Updates, Honorable Mentions, and the Warping of Young Minds

This summer marked the first time I taught (twice, even!) creative writing for young writers. I was delighted to serve as guest author for the good folks at Richmond Young Writers, and had the pleasure of working with Julie Geen, whom I’ve known for a couple years now, at VCU and from around town, James River Writers, etc. The kids were great, it all seemed to work out well, and I’d love to do it again one day.

This autumn I’m going to be presenting some of my Lovecraft scholarship in an academic venue. More details on that down the road, but I’m darn excited. My other scholarship on literary horror, HPL, and weird fiction continues apace.

In a not unrelated vein, I’m excited for the publication of “His Knife, Her Shadow,” in the second issue of Thinking Horror this autumn. My piece is a confessional memoir of sorts, all about how I came to horror as a child in the early 1980s. Writing it proved unexpectedly harrowing, and I hope it’s of interest to the readers of Thinking Horror.

Finally, in further exciting news, I was delighted and honored that Ellen Datlow noted two of my short stories for her long list of Honorable Mentions for Best Horror of the Year, Vol. 8:

“Hunger Full and Lean,” The Lovecraft eZine 34 [free online]
“Mercy’s Armistice,” Big Bad II [$2.99 on Kindle]

In Belgium, No One Can Hear You Fhtagn

What waits between the stars? Lovecraft eZine illustration by Peter Szmer

It’s been a pretty good month. I’m delighted to announce that I have sold French-language translation and publication rights for my Lovecraftian SF story, “How Rare Are Light and Life.” My first foreign rights sale! They were acquired by Patrick Dechesne for a Lovecraftian anthology forthcoming this autumn. Patrick is starting a French-language house, entitled “Les Editions de l’Instant,” which will publish anthologies and novels, including some translated from English. I’ll share more information about this project as I have it.

Big thanks to Mike Davis for first publishing this story in The Lovecraft eZine, a year ago this month. I’ve been pleased to hear from both friends and strangers who have read and enjoyed it over the last twelve months, and I’m glad to see its wings tentacles spread a little farther.