stories

That Shiny Newfangled Technology Can’t Do the Work for You

July 3, 2023 by Rasmenia Comment Closed

The venue reeks of cheap coffee. Creaks and groans of tables and chairs dragging on the hardwood floor echo, bouncing off the high ceiling. Barely audible beneath it all is the mumbling of socially awkward writers mingling in the early morning.The chipped folding tables are covered with cloths. Stacks of books and displays are propped up, tip over, then propped up again. Chatter and laughter rise in volume proportional to the increasing number of bodies.A quiet little man with a single stack of books stands next to his wife, who looks at no one and speaks to no one. He shows me his book. Shows me photos of himself with his book. Tells me how impressed people are with his work. And so on.This guy, my neighbor for the day, nods toward my carefully laid-out display of books. My short story trilogy, finally complete.“How long did these take you to write?”The way he asks this, it feels like a trick...

More Books to Add to Your 2022 Reading List

December 17, 2021 by Rasmenia Comment Closed

I don't know about you, but my to-read pile of books is absurdly out of hand. Every year, I manage to knock a hundred or so books from the stack. This makes no dent in that ever-growing behemoth. It does, however, mean that I discover a few gems each year. (A few duds, too, but I'm here to give love, not to disparage. Sorry.)Anyway, this isn't a goddamn recipe blog, so let's skip the boring story leading up to the reason why you're here and get to the goods.Please note that these are not necessarily books published in 2021, just books I read this year that made such an impact on me that I want other people to read them, too. Books by Authors Not New to Me, Who Still Managed to Surprise the Hell Out of Me:Look, this book was published in 1997 and takes place during peak AIDS crisis in San Francisco. Yet, it feels current and chillingly relevant....

Why I’m No Longer Mad at Boulder, Colorado

October 7, 2020November 23, 2020 by Rasmenia Comment Closed

You can't go home again. That's what they say. Which is weird, because the truth is that you never really leave. Regardless of how many years or miles pass by, there's always a part of you trapped in that place. A splinter of home is forever lodged in your psyche.Home is a complicated thing. It isn't just a place. I'm not talking about those corny plaques that everyone's grandma has hanging in their kitchen that says something like, "Home isn't a place, it's a feeling." Or even worse, "Home is where the heart is." That's all too simple and trite. Especially if you've had many homes.One of those places wasn't my home at all. I never lived in Boulder, Colorado. And yet, I've long had a thorny relationship with the place.Curled up on the floor of my cramped bedroom in a little trailer park in Indiana, I drew one enormous picture after another of mountain scenes with my fat Crayola...

Read the First Chapter of Tied Within

July 9, 2020December 3, 2020 by Rasmenia Comment Closed

Chapter 1: Entering We’re talking about nothing again when someone asks if I know what terror feels like. A familiar voice, an echo, reaches through the smoke. Behind the guitar assault grinding and growling though a blown speaker, I know someone is talking to me. I summon the effort to focus my attention on the voice’s face. “So, do you?” One of the twins, the one who parts his hair to the left, passes me the joint. He looks like one of those guys from A-ha. His twin brother, who parts his hair to the right, looks like the other A-ha. Holding the joint out to me, he tosses his head back, shaking hair out of his eyes. “I don’t mean a little bit startled. I mean stark terror. Unable to scream. Shit your pants scared.” I take the joint from him without answering. “I know what that feels like,” Dom says, twisting the cap off a bottle of beer. “When they brought my...

Black Stories Matter. Here’s a Few I Really Like.

June 12, 2020December 23, 2020 by Rasmenia Comment Closed

Stories matter. They change our minds and teach us empathy. Stories help us to understand ourselves and those unlike ourselves; experiences we can never truly understand, even though we must try. If we want to make the world a place where human beings can do things like go jogging, relax at home, drive a car, or go shopping without taking a bullet or having their windpipe crushed as they call out for their mother, we must try. We must learn. We must listen to the stories. Because black stories matter.Sure, it's true that some stories are more helpful than others. For every Uncle Tom's Cabin, there's a Birth of a Nation. Every day, you have to decide what you're going to feed your brain and body. What kinds of stories you're going to consume. What kind of person you are and who you're going to be.I read as many books as I can. I try to watch all the things...

An Author’s Rite of Passage

March 5, 2020November 23, 2020 by Rasmenia Comment Closed

I was selling some of my books at a local book fair when a cheerful woman walked over, scanned my table, waved her hand over my display then asked, "But do you self-publish these stories or did someone else publish them?""Both."With a squint and a head tilt, she asked me to elaborate. I explained that I publish some small books on my own, and they're a mix of things that have been published in various places and some that haven't.She nodded. "That's good."She clearly wasn't keen on self-published books. That's cool. I'm all for self-publishing, obviously, but don't disagree with her. Stories need to go through a gauntlet. So do their writers. I want control over everything, but I also crave the validation that comes from having my stories go through a gatekeeper. I like to mix it up. I don't want people telling me what to do. But I do want them to validate me. I want criticism and...