Guest Post from Sara Hosey
Sara Hosey is the author of three young adult novels: Iphigenia Murphy, Imagining Elsewhere, and Summer People. Her short fiction been shortlisted for the Katherine Anne Porter Prize and the American Short Fiction Halifax Ranch Prize and has appeared in journals like Cordella Literary Magazine and Mudroom Magazine. She is a parent, a community college professor, and a tree enthusiast.
“Only Connect!”: Ideas and Inspirations
I often develop stories by thinking through a hypothetical situation or question. I was once in my local supermarket, for example, and for a split second I thought I saw something obscene on the flatscreen television about the checkout line. When I looked again, I saw that I had been mistaken; it was just an unappetizing shot of some squash. But I kind of laughed to myself and thought, what would I do if it had been an obscene picture? Would anyone else have noticed? Would I have continued to watch the screen to see if it cycled back around again? This situation became the opening for my story “Not for Everyone,” in which a mother character sees what she believes is a “dirty” picture in the supermarket. It freaks her out, and becomes the instantiating event of the story, which traces a daughter’s realization that although her parents are not unambivalently bad people, they are in fact profoundly dysfunctional, and, in many ways, hateful.
Similarly, sometimes a word or phrase or even a joke will come into my mind and that will be the anchor for a story, or I’ll hear or read about a concept, and I’ll ruminate about it until it works its way into a story. I came across an article one day that said that, before they were aquatic, dolphins had been land mammals. What? Dolphins had walked around on the earth? I found this amazing, and I incorporated it into my story, “Land Mammals,” in which the main character, Lexi, uses the idea of leaving behind one kind of life and moving into another medium, going somewhere that others cannot easily follow, as a way of grappling with the loss entailed by her mother’s dementia.
I am also endlessly inspired by my friends and relationships. I try to surround myself with people who interest and invigorate me. I thank many friends in Dirty Suburbia’s “Acknowledgements,” and some of them are people I haven’t spoken to, literally, in years, but whose lives or behavior or just general way of being impressed or inspired me somehow. I’m fortunate too, to have friends that make me laugh and who sometimes let me borrow their jokes, and they are acknowledged as well.
And it’s only now, as I consider the book as a whole, that I’m realizing how many of the stories end with two people, usually women, sometimes strangers, taking care of or supporting each other. Not all the stories end happily, and when they don’t, I think it’s because characters are left without that sense of being understood or belonging. I feel that short fiction is particularly well-suited for exploring this fumbling-towards-connection, and many of the authors whose work most inspires me—Kelly Fordon and Joel Mowdy and Jess Walter and Chelsea Bieker—so deftly conjure complex characters who try—and sometimes succeed—in breaking through. It’s what E.M. Forster called for, over a century ago: “Only connect!” To me, the most inspiring art is art that explores, and sometimes as a result enacts, this idea.
About the book
Dirty suburbias are working-class neighborhoods in which girls who are left to fend for themselves sometimes become predators, as well as affluent communities in which women discover that money is no protection against sexism, both their own and others’.
One young woman sets up her abusive, cheating boyfriend, hoping he’ll get arrested so that she can rescue him and win him back. A teenager arranges to meet up with an older man she’s met online playing video games; she brings a knife with her, just in case. A middle-aged divorcee attempts to rekindle a romantic relationship with her high school English teacher, who happens to be a former nun. A struggling academic falls in love with a Henry David Thoreau impersonator, and a well-adjusted grad student goes home for Christmas only to be repulsed by her family’s casual cruelty.
Despite the ugliness and injustice they face, as well as the failures of their families and communities, these characters often find relief in friendship and connection, and sometimes, even discover meaning and cause for hope.
Available on Amazon and Barnes & Noble
Vampire Profiling
But what about my vampire? Recently, I listened to “Dracula” by Bram Stoker, read by Steven Red Fox Garnett—a talented vocal artist. Stoker’s vampire was treacherous and evil—not to mention his lady vampire companions.
About Dark Blood Awakens
When I sat down a few years ago to begin writing the first novel in the 
One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Kesey (1962). 
The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath (1963). 
Beloved by Toni Morrison (1987). 
She’s Come Undone by Wally Lamb (1992). 
It’s Kind of a Funny Story by Ned Vizzini (2007). 
Wintergirls by Laurie Halse Anderson (2009). 
Turtles All the Way Down by John Green (2017). 
A Guest Post from Dr. Horowitz on Climate Grief
So, what could our world look like if we continue on our current path? That is the future I imagine in my upcoming novel, Starseed R/evolution: The Awakening. The year is 2037, and the Earth is in the midst of a deadly climate crisis, prompting the massive spread of various vector-borne diseases, such as Lyme disease and West Nile virus. Chemical pollutants have left birth rates at an all-time low, and crop destruction has led to massive famines. The world’s only hope lies in the hands of Crown Prince Ian, the last surviving heir of the Royal Arcturian Family of Antwar. He’s a half-human/half-alien with an IQ approaching 200, a penchant for Swiss chocolates, and defending humanity from itself.
A Guest Post with Jonathan Durham, author of Winterset Hollow.
Jonathan Edward Durham was born near Philadelphia in one of many satellite rust-belt communities where he read voraciously throughout his youth. After attending William & Mary, where he received a degree in neuroscience, Jonathan waded into the professional world before deciding he was better suited for more artistic pursuits.
A Guest Post from Jeff Evans, author of the middle-grade fantasy series ‘What Magic is Not’.
Evans: I’m honored today to interview Professor Philonius Gnut, who teaches magic at the legendary school in the woods, deep in the Enchanted Forest. He’s a bit of a local legend: every rumor about him is more outlandish than the last, and he rarely leaves the woods, so booking him for this interview was not easy. (I had to promise him a few months off of work before the sequel.) But here he is—Hello, Professor! Thanks for joining me.
Guest Post from Clark Burbidge – His advice to budding authors and what he’s learnt from writing!
In A Lullaby in the Desert, one woman’s fight to freedom plunges her into humanity’s depths
What they don’t know is that fear won’t stop someone who has nothing to lose. In A
A Guest Post with Sophie Whittemore, “Writing an LGBT+ Found Family”
Coming out and joining the LGBT+ community, reckoning with my gender and sexuality, wasn’t an easy process. I am so incredibly grateful I had amazing, understanding friends along the way. And honestly, when I was in the closet and didn’t have the vocabulary to say what I felt and understood about myself, watching media was the only way I knew how to make sense of myself. The main characters in Catch Lili Too have their own coming-out and coming-of-age experiences (yes, even immortals and undead young adults manage to have those too), and it was important that they not be alone in it.
Sophie Whittemore is a Dartmouth Film/Digital Arts major with a mom from Indonesia and a dad from Minnesota. They’re known for their Gamin Immortal series (Catch Lili Too) and Legends of Rahasia series, specifically, the viral publication Priestess for the Blind God. Their writing career kicked off with the whimsical Impetus Rising collection, published at age 17.