Third rule is: don’t talk to aliens

 When I told my mother that I had a story accepted in an anthology about punk rock, she said “ first the bicycle anthology, now punk rock. So you’re just writing about stuff you have absolutely Zero experience with?“

 She had a point. I know a little bit about punk rock, but it is not my music.  I didn’t grow up with it, I don’t have any particular interest in it, and I really didn’t  understand the entire subculture around it.  But  I had an idea for a story and once I began researching punk rock, I realize that, even if I did not grow up listening to the music, the whole idea of it is something that really speaks to me.

A Punk Rock Future is a science-fiction anthology with a punk rock aesthetic. My story, Third Rule  Is: Don't Talk To Aliens, is about a radio DJ faced with an alien invasion. She can't stop it (or can she?), but she can play one last song to comfort earth.

My story was inspired by a dream I had where that world was ending and the entire population of earth got together to sing Rainbow Connection. It's a very short story, but there are much longer stories in the anthology and I greatly enjoyed it.

https://www.indiebound.org/book/9781733775007

Oil & Ivory

In the grand tradition of Jennifer Lee Rossman, I have written a story based on a piece of media I have never actually consumed. Usually it's books. This time, it's the movie Ferngully: The last rain forest.

All right, technically I have seen Ferngully. Just… not since I was like seven. I did not remember the plot, the characters. Anything really except it was about the environment. So when the good folks at World Weaver Press, the closest thing I have to a publishing family, put out a submission call for Solarpunk Winters, a companion book to Solarpunk Summers, of course my first idea was "ferngully with narwhals."

You know narwhals. Like whales, but colder and with unicorn horns?

There's going to be a whole blog post on the WWP site about how I got from that note to my eventual story, so I will link to that when it goes live.

My story, Oil And Ivory, takes place during the annual narwhal migration. A polyamorous and your family in a futuristic Greenland is tasked with guiding the whales safely under the ice, which has been made thicker by climate change. If they don't help the whales find air holes, they will suffocate. But this year brings a new challenge: an oil spill threatening to poison the ocean.

Can they work together with the oil company to save both the whales and the ocean?

Solarpunk Winters is now available in paperback and e-book. https://www.worldweaverpress.com/store/p169/Glass_and_Gardens%3A_Solarpunk_Winters.html

Space Opera Libretti is now available!

Well. I have had a long year. Totally uprooted my life, moved out of my mom‘s apartment, living in a group home… and all of that unfortunately delayed a lot of projects, but through it all, there was the anthology.

It was stressful because a lot of people were relying on me when I could hardly rely on myself. But I had someone I could rely on: my amazing coeditor Brian. It took longer than it should have, longer than we wanted, but we are proud to FINALLY announce that Space Opera Libretti is now available for purchase.

When you put a book on Amazon, it doesn't always put the e-book and the paperback version on the same page right away. So for the time being, I have two separate links for you. In a few days, either link should work for either version. 

E-book

Paperback

In the coming weeks, I'm going to be hosting interviews with the authors and talking about their stories. For now, though, I will let Brian McNett, my fearless copilot and coeditor, give you a description of the book as a whole.

The problem with space opera is that there's not enough opera in it, and certainly a dearth of coloratura diva sopranos in the third act. This anthology sets out to fix that by placing the music front-and-center. We've created a glittery disco-ball of fun. 20 stories designed to amuse. Some actually take place in space. There's even an actual opera in here. We didn't hold back.Time-traveling cats that quote opera... Intergalactic singing competitions... An endless song that becomes the soundtrack to countless generations of rebellions... And, of course, invisible space bears made of black holes that may or may not be extinct.

That last one is my story. I'll be talking about that one, too, even though I would rather talk about all of our fabulous authors:

Ingrid Garcia

Lizz Donnelly

Harry Turtledove

Brian McNett

Jennifer Lee Rossman

Alex Kropf

KG Anderson

Spruce Wells

EDE Bell

James Dorr

Cait Gordon

Dean Brink

Dawn Vogel

Minerva Cerridwen

Bruce Taylor

Tom Barlow

Larry Hodges

Jean Graham

Julia Huni

Dave D'Alessio

I am absurdly proud of all of our writers, and all of the authors who we could not publish despite having amazing stories. Our authors get paid when we get paid; we are splitting everything evenly between the 20 of us.

And a very special thank you to Ivori Blake, who did our cover art!