The Celestial Scene, Cover Art, Issue 47, June 15, 2019

Soren James is a writer and visual artist who recreates himself on a daily basis from the materials at his disposal, continuing to do so in an upbeat manner until one day he will sumptuously throw his drained materials aside and resume stillness without asking why. More of his work can be seen here:  https://sorenjames.wordpress.com

Get to know Soren...

When did you start your art?

Twenty years ago

Why are you an artist?

There's nothing else for me to be.

Why do you pursue Science Fiction and/or Fantasy?

It's more imaginative.

Who is you favorite artist? Your favorite art?

Don Quixote

What are you trying to say with your art?

Engage in the living moment.

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

I died writing my own epitaph.

Twenty-Seven Images of Retribution, Fiction, Issue 30, March 1, 2015

Kristin Janz was born in Vancouver, Canada, but moved to Nova Scotia at the age of 7. After crossing the continent a couple more times, never stopping in the middle, she decided she liked the eastern edge best. For now. She lives near Boston with her husband, author Donald S. Crankshaw.

Kristin attended the Clarion West Writers Workshop in 2008. Her fiction has appeared in over a dozen magazines and journals, including Prairie Fire, Crowded Magazine, and On Spec, and was reprinted in ChiZine Publications' Imaginarium 2012 anthology (The Best Canadian Speculative Writing). 

She has a tendency to take up too many hobbies, resulting in not nearly enough time spent writing.  Lately, she's been excited about gardening, cooking, old school cocktails, and crochet. You can read about all these interests--and, occasionally, about her fiction--at KristinJanz.com.

Get to know Kristin...

Birthdate? Sometime in 1974.

When did you start writing? I think I was 12 or 13.

When and what and where did you first get published? "Veritas Nos Liberabit" in Futurismic, in 2008.

What themes do you like to write about? Many of my characters feel that they don't fit in, or they're not sure who they're supposed to be or what they should be doing.

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 Lord of the Rings made a huge impression, and I haven't been able to stop writing about elves. I was always fascinated by the idea of a human high king ruling over other intelligent peoples in The Chronicles of Narnia, and love to imagine new ways for that to go horribly wrong. I keep going back to George R. R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire series as a textbook example of how to approach such a long and complicated story without boring or confusing your readers. I might not kill quite so many people in my own work. Lucy Maud Montgomery's Emily of New Moon trilogy was the series that convinced me I wanted to be a writer, so strongly did I identify with Montgomery's brooding, unpopular teenage heroine and her literary aspirations. Other influential works (mostly books I read when I was quite young) include the novels of Lloyd Alexander and Susan Cooper, Mary Stewart's Arthurian series, Colleen McCullough's books about ancient Rome, and Tad Williams's Memory, Sorrow & Thorn trilogy.

Beggar Moon, Flash Fiction, Issue 47, June 2019

Bio

Leigh grew up in the middle of nowhere Kansas, gorging herself on fairy tales and, let’s face it, any other piece of written word she could get her chubby little hands on. (When forbidden to read at the breakfast table, she proceeded to read the cereal box. Over and over and over.) She eventually graduated to mysteries, Victorian literature, and historical fiction, only to finally make her way back to fantasy and stay there.

After several whirlwind years of living everywhere from California to England, she eventually returned to Kansas where she now resides with several roomfuls of books, an abundance of teacups, and an overly pampered feline who answers to the name of Princess Puffy Pants. When she’s in the mood.

Leigh is currently working on her first novel which will be released later this year. You can also find her collaborating on a snarky bi-weekly fairytale series at https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/25203/meanwhile-at-the-withershins-inn 

Get to know Leigh...

Birthdate?

September 8th

When did you start writing?

That’s actually a question with several answers.

The first and simplest answer is probably as soon as I could start stringing words together with a pencil. I’ve been addicted to story for as long as I can remember, and if I wasn’t reading a story, I was almost certainly making one up.

The second answer is that it was my second grade teacher who decided I was going to be a writer long before I did. Something about asking us to write a one page report on Christopher Columbus—probably something that was meant to be displayed on the classroom wall in a nice neat row for Columbus Day—and mine ended up being four pages long and had to be stapled together. She insisted from then on that I was going to be a writer, and continued to encourage me to do so even years after I’d left her classroom.

But, for the final answer, I don’t think I saw it for myself until I was about twelve. It was one of those crystal clear moments that you never forget. I was standing in the local library reading a notice that had been taped to the end of one bookcase, advertising a story competition. And the thought suddenly came into my head:

I could do that.

And so I sat down at one of the long wooden tables with my pencil and a sheaf of loose notebook paper and proceeded to write.

I never did enter that competition, but the story I started that day turned into my first attempt at a novel and the beginning of a decades long obsession with writing. It was also, cheesy as it sounds, the beginning of a soul-deep conviction that this is what I was put on the earth to do.

When and what and where did you first get published?

I’ve had a number of non-fiction articles published over the years under another name. But this is my first fiction publication, and I could not be happier that it is “Beggar Moon”.

It has long been a favorite story of mine, one of those glorious tales that seems to pour through you, nearly writing itself and keeping you awake till three in the morning until you get every last word down on paper. Would that every story wrote itself that easily. So I am exceedingly happy that this one has finally found the right home with New Myths.

Why do you write?

It’s a bit of a cliché, but, honestly, I write because I can’t not write. If I go more than a few days without writing I start getting this odd anxious feeling which, if not checked with the thorough application of words on paper, can tumble headlong into full on grumpy. And then I’m just a pain to live with. Even my cat doesn’t like me much then. So it’s just better for all concerned if I keep writing.

Who is your favorite author? Your favorite story?

Good grief, that’s like asking “What’s your favorite appendage? Would you rather keep your big toe or your right ear?”

I’ve soaked up too many stories for two many years for me to pick just one.  My favorite probably depends on the day and my current mood. But if I had to pick my top two authors it would probably be Tolkien (unoriginal, I know) and Terry Pratchett. If you ask me tomorrow it might be Anne McCaffrey, Robin McKinley, Brandon Sanderson, Scott Lynch, Rachel Aaron or Neil Gaiman. Or any of a half dozen others.

What are you trying to say with your fiction?

Honestly, I’m just trying to tell a good tale, and to tell it the way the tale itself wants to be told. If the story has something to say to someone, some great insight to impart, that’s between the story and the reader. My job is merely to get it down in words as best I can.

If, in so doing, I also manage to give someone a few moments of joy or entertainment or even just escape, then I have said all I meant to.

Do you blog?

I don’t blog in a conventional sense. I’d honestly much rather be making up stories than spending my writing energy on anything else. But, being the incurable world builder that I am, I do write extensively about my current novel’s world at https://www.worldanvil.com/w/the-archives-of-the-bound-realms-leigh-janzen

For Peter's bio please click here

Manic is the Dark Night, Poetry, Issue 21, December 1, 2012

Deep in My Couch, Poetry, Issue 59, Summer 2022

Birthdate? 

I was born on September 22nd, 1947. Yes, too damn old.

When did you start writing?

I started to write in 1967, 45 years ago. I lived in Canada for ten years due to the Vietnam War Era issues. Then there were only typewriters, no internet. I would type poems one by one (no photocopies allowed), and those international coupons, snail mail, stamps, long response times, and 95 out of 100 never personally responded. Few editors, if any, commented on your poems; ironically, rejection letters were usually a formed photocopied response. So, for many years I continued to write but not send the poems out. For about 8-10 years, I didn’t write at all, focusing on survival and income issues, knowing poetry would not support me financially. About 2007, I concentrated on poetry. With the established advent of the internet, I revised and created new poems. As of 2022, I have been nominated for 4 Pushcart Prize awards and 5 Best of the Net nominations.

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

In exile, I actually got published in Canada in about 1975 with a free opinion article about draft evasion, “A price that continues to be paid,” along with one poem called “Pine Tipped and Resisting.” It was the worst poem I’ve ever written. I have been lucky; I have never written a poem not published. I have over 100 unpublished poems yet to send out. Since I have been published in over 1,300 different publications. I have stopped counting.

Why do you write?

In the beginning, I think I wrote for therapy to find my way out of my own emotional hell. But aging, increasing stability through income, condo ownership, a stable relationship for years, and running my own business, writing is now a hobby and a source of pure joy and hopefully legacy.

 Why do you write Science Fiction and Fantasy?

I do not write science fiction. I think all poetry has elements of science fiction and fantasy at times, but poetry is primarily storytelling.

Who is your favorite author? Your favorite story?

I have been heavily influenced by Carl Sandburg, Robert Frost, Herman Hesse, Irving Layton, and Jiddu Krishnamurtii, among others. Narcissus and Goldmund by Krishnamurti profoundly impacted my life by exchanging differences between the life path of two different individuals expressing a natural and spiritual confrontation of ideals siring passages of their lives. Carl Sandburg will always be the love and the inspiration of my life. I learned how to be essential, reflect voice, and be simple yet a storyteller through this man. Herman Hesse was a brain and an intellectual-but he lost me in Steppenwolf, going up and down the staircase a loner of night.

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

“This man died dancing.  Leaving a legacy behind was his poetic dream.

Karl and Kim, Fiction, Issue 70, Spring 2025

R.A. (Rob) Johnson is a pan-genrist author whose writing stretches from micro-fiction to novel series, and spans historical thrillers, science fiction, fantasy, horror, and even speculative non-fiction, for YA readers through adults. His forty-year career as a software engineer diverted much of his writing output to journal articles, academic papers, marketing collateral, design specs, and the ever-present code, which led to over forty-five issued patents and dozens more pending. His writing often features an element of mystery that challenges the reader to examine the story and their world on many levels. Then again, some of it is just plain fun. You can connect with Rob at rob@rajohnsonauthor.com and www.rajohnsonauthor.com.

Get to know R. A. Johnson...

Birthdate? 

June 22nd, 1959 -- Yes, I'm that old.

When did you start writing? 

I submitted a story to Boys Life magazine when I was about 12. I've been writing fiction, nonfiction, marketing stuff, etc. ever since.

When and what and where did you first get published? 

I wrote (and got paid for) several articles for a trade magazine back on the 90s.

Why do you write? 

Why do I eat? Drink? Breathe?

Why do you write Science Fiction and/or Fantasy? 

Ideas, ideas, ideas. My thinking goes to the unusual, not the mundane. 

Who is your favorite author? Your favorite story?

I have two favorites both OGs. Frank Herbert and Larry Niven. So, of course my favorite series are Dune and Known Space.

What are you trying to say with your fiction?

That's a good question. I guess I'm trying to say that everyone, whatever their gender, whether they're human, alien, or AI, has the same needs and desires--safety, a home, friendship, and love.

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

Ha! Good one. Hmmm. "He tried to make people cry a little and laugh a lot." How's that?

Do you blog?

Yes. I write a 309-word flash fiction piece just about every week. You can check it out at rajohnsonauthor.com. 

Cynocephalus, Fiction, Issue 9 December 1, 2009

Get to know Christopher...

Birthdate? 22 April, 1977

When did you start writing? Sometime around 1998 or 1999. One day I decided to sit down and write a novel for the fun of it. I've never quite been able to stop since.

When and what and where did you first get published? In 2001 with a short story in "It's Fate," a UK supernatural/woman's magazine.

Why do you write? To entertain, to communicate, to answer a need in myself, and perhaps, hopefully to address needs in others.

Why do you write Science Fiction and/or Fantasy? Science fiction and fantasy are both genres of the imagination. They are backgrounds against which I can tell the sort of stories I like to read.

Who is your favorite author? Your favorite story? It's an even draw between Bradbury, le Guin and more recently perhaps Michael Chabon. A favourite story, I can't decide on. There are so many good ones.

What are you trying to say with your fiction? I find that readers tend to be better at understanding what a story is meant to say than the writer ever is (and stories never do have to say the same thing twice). Readers are clever, they have a knack for knowing what needs to be understood from a story.

Do you blog? Where? Yes, occasionally. I have a site at www.somniloquist.org that has some writing, thoughts and notes.

If you could write your own epitaph, what would it say? Christopher Johnstone. 1977-

Chasing Fireflies, Flash Fiction, Issue 40, September 2017

Touched, Part One, Fiction, Issue 43, June 2018

Touched, Part Two, Fiction, Issue 44, September 2018

Tom Jolly is a retired astronautical/electrical engineer who now spends his time writing SF and fantasy, designing board games (such as Wiz-War, and Manhattan Project: Energy Empire), and creating obnoxious 3D puzzles. He lives with his wife Penny in Santa Maria, California, in a place where mountain lions and black bears still visit. You can find more of his stories at www.silcom.com/~tomjolly/tomjolly2.htm. 

Get to know Tom...

Birthday? April 8, 1954

When did you start writing? When I was around 18-ish, I started submitting stories to a few SF magazines, back when you had to do everything by mail. I have a lovely collection of rejection slips from that period.

When and what and where did you first get published? My first published story was “Surface” in 2011, which I sold to Daily Science Fiction. So, basically, it took me roughly 40 years to sell my first story. “Chasing Fireflies” will be my 17th published story, so apparently I figured out what I was doing wrong.

What themes do you like to write about? A lot of my stories seem to involve the end of the world in one fashion or another. Also, I tend to latch on to interesting science ideas and write stories around them. 

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? "More Than Human," by Sturgeon, the “Jumper” series by Gould, "The Stars My Destination," by Bester. These stories all feature anti-gravity or teleportation in one form or another. A lot of my stories tend to have people flying around in them. I really enjoy the idea and release of unaided flight, so it’s a recurring facet of my stories and books. I also enjoy Christopher Moore, Steven Brust, and John Scalzi, all of whom use snarky wise-ass characters, a common feature in many of my stories. And there’s the science in Niven’s, Brin's and Iain M. Banks’ books which have influenced me to write some very heavy SF stories, and a background in astronautical engineering has helped me there.

Website? www.silcom.com/~tomjolly/tomjolly2.htm

Corpora, Flash Fiction, Issue 53, December 2020

David Houston Jones has published prose poetry and speculative fiction in Dead Charles, Cambridge

Poetry Review, Mask, Avatar anthology and NewMyths. His recent writing is concerned with the forensic and the archival. He is a university lecturer and lives in Exeter, UK.

Get to know David...

Birthdate? 16/08/1972

When and what and where did you first get published?

I published some prose-poetry in small magazines in the UK in the 90s. I was very involved in that scene and have fond memories of it, blended it with a kind of SF-inflected media nostalgia...

Why do you write?

I’m interested in the creation of speculative worlds and in capturing the evidence of those worlds. I have a particular interest in some of the visual projects which arise from that problem and my academic research is in art history. In my writing, the genre of alien remote storage comedy is a particular focus.

Why do you write Science Fiction and/or Fantasy?

I've always read a lot of Science Fiction. The early stuff I wrote isn't SF but it's peppered with references to journeys, drives and obscure instruments, so perhaps it was SF in disguise.

Who is your favorite author? Your favorite story?

 Classic SF, Asimov, Kurt Vonnegut. A lot of modern French authors, including Jean Genet and Marcel Proust. Samuel Beckett, Philip K. Dick, Bruno Schulz, Kafka, plus contemporaries including David Mitchell, Derek Kunsken, Ursula LeGuin, and Ann Leckie.

Do you blog?

Yes. At https://dhjones05.wixsite.com/website

Those Halcyon Days, Flash Fiction, Issue 49, December 2019

Shelly Jones, PhD is an Associate Professor of English at SUNY Delhi, where she teaches classes in mythology, fairy tales, literature, and writing. She received her PhD in Comparative Literature from SUNY Binghamton. Outside of academia she is an active nerd who enjoys board games, Dungeons and Dragons, being outdoorsy, and knitting. Her speculative fiction has been published in Podcastle, Luna Station Quarterly , and is forthcoming in The Future Fire.  

Get to know Shelly...

Birthdate?

December 21 - Being born on the solstice, I am particularly drawn to mythologies dealing with this time of year. Both the myth of Alcyone and Sedna have associations with the solstice. 

When did you start writing?

I began writing stories as a child and always wanted to be a writer. My desk was lined with marble composition books filled with stories. I have a form rejection from Dell publishing for a story I wrote when I was eight. I was so thrilled to receive any kind of response for my work. If only receiving rejections were still as inspiring! 

When and what and where did you first get published?

I did not pursue creative writing while I was in grad school working on my PhD. It was after I graduated that I began to think about returning to writing. I wrote here and there, but didn't really dive back in until 2015. I was working at a job that I found unrewarding and spent hours instead lost in a story about bees. After a dozen rejections, "The Watchers" was published in 2017 by Luna Station Quarterly. This success encouraged me to continue my writing. 

Why do you write?

I don't know any other way to live. 

Why do you write Science Fiction and/or Fantasy?

I got into Fantasy later than I care to admit. As a child and teenager, I was much more conservative in my views of Literature (with a capital L). It wasn't until grad school and after when I got into gaming that I realized there was an entire world of fantastical literature available to me. 

Who is your favorite author? Your favorite story?

I'm not sure that I have a single favorite, but I love stories that effortlessly combine fantastical elements into the mundane everyday world. A text that does this for me is Helene Wecker's The Golem and the Jinni. 

What are you trying to say with your fiction?

I don't know that there is any one take away from my work, but I often try to illuminate the small, the everyday in a new way and make them more impactful. I want to give the little things a life of their own. 

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

My epitaph would be a play on Ovid's story of Echo as I wander the woods writing snatchets of stories: 

"She lies concealed in the wild woods, nor is she ever seen on lonely mountain range; for, though we hear her calling in the hills, 'tis but a voice, a voice that lives, that lives among the hills." Ovid's Metamorphoses  Book 3 - Story of Echo and Narcissus 

Do you blog?

Sadly no. Between grading, my scholarship, and creative writing I haven't found the time to blog on a regular basis. 

Cinnamon Sale, Poetry, Issue 2, March 1, 2008

Author's Web Site: http://johanjonsson.net

Get to know Johan...

Birthdate? 1986.

Why do you write? For love of literature and the written word.

Why do you write Science Fiction and/or Fantasy? Science fiction and fantasy give the writer two sets of very interesting tools. It would be a shame not to use them.

Who is your favorite author? Your favorite story? O, the impossible question. I don't have a favorite author. Or ten. I love the works of Wolfgang Borchert, Hope Mirrlees, Arne Sand, Mervyn Peake, Anna Maria Lenngren, China Miéville, Mikhail Bulgakov, Tove Jansson, Harry Martinson, William Shakespeare, and Karin Boye, just to name a few, but ask me again tomorrow and my list would probably look completely different. As of writing, I've just re-read Franz Kafka's In der Strafkolonie for the fourth time, or so. It's quite wonderful, so it can be my favorite story of today.

What are you trying to say with your fiction? Depends on what I'm writing. Sometimes I'm trying to say this, 

sometimes I'm trying to say that, sometimes I'm not trying to say anything at all.

Do you blog? Where? Guilty as charged, but only in Swedish. At Ampersand (http://vetsaga.se/a/) and Bränt järn (http://brantjarn.se).

If you could write your own epitaph, what would it say? Being twenty years old, I really do hope that's a premature question.

To Lie with Honor, Fiction, Issue 58 Spring Edition

Birthdate?

May 1, 1983

When did you start writing?

I’ve always told stories – my mom has some of the ones I wrote as a six year old. But for a long time I mostly just did NaNoWriMo every year and not much else. About ten years ago I decided to get serious and start writing year round, and I’ve kept that up ever since.

Interesting fact: I can’t write while pregnant, and I’ve had three kids in the last five years. It’s definitely slowed me down! No complaints, though, the kids are cute and I'm hard at work making up for lost time.

When and what and where did you first get published?

My first story publication was my Baen Fantasy Adventure Award winning piece, “The Golden Knight”, published in 2014. I was the first ever winner of that contest! Like many of my stories, including my NewMyths.com publication and my Writers of the Future winner, it's part of a larger shared universe that I hope to share more with readers in the future.

Why do you write?

Because I can’t not write. I have stories in me and they have to come out. Thankfully my husband is not just supportive, he’s my creative partner, and we brainstorm, plot, and edit together. My writing process involves long weekend adventures, driving out to ghost towns, cooking burgers on top of mountains, and talking story. It’s pretty darn awesome, actually. 

Why do you write Science Fiction and/or Fantasy?

I find you can tell stories about human nature using the medium of SFF that are really powerful. You think you’re writing about magic, or space travel, or a quest for a golden goblet, and then you discover you’re really writing about duty, honor, redemption – the things that make us human. Plus, it’s what I’ve always preferred to read. What’s the point of a story with no dragons?

Who is your favorite author? Your favorite story?

Tough question! I have so many, but I think I’d go with Lois McMaster Bujold. Her mix of brilliant characterization, witty dialogue, sparkling plots and deeper meanings brings me back to her books over and over. I would like to be her when I grow up. Maybe with a little more swordplay. 

Favorite story is an equally hard one! But near the top of the list is definitely Andy Weir’s The Martian. It’s got such a great combination of humor, science, and human spirit. 

What are you trying to say with your fiction?

My most important consideration is to write stories that entertain. I don’t ever want anyone to be bored reading my work. Everything else is secondary, though I do have themes I like to touch on. Connections between people. Family. What does it mean to be human. Redemption – that’s one I really like. I believe redemption is always possible, if you’re willing to pay the price. 

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

“Died age 103, of surprise”. 

Do you blog?

Not currently. I have a website, kdjulicher.com, where I list my story publications and other interesting items, but that’s about it. I’ve been considering starting an Instagram with pictures of my Nevada adventures, though!

My bio:

K. D. Julicher lives in rural Nevada, where she writes stories and raises children with her husband. When not writing, she’s likely having amazing adventures in the desert. She abandoned a promising software engineering career for the evils of QA some time ago, but likes writing stories more than writing code or squashing bugs. Her stories have appeared in Writers of the Future, Intergalactic Medicine Show, and Deep Magic among others.