Ash Vale Updates: June 2024
Happy Pride month nerds!
Some Stuff from this Month
First off, BIG NEWS: The dark fantasy short story I mentioned in the May newsletter is being published!!! This is my first publication, but it was also the first story I ever submitted! “I Met My Wife in the Woods” will appear in the next issue of Heartlines Spec on July 31st!
Writing
On short stories, I’ve submitted a few different pieces this month that I’m proud of regardless of their outcome:
A sub to a 48 hour horror flash fiction contest featuring ignorant white girls, scuba diving, and cosmic horror
A short story for another flash fiction contest about a trans guy getting slightly horny with a weird lil water dweller over edible glitter
A creepy poem about AFAB bodies and ownership (and vore, don’t @ me)
A really short speculative/sci-fi climate change story about the sky disappearing
The romance novel is approaching 30k words so over 1/3 of the way through a first draft! Doughnuts, as ever, are excellent motivation (I ate 3 today)
Reading
I finished Out There Screaming: An Anthology of New Black Horror edited by Jordan Peele (yes, that Jordan Peele) and definitely enjoyed it. I think even if you’re squeamish about horror this is a solid read, most stories lean more Black Mirror than anything shit-your-pants scary. My favourites were “Eye & Tooth” by Rebecca Roanhorse, “The Most Strongest Obeah Woman of the World” by Nalo Hopkinson, and “Hide & Seek” by P Djeli Clark (who also has a phenomenal novella called Ring Shout about hunting KKK members!)
Started D’Vaughn and Kris Plan A Wedding by Chencia C Higgins and honestly I wasn’t sure if the influencer/reality TV angle would work for me but Y’ALL I’m hooked!! It’s so cute so far, and spicy 🔥 fake wedding, sapphic romance, what more can you ask for?
Recommendations
Ten Ways of Looking at Snow, Reflected Off an Obsidian Armor by Avra Margariti. This is a queer short story about making a bargain with the fae, a dark fantasy sapphic love story told throughout 10 winters. It’s gay! It’s a little tragic! It’s heroic!
(You would teach me, many winters later, why one does not agree to a contract one cannot read.)
Five Views of the Planet Tartarus by Rachael K. Jones. Another short (emphasis on short) story, this one a sci-fi horror that does WILDLY impressive world-building for something that clocks in at only 549 words. I’m not putting a quote from this one because anything I post will be a spoiler, just go read it instead!
I’m obsessed with Olivia Rodrigo right now and no one can tell me shit, stream Vampire by her
Something Extra
If you’re going to buy a Pride sticker may I humbly suggest this one. I like that the artist really managed to capture my likeness.
Thanks for reading, and don't let the monsters under your bed get you, unless you're into that! I don't judge!
Ash Vale (they/them) is a queer, non-binary, neurodivergent cryptid writing short stories in horror and fantasy, and working on a sapphic romance novel.