Ash Vale Updates: September 2025
Kickstarter is Live!!!
It’s here! It’s happening! The OTHERSIDE Kickstarter campaign is live!!!
And, uh, we’ve actually hit our base funding AND one of our stretch goals? I’m completely, absolutely blown away, walking through the world in a bit of a fog. Thank you, thank you, thank you, and if you haven’t backed—maybe consider it? We have some cool rewards, and you’d have the benefit of knowing you’re backing queer art in a world entirely hostile to it at the moment.
Writing
Out Now
Heyyyy I have a story in an anthology that’s out TODAY!! This is an anthology of reproductive horror, which couldn’t be more fitting with some of the political turmoil happening in the U.S.
My story, “Fireweed, Ferns, and Moss,” is about two midwives in a dystopian, wildfire-riddled Alberta who are trying to deliver a baby and collect the placenta before the police catch them.
It’s dark, and a bit scary, and looks at control of reproduction and who’s allowed that power when birthrates fall. Have a small sample to entice you to buy:
“We’ve heard whispers for so long from other birth workers; that afterbirth, the placenta, planted under a living tree, might heal the rotted ground and sulphur sky. Mother Earth is eager to accept lifeblood and return it tenfold.
I have never seen a tree.”
Sales/Updates
I’ve actually made two sales since my last newsletter, which means it’s been an incredibly productive month somehow! One of them I can’t talk about quite yet (soon, hopefully), but the other is a sale to Die Laughing Magazine! They bought my ridiculous horror comedy “mushrooms are eating people, but it’s told through academic journal article comments” story. Which also has the longest title I’ve ever written.
It should be out October 31st, so hopefully next newsletter I can let you know where to grab a copy!
In Progress
Short stories have really been on the back burner as I try to get through this latest draft of my book. My plan as of now is to finish the draft by the end of the year (I hope, send up a prayer for me), let it sit for a little while and I can work on some other things, and then get back into the 3rd draft which will go to beta readers. Whew. A lot of work!
Short Story Recs
This story by Nadia Radovich in Flash Fiction Online (best read on desktop if possible as it has some fun formatting) is a strange, delirious trip through gendered decision-making if you’re Silence, and your father has raised you as a son, and you have a gun.
This story! This fucking story! If you love toxic yuri and giant mechs, this story from Claire Jia-Wen is for you. It deals with a planet that hosts fights between massive generated mecha monsters and the people who create them, with a main character who could do good if she wanted, but instead will do anything to keep from being lonely. And isn’t that painfully relatable?
Reading
All the Hearts You Eat by Hailey Piper (vampires/lgbt/gothic horror)
Watching
Gilmore Girls re-watch because for some reason it’s eternally a fall show for me.
