June 13 — Reading as part of Queering Sound Spoken Word with Bernard Welt, Mark Osele, Natalie Illum, & Daneille Evennou. 7 PM at the Takoma Beverage Co.
Virtual Stoker Con Panels
Take Their Hands: Ancestry as Source. Moderated by L.E. Daniels, with Lee Murray, Pamela Jeffs, Eugen Bacon & Cindy O’Quinn.
Something Old, Something New: The Power of Horror Retellings Moderated by Gwendolyn Kiste with Addie Tsai, Eden Royce, Gaby Triana, Jessica McHugh, Craig L. Gidney, and Alyssa Palombo
I had the pleasure of moderating a panel at the Gaithersburg Book Festival last week with the authors Jinwoo Chong and Owen King.
Flux, Chong’s debut is a speculative fiction novel that has elements of time travel, alternate realities, tech startups, and queer and Asian American identity.
King’s novel The Curator is a gaslamp neogothic fantasy set in an unnamed European country at the turn of the century, equal parts Dickens and Wes Anderson. (And it’s illustrated, too!)
I recommend both novels –and authors (they are great people).
I have stories in two summer anthologies that can be pre-ordered.
Blackened Roots, an anthology of zombie stories from the African Diaspora, edited by Nicole Givens Kurtz and Tonia Ransom features my story “Grayed Out.”
Unspeakable Horror 3: Dark Rainbow Rising, edited by Vince A. Liaguno, features my story “Strange Enchanted Boys.”
I will be attending the Gaithersburg Book Festival this Saturday, May 20, where I will be in conversation with two authors — Owen King and Jinwoo Chong. The folks at the Washington Independent Review of Books asked me to conduct these interviews.
2022 saw me traveling to more cons and events. In March, I went to the International Conference of the Fantastic in the Arts in Orlando, Florida. I went to Stokercon in Denver and two weeks later to Balticon. In August, I went to Necronomicon in Providence, followed by the HP Lovecraft Film Festival in October. I went up to Philadelphia for a Halloween reading event, and in November back up to Baltimore for another event. Finally, I went to New York to read at a Burlesque show in early December.
2022 also saw the release of my fifth book, the third collection called The Nectar of Nightmares from Underland Press. “Impz” is a new story I published in Looming Low Volume II. Two anthologies my fiction was in won major awards. Unfettered Hexes: Queer Tales of Insatiable Darkness (ed. dave ring, Neon Hemlock Press) won a Shirley Jackson, and The Year’s Best African Speculative Fiction (ed., Oghenechovwe Donald Epeki, to re-released by Arc Manor Press) won the World Fantasy Award.
I also co-won the Joseph S Pulver Award for Weird Fiction (along with Zin E. Rocklyn).
I met a bunch of people, both readers and authors, and in one case, drag performers, in each city I visited. It was a full and busy year. 2023 is about hunkering down and writing more fiction.
The last couple of Tweets by Space Karen were enough to make me pull up my roots and leave the birdapp. In one, he implied a former employee (who’s gay and Jewish) of being a pedophile apologist by taking an excerpt of his PhD thesis paper out of context. In the second tweet, he threw meat to anti-vaxxers and transphobes. I barely have a presence there, but I’m out. (Space Karen has become a proto Proud Boy and is turning the birdapp into his personal KiwiFarms).
I used to like Grimes, (his ex) but I can’t even listen to her anymore. She must have seen what a far right buffoon he is and picked him anyway.
So, I’ve joined Mastodon. Here’s my relevant information — ethereallad@pettingzoo.com
I also signed up for Post, but who knows when I’ll get an invite?
I participated in the Books & Burlesque show in New York City on December 2, along side authors YZ Chin, Aimée Lutkin and Ricky Tucker. It was easily the most unique reading experience I’ve ever done! The authors read, and burlesque performers interpreted the excerpt. A statuesque performer named Beleza interpreted images from my cosmic horror story set in the Ballroom scene, “Spyder Threads,” using the “Theme to Mahogany” as the background.
Thanks to Fortune Cookie and Rose Tulips for inviting me to the event!
On December 2, I will be reading at the Books & Burlesque event in New York City at Caveat Club
From the website:
The December edition of “Books and Burlesque” is hosted by Fortune Cookie and features award-winning authors reading excerpts from their new books: Aimee Lutkin’s nonfiction memoir “The Lonely Hunter: How Our Search for Love Is Broken”; Craig Laurance Gidney’s collection of short stories “The Nectar of Nightmares”; Ricky Tucker’s nonfiction book “And the Category Is… Inside New York’s Vogue, House and Ballroom Community” and YZ Chin’s “Edge Case.”
The burlesque/boylesque/drag performers we are featuring are Rosie Tulips, Fortune Cookie, Beleza and Zebra. Stage Kitten: Ty Valentine.
Tickets and other information about the event is here: (https://caveat.nyc/events/books-and-burlesque-12-2-2022)
Fortune Cookie has provided me with these fabulous promotional images of the performers and the featured books. It promises to be a great time!
I’m currently writing a zombie story for the anthology Blackened Roots, edited by Nicole Givens Kurtz and Tonia Ransom. The anthology is being crowdfunded, and includes many other Black authors of speculative fiction. Nicole’s last anthology, Slay, included my most anthologized story “Dessicant,” which was produced for audio by Tonia. (You know it’s going to be good–Nicole and Tonia have a keen editorial eye). You can contribute to the campaign here, if so inclined!
Last week, the review site Fantasy Literature, did review of The Nectar of Nightmares. Reviewer Marion Deeds, said, “When it comes to shaping the weird and the uncanny, few are doing it as well as Gidney does.” You can read the rest of it here.
Craig Laurance Gidney 
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