We Can Create; March 19 2025

Heads up to my friends in Ottawa (or in that area of Ontario) – I’ll be going to Can*Con this October!

Can*Con is a convention for literary lovers of sci-fi, fantasy, and horror. I’ll be there with my publisher to sell copies of my book, The Other Face of Sympathy, which comes out September 9th!

If you don’t know anything about my book, here’s a quick blurb:

Edward Barrett’s grandmother committed suicide. She left him everything. Having been homeless, Edward unquestioningly moves into her apartment, unaware that she left something behind. Something that sinks its teeth, quite literally, into his very existence.

His one shot at figuring out what’s haunting him and saving himself is inside the journals he picked up from Otherside Book Exchange – old diaries, written by people who became monsters. Edward had better read fast, or he’ll be eaten alive.

I’m so psyched that this book will be out in the world; I put a lot into it. Research, authenticity/sensitivity readers, and energy. I wrote it when I was going through an exceptionally hard time.

Which leads me to what I want to talk about now, which is… hardship, in general.

Thanks to the people in power in America, a lot of us are facing horrific struggles in the future. They’re trying to erase us, degrade us, and exterminate us if they can.

I’m not one of those people who believes ‘everything happens for a reason’. There’s no good reason for any of this. But what I do believe is, we can create meaning from anything. There can be a time when we look back at this batshit terrible time and say,

It’s over.

We made it, and it’s over.

And then we can heal. We can make something out of the suffering, something beautiful, and that creation will go on to help others heal too.

That’s the best I’ve got. It’s all any of us have right now.

Good luck, all.