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Brother Dave Duford’s Newsletter – is far better than mine, and he claims It’s Never Too Late (until it is).
You can find out what you, he, and others may or may not be too late for on his website |
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Brother CW Hawes also has a Newsletter, and it’s also a treat. He covers dead porn stars, moving to California, getting kicked at the start, how to bluff magnolias, and his 4488 cars.
Okay, what he really covers are his novel, Death of a Porn Star, his upcoming Kickstarter campaign, and the Underground Authors‘ Magnolia Bluff, and Car 4488 series.
You can find it all on his website. |
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Writers’ Month Long Workshop – June 2026’s writers’ workshop covers many if not all phases of craft and storytelling. The workshop is on Wednesdays, 3-24 June 2026, morning and evening openings available.
Sign up here.
You can an idea of what craziness (and learning!) will ensue on my Experiments in Writing posts. |
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David Duford’s at Bound Together Books’ Authors’ Exchange – Yes, Dave gets a two-fer this month. He’ll be reading, signing, and talking about his books on Saturday, 20 June 2026, 2-4pmET, at Bound Together Books on West Pearl St in Nashua, NH.
Dave has always possessed a vivid imagination, and writing fiction stories is how he best expresses those wild ideas. Sci-fi and unexplained phenomenon have fascinated him since he was a kid, whether it’s Star Wars, Star Trek, sasquatch, extraterrestrial beings, or superheroes.
Influenced by masters such as Stephen King, George Orwell, Ray Bradbury, Orson Scott Card, Dennis E. Taylor, and others, David finds inspiration everywhere, and from so many sources. When you crack open his stories, you should expect plenty of “out there” twists to Keep you guessing where the story will take you next.
David belongs to the New Hampshire Writer’s Project and you can find him on Facebook under NHwriter. He also maintains a weekly blog (In Pursuit of Perspective) on his self-titled website, where you’ll see his creative imagination on full display. You’re invited to come have some fun exploring new perspectives, while spreading positivity and thoughtfulness to help make this a better world to coexist in.
While we’re on the subject of Bound Together Books and Authors’ Exchange…
Bound Together owner Michelle Audet’s asked me to help her vet authors and host regular author events at her West Peart St, Nashua, store. I’m currently seeking authors willing to give up a Saturday night, 6-8pmET, to talk about their work, take part in a panel discussion, give a class/training, read, sign, et cetera.
Email me if all the following are true
- You have at least one (1) book published and available. The more recently published the better, or if your book has a regional or seasonal tie in, also good.
- You can get to Nashua to drop off 5-10 of your books two weeks prior to your scheduled event AND for your scheduled event.
- You can make time for a Zoom chat with me so I can put together a 5-10m promo material for your book/topic/presentation. This means a hi-res headshot, hi-res bookcover, blurb, writeup, pitchline, teaser, backcover copy, related hi-res artwork, basically material we can put together to get the word out.
- And this is the big one: You will actively promote ALL author events, not just your own. Actively means via your social media (FB, LI, IG, TikTok, BlueSky, Mastodon, Cameroon, Dingbat, Marzipan (and yes, I made the last three up), your blog, … and several times, not just once. Fail to do so and you’re event will be canceled. This also applies to authors after their event. Failure to promote other authors brings your videos down.
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Talk with the Editors – Wilderness House Literary Review EIC Steve Glines and I (Senior Fiction Editor) hold monthly open chats with authors interested in a) writing for us, b) improving their craft in general, and/or c) increasing their chances of being accepted by other markets.
Meetings are held via Zoom on the last Friday of each month from 9-10amET.
So, want to know how to write for us? Want to know what gets our attention? Want to know how to write better for whatever market you’re interested in? Join us for our next “Meet the Editors” Zoom session. Seats limited! Sign up and talk with us. We’re relatively easy going and fun to be with. |
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Brother Ken Weene’s Bench – Ken offers a memorial poem on Youtube, a short prose poem titled The Bench and it’s worth a view. Share the link. |
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Brother Greg Hickey’s Summer in the City Greg’s hometown of Chicago is a great summer city (some might say, the best summer city). Like other places with long, cold winters, Chicagoans are especially grateful for warmer weather. Chicago summers are hot but usually not unbearable. And the city’s many freshwater beaches are a unique and enticing feature.
Throw in street festivals every weekend, outdoor sporting events, and the abundant parks throughout the city (Chicago’s motto is “Urbs in Horto” or “city in a garden”), and there’s something for everyone in Chicago’s brief summer. |
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Crysalis is available as an eBook
Chrysalis is a story of personal recovery from childhood and adult trauma told in three parts:
The Echo
Welcome to My Sandbox
The Stone in God’s Sling
The Echo In a bizarre nightmare world, Gerrold is relentlessly attacked by groteques which thwart his every attempt at escape until an angelic being, Acquiesce, appears and offers him a way out. Acquiesce does not do the work of escape for Gerrold and instead guides him to make his own discoveries about escaping and what it means to be free. With Acquiesce’s help, Gerrold realizes escaping the nightmare means challenging the taking control of the nightmare and robbing it of its power over him.
Welcome to My Sandbox Freed from his personal hell, Gerrold realizes freedom comes with a price, and the price is to help others escape their personal hells. This means realizing some people would rather remain in their hells, meaning he is powerless to help him. But this confuses him; how can someone recognize they’re in hell and not want to escape?
Acquiesce explains freedom is a choice, that every moment of a person’s life is a matter of choice, and freedom’s responsibilities can be frightening to those not willing to do the work of healing and compassion.
This revelation causes Gerrold to realize some responsibilities are obvious, some are hidden, and now he wonders if he’s fully paid the price of his freedom. He decides to confront the source of his nightmare to learn the truth of it.
The Stone in God’s Sling Gerrold travels to his nightmare’s source and faces its creator only to discover he has constructed the nightmare himself. Can Gerrold destroy the part of himself which has imprisoned him, set himself free, and heal from the things he’s let happen?
Fans of Guillermo del Toro’s and M. Night Shyamalan’s work will appreciate this dark psychological fantasy which forces the reader to recognize their own hells and offers paths out of them. |
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Cicatrix needs first readers Initial comments are both strong and good (whew!) and I can always take more.
Synopsis: Paul is a mathematical genius. Nobody doubts that. His thesis demonstrates a way to mathematically bridge realities, to bring what’s “over there” to “here” and vice-versa.
The problem is nobody really knows what’s “over there,” and people can only imagine based on their experiences. You can describe the ocean to someone but until they experience it first hand, they really don’t understand it. Similarly, committees shouldn’t be allowed to design horses. Paul experiments with his reality engines, but much of what he conceives of being “over there” is based on childhood trauma. There are monsters over there, and Paul’s equations bring one “here,” to finish the work his parents began years ago.
Cicatrix is ~20k words, novella length. Email me if you’d like to be a first reader, let me know what needs fixing, and how to fix it. |
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Sister Vineeta Kommineni’s Zen Citizen has had another good month!
We worked with Seva Sindhu and BDA to simplify the Possession Certificate application process, and unexpectedly ended up re-designing the service itself; while reviewing BDA’s upcoming RTI portal, we successfully pushed for more citizen-centric design decisions; finally, while documenting government procedures, we discovered that processes are not always clear even to officials themselves – this strangely makes us hopeful as it is something that is relatively easy to fix. You can find out more on the Zen Citizen website |
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A Little Game – A riddle.
What has over 10,000 legs and no eyes?
The first five people to get back to me with a correct answer get a signed Chrysalis ebook. The first person to get back to me with answers that make me laugh gets a signed print copy of Tales Told ‘Round Celestial Campfires Volume 2 (and no looking it up on the internet, folks!). |
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That’s it for May. See you next month!
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