A personal goal’s been achieved:  My first published non-fiction essay, “The Gyrification of Violence,” will appear in the Fall, 2021 issue of Vastarien: A Literary Journal.  

Yet — having a piece of writing accepted under the critical eye and estimable reputation of Jon Padgett and Grimscribe Press — also serves as a professional marker; one need only examine the table of contents and the names of my fellow contributors to confirm this double issue’s literary formidability…

• Vastarien Column: Tenebrous Ramblings by Romana Lockwood
• The Unpleasant State of Beginning by Hailey Piper
• Matsuri by Michael Uhall
• The Mushroom Men by Carson Winter
• Heartstrings by Philippa Evans
• Sculpting by Mari Ness
• She Ain’t Stoppin’ by Christi Nogle
• Fold by Gwen C. Katz
• Night Mare by Stephanie M. Wytovich
• On Borrowed Time by Greg Sisco
• Voyeur by Tori Fredrick
• Everything Will Be Okay by John Claude Smith
• The Bloody Story of his Canvas: A Reading of “The Lost Art of Twilight” by George Prekas
• How to Send the Dead (Assuming You’ve Cremated Them Against Their Dying Wish) by Juleigh Howard-Hobson
• Sometimes It’s Just Like Hiding by Georgia Cook
• Down the Dark Hallway: An Essay on P.T. by Sean M. Thompson
• A Walkthrough of Route X: Video Games and the Postmodern Gothic by Joanna Parypinski
• Thy Structures Rear’d in Blood by Rhonda Eikamp
• Vulture Eyes by Christa Carmen
• Revenge and Envy Are Very Small Things: Cosmic Inconsequentialism in S. P.
• Miskowski’s Skillute Cycle by S. L. Edwards
• The Accursed Manor of the Mirrorlands by LC von Hessen
• Anthropophagus by Sara Tantlinger
• The Collected Poems of James Zjarek, Transgressor by Perry Ruhland
• The Shining Path by Paul L. Bates
• Lullaby by Jenny Darmody
• Lonely Wordless Ghosts by Mari Ness
• Red Knots Tightening by Emer O’Hanlon
• The Three Paradigms of Horror by Dejan Ognjanović
• The Gyrification of Violence by Clint Smith
• The Food Fellow by Ivy Grimes
• This Story Will Kill You by Kurt Fawver