One woman eats plastic, another eats sorrow, another eats matsutake tempura, and the last just a nutrient-rich slurry

In order words, news on four stories!

New story published: The Conditions for Blooming, Utopia Science Fiction (sci-fi)

The Conditions for Blooming is available in Utopia Science Fiction! The first part is in their February/March 2023 “Weird Progeny” issue here; the second part is in their April/May 2023 issue here.

This story takes place on an Earth where the sun has become poisonous to human DNA, centers around Luni’s desire live up to the hopes of her ancestor, who is the source of the genetic data she was cloned from. I started writing this years ago, and didn’t have the skills or vision to finish at the time. I ended up finishing it in my first workshop class at Hugo House, and I’m really delighted that it’s found a home. 💚

Luni remembered the moment she was born: the seal cracking like an egg, the hiss of air, the gelatinous tide of amniotic fluid, her limbs unspooling and cooling underneath headlamps round and bright as moons. She kept this story tucked inside and told it only once: to another self of hers, the first she’d ever met, who reacted not with a swell of rapport, but horror. 

“Do…you not remember…?” Luni’s voice creaked. When she was worried, the complexities of her half-meat throat fluttered and clenched, smothering her words. 

“No,” her other-self said. “I’ve never heard it from another of us, either.” 

Free to read: The Bright in the Gyre, Reckoning (climate justice sci-fi)

The Bright in the Gyre is out to read for free in Reckoning 7: Oceans!

In case you missed it, this story is about Cora, a researcher developing trash-eating mushrooms, who is dying of microplastic-related disease. Tired of corporate bureaucracy stalling her projects and quickly approaching her last birthday, she decides to turn to a community of people floating out around the North Pacific Garbage Patch. This is a really special story for me, salted with my heartbreak about COVID/pandemic, anger for having to work throughout it, and the love I feel for my communities helping me get through. 💙

This story was also listed as one of Maria Haskin’s Short Fiction Treasures in her short fiction round-up on Strange Horizons, and had a feature by Charles Payseur in Locus Magazine!

In July, Reckoning’s gorgeous issue is out in physical form and I’m looking forward to it!

New story upcoming: Inheritance in Six Parts, Worlds of Possibility

I have a flash story upcoming in a future issue of Julia Rios’s Worlds of Possibility! Inheritance in Six Parts is a hopeful/cozy cyberpunk flash about the things passed down in a family, like eyes that can (??) see ghosts.

Worlds of Possibility is an anthology of uplifting, hopeful, and happy science fiction and fantasy stories. Their Kickstarter collecting the past two years of stories and illustrations was just funded successfully at 124%!

New story upcoming: An Inherited Taste, No Trouble At All

I made my first sale of a horror story to Cursed Morsels Press’s anthology, No Trouble At All! It’s available for pre-order here for its June release in both eBook and paperback). No Trouble At All is about polite horrors:

These horrors color our intimate, familial, professional, cultural, and political lives. Those without power are expected to smile and accept injustice for fear of retribution. The powerful dress up ugly realities and make suffering palatable to prevent resistance. Polite horrors come from both sides of the weapon—the wielder and the wounded. (via)

“An Inherited Taste” is about a woman taught to survive by eating others’ sorrows, and how she raises her daughter to eat sorrows too. 🍽️🍽️

What I’m reading:

When the Circus Lights Down, Sarah Pinkser, Uncanny Magazine Issue 3

I recently attended Norwescon, where I was lucky to meet Lynne M. Thomas, one of the editors of Uncanny Magazine. She happened to mention one of the first stories published in Uncanny, about “a circus that basically eats people,” and I had to find it. I loved the imagery of this circus flapping and roosting and flaring lights like a deep-sea creature.

The circus landed in late October. It was a Tuesday night, near midnight, and I should have been asleep.  I had been asleep, actually, on the couch that served as my bed, but then the rain started. Not a gentle autumn rain like we’d been getting off and on for the last week. Sharp, slanted rain that would rip the last brilliant leaves from the sycamores lining the street; the kind that drenched the floor under the window before I was awake enough to register what was happening. I tripped over a roller skate in the dark. Groped in the hamper for a towel, but ended up grabbing a bunch of dirty clothes to dry the floor. I couldn’t afford to lose the security deposit if the apartment got damaged.

I saw the circus then. It was only beginning to fall.

Loving Bone Girl, Tehnuka, Apex Magazine (Asian & Pacific Islander Bonus Issue)

Loved this story which is soo brimming with beautiful words. I also adored the diaspora emotions alongside the magic of making places. "I wish you had been with me back then. You are the safest place I can imagine." AHH.

“When I die, I want you to keep my bones.” Vasanthi floats in the dark pool, the softness of her voice punctuated by softer drops of water from stalactites.

“You mean your ashes.” The best misunderstandings come from our language differences. “I’ll find you a nice urn.” Something brushes my ankle and I flinch away, peering back to where golden lantern light shows a small white fish drifting in the murk.

Water drips from Vasanthi’s face where I’ve splashed her. Her hair swirls in the ripples, black on black, but her eyes gleam. “No. I mean my bones.” She switches languages, to leave no doubt. “My elumbukal.”

Ichi in the cherry blossoms

Every year Ichi tolerates our obligatory shiba-sakura photoshoots.

See you next time!

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