Create My Own Perfection - my aroace retelling of Medusa - now has a cover!
Click here to see it in all its stunning glory!
You can preorder the book in the following places:
iBooks: https://bit.ly/36qysfh
Kobo: https://bit.ly/2GRdbCY
B&N: https://bit.ly/2Uo3RcIBalcony Gardening
Once there was here and yet was not,
A boy whose name, they say, was 'Jack'.
He grew his beans in tiny pots
And never now felt any lack.
Jack was nimble, and Jack was quick.
He lived in a studio flat.
No cow was there, nor magic trick,
Just a single, smiling, city rat,
A cutting brought from his beanstalk,
And a grin both bright and bold
As if to say (if beans could talk)
Now who's the goose? I've got my gold.
Climb Every Tower
Robbie fiddled with the candy cane tucked in her shirt pocket to identify her to her contact, then tipped her head back and stared up at the tangle of ironwork disappearing into the fog above her. Rumour claimed that every girder was forged from the souls caught by the Puppets, and every time someone new was caught, the Tower got that little bit taller. She certainly couldn't see the top of it, not from down here.
Ten more minutes, she told herself, and then she was retreating to her fall-back position.
It was only five minutes before she heard quiet footsteps, and then her sharp ears caught the mumur of someone directing the Puppets. She flinched despite herself, as the mist began to swirl on both sides of her.
She was trapped. Her contact had either been caught, or had betrayed her willingly. She looked upwards. If she was going to be caught and turned into part of the Tower anyway, she might as well explore it of her own free will first and satisfy her curiosity. She reached for a girder, and began to climb.
Snake Eyes
I took advantage of being alone in the lift to slide my dark glasses off and knead the knot forming between my eyes. It had been a very long day chasing down a gang of magical thugs, and one was still missing, so it didn't look like it was going to end any time soon.
The lift chimed, and I hastily jammed my glasses back into place again. They tried to slide down my nose almost at once. Such are the perils of wearing a slippery mask.
When the door opened, the missing gang member stood there with a gun in her hands. She pointed it at me, and I sighed and tipped my head down to catch her gaze over the top of my glasses.
She forgot enough to meet my eyes - and turned to stone. Rather nice limestone, in fact, rather than the shale the rest of the gang had become. I don't choose what stone someone becomes, there are a whole bunch of factors involved, from the bedrock of your birthplace, to what you connect to as a person.
The gun changed with her, as did the clothes she was wearing, and I shoved my glasses up my nose once more and hoped they stayed this time. Stepping around her as I left the lift, I pulled out my phone and brushed the snakes away from my ear. "Last one to be picked up in the hospital," I told my contact on the other end. "Statue again. Yeah, I had the lenses in, so it'll wear off tomorrow, you can do what you like with her then." I ended the call, sighed again, and trudged onward to get the final witness statements and wrap up the endless day.
Create My Own Perfection, my queer retelling of Medusa, will be out in April 2021!
You can preorder it in the following places:
iBooks: https://bit.ly/36qysfh
Kobo: https://bit.ly/2GRdbCY
Common Bonds, the anthology of platonic stories, (one of which is mine!) is coming very soon to a shelf near you.
If you backed it, check your email for ebook deliveries and address confirmation. It's on the way!
(Old Habits) Die Hard
Things get weird when you can't die. Two centuries ago, I used to practice my drawing and aiming skills for duels on old pots and plates, getting good enough so people would assume I'd won fairly rather than because bullets slide harmlessly through me, like I'm a sand dune. Today I found my old targets in a museum. Apparently they had some "ritual purpose".
I wonder if they'd accept the real explanation. It's not like they can kill me, right?
