these stories never had endings. Endings are hard.

When and what and where did you first get published?

Although I’ve been writing since I was a child, I never seriously tried to publish anything until I read and was inspired by Stephen King’s On Writing in 2021. Shortly afterward, I wrote a 400-word story about a robot with strong opinions on human naming conventions (entitled “Sometimes They Call Me Human”) and sent it off to Daily Science Fiction. It was accepted and published in August 2021. This early success gave me a really skewed impression about how easy getting published would be!

Why do you write?

I love writing. I honestly don’t know what I’d do if I didn’t write. Have a clean house, I suppose.

Why do you write Science Fiction and/or Fantasy?

I love the freedom that speculative fiction provides. In particular, I enjoy writing nonhuman characters. I studied animal behavior in college and love modeling some of my inhuman species off real-world animal behaviors, e.g., the eusocial society of naked mole-rats or the highly structured hyena clans.

Who is your favorite author? Your favorite story?

I’ll buy any book Martha Wells releases, although I doubt she’ll write anything that tops Network Effect.  

What are you trying to say with your fiction?

This story plays with the “urinary leash,” which in Victorian times limited women’s access to public spaces by preventing them access to public bathrooms. I tried to approach this issue in a fun way, but the lack of access to safe and clean toilets still affects women and girls in many parts of the world.

Do you blog?

Not yet, but it’s on the to-do list! I have something coming out soon on 100footcrow.com. 

Fight Off Your Demons! - Part I, Fiction, Issue 37, December 15, 2016

Fight Off Your Demons! - Part II, Fiction, Issue 38, March 15, 2017

John W. Buckley can’t seem to stop writing about California despite having not lived there almost ten years. He can currently be found one state over in his native Arizona, where he teaches composition and literature to community college students and edits technical documents at his “day job.” His work has previously appeared in the Menda City Review, the Los Angeles Review of Los Angeles, Spark, and Bartleby Snopes. Visit him at http://battleof-whocouldcareless.blogspot.com/

Get to know John...

Birthday? July 14, 1983

When did you start writing? The first piece of fiction that I was proud of was something I wrote as a high school senior. I started writing seriously as a college freshman at Arizona State University. That was about 15 years ago now.

When and what and where did you first get published? My first published story, "Girl in the Mirror," appeared in the Fall 2012 issue of the Menda City Press.

What themes do you like to write about? Small acts of rebellion, the intersection of the real and the unreal, Los Angeles, slightly strange women, nighttime. Often all in one story, and more often than not with a diegetic soundtrack.

What books and/or stories have most resonated with you as an author? Why? How do these stories and their characters find expression in your work? My favorite writers have always been able to combine the magical and the mundane -- Murakami, Gaiman, Atwood, Lethem. (And Rowling, duh.) Their characters, like mine, aren't usually great heroes or exceptional beings -- they're recognizably human, even if they get caught up in something extraordinary (and they often do). Stylistically, my idols are Boyle, Gibson, and McEwan.

Wizard's Tome, Poetry, Issue 22, March 1, 2013

Erik Bundy lives in the magical North Carolina woods where chocolate is a vegetable, female chipmunks are called chipnuns, and mice claiming to be cousins move in for the winter then take the towels when they leave in spring. The federal government pays him not to work in one of their offices. He has published thirty poems and stories in French and American magazines. He is a graduate of the Odyssey Fantasy Writing Workshop, and last year, he was the grand prize winner in Sidney Lanier Poetry Competition.  

Get to know Erik...

Birthdate? Pisces

When did you start writing? In the third grade, I wrote a Mother’s Day poem that was much lauded by a number of teachers. I’m certain Hallmark Cards would have loved it. Anyway, the unexpected attention I received disposed me towards a vocation as a writer.

When and what and where did you first get published? Sometime during the Stone Age, Crosscurrents published my literary short story, “The Sparrow”.

What themes do you like to write about? I tend to avoid vampires, zombies, and werewolves, though I did publish a story about a wereturtle. Without conscious effort on my part, spiritual and Jungian psychological aspects show up in many of my stories and novels. I also like Norse dragon myths and alchemy (the combination of religion and psychology kind).

What books and/or stories have most resonated with you as an author? Why? How do these stories and their characters find expression in your work? I don’t normally focus on individual books or stories as much as on stylists who are exceptional storytellers. Anything written by Liz Hand is gorgeously written. As is the work of Annie Proulix or Barbara Kingsolver or James Lee Burke or W. Somerset Maugham, though he is prone to using clichés. For poetic power, I like Milorad Pavic, E.E.Cummings, Billy Collins, and Rainer Maria Rilke. My bell also tolls for John Donne. All these writers engage the brain and the heart simultaneously. Their work stimulates ideas and themes in my own stories and poems.

Teeth Outlived, Poetry, Issue 61, Winter 2022

The Microscopic Moments (to Carry You through Cryo), Poetry, Issue 65, Winter 2023

Coffee at Your Fingertips, Flash, Issue 68, Fall 2024

Jason P. Burnham loves to spend time with his wife, children, and dog. He co-edits If There's Anyone Left, a magazine of inclusive speculative flash fiction with his friend C.M. Fields. Find Jason on Bluesky as moparandgalen.bsky.social.

Get to know Jason…

When did you start writing?

Sixth grade in Mrs. Imrie's English class. It was so cool! I never thought I could keep it going (and probably this was influenced by peer pressure and trying to fit in, ugh), but I picked it back up in 2016 because I just had to create.

When and what and where did you first get published?

In 2019, Constellary Tales (which appears to have died after it released the story in which my issue ran) published my first ever short story called Deathfeed (http://constellary.com/blog-post/fiction-deathfeed/). It came to me one night as I listened to my son's monitor as he slept. I had fallen asleep sitting up in a chair and something roused me, probably a type of anxious nightmare that led me to that story idea. I remember going to take the dog to pee after that, and I wrote the first seeds of the story down in my phone.

Why do you write?

To get all the stories out. They just keep coming and they won't stay in. (I love it.)

Why do you write Science Fiction and/or Fantasy?

The short answer is because it's cool. I can't imagine writing anything else. I couldn't tell you exactly which movie or book first enamored me to science fiction, but I've thought since childhood how cool it was. Maybe it wasn't even fiction. Maybe it was learning about geologic periods when I used to love rocks. Maybe it was learning about dinosaurs. Maybe it was seeing a spacecraft launch on television. It was all just so cool, the discovery. And to imagine what else might be out there is so fascinating. It also provides an excellent medium to reflect on the world around us in ways that people can connect with. It's truly wonderful.

Who is your favorite author? Your favorite story?

It has to be Ursula K. Le Guin. No other author do I consistently sit down with their work, read it, and think 'Wow. Just wow. What mastery of language and story.' Favorite story is too difficult to narrow down to just one!

What are you trying to say with your fiction?

It depends. In the broadest stroke, to look at the world around you. How a specific piece achieves this may vary widely. Maybe it's saying, look at your relationship with your children and appreciate it while you still can. Maybe it's saying, look at the injustices in the world and how awful and ridiculous they are, and please let's make the world a better place. Maybe it's saying, look inside yourself and decide if that is who you want to be. Maybe it's saying, look at the astounding variety of life and stand in wonder for as long as your senses allow. Or maybe it's just saying something silly to try to brighten your day.

If you could write your own epitaph, what would it say?

I hope not to have one! Not because I think I'm immortal, but because hopefully I'll have a natural, environmentally friendly post-life. Perhaps I'll walk into the woods rather than dying in my house. Perhaps if I'm not too far from the water, someone will throw me overboard for a water burial. Or maybe someone will compost me and fertilize a beautiful tree or garden.

Do you blog?

No. I've considered it, but have yet to convince myself that people would be interested in reading the pecularities of my reacting to reading the lyrics of songs for the first time that I've listened to for many years without having any idea of what the singer was saying.

It's a Most Wonderful Time, Fiction, Issue 3, June 1, 2008

R. Michael Burns has published fiction in Dreams of Decadence and City Slab magazines, as well as in anthologies such as Bound for Evil; Goodbye, Darwin; Bell, Book & Beyond; and the forthcoming Horror Library Volume III.  Before moving into the deep dark swamps of central Florida, he lived for more than four years in Japan, where he taught English to students from 1 to 70.  He is a Colorado native, and his heart is still among the mountains, a fact which has substantially diminished his circulation.

His website is, http://www.coloradospringsfictionwritersgroup.org/members/r-michael-burns/index.html

Get to know R. Michael...

Birthdate?  October 12, 1970

When did you start writing? I can't recall a time I wasn't writing.

When and what and where did you first get published? My first published short story was a science fiction tale called "Project #374792", published in the Engineer, the magazine of the engineering department of the University of Colorado, Boulder. 

Why do you write? To keep the weirdness from backing up in my subconscious until my brain drowns.

Why do you write Science Fiction and/or Fantasy? I like to tear little holes in the fabric of reality and see what leaks through.

Who is your favorite author? Your favorite story? No single favorite...Bradbury, King, Lovecraft, Harlan Ellison...  Bradbury's "The October Game" is one of my favorite short stories. The pacing is brilliant, and the story ends with the best damn last line I've ever read.

What are you trying to say with your fiction? It depends very much on the tale, but like most writers (I think), I am fascinated by our daily struggle to determine what really matters, and how to hold onto it...or if we even should.

Do you blog? Where? I rant about politics on MySpace.  It's another pressure valve.

If you could write your own epitaph, what would it say?  Hmmm... I can't think of anything appropriately pithy and morbid. I just hope I get a cool tombstone - something pre-aged, and moss-covered.

Special Delivery, Flash Fiction, Issue 67, Summer 2024

C.K. Butcher is a speculative fiction writer, professor, and non-fiction author. She lives in the metro-Atlanta area with her husband, two children, and a slew of pets.  When not writing, teaching, or grading papers, you can find her playing trivia with her husband, playing games with her kids, reading a book, or watching an inordinate amount of TV.  

Get to know C. K. ...

Birthdate? 

October 21

When did you start writing?

I started writing fiction in 5th grade and was the editor of my small town high school literary magazine. I then lost my way from fiction, spending what feels like an eternity writing academic and non-fiction pieces. I found my way back to fiction about three years ago, during the pandemic. 

When, what, and where did you first get published?

I have published many academic/non-fiction pieces over the years, but only became published in fiction in July 2023, when "The Forest of the Gods" was published in The Lorelei Signal (https://www.loreleisignal.com/forest-of-the-gods).  

Why do you write?

Writing is my escape from the rest of the world. 

Why do you write Science Fiction and/or Fantasy?

When you want an escape from the current world, what better way than through science fiction and fantasy? 

Red, Fiction, Issue 44, September 2018

Candyce Byrne enjoys acting, directing and playwriting as well as writing short stories and poems.  She is a graduate of Clarion West and has published in Asimov's.

Get to Know Candyce:

When did you start writing?

Elementary school. I wrote dreadful novels about horses and heroines and sent each chapter to my grandmother in California as soon as it was finished. Continuity was not my strong suit.

When and what and where did you first get published?

I was the editor and main reporter for my elementary school newspaper, so I guess I published myself. Ditto in high school and college, but for literary magazines, and I was writing short stories and poems. Then I got a journalism degree and wrote nonfiction for hire for decades. Ended up a medical writer/editor and produced PR materials for nonprofits.

Why do you write?

I decided I wanted to write "when I got old" when I was three and my father read his childhood copy of Treasure Island to my sister and me. I didn't know what writing was, but I knew it was what I wanted to do. That book smelled so good!

Why do you write Science Fiction and/or Fantasy?

I always say what i write would be science fiction except it's about art so it's art fiction and that makes it fantasy. Weird.

What are you trying to say with your fiction?

The mythic past never dies but rather bobs just below the surface of what we think is reality.

If you could write your own epitaph, what would it say?

She has died and is off on a new adventure.