Imagine a piece of flat, perfect, origami paper. White on one side, vibrantly purple on the other. This is the representation of my emotions before Life happened. I remember the first time that I was ever truly, rightfully, angry. My father was dying. He was dying from a disease riddled with social stigma. When the […]
Reader, do you remember the book you loved most as a child? The one with illustrations that fascinated and haunted you in the best of ways. The one with words you spoke under your breath so your parents would not know you didn’t need to be read to anymore. The one you stole from the […]
One does not simply walk into Mordor. We all know this, everyone knows this. The road to Mount Doom is treacherous. Every step brings confusion and terror. And yet we pretend it is so, that one can walk in, and can then walk out again, unchanged. It starts so simply, so small. You find a […]
When people ask for advice toward developing editorial skills, I have a dirty little secret to editorial greatness.* Usually, I give tips that have been repeated elsewhere. Read widely. Keep a curious mind. Decipher the technical tricks of your favorite authors. Or follow their blogs. There is one strategy I’ve not admitted to. Fact is, […]
Sheldon Teitelbaum and Eli Herstein note in the Encyclopedia Judaica that traditionally Jewish literature has avoided the purely imaginative, often framing stories that would seem on their face to be fantastic as true accounts or using the less realistic elements to make a point about the true nature of the world. Despite this, Jewish folklore […]
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Making good life choices is hard. Making good life choices when you’re neurodivergent is damn hard. Perhaps the most relatable and engaging such struggle I’ve read is that of Miles Vorkosigan, from Lois McMaster Bujold’s Vorkosigan Saga. Miles and his “excellent life choices” entertain, astound, and horrify me even as they dig at something deep […]
I have always felt like a monster. And on this particular morning, my brain and body transform me into a creature I barely recognize. Claws inject a longing ache deep in my ribcage, the disembodied chemicals’ lips brushing the shell of my ear whispering things no human should endure. Twins of agony perch at my […]
I dream of malfunctioning space stations. They pitch and yaw wildly; the artificial gravity works sometimes. Sometimes it doesn’t. It cuts in and out at unpredictable intervals and smashes me into the deck. I float back up, I am weightless. I am slammed into the ceiling. It is my job to fix it, and I […]
When Julian Bashir is asked to help a group of genetically engineered “mutants” on the space station Deep Space Nine, he faces an interesting dilemma. Illegally genetically engineered as a child himself, his status as a “mutant” has recently been revealed, and he now has to deal with the fallout as his friends and co-workers […]