Things have been a bit rough recently. The day job is busy, the kid is back in school, multiple family members had some health stuff (all are fine now, thankfully), and my mental health isn’t the best. It’s what I like to think of as a crucible season; when the various elements in my life heat up and if I can survive it, I’ll make it out stronger (or I’ll just melt into a big puddle of goo, which is also sometimes necessary. (When I started this post this stuff was true but now it…isn’t as true.)

I have two novellas in the works. That’s all I can say right now but keep your fingers crossed for me.

I also recieved my Shirley Jackson nominee stone and award.

Someday I’ll have words for it. I suppose I’m just still in shock. I’m supposed to say that winning an award for writing has bolstered my confidence (it has), and that as one of the first Black people — fairly certain the first Black woman (I think?) — to win this particular award, I am [insert something]. I feel good and hopeful about my writing and I think that’s plenty. I’m mostly very grateful to the jurors and advisory board.

You should become a Patreon of Seize the Press so you can read their interview with me along with some absolute bangers of short fiction and reviews.

Here’s a list of writers and their works I’ve enjoyed recently: Livia Llewellyn (Furnace), Chris Kelso (Voidheads — you can read it for free at this link but you really should get the paperback here), CB Blanchard (Mycophilia) , Donyae Coles, Priya Sharma (Fabulous Beasts), Charlene Elsby (Violent Faculties — I also just discovered this interview with her and it makes me so glad), David Simmons (Djingo Bottom Bellfree — David also had a bomb ass story in the From Beyond Press anthology, This World Belongs to Us)

Death in the Mouth 2 Kickstarter — Please check out the Kickstarter for Death in the Mouth 2: Original Horror from the Margins, CAUSE I WANNA WRITE A STORY FOR IT — and other reasons. “DEATH IN THE MOUTH: Original Horror from the Margins is the second installment in our horror anthology series showcasing BIPOC and other ethnically marginalized writers and artists from around the world. It will feature 20 stand-alone prose stories spanning from the mythic past to the far future, cross between real and fictive worlds, and explore unique and unsettling manifestations of horror. Each story will also be accompanied by an original black and white illustration by a unique artist.”

Well, it’s very late here and while I’ve accomplished writing this blog post I had other stuff I was supposed to do and I…haven’t done it.

I hope you’re doing well.

So, I can’t do the perfect stuff. You won’t get that from me. But I do like keeping folks up to date and with the variety of social media platforms available (I have social media malaise, for real) Substack seems like the best way to reach everyone at once.

Which means that until my ADHD ass finds this consistency too boring, I’m going to try and post at least once a month near the end of the month with updates about various writing things. Or whatever I feel like it. I find the key for me is to just create something without thinking too much about categorization or placement.

Anyway, here’s a bunch of pictures from StokerCon 2023. The person I was before StokerCon and the person I was after StokerCon are two different people. It was that transformative. I met so many lovely people (I was at one point keeping track and I have a very long list on my phone but eventually I just gave up), some I’ve known for years on social media and others I had just recently met. I met SO MANY of my favorite writers and artists and readers and it was just a phenomenal time.

I’m sorry, I know I probably sound like I’m in a cult.

Has HWA ever come out and said they weren’t a cult?

WAKE UP SHEEPLE.

I am also pretty certain I was the third or fourth shortest person there. Certainly in the top five, probably.

Anyway, I was recently on the Dark Mind Podcast with Vince Midgard. It was a delightful discussion and Vince uncovered some rarely (if ever) discussed influences and inspirations for We Are Here to Hurt Each Other (Godless | Amazon).

The amazing Becky Spratford had some lovely things to say about “A Confession of Earwigs” in her recommendation/review of This World Belongs to Us: An Anthology of Horror Stories About Bugs: “Also of note “A Confession of Earwigs,” by Paula D. Ashe, a chilling, dark academia tale of love, revenge, and, of course, earwigs, told through emails.”

I particularly love the ‘dark academia’ designation, because the story absolutely is but I never thought of it that way. This collection slaps and you should request it at your library and/or purchase it. The bug book is available for purchase through From Beyond Press, and you should also checkout the Kickstarter for their next project, Escalators from Hell: Shopping Mall Horrors!

Gemma Amor wrote about being (deservedly) nominated for a BFA (British Fantasy Award) and I can very much relate to a lot of what she said in regards to both the Stoker nomination and winning the Shirley Jackson Award for Single-Author Collection. It’s all very surreal, but thank you to everyone who voted and makes those decisions.

Upcoming:

I’ll be making an appearance in an interview over on Seize the Press. I’ll let you know when it drops.

I’ll be making an appearance in an interview on Ivy Grimes’ Writing Thoughts. I’ll let you know when that drops, too.

I have a short story appearing in The Book of Queer Saints volume 2 and it is one of the most honest yet mean things I’ve ever written.

I’m exerting so much restraint right now by not blabbing about a development, BUT ALAS. There will be more news.

Anyway, I need to go write some actual fiction so thanks for reading and supporting thus far. I hope you’re doing okay. It’s rough out here.

ETA: I forgot something! My dear Shannon Barber took a goofy ass tweet of mine and spun a whole eldritch creepy mythos from it. I love it so much. Please check out their story, Hunter or Hunted.

We Are Here To Hurt Each Other was officially nominated for a Bram Stoker Award for Superior Achievement in a Fiction Collection. Literally every day since it has been announced I just have a moment of disbelief. The Stoker awards started when I was a kid and I remember noticing the stickers on books when I was a teen. I actively started looking for the nominees and winners when I was in college. So, the Stokers have been part of my life for quite some time and I’m just very very grateful for the opportunity to be part of HWA history!

Y’ALL THAT’S WILD ANYWAY

Writing Updates

I had a sudden burst of creativity last November and wrote:

I appreciate everyone who has commented on and shared the piece. While it was written relatively quickly (which is rare for me) it was another important step for me out of the ‘shadow’ of WAHTHEO. I don’t mean that in a negative way at all, the response to my collection has been UNBELIEVABLE (which I’ll discuss in an upcoming post — update: I still have plans for that post but no clue when I’ll write it, maybe such a thing is unnecessary, I don’t know) but after completing a big project I always think, “Welp, that’s it. I’ll never write anything worthwhile again.”

Y’ALL THAT IS CRAP. Don’t believe it for a second. I’m not sure where these garbage ideas come from other than insecurities and the after-effects of imposter syndrome, but they are wildly and almost comically untrue. That is all to say that the response to The Last Thanksgiving has been very affirming and helpful to me, so thank you!

Subs: I’ve had three pieces of fiction accepted for publication this year (2023); a Ligottian sci-fi flash piece called “Flesh, Porcelain, Steel” for Vastarien (which I subbed before accepting the associate editor position — and no I did not ‘accept’ my own work 😂). I was floored to get in, Vastarien has been a dream publication since I’ve learned of its existence. I have another bit of ominous flash for Hungry Shadows Press’ Deadly Drabble Tuesday which drops in May (I think?) and a story in This World Belongs to Us: An Anthology of Horror Stories About Bugs, which you can learn more about below.

I’ve been invited to several anthos (which is always nice). Here are a couple (there are more, I’ll share those as we get closer to their deadlines/reveals):

Cursed Morsels Press’ No Trouble At All (Please sign up for more info about the Kickstarter for the project here. Update: Kickstarter was funded and then some!)

From Beyond Press’ This World Belongs to Us (Update: This Kickstarter also funded (yay!) and we just got proof copies for review. If you’d like an ARC for review please email the publisher and editor, Mike Phillips (mike[at]frombeyondpress).

Last but not least, I am one of three featured authors for Medusa Haus’ Book of Queer Saints vol. II; alongside Sam Richards (Weirdpunk Books) and Alison Rumfitt (Tell Me I’m Worthless) and we *just* got funded yesterday and I cannot tell you how thrilled I am to be part of this project. Queer Saints v1 found me exactly when I needed it and I am so happy to be able to pay that forward.

Appearances

Why should people read your work?

Are you having a pleasant day? Do you wish to not? Have I got the fiction for you!

The lovely folks at This Is Horror interviewed me briefly for their Meet the Writer feature.

I was so thankful to be able to speak to Simon Bestwick and Gemma Files (!) from No Darkness But Ours, one of the best podcasts about creativity and horror out there. Part one is available now, I’ll update once parts two and three drop.

Finally, the fine gents at Horror Makes Us Happy (Steve and Chris) were so kind enough to have me on their AMAZING podcast and we chatted for…close to three hours. Once it’s available I will be sure to link it but y’all, PLEASE check out this podcast. I’m not kidding, it is a hidden gem of a show where they’ve asked some phenomenal questions of folks like Barbie Wilde, Josh Malerman, Hailey Piper, Sarah Langan, Lucky McKee, Spider One (yes, from PM5K), Phillip Fracassi…please please give them a listen.

Note: I signed up for Booklinker thinking I could link WAHTHEO on Amazon and Godless, but alas it would not let me link Godless. I love being on that platform as they really have something for everyone at INCREDIBLY affordable rates for ebooks. Check ‘em out if you haven’t done so already.

Whew. I’ve been writing this since January for some reason and I’m going to work on being a bit more consistent and not worrying so much about…well…everything.

Images: The Internet (Starry AI Generator – prompts by Gavin Bragdon, excluding final image by Paula D. Ashe) 

Special Thanks: Danielle Haspel and Christopher Ropes, for their feedback

Author’s Note: Initially, this was supposed to be a ‘funny’ little collection of vignettes inspired by that unmistakable ‘style’ of AI generated art: images of weird, smear-faced humanoids in uncanny settings. The vibes are always of both nostalgia and hyperreality, composite living spaces cobbled together from the digital detritus of forgotten photographs, served up as pseudomemories regenerated through automated comparison and collection.

I enjoy them for their eeriness. The method of their construction and the images themselves are the very stuff of ontological and hauntological nightmare. Who are these non-people in these not-houses eating not-food with their not-families?

They are (literal) bits of all of us. Every photograph ever uploaded returns to us in strange, shadowy assemblages, sometimes tweaked with the fantastical and otherworldly.

So, what started as something simple became something bigger and a bit more complicated. I hope for two things: 1.) That you ‘enjoy’ it (as best you can, you know how I do) and 2.) That you enjoy this holiday season. It is not lost on me that for many people, this is a painful time of mourning. Personal losses hit harder, gain a new sharpness during the holidays.

Please take care of yourself.

One last thing (I promise): originally I was going to hide this behind a paywall but I found the process too cumbersome. I value my work so if you get something from this tale, please pick up a copy of We Are Here to Hurt Each Other if you haven’t already, or share it as you see fit.

Thanks y’all and happy holidays.

Part 0: November 26th 2018

Hi everyone. I’m Sarah, Jess’ cousin. Sorry to post on her page but I’m not sure what else to do. I haven’t seen her in three days and don’t know how else to get a hold of her. She showed up at our place the day after Aunt Mary’s funeral a few nights ago. We talked for a while and then it got late, I went to sleep, and woke up the next day and she was gone. Sorry, this is scattered. I just don’t know what to do.

I’m sending this out in the hopes that maybe somebody, somewhere can help us find her. So far she’s only been gone three days but wherever she went…she left everything behind. Her job, her apartment, her car, her phone, laptop, and her cat. I only really knew about her life from here on Facebook, and mostly she just posted about the cat. That’s the part that really scares me, that she left him. “Please keep him safe, Sarah.” That’s the only handwritten note she left. It was in an envelope with some money, I guess for Silas’ care. (Before anyone asks I will be keeping him for the time being, Dave and I are pet people and we’ll take good care of him no matter what. He’s a sweet boy.)

Jess left her phone at my house the night before she went missing and I found everything below in a document she made. I’ll just say it, it knocked the breath out of me. There’s so much here I wanted to forget, so much I didn’t want to know. Please look at the images. You probably don’t want to invite this kind of stuff into your head anymore and I don’t blame you — I’ll admit I only looked at a few but you’ll learn why as you read — but I don’t know what else to do. I know now that there were a lot of us who grew up in Branson’s Ferry who caught glimpses of things we never should have seen. I learned real early on not to talk about it, to lie about it even. I wish Jess understood why I did the things I did. I wish I could tell her that I didn’t mean to leave her alone with it. We were kids and after what happened to Dad…I had to learn how to live inside my own self again and pretending things were different was the only way I knew how.

Anyway.

My cousin’s name is Jessica ‘Jess’ Fraser. She’s thirty-six or thirty-seven years old (I can’t remember her birthday, sorry) and she’s from Branson’s Ferry, Ohio. She’s white, about 5’7, somewhat overweight, with brown eyes and dark hair usually pulled back in a ponytail. She has a lip ring and a nose ring, I think. She usually wears a hoodie with the hood up. For reasons you’ll soon understand, there are no pics of Jess, save the one from when we were kids and the one at the end that isn’t all that helpful. As soon as I get a chance I’ll get someone to draw her so at least people have something to go on. Please feel free to contact me via private message and share this everywhere you can.

Whatever this is, I know she wanted folks to see it. If I couldn’t do anything else, I can at least do that for her.

Thank you.

Sincerely,

Sarah Caldwell

Part I: Thanksgiving 1986 

He posed with us just at the moment his presence lacerated the air. It was so fast we couldn’t even react. Aunt Tanya was telling everyone to ‘pipe down’ for the picture and then the world gasped and spoiled at the wound of his entrance. He appears in several family’s photographs from around here, dating back to the fifties, but only after they’ve been digitized. The negatives are as mundane as the ripples in canned cranberry sauce, but then you scan it and he’s there. And if your family’s standing in the picture he stands too and if like us you’re seated, he’s nestled behind the table like a sheepishly late visitor. Try it sometime, Ferry folk. It may not be him but it’ll be one of them, somewhere. Sometimes they’re hard to see but I honestly think they like being seen.

He could have materialized anywhere, why did he choose to sit between me and Sarah?

Sarah, Jesus.

One minute her dad’s copping a not-so-sneaky feel on his date and the next minute his grinning face is bubbling onto the back of her lilac sweater.

They tried to put Sarah in an institution but by then they were all full with ‘worse’ cases. Mom and Aunt Tanya never let me go with them, I had to stay home with her and Tanya’s worthless ass daughter, Beth-Ann. She was lazy teenaged lump on the couch while I watched Sarah. What the hell was a mildly traumatized seven old supposed to do with another — yet more severely — traumatized seven year old? Sarah was already messed up cause her mom died a little after she was born and then this. I guess Aunt Tanya and mom were at fault too. Anyway, all she did was stare at the walls and rock back and forth, chewing on the ends of her hair. It would get all slimy and look like straw. She’d forget sometimes and a bit of wet hair would brush her neck and she’d scream until she passed out. We took down all the pictures of Uncle Mike and Mom cut Sarah’s hair.

After that, like a lot of folks, we didn’t do Thanksgiving for a long time. All that was left to give thanks for were our distant relatives who died quietly and not in ribbons. Traditions can stifle as much as they comfort. Years wore on and we carried our brokenness in our own ways. The strangeness seeped in. And somehow, some of us forgot and celebrated Thanksgiving again.

Part II: Thanksgiving 1992

“The children won’t eat unless the meat’s still screaming.” The below picture isn’t of my family, but it was one of the more well-known ones when they started the inquest. I obviously didn’t know what that meant until a lady from CPS came to my school and asked me to tell her what was happening. I was eleven and we hadn’t celebrated anything in six years. “How do you know that? Ab—about the screaming? How do you know?” Only now does it occur to me how fucked up that was, but it was the nineties; I didn’t even tell my mom. Although, as long as my grades didn’t slip and I reminded her when the bottom shelf of the fridge was low on Little Kings, I could’ve set a dog on fire in front of her and she wouldn’t have cared. The CPS lady was so scared she could barely look at me. The printout trembled in her hand. Years later I saw the original; a bunch of greedy looking kids eyeballing a perfectly roasted turkey while their dad balanced the serving plate and chuckled. I did tell Sarah though, we were still close back then. “You don’t know?” She said, her eyes glassy from whatever meds my mom and Aunt Tanya gave her. I shook my head. “They ate that girl last Thanksgiving. Her dad skinned her alive and chopped her up and put her on a big plate. Those other kids were her brothers and sisters.” I shook my head. “How do you even know that, Sarah?” She shrugged. “Everybody knows that except the grownups, like how you knew that ‘the children won’t eat unless the meat’s still screaming.’ That’s what you told that lady, right?” My mouth opened and closed without sound. I hadn’t told Sarah that part. “We all know, Jess. The trick is to keep knowing.”

That night, I tossed and turned in bed and remembered that that missing girl, Rebecca Collier, had been in my kindergarten class and if I thought hard enough I could see familiar streaks of her even on a plate made heavy with her raw and marbled countenance.

Part III: Thanksgiving 1997

Sarah’s new boyfriend is named Dave and he’s too old for her and too weird but she’s sleeping again and even laughs sometimes so nobody says anything. It’s the third Thursday in November and we’re trying to just have a normal day but Dave comes over with a ‘duck’ he says he found near the lake behind his apartment complex. Everyone thinks its a duck but I can see what it isn’t and it cries with a child’s voice and says it remembers what Dave did to it when it was smaller. He lets it loose in our backyard and everyone laughs while it waddles around sobbing. My mom laughs so hard her drink sloshes out of her glass and she almost falls over trying to save it. I fucking hate Dave. Whatever he’s done to Sarah has made her forget and now I’m the only one who knows. I ask Dave what he did to it and he just chuckles like a moron and says, “I was just playing around.”

Every time he lies about it, I watch him grow an extra finger.

Part IV: Thanksgiving 2002

Noe wants me to go back to BF to visit with her folks for the holiday. She knows some of what I’ve seen, but I haven’t told her everything. We learned we had the same hometown during one of those stupid icebreaker sessions in an English class our sophomore year before I dropped out. We started talking and somehow didn’t stop.

I told her about Rebecca Collier and Sarah’s meds and why I don’t sleep. She said she had never experienced the same, but she always new something was ‘off’ about Badshit Fairy. But she wasn’t scared of me when I told her. She didn’t leave. In fact, not long after that she moved into my apartment.

I guess her family knows she’s queer and are okay with it, which is a relief. I don’t know if I want to see my family. I told my mom I’m a lesbian but she was hammered and hasn’t brought it up since. Aunt Tanya said she always knew (thanks) and she would keep praying for me (double thanks). Beth-Ann just rolled her eyes. Sarah said she was happy for me.

Sarah lives with Dave and they go to church and she tells everyone Uncle Mike had a particularly violent and fatal seizure at Thanksgiving dinner all those years ago. The kids who were around back then know this isn’t true but as adults they’re too worn down to care. My mom still won’t celebrate the holiday but she doesn’t celebrate much of anything anymore. The call center’s closed so I don’t have to work until Monday. I have no excuse and Noe knows it. I’m gonna take my own car, Noe can take hers. It’ll hurt her feelings but if my family freaks out or hers freaks out for whatever reason, I just want a way to get out of there fast. I’m being paranoid but…I don’t put anything past Thanksgiving.

It’ll be fine.

Her cousin Sharon brought it into their home like that. I felt my eyes grow wide and Noe looked at me and I know she saw it too, just for a second. The doors were wide open but she blinked and slammed them shut. It was too much. If you let that in you have to let everything else in and it never stops. I don’t believe in ghosts because people don’t haunt people. It’s the knowing that haunts you. She left me alone with her lovely, accepting family and the thing her cousin brought convulsing in its bowl. It shuddered and screamed, black skin rippling like dried pudding. They all laughed with mouths too wide as Sharon shoved her forearms into its cavity and pulled something living and infant-like from the carcass. They cheered. Noe reached over and grabbed my hand. Sharon shouted and set the infant-like thing into her shoulder. It stuck there in some impossible arrangement of physics. They all sat back down around the table and Noe gently pulled me back into my seat. “Almost forgot!” Sharon called, all chipper while the parasitic infant swiveled beside her like some awful goddamn parrot. The thing in the bowl gave one last spasm of afterbirth and from it floated a new face. Sharon put it on over her old face. The family picked up their drinks to cheer as Sharon sat back down, both her face and her infant misshapen and seeping. Noe looked at me and smiled, leaned over and said, “We never stopped celebrating because we cherish all his gifts. You could celebrate with us too, Jess.”

I tore my hand out of hers and ran to my car.

That night she called and I didn’t answer but she left a message I’ve never forgotten: “Hey, listen, I’m sorry about what happened. I should have told you what to expect but I didn’t think you’d come if you knew. I shouldn’t have lied and I’m sorry I did. You think you’re so alone, but you don’t have to be. You aren’t even, really! You know that, right? They can see us, all the time. We can only see them digitized for some reason. I don’t really understand it, but one of my cousins posted a family pic of us on Thanksgiving when we were kids and there was a man standing next to me and he had so many mouths with so many teeth. He visits every year and he brings us gifts. Blessings, really. And we’re so happy and I…Jess I want you to be happy too. The way you are just breaks my heart. You’re so sweet and funny, you could have such a good, full life. Even after what happened my parents still like you! The machine should have cut me off by now but it won’t, that’s another gift. Things bend the way I want them to. Not always, but sometimes. Especially around this time of year. I hoped for you, you know? I hoped for you and I thought that maybe he sent you to me. I’m not trying to scare you or anything, I just want you to know what you’re missing out on. You think you’re alone but you’re not. He could be there with you right now. I hope someday you look up and see him and I hope he sends you back to me.”

I’ll live in my car until I find a new place.

Part V: Thanksgiving 2018

Of course mom’s funeral was today. This day. It was the only day everyone was free and we figured since we didn’t celebrate it, it didn’t matter. I’m not sure how I’m meant to feel. It feels over. My pdoc says the med changes over last six months have yielded ‘remarkable results’. Namely that I’m not on the edge of losing my mind all the time. Thing is, I still see them. They’re everywhere now but they’ve become more selective about where and how they reveal themselves. I don’t know what it means . Honestly, the meds made it easy not to care.

Then mom got sick. I knew it would happen, that’s a guarantee with 30+ years of alcoholism under your belt. I knew it would happen but it still knocked me off my orbit.

Noe came to the gathering with her wife, which felt great (it didn’t). “I’m sorry about your mom.” She said after telling her wife to wait for her in the car. She was like a raven; all black iridescence and gleaming. All I could do is nod and then words came out of me that I meant but didn’t intend to say aloud. “He send you her, too?” Noe gave me a strange look that passed quickly. “No, no I don’t think so. But I waited for you, for a while. Longer than I should have.” One of Beth Ann’s litter bumped into me while running from one room to the next. I cursed at them and they just giggled and kept running. “Well, I guess this is what catching up with you is like, then.” She said and hitched her designer purse higher up on her shoulder. “Oh hey, sorry I’m not more entertaining at my own mother’s funeral. Get fucked, Noe.” She quirked her mouth and I knew exactly what she was going to say before she said it. “Oh we will. After dinner with the folks. We came back to celebrate the holiday and I heard about your mom and wanted to pay my respects. I shouldn’t have bothered.” I stared out the window instead of looking at her. Her Beamer was like a spaceship trapped in a junkyard. I heard her walk away and then she stopped . “Take a look at yourself sometime Jess. You know how I mean.” I turned to her then. “Why do you think you could see them in the first place?” She left finally and it felt like a knife sliding out. Someone else soon filled the space with idle chatter and awkward sympathy.

Her words hounded me all night until the next morning. I took a pic of myself with my phone for the first time.

And the last.

The End