Award Eligibility and 2022 Recap!

Making one of these before the year is out because I’m predicting full body-mind hibernation in December. First off, here’s the short stories I was able to publish this year!

Paradise – A tropical biopunk indigi-horror story following a lone survivor in post-apc Hawaii – 7k words – Published online at Expat Press (2022) – Published in the print edition in Death in the Mouth: Original Horror from People of Color (2022)

What Was Your Inspiration? – A ‘hard’ SF story about an artist whose thoughts are being monitored while making art. – 2k words – Analog Science Fiction and Fact Magazine September/October Issue (2022)

What Salt Will Bring to Bear – A sci-fantasy story about a soldier looking for a place to die on a foreign planet after a great interstellar war – 5k – Dark Matter Magazine Issue 008 (2022)

Stars May Hunger, Suns May Still – An indigeous sci-fi novelette about the daughter of exiled women who undergoes a strange transformation as she comes of age – 10k words – Snaring New Suns: Speculative Works From Hawai’i And Beyond, Bamboo Ridge #122 (2022)

And a general recap! I’m not feeling too wordy so here’s just a bulleted list of some highlights:

• One of my stories was translated into Spanish, my first ever translated work!
• I also had one of stories read by professional for the first time, which was incredible to hear: listen to it here!
• I wrote a 9-episode audio drama starring Nikki Tuazon and Harry Shum Jr, written by Millie Ho, Monte Lin, Curtis C. Chen, myself, and Jenn Reesefor RealmFM called Echo Park.
• Leslie and I ran the first Minicomic Awards which was a blast! We read over 100 minicomics and then chose our favorites for 5 different categories. Each winner won $400 which we were stoked about since no other comics awards comes with monetary prizes. You can read a write-up of the event here and watch the award ceremony here!
• I also helped program my first virtual convention, Flights of Foundry!
• Me and Anna were nominated for the Cartoonist Studio Prize for our graphic novel Graveneye.
• I got to attend Clarion West Writing Workshop after several years of waiting (thanks pandemic!). It was energizing, demanding and I was astounded by the stories of every classmate. Such a fun, inspiring summer…
• I was one of the judges for the LA Times Book Prize and had a blast reading hundreds and hundreds of graphic novels.
• I made a cartoonist webring!
• I drew a book cover for my friend Charity, one of my favorite writers around!
• I joined Unicorn Authors Club as a mentor and coach.
• I wrote my first screenplays for an animated series (secret for now)!
• Death in the Mouth: Original Horror from People of Color was published October 1st and we had a wonderful book virtual book tour to celebrate!
• I went to Boise Comics Festival, the first comics show I’ve been to post-pandemic. It was held at the zoo which was rad, all cons should be held at zoos!
• I finally finished Prism Stalker 2: The Weeping Star, out from from Dark Horse July 4th 2023. Lucas Gattonni lettered the book and worked with me on styling it just right!
• Put together a Cronenberg fanzine called Murdered Futures (out in December)!
• I made it into BRAVE NEW WEIRD: THE BEST NEW WEIRD HORROR VOL. 1 with my story Paradise!

Some media favorites:

Comics: The Third Person by Emma Grove, Murasaki Yamada’s Talk to My Back, Meläg: Town of Fables by Bong Redila, Letters for Lucardo: The Silent Lord by Otava Heikkilä’, Step By Bloody Step By Mathias Bergara Simon Spurrier, Orphan and the Five Beasts by James Stokoe

TV: Better Call Saul, Raised by Wolves, Outer Range, Barry, Severance, The Old Man, The Boys, The Rehearsal, House of the Dragon, Yellowstone, Players, Righteous Gemstones, Irma Vep

Movies: Crimes of the Future, Resurrection, After Yang, Barbarian, Turning Red, Everything Everywhere All At Once, Parallel Mothers, Vesper, The Northman, Tar, The Banshees of Inisherin, RRR, The Stranger, Mad God

Games: Perfect Tides, Elden Ring, God of War: Ragnarok, Pokémon Legends: Arceus, Pokémon: Violet, Scorn

I don’t really keep up on new-new books but in my book club, we read: Lindqvist’s I Am Behind You, McCarthy’s Child of God, Babel 17, Nabokov’s The Defense, Zola’s The Ladies’ Paradise, Ojeda’s Jawbone, Lolita, Ruthnum’s Helpmeet, The Bad Lands, Eschbach’s The Carpet Makers, and Bulawayo’s Glory. Not sure what our December book will be…

All in all, another mixed bag of year. Don’t know that there’s any other kind unless you get really lucky! I’m hoping this will be my last year in Portland, too, since I’m aiming to move to LA with the rest of the hopeful artist masses during summer next year. Wish me luck!