The Literary Underworld

Pride

By Angelia Sparrow

So many places I could start this. It’s June, and hence Pride.

Maybe we should make it Veterans’ Month.

When’s Straight Pride, hurhurhur?

It’s Men’s Mental Health Month and you all need mental help.

Maybe we should drop the TQ+, they are scaring off allies.

And Donald Trump Jr. announced on June 16 that the transgender movement is the most violent domestic terror threat in the world.

These are a few of the recurring things I’ve seen this month. There is a saying that the comments on any post about feminism prove the need for it. Ditto Pride. After all, homophobia is just misogyny’s rainbow-clad twin.

In 2024, the ACLU tracked 533 anti-LGBTQ laws through the state legislatures. This year it’s 597. And 937 anti-trans bills have been proposed. Over 100 have passed. 26 states have passed bans on gender-affirming care.

Across the country, feeling the shift in the zeitgeist, corporate sponsors are pulling out of Pride parades and festivals. San Francisco, New York and St. Louis are some of the bigger ones.(Memphis Pride got rained out HARD, lightning strikes and flash flooding. The parade was postponed.)

And this is why Pride is more necessary than ever. Twenty percent of GenZ (1997-2006) are LGBTQ+. For reference, that’s my two youngest kids, age 27 and 25. Their grandfather’s generation, before 1946, has about 2%. But they were one of the hardest hit by AIDS.

Overall, about 9 percent of the population is some shade of queer. In demographic comparison, that’s all the Asian, Pacific Islanders and Native Americans, put together. It’s two-thirds of the Black population. It’s the same number as all the non-Christian religious folks in the country: Muslim, Jewish, Hindu, pagan, etc.

Yet, right now, that 9 percent is under attack by state and federal government. According to Project 2025’s aim to “Promote Life and Strengthening the Family,” all “trangenderism and woke gender ideology” must be removed. To this end, they want:

The Department of Justice to treat anti-gay discrimination as a free speech issue (We reserve the right to refuse service);
The Department of Defense to remove trans soldiers from the military;
The Department of Health and Human Services to remove a focus on LGBTQ+ equity;
The Supreme Court to quit applying Bostock (Title VII gender equity ruling) to matters of orientation and gender identity.

And that’s only part of it.

My wife is trans. And the laws make her public existence a minefield. She is very cautious about going to the restroom in public. She ignores the dirty looks we get in restaurants (I tend to glare down the offenders). While all her ID has her real name on it, her driver’s license still says M. Because Arkansas decided emergency action was needed against all 200 people who had an X, and all the trans people.

I am scared for her all the time.

While you personally may not be part of the QUILTBAG, you may not be out of the woods. In February, Oklahoma introduced an extremely broad obscenity bill (SB 593),which could be applied to anything someone believes is obscene. If you write so much as a kiss before closing the door, and someone takes offense, it can be prison time, massive fines for the author, the publisher, and any book seller or librarian. And if you write LGBTQ+ characters, that will be the first target if this passes.

Oklahoma already passed HB 1217, which criminalizes “obscene performances,” especially drag, around minors. This is a slippery slope bill. First, they make drag illegal/obscene. Then they arrest trans women for wearing dresses to the grocery store and charge them with exposing minors to obscenity. Immediate prison and registry on the sex offender list. And if Project 2025 gets its way, executing them. Over going out for a box of Cheerios.

Some of us who know how this picture (Cabaret) ends are fighting it every step of the way. Others don’t think it will get that bad. And a small minority think their wallets will protect them.

“No one ever talks about [extermination]. They just do it. And you go on with your lives, ignoring the signs all around you. And then, one day, when the air is still and the night has fallen, they come for you.” The 2000s X-Men movies are a gay metaphor and Magneto’s assertion has only become more salient since.

And this is why we need Pride. To come together in public, in joy and color and happiness. To wave at all those who cheer. To cheer for those who march. And most of all, to dance our defiance of a tinpot fascist who thinks we can be eradicated and no one will care.

In the darkest days of the AIDS crisis, the saying “Bury your friends in the morning. Protest in the afternoon and dance all night,” came into being. We dance. Well, others dance. I no longer can. So I make things and I write.

This year, all my amigurumi was in Pride colors, rainbow, lesbian, nonbinary and other.

And yes, I am writing. One of the tenets of Primali Paganism is Divine Defiance. So, I write. It’s slow going through the COVID brain fog, but I continue. Whether an Orc lord marrying for political gain, or Santa and Krampus having some (ahem) VERY private time between holidays, I’m still making words happen.

“There was a cabaret and a master of ceremonies, in a city called Berlin in a country called Germany. And it was the end of the world.” — Joe Masteroff, Cabaret

From Cemetery Dancers, the fourth of the Withycombe and Doyle books, in progress.

[His father] looked sharply at Charlie. “You never seemed to have much interested in dating or courting. Has that changed?” When Charlie glanced down, he nodded. “I see. It hasn’t.” Mr. Doyle lowered his voice. “Is it Edward? You try to keep your letters casual, but you adore him, and it comes through in every line.”

There it was, the big secret, the one that could get him arrested or deported. And his father had seen it without him even telling it.

“Yes. And it’s so illegal.”

“I can’t say I approve. We would like to see you married, although, your Ma would prefer you live nearby so she can spoil the grandbabies rotten. Having them across a whole ocean would be a trial to her.”

“I wasn’t asking for approval of Edward. I was asking about how to get married when it looks as if the marriage is going to be arranged for me.”

His father shook his head. “That’s a hard one, son. The best you can do is be kind and sweet to her. But that’s your nature so it shouldn’t be hard. Remember she is in the same position and no easier with it. You don’t have to love her right away. But do try to be her friend. That may grow into love. There is more to love than the swoopy, giddy feeling.

“When Ma smiles at you, is it still like the sun coming out?” Charlie asked.

His dad smiled. “Every time.”

My writing work can be found on Amazon or the Literary Underworld as Angelia Sparrow or Nick Rowan (NOT the one who writes the Silk Road travel books). My links can be found at these pages: Angelia Sparrow or Nick Rowan. My crochet work is available at The Traveling Tinkers.

Vegas Run

By Rachel Brune

Run Faster…

Rick Keller, werewolf secret agent and grumpy retired soldier, came to me over the course of three or four writing exercises. I wasn’t expecting him to set up shop in my creative brain until those exercises turned into Cold Run, the first book in the Rick Keller Project. Nor did I expect there to be more books, short stories, and half-formed ideas that would grow along the way, each waiting to be set down with greater or less patience.

But after Cold Run, which had its own long, strange trip to its current publication with Falstaff Books, I wasn’t sure what direction I wanted to go in. We’d already visited the trope of the retired spy being dragged back in from the cold, with the shady government agency that treats him like just another resource to be used up at their discretion. Did Cold Run work as a standalone book? Did it have series potential? And what would that series potential look like?

I’m a history nerd with a long reading list in 20^th century shenanigans, and one of the elements that stood out to me when learning about the arms race was the absolute amorality of the sprint to developing nuclear weapons. Project Paperclip showed that the mission to develop and keep the edge in the nuclear arms race against the U.S.S.R.

Without giving away spoilers for Cold Run (and if you haven’t read it, it’s available right here on the Literary Underworld), at the end, Rick Keller tries once again to disappear into the wilderness—but there are some loose ends that are going to eventually bring him back.

And those loose ends are directly tied to the fact that governments and extra-national organizations will, in the vast game of might-against-might, will do anything they need to or can do to pursue that edge in race for the bigger and better weapon.

Even if it ends up destroying them.

Keep running!

Vegas Run, the sequel to Cold Run, is now out and available for purchase here at the Underworld, as well as from Falstaff Books. (And I guess you could buy it from other places, too, but if you’re here, you probably enjoy supporting indie authors and publishers.)

There’s a bunch of themes and topics I’ve been thinking about while planning out the rest of the series. Vegas Run is where I went hard on the theme of found/chosen family. It’s the book where I worked through my feelings about the decision to leave the military and what that would look like. (Spoiler alert – I immediately joined the Reserve because, like my main character, I am a masochist.)

Vegas Run also has a few hints as to where the next books in the series will go. And, I have to say, the final climactic sequence was immensely satisfying to write.

But of all the different plot twists and characters introduced and various themes touched on, I kept coming back to the idea of how far people will go to pursue power and a technological edge, even if the final weapon has the capability to wipe us off the face of the earth, along with whatever group of them we’re demonizing and othering at the moment.

But pace yourself…

When I pitch my series to readers, I tell them it was written by someone who grew up in the Cold War and served in the global war on terror, and enjoy reading spy and thriller novels—but always wished they had a werewolf.

When my publisher pitches the book, he pitches it: “If Joe Ledger were a werewolf, he’d be Rick Keller.”

The arms race never went away. The desire for power and strength and pursuing the technological edge to keep that power and strength never went away.

As Vegas Run launches, and I work on finishing up the third book in the series, Trial Run, it reminds me that when faced with the banal malevolence of large entities embarked on the quest for absolute power, the only thing that can throw dirt in the gears of the machine is finding the people who will be your family and stand with you—and hand you another handful of dirt.

I hope that the folks who have given the series a chance will enjoy the ride, and that if you—like me—get nostalgic for a little Spy vs. Spy—with werewolves!—you’ll check out the series. And take care of yourselves and your chosen and found families.

RACHEL A. BRUNE graduated from the NYU Tisch School of the Arts in 2000, and was immediately plunged into the low-stakes world of entry-level executive assistantship. Her unexpected journey out of that world and into the military is chronicled in her self-published book Echoes and Premonitions. Rachel served five years as a combat journalist, including two tours in Iraq, and a brief stint as a columnist for her hometown newspaper. After her second tour, she attended graduate school at the University at Albany in NY, where she earned her M.A. in political communication, and her commission as a second lieutenant in the military police corps.

Although her day job has taken in her in many strange, often twisted directions, Rachel continues to write and publish short fiction. She released her first novel, Soft Target, in early 2013, and other books have followed. In addition to writing, she is the founder and chief editor at Crone Girls Press and edits the Falstaff Dread line of horror fiction at Falstaff Books.

Some debts you can’t outrun.

An unprovoked attack destroys Rick Keller’s refuge and sends him back to civilization. Adrift, alone, his past reaches out to him as the agency he escaped–and the old Soviet spook he almost didn’t–call in their debts. His choice: work with MONIKER one more time, or face the rest of his life on the run.

From the snows of the north to the sand of the Las Vegas strip, Rick finds himself enmeshed in a web of old alliances and new, as his team heads out on the trail of the latest development in the supernatural arms race. While Rick has been hiding in the north country, MONIKER has been building a supernatural army. No matter how fast or far he runs, it won’t be enough. This time when they call him in, they don’t need an agent–they’re eliminating the competition.

This time, he’s going to burn them to the ground.

I remembered I was an artist

By Elizabeth Lynn Blackson

I need to tell you a secret: I am a fraud. I’m a complete fake. I don’t have a degree in English. I have no piece of paper declaring myself competent. Nothing.

I’m no author.

That’s the voice of my harshest critic: me.

Stephen King has been quoted as saying “If you wrote something for which someone sent you a check, if you cashed the check and it didn’t bounce, and if you then paid the light bill with the money, I consider you talented.”

Damn. That quote is a powerful tool against my raging Imposter Syndrome, and frankly, it’s something I occasionally dearly need to hear.

There is this long, terrifying space in the process of writing. Not the slap-dash first draft. Not the hours of honing, or reading and rereading, looking to spackle plot holes closed. Not going through dialogue, looking for opportunities to strengthen character through their voice. Not researching absurd facts, like whether a Glock 17 has a last-round hold-open on the slide.

When you buff and polish, and format and publish and then…

Then you wait. And you hope for positive feedback. And you get… not much. Sometimes none. If you’re lucky enough to have a few reliable beta readers, whatever momentum you got from their enthusiastic cheering fades, and you wait.

I finished an entire trilogy of urban fantasy/horror novels collectively known as “The Suffering Sequence.” And then…

Nothing.

I don’t know how to market. Maybe worse, I do not wish to learn. I HATE the face-forward portion of this process. If I felt fake calling myself an author, I feel doubly so trying to be my own hype-woman. “Read my stuff. I’m amazing.”

I hate the ‘elevator pitch’ and the ‘back cover blurb.’ I hate selling myself as an author, but unless I plan to magically find funds to hire someone else to do it, I’m… stuck.

I’ve written over a million words of fiction: seven entire novels, co-authored two other novels, only four of which ever saw the light of day. I’ve DNFed several more novels around the halfway mark. I have written three other novellas, which are frankly fan-fic, but (I feel) important building blocks to longer works. I have also written a fair bit of short fiction, enough at least for several collections.

Minus one novel written with Scrivener, all of them have been created in simple word processing programs. I’m writing this using Google Docs, which is what I used to write the entire “Suffering Sequence” trilogy.

I have had issues with finding cover artists, editors, publishers, and at every turn it’s felt like the world conspired against me to place barriers to completion. Add frustration, impatience, and lack of funds to the Imposter Syndrome.

In the early 90’s, I was working with a friend on small press comics. While sitting at a booth, selling our wares, there was another artist next to us, and we struck up a conversation. The topic wandered to the parts of the process that are in our control, and the difficulty of the whole process. He said, paraphrased, that it was a lot of effort even to make garbage. That notion has stuck with me. Even in the age of print on demand, creating a finished book is a lot of work.

After having a cover artist’s delay in getting his assignment completed, I became gun-shy of farming out ANY part of the process.

That’s when I remembered something that I frequently shove aside in the mad dash toward monetization of any skill: I make art. I write. I create fonts. I draw and I paint.

I remembered that even if I was reduced to a physical spiral-bound notepad and Bic pen, I would still write and draw.

I painted the cover image of my latest collection with poster paint from Dollar General. I might complain mightily, but I still create. It seems to be an innate part of me, and budget constraints are only limiter as to what tools I use.

When I pulled my head out of the mire of depression, I remembered I was an artist.

ELIZABETH LYNN BLACKSON grew up in a small town in Eastern Ohio, living on a steady diet of comic books, horror movies, and Stephen King novels, while playing D&D and listening to heavy metal. It twisted her into the maniacal creature you now see before you. While certain she was going to be a comic artist, life pulled her in a different direction, and she ended up in the St. Louis metro area, where she lives with her hubby and two cats. Check out her work on the Literary Underworld!

This is Your Brain on Story

By Kathy L. Brown

The Story of Us

Unless we are some sort of Zen master of mindfulness, for good or ill most of us walk around all day immersed in the story in our head. We converse with ourselves or imaginary people. We react to events, parse their meaning, and fit them into patterns of our own creation. Each of us stars in our own story for an audience of one.

The late neurologist Oliver Sacks has written extensively on the subject. We seem to be hardwired to find patterns and impose sense on this narrative we call life. We unconsciously amend the objective facts to make a “better” story: More dramatic, more interesting, or just to “earn the ending.” Events really can’t be random and meaningless, right? And that pattern-finding instinct comes into play as we see images in random patterns, from clouds to grilled tortillas.

We Love Some Oxytocin

Human brains produce oxytocin, aka “cuddle hormone,” when we feel trusted or receive a kindness. It increases our empathic abilities–insight into other people’s emotional states–and thus makes cooperation more likely. (Fun fact: Oxytocin triggers the let-down reflex for nursing mother’s milk flow.)

Dr. Paul Zak’s brain chemistry research at Claremont Graduate University took blood from test subjects before and after they heard a narrative. Character-driven stories were associated with increased oxytocin levels. And more oxytocin is associated with more cooperation. Researchers have found stories—”experiential products”—provide happiness, just like real-life experiences.

“Collaborate or Die”

Proto- and early humans had to get it together, literally, or die. An individual naked ape had little chance in the wild. One thesis of social development cites the power of empathy—internalizing another creature’s observed experience and reacting to it as one’s own.

This instinct lead to banding together and cooperative behavior. It helped all member of the group get “on the same page,” as it were. Early cave paintings hint at an oral tradition of storytelling that harnessed the group’s experience: A powerful bonding tool.

The Power of Story

As biologist Nathan Lents points out, “We cannot feel empathy for data.” A character-driven, emotional rich narrative is remembered more accurately later and is more likely to change behavior. Marketers and educators tap this aspect of human psychology. When I was in graduate school, I used a case study for a presentation on health behavior principles. My patient had worked hard as a coal miner all his life. He’d played hard, too. He loved the nightlife, beer, and cigarettes. When we meet, he had end-stage lung disease. Medicines were barely helpful, and the disease would slowly but inevitably destroy his lungs, each breath a labored gasp. But then, he was put on the wait list for lung transplant.

See what I did there? This expository piece turned into a story about a poor dude who couldn’t breathe. Maybe it’s a little more interesting now, as the oxytocin-driven empathy kicks in.

Because story links directly with our emotions, the connection is stronger and faster. The facts don’t have to convince us of the superiority of a particular brand of chewing gum: when we see a sweet, one-minute story about a man, his growing daughter, and the bond between them symbolized by a chewing-gum wrapper collection, we not only want gum, we also want the “gum experience” of love and family devotion.

This blog was originally published on 6/7/2019 at The Storytelling Blog.

Kathy L. Brown lives in St. Louis, Mo. and writes speculative fiction with a historical twist. Her hometown and its history inspire her fiction. When she’s not thinking about how haunted everything is, she enjoys hiking, crafts, and cooking for her family. Montag Press published the first novel in her Sean Joye Investigations book series in 2021. Follow her social media platforms: Instagram at kathylbrownwrites, Facebook at kbKathylbrown, and Twitter at KL_Brown. The Storytelling Blog lives at kathylbrown.com.

Wearing many hats as writers

By Diana Morgan

For years, I’ve struggled to maintain a consistent blog or newsletter. Between having ADHD and feeling like I have nothing to say, it’s seemed an impossible task. But there is one other thing besides fiction writing I’ve always wanted to do: write media reviews and commentaries.

As writers, we often wear many hats to connect with our readers, we’re selling ourselves as much as our stories. We’re publicists, social media influencers, activists, and so much more. Our jobs are often to sell so much more than just our words. It’s difficult and overwhelming at times. We’re always looking for new ways to connect to our readers and share our passions with the world.

One way I’m doing that this year: I’m launching a Patreon. Regular content includes movie and TV show reviews and a general blog. Eventually, I’ll add paid content, including serial fiction, short stories, and other sneak peeks at my writing.

I’m still hard at work on Lost Colony book 2, now titled, Retributions. Keep reading for a quick teaser or check out my website for further details.

Saving the Colony hasn’t made life easier for Livia Icini. But when a soldier turns up dead, Livia is the prime suspect, and the entire Colony is ready to see her banished. But the murder is just the beginning; an old enemy has found her, and he’s brought the Aveeys with him to bring the universe crashing down around her.

Jacob Moorland doesn’t care about Livia’s past. He just wants her to run the hospital so he can use his skill as a surgeon to help as many people as possible. When Aveeys attack, he ends up a prisoner to pirates, he has no choice but to adapt and survive in ways he never thought possible.

Revenge is served cold in space.

Follow me on Patreon for more.

DIANA MORGAN is a superhero by day, writer by night. Okay, not really, but when she’s not writing books, she’s a librarian at a local library, which is kind of a superhero. Her superpowers include always knowing what kids like to read, being able to read more than 10 books at one time, and the ability to eat more pizza than anyone.

Diana has always loved science fiction and fantasy. She grew up watching Quantum Leap, Power Rangers and Star Wars. She can’t remember a time when she wasn’t making up stories.

She was a geek before being a geek was cool, and she loves hanging out with other geeks and sharing her love of all things space and magic and books.

BLACKFIRE RISING has shambled to Literary Underworld

By Elizabeth Donald

I’m happy to announce that Blackfire Rising has finally been resurrected, and is now shambling your way via the Literary Underworld.

Longtime readers know that the Blackfire series has been going on for 15 years in various forms, beginning with a novella published by Sam’s Dot Press and continuing through novels, short stories and another novella, published a few years ago by Crone Girls Press. Now the good folks at Falstaff Books have picked up the series, and our first release collects all the Blackfire pieces into one volume with some new stories and a look forward at what might be ahead for Sara Harvey and (what’s left of) her team.

It was an experiment. A way to create a better soldier. Colder, more efficient.

But some things shouldn’t be altered, and some creatures are best left to myth. The dead know no peace, and they are coming for Sara Harvey.

Sara has faced the Cold Ones again and again, losing friends and comrades in a running battle to keep the world safe from the monsters released by an experiment that should never have happened. Again and again, Sara is drawn back into Blackfire, as it hunts the things that hide in the shadows.

The clock is ticking, and the slaughter has begun.

And you shouldn’t have to pray to just stay dead.

From award-winning horror author Elizabeth Donald comes a compendium of the entire Blackfire series… so far.

Blackfire Rising is published in ebook, trade paperback and hardback. Preorders are on their way and will be shipped as soon as they’re in our hands. If you didn’t preorder, feel free to order right away! If ordering through Literary Underworld, you can have it signed upon request – be sure to indicate it in your checkout.

And you can join me on Monday for a live Zoom chat where I will read selections from the book, talk about its weird shambling journey to resurrection, what might be coming in the future for this series, and also pass the bourbon. Click here to RSVP on Facebook, or if you eschew the book of face, you can register at EventBrite. The Zoom link will be shared closer to the event.

Where to buy the book:

Many thanks to the awesome folks at Falstaff Books for their fine work on this book, even making me fix all those em dashes. Special thanks to Rachel Brune, editor extraordinaire (and fellow Underlord!), and publisher John Hartness for their hard work and patience and faith in this series.

I have had so much fun with this book in all its iterations. I hope you enjoy it just as much as I enjoyed writing it.

How art can be a protest

By Alexander Brown

While art is primarily for the artist, it can be a Trojan horse for the audience. Although works produced for commerce can still evoke emotion in the consumer, nothing is as raw as an artist who creates to reflect the horrors of society. As the general public suffers under an administration that only cares for its own well-being, and an audience that screams that the smallest fraction of diversity in entertainment is “woke,” wokeness in art has existed since the dawn of time. Yet, the general public has refused to acknowledge its existence.

To give a popular reference that the majority should be familiar with, there is Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. This gothic classic deeply resonates with classism, feminism, race, and even queer culture. Consider Frankenstein’s “monster,” who began as docile and only wanted love and acceptance. But rather than having gained that, he was literally feared for no other reason than his identity. Sound familiar?

Another fine example is Toni Morrison’s Beloved. This Pulitzer Prize-winning masterpiece, which takes place shortly after the American Civil War, explores the horrors of slavery and racism through a paranormal lens. And since the ghost serves as a vehicle to remind us of a traumatic past, what better way to focus on these subjects than to present it as a ghost story? To show the impact of this novel, even in 2021, Republicans tried to use it under the guise of propaganda to justify their prejudice against the critical race theory.

Another fine example is Bret Easton Ellis’s American Psycho. This splatterpunk classic reflects the horrors of the 1980s, where the monster of Corporate America was projected onto the ruthless antagonist, Patrick Bateman. In this shocker, not only did he murder those who were his competition, but he brutalized women, minorities, and those who were underprivileged for an extensive amount of page time. Meanwhile, he continued to financially thrive in a society of Reaganomics. What better way to humanize Corporate America by giving it the traits of a sociopathic narcissist?

Other great examples can be seen in the work of Octavia Butler and her series known as the Xenogenesis trilogy, which focuses on colonization. Then there’s Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale, which warns against totalitarianism. Also, we have Poppy Z. Brite’s Exquisite Corpse, which explores the suffering of those in LGBTQ+ community when they are shunned.

Something all of these books have in common, aside from being outstanding literature, is they are all Trojan horses that comment on society in one form or another. For the most part, the general public has accepted them as a form of entertainment and nothing more. Yet, if one were to look harder, they would see that these pieces, and many others, have acted as a protest against a world where movements are few and far between. The reason why one has to look hard for these subjects is that a good artist knows how to show and not tell. In other words, they present without proselytizing or pandering.

If done right, art can be a protest; the artist a protester and documentarian. A source that can act as a creative liver. One that processes vital subjects into a format so its consumers can develop a deeper level of sympathy for those who are different from themselves, or empathy for those who feel alone in their struggles.

To create good art, not only should it entertain, but it should also evoke emotion, whether that emotion be positive or negative. The only way to do that is to produce unforgettable characters in a concept that reflects our own reality. Regardless of what medium one chooses to express themselves in, what better time than now, 2025, to create something that reflects the external horrors of everyday life? Don’t be afraid to be woke with your art; use it as a protest, even if the end result is just as nihilistic as the ending of a Bachman book.

ALEXANDER S. BROWN is a Mississippi author whose first book, Traumatized, was published in 2008 and later re-released by Pro Se Publications. Brown is co-editors/coordinator of the Southern Haunts anthology series published by Seventh Star Press. His horror novel, Syrenthia Falls, was published by Dark Oak Press. His short story collection The Night the Jack O’ Lantern Went Out, published by Pro Se Press, reached bestseller status in three literary categories on Amazon.com upon release. Brown is the author of multiple young-adult steampunk stories found in the Dreams of Steam anthologies, Capes and Clockwork anthologies, and Clockwork Spells and Magical Bells. His more extreme works can be found in the anthology Luna’s Children, published by Dark Oak Press; Reel Dark, published by Seventh Star Press; and State of Horror: Louisiana Vol. 1, published by Charon Coin Press. Brown is also an actor and producer in the short film The Acquired Taste, inspired by a story in Traumatized and directed by Chuck Jett.

Welcome to the new age, and I’m radioactive…

By Angelia Sparrow

I’m writing this on Jan. 21, my sister’s 53^rd birthday, the day before my mother would be turning 79.

Yesterday, That Man (Southern for “the Enemy”) was sworn in again as president. He wasted no time in decreeing that there is only male and female, and the sex you are born is the sex you must present all your life.

Fascists always go after trans folks first. The very famous Nazi book burning photo was taken at the Magnus Hirschfeld Institut für Sexualwissenschaft, that is the Institute for Sexual Science, which was doing research on all branches of sexuality and had done some of the earliest gender-affirming surgeries.

The rest of the QUILTBAG is on the hit list, along with ethnic and racial minorities, women, and non-Christian religions. It’s not a good time to be an openly queer author who writes explicit same-sex romances.

Amazon has started hiding such books from the search engine. Pre-emptory compliance.

It’s all of a piece with Don’t Say Gay Laws and book censorship in schools and libraries. Now, bear in mind, when I say censorship, I’m not referring to the library purchaser’s decisions on what to buy for the collection. No library can afford all the books published in a year, and not every book is needed for every collection. An engineering college will need much different books than a general public library.

I am talking about outside forces telling a library they may not keep a book on their shelves. Usually because someone must Think of The Children.

It’s a scary time right now. We don’t know what is going to happen exactly or when. We know things like this can move very fast. The Hirschfeld book burning took place May 6, after the January 30 inauguration. The first concentration camp opened 2 months earlier, in March.

Some writers I know have quit writing, and quietly pulled their books. They have stepped away from social media, some even deleting theirs. They have families to worry about, jobs and more. That’s fine. We do what we need to do to survive. Many members of my church are planning to relocate to Minnesota this summer, for much the same reason.

I’ve considered it. I’m in a position professionally where Nick Rowan and Dean O’Bedlam (my drag persona) could vanish into the ether. I can write cozy mysteries about bakery owners finding dead bodies while walking their dogs. Or whimsical fantasy. Or anything without sex.

But personally, I am in a position where I can’t. I’m queer. I am out, proud and a little loud. A lot of people don’t like the word, but it’s the only one that works. My wife of 35+ years is a trans woman. My husband of almost 10 years is a trans man. My daughter-in-law is part Hispanic. My grandsons are Native. Both of the active priests in my church, plus many of the congregation are trans. We are all squarely in the crosshairs.

And I have forgotten the cardinal rule: Don’t draw fire, it annoys everyone around you.

One of the tenets of my Primali faith is Divine Defiance. It is my sacred duty to stand there, in the crosshairs of this regime, stick my tongue out, waggle my hands in my ears and sing scurrilous songs. The Bardic Right of Ridicule has never been revoked.

I haven’t published anything for a couple of years. I’ve written a few things. But after the election, my writing seemed to kick into high gear and I am hard at work on a super-spicy piece for next December and a couple of novels. Nothing terribly exciting to share yet, but you will hear when it happens.

For now, keep your eyes open, your ears sharp. Stay alert. Hinder where you may.
And remember: Granny Witch Loves You.

Angelia Sparrow is opting to stand tall. (as if she actually has any options on that front). You can follow her on Facebook here. There is also her crafting partnership, The Travelling Tinkers. She is valarltd on Pinterest, Threads, BlueSky, Mastadon and LiveJournal; WitchGrannyAngel at TikTok.

A fungus amongus

By Rachel Brune

Crone Girls Press has published horror for five years and counting at this point, but it was only until a year or so ago that I realized we were an independent press whose books were not available through most independent bookstores. And so, with our latest release, Dark Spores: Stories We Tell After Midnight Volume 4, we’re focusing on giving our readers options.

An Inherent Contradiction

When I started Crone Girls Press, I knew a good deal about what makes a good story, how to cajole my connections to provide me with a good story, and how to work with an author to make a good story even better. From the time we published the first volume of Stories We Tell After Midnight, I have learned a lot about how to be a better editor, coach, mentor, friend, and anthologist.

The thing I wished I knew, back in 2019, was limiting it could be to publish exclusively on the Big River Site. I listened to podcasts and followed author groups that recommended rapid release and Kindle Unlimited exclusivity and various other Amazon-focused profitable techniques that made a lot of sense for publishing speculative fiction but, as I learned, had limited application to other genres and forms.

But still, publishing KDP was a place to start, and that’s where we began.

Genre Horror and a Punk Attitude

I’ve always pursued creative ventures. I had a band in college (shout out to Pop’s Basement), I enjoyed blogging and publishing interviews, and I have been writing songs, poems, and fiction for years. Through those years, I’ve seen various platforms that claim to support independent creatives come and go, from Lulu to CreateSpace to CDBaby to Bandcamp to Spotify for Podcasters and many more. The one element they all had in common was relying on creatives’ work to drive aggregate traffic to their platforms where they would parcel out pennies to the creator and bank the rest.

For book publishing, it seemed the same. Sure, we could strike up partnerships with collectives like The Literary Underworld (shoutout to The Underlords!) Or, we could consign books with certain bookstores, especially local indie shops. But for the most part, it seemed like the Big River Site was the only, or at least the best, way to go.

But was it?

Corporate monopolies aren’t very punk rock, and it seemed like an indie press like ours could put in the time and leg work to start growing an organic presence and giving readers an alternative to purchasing our works that weren’t (only) through their ’Zon accounts.

First Step—The Underworld

Elizabeth Donald was one of the first people I thought of when it came to horror. And shortly after we started publishing, she invited me to become part of the Literary Underworld. And in fact, this partnership contributed to the motivation to dig into how and where and why we were selling our work, and to do the leg work to understand more of how we could get away from sole reliance on Amazon.

Take a look over at the Underworld catalogue. You’ve got all genres from horror to sci-fi to urban fantasy to romance. You can find some of my personal titles there (Cold Run and Side Roads), as well as a number of Crone Girls Press titles, a few of which contain familiar Underlords in the tables of contents (Coppice & Brake, Tangle & Fen.) And, one sale of a title through the Underworld returns about three times the amount of an Amazon sale. (Punk rock might not be about profits, but book sales help keep the lights on.)

Next Step—The world! Muahahaha!

Dark Spores: Stories We Tell After Midnight Volume 4 is our first anthology in the series to follow a theme. We fell in love with the idea of mushrooms and fungus and mold and mildew creeping along in the dark underground, building and multiplying, until they extrude through the soil or the skin. The theme resonated with our authors who sent in tales of loneliness, isolation, and fear, as well as forced assimilation, willing submission to the darkness, and other fearsome fates.

As with our other projects, we looked for the widest and deepest variety of voices and perspectives that we could invite, seeking unique ways of looking at life—or death, as the case may be.

And, with this volume, we are doing our best to offer different ways of inviting the spores into your library. (We realize that’s possibly not the best way of putting it…)

First, you will be able to order the anthology through The Literary Underworld.

Or, and this is our second-favorite way, you can head to your local bookseller, especially if you have a local bookstore you enjoy frequenting, and order it through them.

Finally, you could order it through a link on the book page on our website.

Feeling a little short on funds? Aren’t we all… Not to worry! My local library has a link where we can request a book, whether through Interlibrary Loan, or for the library to purchase the book. If yours has a similar link, fill it out and let’s spread our spores through the public library system!

Many thanks to Elizabeth Donald and The Literary Underworld, who have been gracious supporters and partners to me and Crone Girls Press from the beginning. Thanks to everyone who has purchased one of our volumes through the Underworld, and especially, who has gone to their review site of choice and left some kind words for us. Here is to a future with more great books and wonderful partners—and lots of independent options for our readers.

The Big Cinch!

I’m Kathy L. Brown and delighted to join The Literary Underworld team! I write speculative fiction with a historical twist. My hometown— St. Louis, Missouri —and its history inspire my fiction.

A Sherlock Holmes story collection captivated me as a ten-year-old. If every tale must have a maker, I resolved to be a maker, too. I immediately wrote a knock-off Sherlockian story, which was greeted with wide critical acclaim (by my teacher). I was hooked, really. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle had ruined me for honest work.

However, I came of age in a tumultuous time. Despite the nascent women’s liberation movement’s encouragement, I convinced myself I had nothing to say to a world in upheaval. Thus, as a new college graduate, I landed a job as a book editor, an ideal pairing of my desire to read all day and a personality that picks at small details. Those skills served me well in a subsequent (and better paying) medical research career.

However, the need to make stories never truly left me. The haunted 1920s world of my book series, The Sean Joye Investigations, was conceived in a beginners’ creative writing workshop.

My supernatural noir stories’ gestation and birth took years. Meanwhile, I earned a creative writing certificate and wrote various fantasy stories for magazines and anthologies. Under my own imprint, I published two short Sean Joye adventures while working on a novel, The Big Cinch. Montag Press Collective published The Big Cinch in December 2021, and it is now available through The Literary Underworld website.

Currently, I’m polishing the next Sean Joye novel, The Talking Cure. We live in an exciting time for stories, and I want to be part of it all. My goals include produce stories in more formats, such as serials, audiobooks, and games. Check out the Sean Joye short stories and novellas at my website, kathylbrown.com.

The Big Cinch

The Big Cinch embeds readers in a magic-laced St. Louis, once known as Mound City, home of the indigenous Americans’ Mississippian ancestors. Little evidence of their civilization survives in 1924, apart from the popular Piasa monster image, invoked to sell plows as well as ornament civic pageants.

Sean Joye, a recent Irish immigrant, tried to avoid fae attention and ignore his magical abilities since childhood. A young veteran of 1922’s Irish Civil War, he aims to atone for his assassin past and make a clean life in America. Sean helps a wealthy, powerful, magic-dabbling family—founders of the most exclusive club in town, the Piasa Lodge—with a discreet inquiry or two. Sexually involved with a secretive, high-society flapper, he falls hard for her fiancé, a Great War flying ace with a few secrets of his own.

But Sean asks the wrong questions about a kidnapped toddler and missing Native American artifacts and becomes a suspect in his lover’s bludgeoning and a tycoon’s murder. Can he master the paranormal abilities he’s rejected for so long in time to protect the innocent and save his own skin?

The Big Cinch will appeal to a wide range of readers:

Fans of a wise-cracking mage, such as in Ben Aaronovitch’sThe Hanging Tree, Steven Blackmoore’s Dead Things, and Jim Butcher’s Skin Games
Lovers of secret societies who worship mysterious, supernatural forces, such as in Matt Ruff’sLovecraft Country, Victor LaValle’s Ballad of Black Tom, Cherie Priest’s Chapelwood, and China Mieville’s The Last Days of Paris
Supporters of fiction that reflects cultural and sexual diversity, such as in Anne Bishop’sLake Silence: The World of the Others and V.E. Schwab’s Shades of Light

Kathy L. Brown lives and writes in St. Louis, Missouri, USA. Her hometown and its history inspire her fiction. When she’s not thinking about how haunted everything is, she enjoys writing elaborate notes about her tabletop roleplaying games. Her supernatural noir novel, The Big Cinch novel won the 2022 Imadjinn award for best urban fantasy novel. Other stories in the Sean Joye Investigations world include The Resurrectionist and Water of Life. Kathy’s blog lives kathylbrown.com.