Extended Stay cover!

The book will be out in spring 2023 from the Camino del Sol series by University of Arizona Press! I love the cover so much & I’m so happy I can share it now.

New story: "A Subscribers-Only Sneak Peek into the Preliminary Report on the Conditions of the Camps"

I’ve got a new story at this cool new science-fiction newsletter-subscription publication called The Sunday Morning Transport. It’s free to read over here, but please consider subscribing: you get new a new story every Sunday from a killer roster of writers.

My story’s called “A Subscribers-Only Sneak Peek into the Preliminary Report on the Conditions of the Camps,” and here are the first two paragraphs. You can read the rest over here.

Not bad. Really. Seriously. Not bad, or at least definitely not as bad as you’ve been led to believe. Pretty okay conditions overall.

There’s been this narrative out there that FloriCorp and maybe all of Colombia has been obfuscating, that they—we—have been denying outside observers access into the perimeter, that we keep a shifting account of the number of deaths and disappearances, that anytime we’re asked to provide a straightforward answer to a simple question, we just go around in circles, that we’re negligent re: the high incidence of injuries, that all we care about is the bottom line, that now that we are wealthy, we’re just doing what the wealthy do. But if that were the case, why would I be writing this (preliminary) report? I mean, why would I even try to tell you of everything that’s going on with the color variation issues re: the Consumers?

There’s a bunch of obvious sources of inspiration: the Colombian flower industry and the immigrant detention camps are the two biggest. I may expand on the post a little with some of my favorite odd bits of information I found while writing this piece.

New Story!

Hi! I’m really proud to have Trumbull, a new story, in the the Spring/Summer 2020 issue of Shenandoah. The story is available right here. The first paragraph is below the photo.

From Trumbull:

They wanted to turn the school by our luxury condo into another luxury condo. I told my wife, Dawn, that it was a bad idea, and she agreed: it was gross, it was wrong. Plus, those condos are totally going to be haunted. I said, How many kids do you think died? The school had been around for almost one hundred years, so my guess was a few. Dawn coughed, looked away. Our daughter, Alba, had just been born. It wasn’t the right time to be talking about dead kids. We weren’t getting enough sleep. When I slept, I dreamt of the school, I dreamt of Trumbull’s massive brick facade, its narrow slits of windows. The school loomed over the intersection of Ashland and Foster, and stood catty-corner to a funeral parlor now occupied by a theater, and Trumbull closing was all our neighbors could talk about.

My America

I’m so proud to be part of the American Writers Museum’s My America exhibit. This interview and the exhibit took place before the pandemic, and I’m glad to share their post here—very excited to take my son to the museum when we make it through this long, difficult, heartbreaking time.

Generative Writing Prompts

I’ve created a few generative writing prompts for my creative writing students, and I’ve shared them on Twitter, but I’m collecting them here as well.

San Antonio AWP 2020 Events

If you’re in San Antonio for AWP this year, I’d love to see you! I posted what I’m doing it below, but I also added the events to the Events page.

• F243. From Unpublished Writer to Book Deal: How to Finish Writing and Get a Book Deal, with Julia Fierro and Marie Myung-Ok Lee

  • Room 301, Henry B. González Convention Center, Ballroom Level
    Friday, March 6, 2020
    1:45 pm to 3:00 pm  

  • The road to a book deal seems so long. How do you find the mental space to be creative? How do you get that manuscript finished and once you do, then what? What should you do before approaching an agent? How do you know whom to approach and get one interested in you? Once you have an agent, what does the submission process look like? When does a book go to auction? How does a book advance work? This diverse group of successful writers with different publishing experiences offers their top tips.

• R. 141. Worry about It Later: Strategies to Finish What You Start, with Christine Sneed, Sarah Kokernot, Kendra Fortmeyer, and Amy Gentry

  • Room 303, Henry B. González Convention Center, Ballroom Level
    Thursday, March 5, 2020
    9:00 am to 10:15 am

  • Starting is often the easy part—it’s what comes after that’s so difficult for many writers. In this panel, we’ll discuss strategies for completing the first draft, along with our experiences of sending out and eventually publishing work that in some cases went through many drafts. We’ll also discuss how to deal with self-doubt and how to write through potential problems. Lastly, we’ll share advice about when to set a project aside.

Readings & Signings & AWP Panels!

I'm going to AWP in Washington DC and doing two panels, plus a signing, plus a reading for Best Worst American and would love to see you and talk with you at one of them. Or at all of them! Seriously. I'm also reading in Chicago and in Little Rock.

Here's where I'll be:

1. Signing! Thursday, February 9, 10:00 am-10:30 am: At the AWP Small Beer Press table (Washington, DC)
2. Talking!/Paneling! Saturday, February 11, 12:00pm-1:15pm, At this panel: "Immigrants/Children of Immigrants: a Non-traditional Path to a Writing Career" (with Ken Chen, Monica Youn, Marie Myung-OK Lee, and Irina Reyn). Location: Liberty Salon N, O, & P, Marriott Marquis, Meeting Level Four (Washington, DC)
3. Talking!/Paneling! Saturday, February 11, 4:30pm-5:45pm, At this panel: "The Short Story as Laboratory" (with Lesley Nneka Arimah, Carmen Maria Machado, Kendra Fortmeyer, and Sofia Samatar) Location: Marquis Salon 9 & 10, Marriott Marquis, Meeting Level Two
4. Reading! (with Kelly Freaking Link!) Saturday, February 11, 6:00pm-8:00pm at Politics and Prose (Facebook event page here) (Washington DC)
5. Reading! Thursday, February 16, 7:30pm-9:30pm at Women and Children First (Facebook event page here) (Chicago IL)
6. Reading! Monday, February 27 at 6:30pm at Curbside Books and Records (More info here, Facebook event page here) (Chicago IL)
7. Talking! in April at the Arkansas Literary Festival (Little Rock AR)

I'm so sorry for all the self-promotion! The robot says if I don't self-promote the h*ck out of this book he will do something unspeakable with this pencil. Blame the robot don't blame me. The robot demands that you buy 500 copies of my book thank you.

The Collection is Forthcoming!

Hi! My story collection Best Worst American will come out in February 2017 out of the amazing Small Beer Press: check it out! You can pre-order it at their site, so why not go there and order 500 copies? The tentative cover is below.

"Northern" in the Fall 2015 issue of Huizache!

Hi! I'm thrilled and proud that my story "Northern" found an awesome home in the Fall 2015 issue of Huizache, and just and thrilled to be in such good company. Seriously daring, urgent, amazing writing in here -- please pick up a copy!

"Missed Tickets" in The Cossack Review

Hi! I'm super thrilled that The Cossack Review published a short creepy thing of mine. It's in the magazine's fourth print issue. Please buy 500 copies.

Two Pieces in TriQuarterly

Two pieces of mine are up in TriQuarterly! While self-contained, they are excerpts from the novel-in-progress, whose second draft is about a month or two away from completion. The pieces are on the magazine's front page, but their Summer/Fall 2013 issue is HUGE (and awesome), and so it's easier accessing them via these direct links:

• Domokun in Fremont
• Courier

Also: Selected Shorts rebroadcast "Customer Service at the Karaoke Don Quixote this month"! Parker Posey guest-hosted! (MP3 available here.)

Captain Adama Book Festival

Hi! I'll be reading and talking, alongside some awesome writers, over at the Sudden Fiction Latino panel for the Latino Family and Book Festival taking place this weekend in Los Angeles. It's taking place over at California State University, Los Angeles, and our panel is on Saturday, October 9, at 2 pm, in room 136 of Salazar Hall.

Stop in! Say hello!

Note that Captain Adama is all about this festival. Captain Adama!

Also: I was on the radio this morning! KNPR's State of Nevada, talking about my story for the Vegas Valley Book Festival's Las Vegas Writes Project.

Now I am talking about my story to the two cats in our house, whose interest in fiction is not to be underestimated.

On Paradise (My contribution to Las Vegas Writes, part of the Vegas Valley Book Festival)

This year, the Vegas Valley Book Festival's Las Vegas Writes project asked some people -- me among them -- to write a short story based on an iconic Vegas photograph. My story is up at their site right now. It is called On Paradise, and you can read it over there. 

There is an event associated with the project! Please attend. There is also a book! Please buy 20 copies to give to everyone you know. 

More stuff:

• On the Vegas Valley Book Festival
• On Las Vegas Writes
• On the Event (also has info on My Wheel is in the Dark: A Night Ride with Las Vegas Bike Bards", a poets-on-bikes thing, also part of the Vegas Valley Book Festival, in which I will also be participating).

Buddying it Up with Borges

Me and my very short Quixote-ish goof of a "sudden fiction" show up right after Jorge Luis Borges in Norton's Sudden Fiction Latino. (Vd.! Table of Contents.)

Buy eight copies!

Well Tended

"Well Tended," a story I wrote about talking plants and vanishing women, is in the current issue of Glimmer Train! (It's the Spring 2010 issue! #74). You can find it in all sorts of bookstores, or online. Buy five copies!