the eve of summer
First things first: my story “This Wanderer, in the Dark of the Year” is up at Clarkesworld!
Your native environment, Annelise always says. Your biome is war. The words had been fond at first, then less fond, as she realized that even though I would come back to New York and sleep beside her, I was never truly there at all.
I don’t wonder what she’s doing. I don’t think of her at all, if I can help it.
They take me to see the alien, again and again. Sometimes it touches me. Sometimes I just stand and stare at it. I don’t know how they know what it wants. If they know what it wants. It’s cryptic as a sea cucumber, as an anemone.
Sometimes I wake in the middle of the night, the smell of apples and bitter almonds choking me.
Summer is rushing towards us, and the Clarion West Six-Week Workshop is swiftly approaching. Between the Write-a-thon and everything else, I’m just a little busy. Just a little. I’m working on revising the political fantasy novel when I have a spare moment, but until September there’s not a whole lot of fiction writing going on around here. (Lots of marketing writing, though! And if you like what I do and want to help Clarion West continue helping bring new and diverse voices in speculative fiction to the world, please consider sponsoring me or one of the many other fine writers during the Write-a-thon. You can find my profile here.)
