With December coming on, it’s unreal to think that another year has slipped by.

To be totally honest, it’s been a bad year for writing. I’ve published, I’ve editted, and I’ve stared down the blank page like it was a thing with snaggle teeth, dripping in rank drool, hungry for the flesh of my mind.

Whenver I start to write, things go one of two directions: sideways or nowhere at all.

So last night, I started a free write just to see what happened. It wasn’t quite a poem, but it wasn’t quite a journal session either. It was allowed to be whatever it was. Here it is:

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The way they smiled was magnetic, undeniable, like a perfect mathematical equation. Stunning–a sunset on fire in ember orange and pastel pink.

The truth of their fingertips on my arm was an electric current straight across my heart. Dangerous in the way a wild fire is: too hot to even comprehend.

Their eyes were oceans after bitter storms. Their breath, the warming air of a tropical storm. In their gaze, the world was exactly as it should be. Not a modicum wrong. Not a molecular particle out of place.

I say “was” and “were.”
Did you catch that?

Death is an unforgiving educator of lessons we had no intenion of learning. Cruel, relentless, and vengeful. After blood, but no one understands why.

Our last days were some of our best, basking in the joy and fulfillment we had no way of knowing was about to be ripped away. Even after you’d gone, reality would not sink it. The truth would not settle. The unalterable *certainty* that we belonged together in that suspension of utter bliss for a lifetime could not be shook free. Details and reality be damed.

Life be damned.

Two years surely could not have passed yet.
And still.
The calendar speaks a truth my heard cannot–will not consume.

All I feel is loss now.
Joy is caught in brief snatches, but as in a phobic animal, it only ever lives on the defense. Bated breath, elevated heart rate, increased cortisol, and wide dilated eyes.

Joy no longer sleeps soundly through the night, but it doses in feverish sweaty fits. It wakes in lurches and starts. Incapable of dreams; it is never well rested or at ease inside me.

It no longer preens and rarely eats. It cannot care for itself or perform routine maintenance. It seeks no enrichment and barely shifts from one foot to another unless in a spooked panic to escape.

It is a rescued animal I cannot rehabilitate, unfit for the wild, incompatible with a quiet protected life. It thrashes against the jagged confines of its shattered confines inside my ruination of a heart.

It bred once, readily and free, with enthusiasm and all its instincts intact. Now, it only sits and stares. It will never breed again. Should all the external conditions be met, it now only barbers itself. It plucks out the barely rooted pinfeathers of hope and chews them to shreds. It mutilates its own shape and form until it’s so unrecognizable that we cannot call it joy anymore.

I have tried with all my strength to chase some shadow of the way it had once been, but every version of this life without you in it remained pallid and disappointing. Every color is dulled, sensations numbed. All I feel is the sharp and angry fear of losing again. Immobilized by the dreads that I might also lose those who have come to cram themselves collectively into the hole you left behind.

I can no longer tell if life is a hollow lie because I’m doing it all wrong or if it’s because I’m meant to keep doing it without you.

The loss will never fit, but I cannot return the unfitness of it.

I’m stuck, and you aren’t here to help me move through like you used to. So I chase the fading echoes of my own voice calling for you while the memory of your voice fades…fades…fades away.

And the hole does not close. Only the vacuum grows.

Somewhere, will there ever be a speckle of starlight?

Or will I learn to see in the dark?

This has been a strange year. A real mixed bag.

I kicked the year off by beginning to put collections of short stories together and making my first ever print books. It was really successful from a production side of things. My audience remains…nonexistent. But, if what everyone keeps telling me is true, one day this is all going to blow up. If nothing else, I’ll just keep doing it, and maybe that will mean enough in the end.

It means enough to me at this point in time, and that’s enough for now.

Then, right when I felt like I was hitting a new stride after the shattered gait that 2020 left me and my career in– I decided to go back to school. I chose a program that would steal every gram of my energy, sap all the joy from my bones, and leave me with no time to do more than the bare minimum. At the same moment this happened, I ran out of backlogged short fiction and needed to write new content in order to continue the year of collections.

Those two things did not go well together, obviously.

And so, the collections have dried up. My creativity has withered. And I’m constantly exhausted but without feeling like I’ve done work that I’m proud of.

Needless to say, things are going to change. And with that change, I hope to bring forth new fiction. Not that any audience is waiting for it (yet). It’s more of a personal goal, and that’s fine for now. If I do it for anyone, I’m doing it for myself and for the future. Sometimes, that has to be enough.

It’s enough for now.

<3 RR

It’s time for a little bit of frank honesty.

The past several years have been hard. Emotionally, financially, socially, and career-path-wise. It’s been storm after storm, but I’m proud to say that I’m still here, weathering it all with something like a grin.

The last post I made was back in 2019 before the world effectively fell to pieces. It feels like ages ago since I was on the cusp of making a splash in the CON world.

Then, things went south. Or rather, they dropped off a cliff. My one regular gig fell through when Heart’s Kiss stopped publishing. All the Cons got cancelled. I lost direction and focus. And for a while, I just sort of sat on my creative hands because I really couldn’t think what else to do.

At the same time, I’d started rescuing and rehabilitating small parrots, and that really took a driving seat in my world. It’s been a work in progress learning to balance both directions of my passion, but in 2020, I decided that it was time to take on a diferent pace.

With what is now 30 small parrots, I’m far less mobile. And, after things hit a running wall in the traditional publishing world, I decided to switch focuses for a while and flesh out my own publishing company.

Weathered Ocean Feathered Sky Press has been quietly publishing my short fiction for going on two years now, and I’ve learned a lot along the way. Covers, back cover copy, pricing, formatting, genre-appropriate fonts…the list goes on! Currently, it’s a one person operation with the guidance of a few really wonderful other professionals, but I’m hopeful that one day, we’ll be able to expand and begin publishing collections, anthologies, and new authors. So, stay tuned.

And, in the meantime, things continue to progress. Quietly at times, but steady. A trickle at a time to, one day, fill the ocean.

My first time ever on a panel at a convention, and they put me on FIVE! I couldn’t be more excited and pleased. The panel choice is excellent, and I am truly honored to be paneling with all of the following amazing fellow writers and professionals.

In addition to the following panels, I will also have a display up in the art displays room (not sure where that is yet!) titled Wheels of Magic. It’s an exploration of what magic in our stories might look if it manifested itself in our world. Check it out if you have time!

All in all, it’s going to be one sick-ass World Con. If you’re there, find me and we’ll kick it! <3

Cooking the books: food in fantasy
15 Aug, Thursday 15:00 – 15:50, Wicklow Room-1 (CCD)
Hobbits had their second breakfast and elves had their lembas. Fantasy books are full of great scenes of food, whether it’s elaborate feasts or people desperate to survive foraging for what they can get. How have authors used food to enhance the realities of their fantasy worlds? What does the scarcity or abundance of food tell us about fantasy societies? The panel will discuss their favourite fantasy feasts and how food has been used as a worldbuilding tool in fantasy novels.
Moderated by: Fran Wilde
Ms. Nicole Kimberling (Blind Eye Books), Rei Rosenquist, Gillian Polack, Giovanni De Feo

Gender and sexuality in YA
17 Aug, Saturday 10:00 – 10:50, ECOCEM Room (CCD)
Young adulthood is a formative time in many ways, but especially when it comes to gender and sexuality. Both topics have been increasing in interest and importance in YA books. How do our books reflect explorations of identity? Why is it important that they do so? Has this changed over time? And how can we approach these topics respectfully – and with an eye on intersectionality?
Moderated by: Sam Bradbury (Hodder & Stoughton)
Diana M. Pho (Tor Books), Victoria “V.E.” Schwab (Tor Books, Titan, HarperCollins, Scholastic), Rei Rosenquist, Rachel Hartman

Beyond binary
17 Aug, Saturday 14:00 – 14:50, Wicklow Room-1 (CCD)
This panel seeks to explore the concept of gender in SFF. In particular, it will focus on societies in literature and other media that do not follow binary definitions of gender. What examples already exist and are they presented favourably? What are some good and bad examples? Do the panellists have ideas for how they would write a non-binary society?
Moderated by: Lex Beckett
Alex Acks, Sarah Groenewegen, Rei Rosenquist

Polyamory in theory and practice
18 Aug, Sunday 12:00 – 12:50, Wicklow Room-3 (CCD)
Resources abound for how to get started in opening up your relationship, but how do you make polyamory work in the real world? What do you do when your relationship styles seem to clash with those of your partners? How can you set effective boundaries with metamours? In this panel, we’ll tackle some of the harder questions that come up when theory meets practice.
Moderated byL Kris “Nchanter” Snyder
Ian Paul Power, Mary Anne Mohanraj (Speculative Literature Foundation / University of Illinois at Chicago), Rei Rosenquist

You’re bard: drinking songs in genre fiction
18 Aug, Sunday 19:00 – 19:50, Liffey Room-2 (CCD)
Fantasy is awash with taverns, ale, and hard-drinking dwarves, which often leads to a rousing drinking song. Raise your glass as our panellists discuss the best drinking songs in fantasy and what makes for a convincing drinking song – and may even break into song themselves!
Moderated by: R.W.W. Greene (New Hampshire Writers’ Project)
Anne Coleman, Rei Rosenquist, Claudia Rapp PhD

The long-awaited Summer Sizzles Anthology from Fiction River is finally here!

I’m so excited to share “Come Summer, Come Winter, I’ll Come for You” with you all. This is a queer romantic suspense set in Japan, written during my winter hiatus in Northern Japan where I spent an entire week without English.

Check out this anthology! It’s full of so many other great stories by amazing authors, including Sabrina Chase’s “Need to Know” and Lisa Silverthorne’s “Safe Like Cedar.”

Click the cover image to go to the anthology webpage.