New Year's Resolutions

I've never been a person who wrote down her New Year's Resolutions. I've never been a person who's kept an appointment book either, or a journal to write my To Do lists in. My mother used to write hers down in pieces of recycled paper and her pleasure was in crossing them out, not elegantly maybe, but satisfyingly enough.

I've always hated being trite and doing what everyone does just because everyone does it, but I've also always mistrusted people who snobbishly dismiss popular things just because they're popular. It's a bit of a catch-22.

Last year and this year, I've decided to start bullet journaling and to start my Bucket List. These are some pretty trite ideas and I've decided to crown them with even more stereotypical glee by writing down, for the very first time in this blog, my New Year's Resolutions.

This year, I want to be aware of what I'm doing and of why I'm doing it, because during the last few years, maybe since 2011 (meaning almost a decade now), I've just come to the realization of how little time I have left in my hands. In these last eight years I've had more existential moments than ever before. By existential moments I mean those flashes where you realize that one day you will die and are not quite certain you'll become anything other than stardust (courtesy of two very atheistic parents who never bothered to instill in me some sort of religious protection against Schopenhaurian dread). In short, I've come to realize how brief life is and how much we have to make each moment count...

But also, I've come to realize that I CAN make those moments count.

During my early twenties I had a very long and very stable relationship (for a twenty-something) with a man who gave me every sort of companionship and comfort I could then wish for. I was going through some tough realizations about myself and his presence in my life was the one fixed blessing I could count on. I felt that this relationship could define me. I had always felt I wanted to transcend (having, once more, no religious insulation from the harsh reality of my insignificance) and, in that relationship, I felt I could transcend through love. The mess my life was in, at school, at home, in my head, the sheer intellectual MUDDLE I was going through didn't matter because I had him. We made meaning together, he and I, we made sense, we made STORIES and in those stories we made a whole that somehow, kept the darkness at bay…

I used to dream of lots of things before that relationship, before that point in my life. I can remember some of them and looking back, very few included that all-encompassing, transcendental love I thought I had.

I dreamt I would travel, that I would see and experience all the places I wanted to write about. I dreamt I would be a polyglot, able to read all my favorite authors in their own language. I dreamt I would be a writer, an artist, that I would leave my mark in the world through my thoughts and MY stories. I dreamt of such an ADVENTURE.

I did not dream of the wonderful, homey relief I would have with this man, the first real love of my life. Before him, I thought I’d fall in love in my travels, while living abroad. I thought (and still half think) that like so many of my friends, the grandest prize I could aspire to would be a foreigner, possibly an American, quite certainly a European. Like Eva Khatchadourian says in We Need To Talk About Kevin: “How lucky we are, when we’re spared what we think we want!”

I cannot for the life of me regret loving this man, with him I learned how it felt to be complete, in his arms, I was, at long last, enough. But I do regret all the dreams I left behind because I thought all I needed was him.

It wasn’t his fault. Like I said, my life was a mess at that particular moment. I had come to realize that I could not be the particular student, writer or daughter that my mother and I had imagined and wanted me to be and it stung, I stung PAINFULLY. So for a moment, I don’t even truly remember how long… maybe half of those six years we were together, maybe more, I just gave up on everything I wanted. I couldn’t write, I couldn’t pass my classes, I couldn’t make my mother happy, I couldn’t fathom how I was ever going to support myself without my parents and I resented them for making me feel, increasingly, like an imposition in their lives. I wasn’t the brilliant intellectual I thought I was when I started college (amazed at how easily I could get wonderful grades in subjects I loved, as opposed to my dismal struggle through high school), I went into the literary criticism classes and I drew a blank. It was all nonsense to me, smart-sounding nonsense that never failed to make me feel inferior but nonsense nevertheless. I wasn’t able to handle anything then, all I thought I wanted was slipping through my fingers.

So I let it all go. I stopped going to college, I stopped trying to write… I stopped trying to dream… And the worst part was how ashamed I was of myself and how often I pretended that none of it was happening. I was only able to tell my parents all I had stopped doing during those years, long after the fact. If it hadn’t been for my friends and my boyfriend I would have died of despair back then. I remember obsessively thinking of these lines from a P.J. Harvey song:

Please don't reproach me 
For, for how empty 
My life has become

That was me, circa 2009, 2010. I was 24 and I was TERRIFIED.

I left home, moved in with this man I loved and broke up with him. And in that process, away from the constant criticism and source of dissatisfaction that my relationship with my mother had become then… I found out I didn’t have to give up at all.

I took up my studies again and stepping away from literary criticism I focused on translation and found out I EXCELLED at it, as I always had ever since I started this degree. I even lost some weight, took up swimming… But most importantly, I started writing again… I started writing AND getting published… Before then, never mind published, I’d never actually managed to FINISH anything I wrote. Suddenly I was confronted with the truth that I COULD do and become all the things I’d always dreamed I could be. I didn’t have to transcend through love, I could transcend through myself, I could accomplish the things that could give me meaning, completeness, and a sense of purpose all on my own. I could make stories that were just mine.

Since then, I’ve managed to finish all my classes and I’ve managed to get professionally published (got paid!). I have accomplished two things I never thought I would: strangers have read me and I neck-to-neck with most of my peers, educationwise.

But all of last year, which I took as an almost complete rest from writing and studying, I felt a small discontent begin to grow again. I’ve left my lands lay fallow too long. I’m ready for the next step. I’m itching for it. Not diving straight into it, has in fact, made me feel like somehow of a fraud. I want to graduate and I want to write a novel. I want to live abroad like I always dreamed and I want to learn new languages. I want to be a published artist like I am a published writer. I want… meaning, completeness and a sense of purpose.

And somehow, up until now, I’ve managed to get these (when I’ve gotten them) by sheer, fumbling luck. I’ve never set down to write what I wanted out of a year. I’ve had grand life plans but never a schedule. Like I said, no new year’s resolutions, no appointment books. I always just thought the grand design of my life plan would carry me through…

One of my best friends turned forty on 2018 and she told me something I had never considered. She told me she needed to sit down and write what she wanted out of the next decade, that she had done it when she turned thirty and needed to do it again now. Since she is one of the most accomplished and happiest people I know, I think I’ll take her up on this one.

(A propos of nothing. More in my style and less organizationally, I’ve been recently remembering Neil Gaiman’s Keynote Address of 2012. Other than being a huge fan of his and considering him one of my role models in what I want as a writer and as a person, I’ve always found what he has said about writing to be extremely useful and relatable. In the Keynote Address he described never having any sort of life plan, but rather, having a list of everything he wanted to write and an idea of the sort of writer he wanted to be. I’ll make that list soon, but today I want to remember this idea of himself as a writer. He called it his mountain. The mountain of being a professional writer of mainly fiction. He said: “And I knew that as long as I kept walking towards the mountain I would be all right. And when I truly was not sure what to do, I could stop, and think about whether it was taking me towards or away from the mountain. I said no to editorial jobs on magazines, proper jobs that would have paid proper money because I knew that, attractive though they were, for me they would have been walking away from the mountain. And if those job offers had come along earlier I might have taken them, because they still would have been closer to the mountain than I was at the time.”)

2019 New Year’s Resolutions 

The three most important ones, which will supersede all others are:

1. I will finish my thesis.
(My thesis is the only thing keeping me from graduating now. Graduating would mean being able to apply for scholarships in Master’s Degrees, it would mean not having to write any more school related things and having the time and freedom to write a novel, it would mean the time and money to invest in learning a new language, in finding a job that will let me travel… it will mean being able to change my life and not living “on hold” anymore, until I finish my degree)

2. I will eliminate debt and save an emergency fund.
(I know I can do this. I did it last year before I took half the year off to rest from the never-ending stress that my life had been since 2011. Doing both of these things will mean financial freedom, I will never again have to stay in an ugly situation because I don’t have the cash to escape it. And I will be able to start saving up for language classes and living abroad as I’ve always wanted)

3. Live the mountain philosophy and say no to stuff that’s not taking me close to my mountain.
(I want to be a professional writer, a university graduate who speaks other languages and has seen the world. I want to be a creator and an artist. Anything that takes me away from this, is not worth my time.)

And in no particular order, these are the more specific ones (those marked with an asterisk will be needing scheduling and planning soon, if it doesn’t have a deadline it’s not a goal!):

*Finish my pending craft projects: Rhino amigurumi and bracelet for C.
*Crochet something for my friend Millie and her impending baby.
-Go to a science museum (Planetarium).
-Have an artist’s picnic.
-Draw at an art museum.
-Go to free culture stuff more frequently (every 2 months).
-Clean out my closet and donate stuff.
-Donate money to a women-focused organization.
-Have everything in my apartment working (dryer, plumbing, toilet seats, etc.)
-Exercise 5 days a week by midyear (June).
-Start an amigurumi business
*Get really cool presents for my parents, saving up for them and planning them with time.
-Keep up with my bullet journal to the end of the year.
-Keep a dream journal in my blog.
-No buying more notebooks until I finish at least ONE.

Entirely Misplaced Sense of Grandeur

So I recently got incredible news in the form of my first, ever review. I am ecstatic. I am DELIRIOUSLY happy. I am also intensely embarrassed and foolishly proud and have shown this thing to everyone because I love it so.

The review came from the Argentinan blog called El Tintero de Nicotina and it concerned the whole of Gutter Glitter's new Psychopomp anthology, Bunny Love, in which I have a short story. You can take a look at the whole review at the aforementioned blog. It is, like the anthology, unfortunately, in Spanish. But I'd like to quote the bit that talks about my own short story, just as a personal form of sickening ego stroking:

La bruja y el lobo: Irene Adela Flores Vazquez nos cuenta na historia casi musical que respeta una estructura narrativa de antiquísimo orígen; la repetición de la fórmula da un carácter casi ritual a esta clase de cuentos que todos sabemos cómo han de terminar, pero queremos oír de todos modos. Los personajes cumplen su papel con fuerza de autómata, pero los versos casi míticos podrían haber sido recitados por Homero o Quevedo ante un público nutrido, y hubiesen sido aplaudidos sin duda. Muy bello.

Or in English:

The Witch and the Wolf: Irene Adela Flores Vazquez tells us an almost musical story which respects a narrative structure of ancient origin. The repetition of this formula gives an almost ritual character to this sort of story, one for which we all know the ending, yet still want to hear. The characters fulfill their roles with the force of an automaton, but the almost mythical verses could have been recited by Homer or Quevedo before a large audience and would have, without a doubt, been applauded. Very beautiful.

I was just called Homer... and Quevedo... I think I shall die of glee.

Untitled

This Sunday I took a late nap after a long day. It was a really short thing, about half an hour all in all, but it seemed to last forever. I was dreaming; dreaming one of those dreams.

There were these children, I remember only a few of them specifically, but I remember there were a bunch of them, all different ages and sizes. They were staying "at court". They seemed to be from important families and they were staying at some sort of palace. As is often the case, the palace looked, unfailingly, like my grandparents' house. It had the same trees, the same garden, the same wall and the same little bungalow my uncle inhabited where I so often walked in uninvited.

The children were at play and it was hard to tell whether they were getting along or not. Their families certainly weren't and there was a strong implication in the air that the reason they were all hanging around at court was to remedy this state of affairs. Someone had suggested they go hunting, or so it seemed to me, and they left the garden by my grandparents' old door, down the brick road, the one with the iron bell, the wall with the ivy over it.

There was a girl, still a girl but evidently fancying herself a woman already. She had the sort of headdress sixteenth century noble ladies wore, a bit ridiculous for a tiny slip of a girl with a little round face and a snubbed nose. She was wearing one of those gowns with a high waist and a low cleavage which hardly made her look womanly in spite of itself; there was very little bosom to work with. She was dressed all in green and gold. Her hair was a honey brown.

There was a lad, maybe a bit older than the girl, but not by much. He had that ridiculous page bob all little princes seem to have, and he was dressed in the way Henry VIII would have dressed if he had been a skinny boy, scarce able to carry so much cloth on his thin shoulders. There was the fur and the rich linen and the gloves. I think the boy was a hunter. Green and gold for him too and the same honey-brown hair. Or ashen brown, I can't seem to recall.

There was a mad dog outside, not much really, a little feist running up and down the street with foam flying of his mouth. Not a danger really, except all mad dogs are sooner or later. I think the lad in green shot him down. Or it might have been his older brother, for there was an older brother, someone who was too much of an adult to run with the children but still slender and young and fair. He did not have the ridiculous page cut, his hair was long and lose. But his coloring was exactly the same as his younger sibling's.

When she saw him, the girl in the womanly gown beamed and preened and flirted, for he was beautiful. I do not believe the young lad was pleased for they seemed to have struck a friendship of sorts. They went back into the gardens and into my uncle's bungalow, which by the magic of dreams, was transformed into handsome quarters, fit for these nobly born youngsters. She laughed at the lad in green and teased him and then asked if she could go into his quarters to refresh herself. He acceded, a bit shy but gentlemanly.

In those private quarters, those appointed to his family, she couldn't help but nose around. She prodded and spied until she came face to face with his father, who had the same unfortunate page bob and the same blonde hair as his sons. But he had a kind face, big nose, big jaw, big smile. He had the furs too and the big Henry VII shoulders. They talked easily and he was evidently charmed. I don't think he had meant to be quite so charmed. As I have said their families seemed to be at odds. All of them.

When they came back into the garden, the young lad was quite as surprised as his father. The young lady was all smiles and graces and he couldn't help feel a bit jealous, that she so easily charmed everyone, as she had charmed him. But again the children were left to their own devices and again the lad and the girl were alone. He was sulking and resentful and she sat by his side and shyly asked him, "So when you are older, will you let your hair grow long like your brother?"

He smiled and said yes and things were mended between them.

The youngsters retired to their parents' quarters and the girl and her lad parted amicably. She went up a flight of stairs that had the railing and my grandparents' red carpet. But as she climbed and climbed the house grew (of course, it was a palace in my dream after all). Her apartments were on a top floor in one of those rectangular courtyards that have a balcony all along its inner walls. There was another girl who had come up to this part of the palace. She had been among the group, quiet and inconspicuous. Dark and mysterious. I think she was the oldest among them. About the same age as this not-quite-a-woman and her lad, but standing just the littlest bit taller. She gazed curiously at our girl in green.

Our little lady was taking down some Halloween decorations, or at least that is what they seemed. Little bats and boogies and other creepy crawlies made of paper. Evidently the celebration was not far behind. And evidently, the lonesome task of taking these apart was entirely hers. She seemed well-content with it and therefore used to this solitary state of affairs. The older girl stared at her strange decorations. I think some of them resembled our Día de los Muertos papers. They were lovely, dainty things, very much in the taste of this mysterious young lady. When the girl in green became aware of her scrutiny she smiled, such a friendly thing. They talked about the decorations, about the loneliness and the disinterest or busy schedule of their parents. Out mysterious lady seemed surprised, but she had made a friend. When she continued on to her quarters she did so with the gift of a paper decoration. She was lodged right in front of her new friend.

Her father was there, busy, I think, reading a paper. Her father was dressed exactly like a grandfatherly version of Bela Lugosi. You see, these two were vampires, what a strange thing. They said their hellos, asked about each others day and settled in the sort of comfortable co-habitation of two people who have had only each other for a long time. And then he warned her, of course.

He said to her, "I saw you talking to the Luther child" (so our little lady's family were the Luthers, I had come to find out). "You must be careful with her," he said to his beloved daughter. She seemed unimpressed. She knew the Luthers were church and would not look warmly upon their kind, but, I suppose, wasn't this the whole point of living at court? To know one another.

"No," her father said. "Come with me and I will show you."

Together they looked out their window, beyond their balcony and into the long descent towards what should have been an inner courtyard. But this wasn't a courtyard, rather a beautifully furnished sitting room. It had books and dark colors, heavy furniture with warmly glowing wood. There was an enormous fireplace with a mantlepiece full of nicknacks and such. There was, I think, a little statue, or a toy, something in the vague shape of a man.

"Look," her father said. "Look closely."

And so the little vampire was able to see the glamor, the magical deception cast upon it.

"It's one of us," she said to her father with a hint of fear.

"And he has his eyes fixed upon your little friend."

The Luther girl came back, of course, for when have young girls ever listened to their fathers? She came back and met her father. There was an old phonograph which she exclaimed over much to his pleasure, and she danced with this grandfatherly Bela Lugosi and charmed him as easily as she had charmed everyone else. Somehow or other she knew they were what they were. So this strange vampire condition must not have been so strange in this palace, this country. Strange enough to hide it from court, but not so strange as to keep a clever, little girl who saw them often from guessing. And the pair of monsters were delighted! For our little lady did not turn away or grew scared but commended them on their fierceness and admired their mysterious qualities. It wasn't long before they had invited her to stay, to sleep over with her new friend, to better keep an eye on her safety.

And this little lady with the luxurious headdress and the womanly gown and the absent parents, what did she do first but inquire as to how two such great monsters could have but a pair of rooms for their use when she and her parents were occupying half this floor and one below? Oh, it was no problem really, they had little servitude and their coffins could well fit in a single room. Oh but the Luther girl was distraught. Should not her friend, a young lady in her own right, have a room of her own? A place to lay her coffin in private and entertain and carry her own affairs?

So it was, and the two girls settled into a disheveled bed, more rooms having been cleared for the use of our two vampires. With such a charming guest the need for a coffin was forgotten. But not the need for alertness. The young vampire girl looked out her new window, trying to ascertain if this simple change in location had somehow dissuaded her friend's admirer.

But he was there still. The face of an almost feline statuette firmly facing towards this very window. She glared at it while her friend complained behind her, told her to come into bed and hear about what those fools at court had done now. But her friend would not move from her vigil; and as often happens, when you stare hard enough, something stares right back.

The Luther girl gave a little cry of protest when she saw her friend climb out her window, but whatever else followed was drowned when the girl let herself fall. And of course, because this is a vampire and this is a dream, our young undead turned into a bat and flew, intent upon having words with whatever intruder would dare menace her friend. She landed upon the beautifully furnished sitting room and looked to the mantlepiece to confront her enemy but there was nothing there. When she turned, there he was, huge, magnificent and full of dark ferocity.


I woke up then and turned to my boyfriend. I said, "I just had the best dream, let me tell you before I forget..."


The girl in the green and gold dress came ready made with a family name, a family name that suggests a history of sorts, but I think I've decided on everyone else. The last week I've been wishing to try and tackle a fantasy project, not the big ambitious one which I've had forever, but a smaller, less intimidating one. I wanted something that would let me stretch my muscles and be a little silly. I wanted to do as GRRM does and name my main family Stark after Iron Man just because that sounds so cool.

I think this is the sort of project I needed. My vampire girl and her father will probably have the family name of Polidori. Her name will be Lucille. Our little family of Henry VIIIs shall all be named after different versions of Lanval... Landeval, Launfal, so on and so forth. This is the dream of the people with L names. I've got such a clear visuals, and it's like discovering a story that's already written. So there are vampires in this country, and some are hidden, but people know. What else is there? I think there shall be fairies. I think my Lanvals have such a very uniform coloring because they might have fairy blood.

Who knows what else will come up?


(There was also something else I think I was dreaming before this big dream story. I think it's connected or so I would like it to be. I was dreaming of something kind of like Hellsing's Alucard. I think that's where I got my perverted scary vampire stalker. I was dreaming there was this young man and he was very sweet and gentle and he was in love. He was courting this young lady. So after getting her consent I think, to something or other, maybe marriage, maybe something else, he comes to his room, all ecstatic. And in that room he finds our vampire, hungry, jealous, but infinitely seductive. I think they must have been old lovers, there was that sort of tension. I think there must have been a heated exchange. I think this man is Luther girl's father. I was worried that her colors, her dress and hair were to similar to those of her Lanval lad. But I think it must be because her mother was of that family. That must have been the lady this young man was courting. Pieces, bits at a time. A young man from a church family with a vampire (ex?)lover who courted and wed a fey-blooded lady. Who knows indeed.)

Little Things

Recently I posted about writing for the wonderful indie publisher Gutter Glitter. I don't own a camera and my computer's webcam is pretty shoddy, so that post did not have the panaché I wanted it too. A friend of mine just did me the favor of taking a couple of pictures I really want to share with the world.

I want this bit here to have a bit of coherence, a bit of consistency, a bit of shape. But really, it is just an excuse for me to feel good and to show off the things that make me feel good. Lately, (in the last two years or so) I've begun to change my life... not all of it, but bits and pieces at a time. Slowly, tentatively, I stretch and touch and reach out and try to see whether the long, dark years are truly over. It may sound a bit trivial, certainly, it may not seem all that important. But these two pictures I have here represent for me all those little things that make life bearable.

This is like an alien sighting. Look, I exist! And so does the book! For realz!

About mid-semester I received a wonderful surprise via snail mail. I received my author's copy of Gutter Glitter's Psychopomp. I've been sending to and considering various web-based magazines, and they all sound great really... yet, yet... There has never been anything quite like receiving and holding a copy of your book, the book where your words are written. There is nothing like looking at the paper, flipping through the illustrations, seeing your work alongside that of others.

Look! It's my name! With Derre's! I swoon! I faint!

And let me tell you, I don't think that I shall ever feel like this again, not even if I get a big commercial publisher deal... because Psychopomp is an intimate, infinite labour of love. When I touched the cover it had a beautiful feel, I could immediately tell that Derrewyn had carefully selected the material. When I looked at the cover, I could feel a fierce, completely misplaced pride in the gorgeous quality of the illustration. For years I have admired and felt inspired by D. I consider her a superb artist, a rising star, a creator of quality up to par with any of my other more famous inspirations. I dreamed of getting her to make me an illustration. I kept trying to write something so good, so moving that she would feel compelled to draw me something for it.

Giddily, I can now say that it gets even better. This year I will be haunting my mailbox for a SECOND copy of my dream come true. A second volume of Psychopomp has just come out and the copies are printed. Soon Bunny Love will join its tamer, fantasy sibling and together they will haunt my bookshelves and whisper evilly to each other, no doubt planning my end.

Cruella de Ville or Aerenys Targaryen? You be the judge.

If you look at the upper right hand corner of your screen, (and at that conspicuous portrait in this very post) you will see that my dark haired self has been hijacked by an unknown blonde. That blonde is me. I repeat: THAT. BLONDE. IS. ME. If you take a look above, you will see the progression, from half a blonde to poodle-puffy blonde, with the occasional misstep such as the roots at the back of my head. This is important. No, really, I'm not kidding. My hair is very, very important.

I've wanted to dye my hair since I was a stupid teenager. When I am on the bus and I see a beautiful girl with beautiful blue/purple/green/anything hair, I make a point of stopping and telling her I love her (okay, maybe not that creepily, but you get the picture). I have longed for an extravagant color and dark roots in my ponytail since always. But I have also thought it impossible. Until now. I had the strange idea that dyed hair is for pretty girls only. Since I don't fulfill the group requirements the idea was out. I also lived at my mother's up until recently. She had a bird when she saw me with the above pictured stripe, had another one when she saw me with a full-head bleach and finally grudgingly accepted there was nothing she could do about it. So I guess it's easy to see why I waited until I had my own place to experiment.

It's been fun. I've done all of it myself. I am still doing it in fact, because the sought after result is white enough hair to allow me to put on as light a pastel as I can. I feel weirdly feminine, weirdly pretentious all the time now. I'm learning how to carry it, how to look less inconspicuous, how to do this without yet identifying as a "pretty girl".

Even kitties love Psychopomp!

What better way to end a post than a picture of kittens? After all, everyone loves kittens.

Currently, there are nine cats living with me. I am the proud owner of about 2.5 of them (I share co-ownership of one of them with my roommate). I've loved cats all my life, but due to different circumstances I was unable to have one of my own for any significant period of time. For the last two years, I've been bringing more and more of these loveable fuzzballs into my life. These three are going to go up for adoption soon. Their mother (Polly) is one of my two cats and she will be spayed after this litter.

Living with them, taking care of them, having to consider them as factors in my life has been wonderful. Having the ability, at last, to make the choice of having them here, is invaluable. I don't know what the future will bring. I may move. I may study abroad. But they've been with me through the last rough changes and I hope I can keep them with me for a long time after.

Trepidation

 Recently I've had a long-held dream come true. I've been reluctant to blog about it because of how I've been dealing with life, because it feels too much like showing off and because I've held off until I had something more concrete to offer. But I think that recently, the stars have aligned, the waters in R'lyeh have risen and all in all, a lot of details have come together that have made me want to not just blog about it, but stick that blog everywhere and make sure it gets read.

I've been published.

Not only have I been published but I've been published by someone I've looked up to and admired for a very long time.

I have a short story featured in Psychopomp: Fantastic Baby, an anthology focusing on fantasy published yearly by the indie publisher Gutter Glitter which is largely run by the wonderful and amazing Derrewyn. My short story is called Gifts and was illustrated by the aforementioned awesomeness that is Derre.


The origin of so much win is located in Buenos Aires, Argentina and the print runs are modest, or I would have had this entry up long ago, demanding that everyone buy a copy. Not just because of my own (very) small contribution, but because the end product is a gorgeous assembly of talent from both Derre and Lu Quintana.

So what really pushed me to make this news available here is that the next issue of the Psychopomp anthology is coming out this year as Psychopomp: Bunny Love, this time focusing on erotic stories. And, the amazing news, is that Derre and Lu have decided to attempt not only a larger print run but an English version too! The goal is yet uncertain because, of course, things like this take money, and Derre and Lu are working out of their own pocket.

So to reach their money goal they've opened a project at idea.me: http://idea.me/proyecto/5056/psychopomp-bunny-love

I don't get a cent out of any of this. I might even donate myself. All I get out of this is the satisfaction that Derre's, Lu's and even  a tiny bit of my own work will reach a far greater audience than they might have done otherwise. So please, consider donating and if not, at least telling everyone you know! The more people find about this the better.