This has been *a year* hasn’t it? I am still grateful for all the thing I managed to achieve. And there were some new and exciting ones! I sold four stories to different publications (some publications were new for me!) and even had the pleasure to write a story for the Wordcraft Writers Workshop powered by Google! Writing Worm-Mothers was a unique experience and I am humbled by the amazing group of authors who took part in the workshop.

Currently, I am guest-editing the Dread issue of Apparition Lit with Nelly Geraldine García-Rosas. The Apparition Team is a dream to work with and very patient as we learn the ropes of the magazine.

Since not all my stories are out yet–there is a story in the Deadlands that I am super excited to share with you at the end of the year–I will be updating the last entry later with a link. But for now here are the stories I published this year. I hope you’ll find something you like. Let’s go!

Here are the stories I published this year and are eligible for awards:

Of the Body – short story – 4300 words – Beneath Ceaseless Skies, issue #365

Sali and Osarah are going to have a baby together, but first they have to hunt and kill the animal that is pregnant with it.

This one started out mostly with vibes. I had the image of a dead deer with a newborn human baby inside it. This thought was so alien to me, so strange, that I had to make it either a far future science fantasy or some secondary world set on another planet. To be honest, more than half of the story is still in my head, and there is more science fiction in there than what’s on the paper. Perhaps in the future there is a novella or two to be found in there. This story is on the Nebula Recommended Reading List!

“What if, I think. What if she is both? She is of the Body, like all of us, and she belongs to it as much as all of us. She could belong to two different worlds. In the end, they are still one.”

Bonesoup – short story – 2400 words – Strange Horizons

Dina’s grandmother never lets her have sweets, yet she cooks up a storm for the other children in the neighborhood. A story about family, food, intergenerational trauma, and a cannibal granny!

This story poured out of me one night almost completely formed. It’s a sort of heartwarming horror version of the witch from Hansel and Gretel with a lot of Greek family dynamics and intergenerational trauma thrown in the mix. I am still absolutely in love with the illustration Dante Luiz made for it and that’s why I used it as a featured image. This story is also on the Nebula Recommended Reading List!

“For a moment—perhaps it was my sweet-tooth brain—she looked mostly made of custard, her eyes were two pastel blue candied almonds, her chin was a shortbread biscuit. But parts of her were still meat. Her hair was black, and slick down her shoulders like always. I looked away and the image was gone.”

This Village – flash fiction – 800 words – Uncanny Magazine, issue #46

The unnamed narrator crossed a path and found themselves in a village unlike any other before.

This story sprang from a Codex writing contest, during Week 3 and I am really glad that it did. It might be small but I found that people enjoyed reading a piece of hopeful fiction at a time when the news were not good at all. Very proud of this little story.

“There is always a trail wherever you live. You just have to find it. If you peer through an opening framed by two linden trees. If you follow the foam of the waves on a cold night. If you are not afraid to crawl into the long narrow caves that open like mouths on jagged rocks. You will see them. They all lead here. To this village.”

Harvest of Bones – short story – 2700 words – The Deadlands

In a village ravaged by war, soldiers come to take away sons and husbands. This is the last night, the night the women must decide what to do. How will these bones they unearthed help them?

This story is an older one of mine. It had many near misses in the submission process and I am very happy it has finally found its home. It is dear to my heart because of the weird premise and coincidentally it features another cannibal granny! I swear I wasn’t doing it on purpose before but now I might start to…

““This is not a cemetery, it’s a bone garden,” Nana said. “Don’t let the stones fool you. These were added later by priests and nuns who didn’t know any better.” She spat on the hard ground as if the stone were an affront to her and grabbed her pickax. “The dead don’t rest here. They are only waiting.””

Thank you for taking this journey through my year. If you enjoyed any of these stories it would be an honor if you voted for them for awards. I hope the new year bring stability and hope to all of us.

Another year has passed and one I am very grateful for. I was a finalist for three (!) different awards, the Ignyte, the Nebula and the World Fantasy Award with my story “My Country Is a Ghost“. I did not win any of the awards but just being a finalist, and being able to attend cons online, talk to other writers, and cheer the winners was enough for me. I got to spend time with some lovely people this year, even though we were on lockdown most of the time. My heart is full.

As it is customary I will post my stories that were out this year and later I will post some of my favorite stories in an always incomplete list. I had quite the productive year with a lot of firsts but all in good time.

Here are the stories I published this year and are eligible for awards:

The Giants of the Violet Sea – novella – 27000 words – Uncanny Magazine, issue #42

This is the first novella I ever wrote and it sold to Uncanny Magazine! It’s available online for free and I would be honored and grateful if you gave it a read and considered it for awards. It is a mystery set in a far future colony with death tattoos and sea beasts and it is in the Nebula Recommended Reading List!

“It is an intricate thing, the tattooing of the dead. The body doesn’t heal. So it must be done with the utmost precision. And the shape and the color must be in perfect harmony for the soul to move on.”

How The Girls Came Home – short story – 5200 words – Uncanny Magazine, issue #40

This is one of my Clarion West stories and it comes with so many fond memories. It is also published in Uncanny Magazine and free to read online. It is a dark fairytale about a girl who wakes up every day having different animal feet. It is also in the Nebula Recommended Reading List!

“Where her human skin stops, bone and muscle twist and take shapes. Shapes that should not be there. Her feet are only sometimes covered in fur. Other times they are sleek and lustrous as if draped in sequins, or cloaked in glossy, kaleidoscopic feathers.”

Tomatoes – short story – 4500 words – Khōréō Magazine, issue #1.4

Another story that sprouted (pun intended) from Clarion West and the first one I wrote while there. I am so happy to share it with you. It’s free to read in Khōréō. It’s a dark fantasy story about family bonds and duty, about two rival witch families, and, well, about tomatoes too.

“Filaments of my flesh turn into rootstalks and move on and on until there is nothing but the plants. I exist only in this garden now. Even if my body can leave this house and walk around the village, my roots can only stretch so far.”

Fish Tale – short story – 3800 words – Professor Charlatan Bardot’s Travel Anthology to the Most (Fictional) Haunted Buildings in the Weird, Wild World

I got solicited for the first time this year to write a story for Professor Charlatan Bardot’s Travel Anthology to the Most (Fictional) Haunted Buildings in the Weird, Wild World! Fish Tale is a fantasy story that takes place in the famous Fish Church (Feskekôrka) in Gothenburg and explores family and community dynamics but also a strange curse.

“The boys crossed themselves and clutched tight at the little wooden fish charms. All the fishermen wore one when they fished the open sea but now all the fishmongers had one too. Because the sea had come inside the market the day she had helped her husband kill that fish.”

Another first for me was that I got to write a side story for Magic: the Gathering’s Innistrad: Midnight Hunt. Sisters is the first IP work I ever got to do and the experience was amazing, as was the fan reception of the story. I hope this will be the first of many.

That is it for now. Thank you for reading this far. If you enjoyed any of these stories it would be an honor if you voted them for awards.

I hope the next year treats you well friends. Many hugs.

This is my first year of eligibility for the Campbell Award for New Writers and I am super excited about it.

It has been an amazing year and looking back I am so thankful for the opportunities it has given me, and for all the new people I got to meet during Worldcon75 and online. Not only my productivity increased dramatically but I got to make some good friends.

So let’s cut to the chase. I had two stories out in 2017 both of them fall under the Short Fiction category.

If you read only one of my stories I would recommend “The Heart is a Lonesome Hunter”  – in Liminal Stories issue #4.

A woman with a fox’s heart meets the devil she has long forgotten about. It is a dark fantasy story about war, a mother’s love and the sacrifices we all make.

I also published “What We Are Molded After” – in Black Static issue #56.

A witch and her golem husband live together secretly in a little cottage in the outskirts of a village. This is a story about identity and abuse and how people cope with it.