Joshua Hebburn
Assistant Fiction Editor
I’m a frozen goods clerk living in North L.A. I write and edit short stories and very short stories.
twitter: @joshuahebburn
bluesky: @joshuahebburn
website: joshuahebburn.wordpress.com
WORK
I’ve been writing a collection of stories that each have a swimming pool in them. I hope to submit the manuscript to CLASH or House of Vlad or somewhere like that in 2025 or 2026. I published one in 2023 and one in late 2022.
FAVORIE X-R-A-Y STORY
David’s Going To Die by Aurora Huiza
I could’ve chosen a dozen others.
FAVORITE NOVEL I READ THIS YEAR
I was entranced, and made to laugh—using my mouth, throat, and lungs, rather than a nostrily, or frontal soft-palettey forward push of air—by Adam Levin’s novel Bubblegum. I read in an interview about how he tried to make the full stop of each sentence in the book, which is 800 pages, land in a way that is meaningful and effective, and it shows. I often scratched and sniffed the cover of Bubblegum, which was scratch n sniff bubblegum, making me seem strange on public transit.
I would describe the premise, precis about it a bit, but if I had read that sort of thing only I wouldn’t have read the novel; I saw Aaron Burch—who has great taste—praise his other novel The Instructions; I had Levin read me two good stories on the New Yorker fiction podcast.
I miss Belt Magnet talking into my inner ear.
I would’ve found the world of the novel, as cruel and strange as our own, unendurable without him.
FAVORITE STORY COLLECTION I READ THIS YEAR
Cheap Therapist Says You’re Insane by Parker Young
When I think of this collection I think of Denis Johnson’s response to being asked his favorite writer: “When I am telling the truth, I say I am my favorite writer, because when I read something by me, I hear all these people, all my favorite writers, they’re all in there, all in one thing.” I think it was Denis Johnson.
FAVORITE LITERARY MAGAZINE I READ THIS YEAR
NOON annual / Heavy Traffic
I believe every contemporary writer should read one issue of NOON.
I can imagine an origin story for Heavy Traffic written in the style of Ovid.
FAVORITE TV SHOW I WATCHED THIS YEAR
Frieren
I’ve been watching around one or two of the seasonally airing anime every year since I was like, 15? I’m going to miss having a new episode of Frieren—a lightly existential, often digressing road story set in a fantasy world after the world’s big fantasy plot has been completed for all of the party members but the elf, Frieren—to watch on Fridays.
FAVORITE ALBUMS I LISTENED TO THIS YEAR
Plantasia by Mort Garson
I listened to Plantasia by Mort Garson until I could catch it playing through the propped open door of a cafe across the street. I find it makes friendly company, like another album I like, Brian Eno’s Music for Airplanes.
I listened to a lot of Death Grips on shuffle; and, on repeat, I listened to Sunami’s Sunami. I listened to these loud ones at work, while I straightened pint cartons of Ben and Jerry’s and the overhead lights brightened to indicate the store was open.
FAVORITE ART I SAW THIS YEAR
I’m Surprised You Haven’t Called by Caleb Lyons
I have been looking at the house flipping signs stapled to telephone poles and zip tied to street signs, enjoying their particular phrasings, since I encountered Caleb Lyons’ painterly renderings of them at his show “I’m Surprised You Haven’t Called” at Harper’s gallery. I recommend following him on Instagram where many of this series of paintings is featured. I was fascinated by the ways that the applications of paint changed the tone, weight, and meaning of the words as I walked around them, as came in close to, or distanced myself from. I was excited by how this is something I can’t do.
FAVORITE INTERNET THING
I was always eager, like some people are to pop newly erupted pimples, to watch a new Molly Moon videos, grotesque shorts done in the style of ‘90s choose-your-own-adventure games: youtube.com/@Mollymoonn
I’ve been getting into the early-aughts Midwest slice of life photo slideshow vignettes of @postmodernpalace
I’m often entertained by Mike Topp’s tweets, especially his exchanges with Raymond Pettibon. I like how he surprises me. I want to read one of Mike Topp’s books.
2024
I purchased all of the NYRB editions of Henry Green’s novels during an NYRB sale. I keep meaning to, but don’t, so I think in 2024 it’s time that I will. I read Loving early in my search for my own taste, and the experience of reading it, his BBC talk “A Novelist to his Readers,” and his Paris Review interview, these seem important to me when I think about me as a writer now.
I’m looking forward to the release of Frederick Barthelme’s Great Pyramids: Collected Stories, though the publication date keeps shifting away from the present. I’m looking forward to the release of Graham Irvin’s I Have a Gun, which has produced some of the best poems I’ve read in the last year as its excerpts.
I’m also going to read Adam Levin’s thousand page novel The Instructions. I think of how people call novels bricks. I have the novel in my line of sight now. I’d say it’s larger than most bricks. I’m imagining a house made out of mortared copies of The Instructions. I wonder how much a brick costs in comparison to a used, quality good, copy. I think the sentence containing imaginary blueprints for this would be referred to as instructions for the The Instructions house.
I didn’t take as many photos this year as I usually do. But here’s one of me reading at KGB Bar in NYC, which was a real treat.
Claire Hopple
Fiction Editor
Claire Hopple is the author of six books (one forthcoming in 2025). Her fiction has appeared in Wigleaf, Vol. 1 Brooklyn, Peach Mag, Forever Mag, and others. She grew up in the woods of Western PA and currently lives in Asheville, NC. More at clairehopple.com.
WORK
I wrote a book called ECHO CHAMBER this year and it’s the wildest, most experimental thing I’ve done so far.
FAVORITE X-R-A-Y STORIES
My fave XRAY piece this year is probably a tie between:
“Bear with a Chainsaw” by Joe Aguilar
“Weird Enough to Be Dangerous” by MJ McGinn
FAVORITE BOOKS I READ THIS YEAR
Other Minds and Other Stories by Bennett Sims
Sweet Days of Discipline by Fleur Jaeggy
The Red-Headed Pilgrim by Kevin Maloney
FAVORITE TV SHOW I WATCHED THIS YEAR
Favorite show was hands-down Platonic.
FAVORITE MUSIC I LISTENED TO THIS YEAR
I’ve been exploring all of Fleetwood Mac’s early stuff. It’s incredible how they can sound like the folk side of Led Zeppelin, or Pink Floyd, or Steve Miller Band, etc. depending on the song.
FAVORITE INTERNET THING
I’m overwhelmed at the idea of a favorite internet thing but somebody I don’t even follow tweeted this image and it represents the essence of my personality.
Jillian Luft
Reader
Jillian Luft recently moved back to Florida. Her writing has appeared in XRAY, Hobart, Rejection Letters, Expat, Vlad Mag and many other places. She’s finishing up her novel about Sunshine State scumbag romance.
twitter: @jillianluft
website: jillianluft.com
WORK
This year I got close to finishing revisions on my novel (hopefully, it’ll be done by the time we publish this. Eek). I also had the privilege of reading at Gwen Hilton & Expat Press’s Chicago reading extravaganza in June; contributing to House of Vlad’s inaugural issue of Vlad Mag; and then editing the second issue. I also bought a car and brought a puppy into my life.
FAVORITE X-R-A-Y STORY
Autumn Christian’s “Disappear Here.” It came out close to the start of the year, but I haven’t been able to forget it. The prose is so sharp and evocative. Tiny cuts that add up to a deep incision.
FAVORITE BOOKS I READ THIS YEAR
I’ve been on a big Harry Crews kick this year and loved A Feast of Snakes.
Other standouts:
Tove Jannson’s The Summer Book
Jack Skelley’s The Complete Fear of Kathy Acker
Lexi Kent-Monning’s Burden of Joy
FAVORITE MOVIES I WATCHED THIS YEAR
Sick of Myself/May December. Two very different films in terms of aesthetic, tone and story, but both radically unravel our preconceived ideas about identity, persona, and the lengths we go to define ourselves in unconscionable ways.
FAVORITE TV SHOW I WATCHED THIS YEAR
Wrestlers on Netflix. My favorite 8-hour movie of the year, really. The best characters. Flawed and complex. And the stakes are damn high.
FAVORITE SONG I HEARD THIS YEAR
It’s from 2022, but Momma’s “Speeding 72” is such a 90s-style banger. Like Veruca Salt if they spent more time at the beach. And it’s about a romantic joyride. I’m a sucker for anything that references the road.
FAVORITE INTERNET THING
Anything that couldn’t be classified as lit world discourse. I don’t spend a lot of time on Youtube or investigating viral shit, but this hit my nostalgic sweet spot right in its sugary center:
Rebecca Gransden
Interviews/Reviews Editor
Rebecca Gransden lives on an island. She is published at Tangerine Press, X-R-A-Y, Expat, Muskeg, and Ligeia, among others. Her books are anemogram., Rusticles, Sea of Glass, Creepy Sheen, and Figures Crossing the Field Towards the Group.
website: rebeccagransden.wordpress.com
Neutral Spaces: neutralspaces.co/rebecca_gransden
instagram: @rebeccagransden
twitter: @rlgransden
bluesky: @rgransden
WORK
2023 releases/publications:
- My review “A SLAB, A MEET – THE CONDUCTED REDUNDANCY OF BANJO GYRO” can be found at Fugitives & Futurists. Watch Banjo Gyro!
- My piece on the 1988 film The American Scream for Film Dada at Psycho-Holosuite.
- “Superimposition” appears at Bruiser.
- A pilgrimage. An England in delirium. My novella Figures Crossing the Field Towards the Group was released in October.
- Also published a collection of Hubert Crackanthorpe’s travel vignettes and fiction sketches. Part of Resuscitations, an effort to bring attention to overlooked or neglected writers. Details here.
FAVORITE X-R-A-Y STORY
Too many outstanding pieces published at X-R-A-Y this year to pick a favorite, “Doomsday Apocalypse Melancholia Blues” by Nathaniel Duggan has lingered with me.
FAVORITE BOOKS I READ THIS YEAR
Die Closer to Me by David Kuhnlein
Sean Kilpatrick’s collected works, Tantrums
R i t u a l by Sean Kilpatrick
the vignettes of Lord Dunsany and Edwina C. Geach
Fourth Industrial Revolution Slut by Karina Bush
FAVORITE MOVIES I WATCHED THIS YEAR
August in the Water (1995)
Russian Symphony (1994)
FAVORITE ALBUM I HEARD THIS YEAR
Roger Webb’s score for the 1970 adaptation of Bartleby:
The Touch score for The Second Coming of Suzanne (1974)
Milieu’s Sleepbuilding project deserves a mention
Katharine Coldiron
Managing Editor
Katharine Coldiron is the author of Ceremonials, Junk Film, and two forthcoming books.
website: kcoldiron.com
WORK
I bought a sewing machine and started altering my own clothes instead of paying tailors. It’s been very freeing.
FAVORITE X-R-A-Y STORY I READ THIS YEAR
Old Man Shadow by Christopher Notarnicola, which kept surprising me every other sentence
FAVORITE BOOKS I READ THIS YEAR
Doom Town by Gabriel Blackwell
FAVORITE MOVIE I WATCHED THIS YEAR
Most fun I had was at Neil Breen’s Cade: The Tortured Crossing
FAVORITE MUSIC I HEARD THIS YEAR
An album of Nick Drake tributes, The Endless Coloured Ways
FAVORITE INTERNET THING
Matthew (K.) Burnside’s Instagram feed
Emily Hannah-Myles
Reader
twitter: @egmyles
website: https://www.emilymyleswriter.com
WORK
This year I had work appear in Split Lip and Devastation Baby! Links can be found at my website.
FAVORITE X-R-A-Y STORY I READ THIS YEAR
Read so many great ones but JACKFRUIT by Gwen Kirby has stuck with me the most. Her voice is so personal and concise, I love everything she does.
FAVORITE BOOKS I READ THIS YEAR
The Land of Milk and Honey by C. Pam Zhang and Biography of X by Catherine Lacey were real standouts for me this year, both so visceral and ornate.
The Land of Milk and Honey by C. Pam Zhang
Biography of X by Catherine Lacey
FAVORITE MOVIE I WATCHED THIS YEAR
The Barbie movie, for its many flaws, etched itself into my heart.
FAVORITE ALBUM I HEARD THIS YEAR
Therapy by the Brendan Eder Ensemble has been on repeat since the summer.
FAVORITE INTERNET THING
This year I discovered and subscribed to Hunter Harris’s substacks and they are a balm for my soul. I highlight, screenshot, impulsively reread them every time I get one in my inbox.
JENNIFER GREIDUS
FOUNDING EDITOR
WORK
Not eating so much cheese, second draft of an autobiography of my time in Cuba, publishing my novel in the spring, being better at returning emails, boating knots.
FAVORITE X-R-A-Y STORY I READ THIS YEAR
SHORT, SMART, FUN, BAFFLING: An Interview with Brian Allen Carr
FAVORITE BOOKS I READ THIS YEAR
Elliott Chaze – Black Wings Has My Angel
Sarah Manguso – The Two Kinds of Decay
FAVORITE SONGS I HEARD THIS YEAR
I play these songs a lot lately.
“Tommy’s Party” by Peach Pit
“Jacare” by Sofi Tukker (Cat Dealers Remix)
“Sneakin’ Sally Through the Alley” by Robert Palmer
FAVORITE MOVIE I WATCHED THIS YEAR
I don’t watch many movies.
FAVORITE TV SHOW I WATCHED THIS YEAR
Deadloch
Bad Sisters
FAVORITE INTERNET THING
Levi Abadilla
Art Intern
Levi Abadilla is a Filipino queer artist of just about anything. When they’re not making art, they write and do music, and attend to the whims of their cats and dogs. Their writing has appeared in Last Syllable, and the podcast Stories After Dark.
carrd: levisstuff.carrd.co
twitter: @nineaetharia
instagram: @escapedscp
tiktok: @escapedscpo0
FAVORITE CAT
This is Alex. My other cats like to hang out in the living room (the sunlight hits that side of the house in the morning, so they sunbathe there), but he prefers to stay with me, for some reason. He cries when I leave a room. His greatest strife in life is when I go to the bathroom and he forgets the concept of object permanence. He is in a never-ending war against my graphic tablet for my lap. I want more people to look at him and admire the way he always sleeps with his tongue out.
WORK
Finished an Adult Fantasy novel that had been in the works for a while now. Currently undergoing revisions after getting feedback and I’m hoping to resub and continue querying next year.
FAVORITE X-R-A-Y STORY I READ THIS YEAR
Smoke and Fish by Uyen P. Dang
FAVORITE BOOK I READ THIS YEAR
System Collapse by Martha Wells
FAVORITE MOVIE I WATCHED THIS YEAR
Favorite movie is a tie between Puss in Boots: The Last Wish and Barbie.
FAVORITE TV SHOW I WATCHED THIS YEAR
For favorite series, I’d have to say the first season of Chainsaw Man.
FAVORITE ALBUMS I HEARD THIS YEAR
Hard tie between Hozier’s Unreal Unearth and Fall Out Boy’s So Much (For) Stardust.
FAVORITE INTERNET THING
The East Patch’s Angel Hare analog horror animated web series. It stands out from most analog horror since it doesn’t do the distorted images and loud noises usually associated with the genre, instead using full-fledged animated and voice-acted cartoon episodes. I also find the story heartwarming.
Michael Todd Cohen
Assistant Creative Nonfiction Editor
Michael Todd Cohen’s work appears in The Rumpus, Split Lip and Columbia Journal, among others, and has been included in Best Micro Fictions, the Connecticut Literary Anthology, and nominated for a Pushcart Prize. He lives with a poet-husband and two illiterate chihuahuas, by a rusty lighthouse, in New England.
Author and Artist website: michaeltoddcohen.com
WORK
“Dear John,” is a stationary box of original character sketches, rendered on vintage Eaton’s paper, inside a handmade, limited edition box. Drawn over three months, using pencil and draft paper. Each “john” represents notions of my queer adolescent experience in America in the 1990s: desire, distrust, love, loss, and longing.
“Lordship House” is an ongoing project with a mission to make community and communion through: the epistolary, the dialogue of the literary salon, and the queer tradition of finding, making and fostering spaces in which to flourish. Includes poets, essayists, publishers, agents, editors, scholars…seeking communion through letters, literature, in-person dialogue.
FAVORITE X-R-A-Y STORY I READ THIS YEAR
“Getting Quiet,” Emily Marie Seibert
FAVORITE BOOKS I READ THIS YEAR
“Flute Solo: Reflections of a Trappist Hermit” by Kelty, Matthew
A strange, sensational, gorgeously unhinged meditation on faith, queerness, solitude and meaning. Found in a used bookshop in upstate New York, and have since bought two more copies from esoteric sources.
“Punch Me Up to the Gods,” Broome, Brian
“A History of My Brief Body,” Belcourt, Billy-Ray
FAVORITE MOVIES I WATCHED THIS YEAR
“Fire & Ice”
some sexy, flawed, dirty, captiviatingly weird shit from Ralph Bashki and Frank Frazetta. Animated, uses rotoscoping and other innovative color & style.
“A Day on the Grand Canal”
Artist David Hockney explores the intricacies of a China scroll. This is a masterclass on perspective: literal, metaphorical.
FAVORITE ALBUM I HEARD THIS YEAR
Everyday, all-day, “Tensile Strength,” by Madelinski
Also, Sunday Baroque on Public Radio. FUND THE ARTS!
FAVORITE INTERNET THING
GIVE ME THAT WEB 1.0 ListServ. This is what the Internet should be.
Chris Dankland
Founding Editor
my head is made of smoke.
FAVORITE X-R-A-Y STORY I READ THIS YEAR
i’ve thought about this story many times in the last year & i think it’s my favorite thing we’ve ever published.
FAVORITE BOOKS I READ THIS YEAR
mike topp is my favorite find of the year — he’s funny, he’s unique, he’s cool. gary lutz described him as a “writer’s writer’s writer” & for sure he has a star studded list of fans: elieen myles, raymond pettibon, blake butler, aram saroyan, william wegman…but u don’t have to be one of the cool kids to enjoy him. he’s bazooka joe — he’s for the people — he’s heehaw with class. if joe brainard wrote joke books, or if norm macdonald wrote poetry, neither would begin to approach mike topp’s excellence. i interviewed him this year & he also published a piece with us.
The Passenger and Stella Maris by Cormac McCarthy
if u combine both books, it’s top 5 cormac for me.
The Conspiracy Against The Human Race by Thomas Ligotti
book that convincingly argues in favor of philosophical pessimism. 1) consciousness is tragic 2) death obliterates everything 3) u have no free will 4) the world is “malignantly useless” 5) one can only find meaning in existence through self-delusion 6) humanity ought to stop procreating & the species should go extinct.
FAVORITE MUSIC I HEARD HIS YEAR
Dissimulant by Ruin Lust
Gowanus Death Stomp by Gravesend
Suffocating Hallucination by Full Of Hell & Primitive Man
Make Them Beg For Death by Dying Fetus
Memento Mori by Marduk
Those Of My Blood by Blutschwur
Black Royal Spiritism – I – O Sino de Igreja by RUIM
novej qalhnjenno by Trha
Alttarimme on Luista Tehty by Azaghal
Doedskvad by Taake
The Ninth Incantation by Lungtoucher
The Fall of Cintra by Hekseblad
Godslastering: Hymns of a Forlorn Peasantry by Hulder
Hiss by Wormrot
The Enduring Spirit by Tomb Mold
FAVORITE MOVIES I SAW THIS YEAR
i really enjoyed Skinamarink & We’re All Going To the World’s Fair
FAVORITE INTERNET THING
my favorite tik tok preacher is @TikTokChurch77. he does a lot of tik tok lives & i’ll watch him preaching in his living room.
Tex Gresham
Reader
Tex Gresham is an award-winning screenwriter, novelist, and filmmaker living in Los Angeles. His books include Sunflower, Heck Texas, and This Is Strange June. His debut feature, MUSTARD (which he wrote, directed, edited and acted in), is available to stream for free on Vimeo. Has gotten very good at sitting at coffee shops and pretending to work.
twitter: @thatsqueakypig
website: www.squeakypig.com
WORK
Two works I’d like to promote:
MUSTARD
FAVORITE X-R-A-Y STORIES I READ THIS YEAR
Listening To Dinosaurs by Kyle Seibel
Ugly Boys by Daniel Isaiah Elder
FAVORITE BOOKS I READ THIS YEAR
Blood of the Virgin by Sammy Harkham
Burden of Joy by Lexi Kent-Monning
Suicide: An Anthology, put out by Cash 4 Gold and House of Vlad
FAVORITE MOVIE I SAW THIS YEAR
Dream Scenario
Jessika Bouvier
Assistant Managing Editor
Jessika Bouvier (she/her) is a queer writer from New Orleans & Atlanta. Her work is published in Catapult, monkeybicycle, Electric Literature, and X-R-A-Y, where she is the Assistant Managing Editor. She has received support from Georgia Writers, the Fine Arts Work Center, and Hub City Writers Project. She is the 2023 Kelley Scholar for Social Justice in fiction. If she’s on social media, it’s always @jessikavbouvier.
twitter: @jessikavbouvier
bluesky: @jessikavbouvier
website: jessikabouvier.com
WORK
Stuff I worked on: many short stories that are presently locked in personal rejection purgatory; continued work on my queer bayou novella; much pondering on my other novel about outdoors recreation & colonialism; and, ofc, all the great work we did at XRAY (and the other journal I work for, So to Speak).
FAVORITE X-R-A-Y STORY I READ THIS YEAR
David’s Going to Die by Aurora Huiza
FAVORITE BOOKS I READ THIS YEAR
Paul Takes the Form of a Mortal Girl by Andrea Lawlor (!!!)
The Atmospherians by Alex McElroy
FAVORITE MOVIE I WATCHED THIS YEAR
Talk to Me, an Australian horror film
FAVORITE TV SHOW I WATCHED THIS YEAR
for TV, probs Severance. I am also a Love Island apologist.
Jo Varnish
Creative Nonfiction Editor
twitter: @jovarnish1
website: jovarnish.com
WORK
I finally completed my PhD this year, so I am now in the planning stages of a new long form fiction project, having put all of my creative efforts into my academic pursuits for a long time!
FAVORITE X-R-A-Y STORY I READ THIS YEAR
This was tough to pick, but my favorite X-ray piece from 2023 is Ugly Boys by Daniel Isaiah Elder.
FAVORITE BOOKS I READ THIS YEAR
Slouching Towards Bethlehem by Joan Didion
Down Here We Come Up by Sara Johnson Allen
How Can I Help You by Laura Sims
FAVORITE TV SHOWS I WATCHED THIS YEAR
My top TV shows of the year are an eclectic mix: Succession, Top Boy and Ted Lasso. All feature the kinds of captivating characters who are easy to fall in love with and excellent dialogue.
FAVORITE MUSIC I HEARD THIS YEAR
Zach Bryan’s eponymously named album is my favorite of 2023.
FAVORITE INTERNET THING
I’m not sure what my favorite internet thing of the year is but I spent a decent chunk of time on Jake Shane’s Tik Tok account!
Portrait of the artist waiting in a Zoom room before a job interview
Kira K. Homsher
Assistant Fiction Editor
Kira K. Homsher is a writer from Philadelphia, currently living in Los Angeles. Her work has received support from the Kimmel Harding Nelson Center and has appeared in Kenyon Review Online, Indiana Review, Passages North, Longreads, The Offing, and others. She is currently working on a novel and story collection.
twitter: @bogcritter
instagram: @kirahomsher
website: kirahomsher.com
WORK
This year, I published in Kenyon Review Online, Longreads, The Offing, and HAD. I also wrote a novel.
FAVORITE X-R-A-Y STORIES I READ THIS YEAR
Very difficult to pick favorites, but I especially loved Joe Aguilar’s BEAR WITH A CHAINSAW and Kyle Seibel’s LISTENING TO DINOSAURS. Both feel like very quintessential X-R-A-Y stories and have the kind of sentences I want to spend time with.
FAVORITE BOOKS I READ THIS YEAR
FAVORITE TV SHOW I WATCHED THIS YEAR
I honestly watched a ton of garbage this year and very little stood out, but I’m liking the new season of Fargo so far.
FAVORITE MUSIC I HEARD THIS YEAR
I’ve been listening to a lot of CLANN while I write. I used to listen to Sea Oleena in high school, so it was cool to rediscover Charlotte Oleena’s music in a new context. Ichiko Aoba‘s cover of Country Road also made me smile when I discovered it last month.
FAVORITE INTERNET THING
My favorite internet thing I encountered this year is my new friend Rachel Seo, who I met on Twitter. 🙂
Alice M.
Reader
Alice, pronouns ae/aer. Alice is a pseudonymous nonbinary femme writer and painter from London. Aer short fiction has appeared in X-R-A-Y, HAD, Hobart, Rejection Letters, and has been reprinted in Salt Publishing’s Best British Short Stories (2022 volume). Alice is founding editor of bodyfluids.org, a small journal for writing about social discomfort, and currently reads fiction slush for X-R-A-Y.
twitter: @notveryalice
bluesky: @notveryalice
WORK
I’m serialising a queer as hell slipstream novel about what being a god’s chosen voice on earth would be like (bad) on my Patreon, here: https://www.patreon.com/notveryalice
I finished a literary novella, ‘Lithopedion’, about a woman and the calcified ectopic foetus she personified and talks to as a coping mechanism, and started sending it out to markets.
FAVORITE X-R-A-Y STORY I READ THIS YEAR
‘Jackfruit’, by Gwen Kirby, which fucking rocks.
FAVORITE BOOK I READ THIS YEAR
‘Weather Underwater’ by Kaisa Saarinen. Kaisa is my poetry editor for bodyfluids, and I painted the cover, but I’m not biased, I swear. This novel is so sick: a slow and delicate disaster unfolding like a blighted flower. I love it.
FAVORITE MOVIE I SAW THIS YEAR
I have rewatched Guadagnino’s Suspiria remake at least a dozen times and it’s never been beaten, although Cosmatos’ Mandy came really close.
FAVORITE SONG I HEARD THIS YEAR
OBSESSED with Chelsea Wolfe’s ‘Whispers in the Echo Chamber’ which came out at the end of October. I’m obsessed with Chelsea Wolfe in general, honestly.
FAVORITE INTERNET THING
I feel like I’ve found my people, thanks to the internet. Shout out to Daye, Megan, Elle, Josh, Emil, Tolja, Emily, and the gang on the bf, RRP, TRG & RWR servers, who have all kept me alive & thriving this year. I am indebted to y’all forever.