Danai's Dispatch: December

Welcome to Danai's Dispatch, where I pop into your inbox once a month bearing gifts: thoughts on writing, the best short stories and books I read, tarot readings for writers, and exclusive giveaways! Thank you for coming along for the ride. If you haven’t subscribed already, please consider signing up below, so you never miss an issue.

December is where the dark goes to rest.

Living in the middle of a Swedish forest has several perks (magpies! deer! mushrooms!), as well as several drawbacks (hunters! boars! no central heating!), but the main constant is that you're a hostage to the changing of the seasons. There is no way to not notice the way darkness marches on, unrelenting, from September onward. Raging against the dying of the light is all well and good, Dylan, but if you do so here, you will be raging for a very long time—approximately from 3:30 pm, every day.

Yet there is something about December that mellows that march of darkness. Not light, not yet, but the promise of it. The knowledge that we made it through the worst part of the year, and things will slowly get better from now on. It is my hope that this is how this newsletter found you: at home, surrounded by beings you love (furry beings and plant beings totally count), hopefully eating yummy food or just licking your wounds from the year, and getting ready for things to slowly get better, from now on.

Because 2022 has been A YEAR, hasn't it? For many of us in the writing community, 2022 was the the year we saw Twitter break down, before we even got to do a vague tweet about our book publishing deal (that we don't have yet). It's scary and sad, and brilliant writers like Catherynne M. Valente have written about what it means to build and then lose an online community far more eloquently than I ever could, so let's leave it at that. I'm still on Twitter, in any case, but you can also find me on Mastodon, TikTok and Instagram. Or you can hang out with me here. I'll do my best to keep the dark at bay, even if I still refuse to yell at it.

The end of the year always brings the inevitable "accomplishments" posts and videos, and these things always make me feel like three failures in a trench coat, but there's something to be said about focusing on the positive, so bear with me. This year:

• I survived after my accident in March, and taught myself how to move again.

• I joined the team of Uncanny Magazine as a submissions editor, and read more than 500 short story submissions. It completely transformed my understanding of writing short fiction, and I recommend it wholeheartedly as an experience.

• I had three short stories published. A sci-fi Medusa retelling in Etherea Magazine, a hope-punk cli-fi about saving the seeds of the future in Flourish Fiction, and a weirdly personal sci fi fantasy about a Wiccan priestess on an exoplanet in Haven Spec.

• I also got my first pro-rate story acceptance in khōréō Magazine, for a story that will be published in early 2023. During edits, I loved my experience working with khōréō so much, that I applied to join their team as a proofreader.

• I survived with two books on submission, got my heart crushed countless times, and kept going because publishing is subjective (or so I'm told).

• I got excited about writing my third book! But more on that below.

What I'm working on

Last summer, as I wallowed in despair because I thought my first book would die in the query trenches and never find its champion, another story started taking shape. A story about two girls, hunted by gods and men, determined to save themselves instead. It tapped into two of my favorite characters from Greek myth, Iphigeneia and Daphne, whose stories I always felt echoed one another: there's sacrifice and metamorphosis, and two sibling gods (Artemis and Apollo) who don't hesitate to hurt them. I thought, what if these two girls met? So I outlined a story that takes place in a spooky forest, where a strange Temple appears, a place that is both sanctuary and a trap.

And then... my first book found its champion in my amazing agent, I went on sub with it, and set aside this strange story. When publishing plays the music, you dance. But the two girls, and their quest for a life unbound by the expectations of others, kept simmering inside. I could tell something was missing; I could only see half the picture. Reader, I'm not very smart. It took me a year from the inception of this story to realize that I wasn't supposed to write it alone, but with my good friend, co-writer and agent sibling Alexandra Van Belle. In the meantime, we had co-written a whole other novel together (along with our third friend Len Klapdor; that was the second book of mine that went on sub this year), as well as two short stories. We had alpha read each other's solo books, took on co-mentoring authors, and realized that together we are more than the sum of our parts.

So, let me introduce you to CURSED THE DEER: our YA sapphic fantasy that combines elements of horror, dark academia, portal fantasy, and murder mystery. It's FOR THE WOLF meets Greek myth meets TRUE DETECTIVE. Alexandra and I are currently in the furious state of co-drafting, with a plan to be ready by the end of January, and it fills me with joy that these two girls are finding their way out of the woods and into the world.

Superb Short Stories

This roundup includes both stories I read this month, and ones I read earlier this year but still haven't left my brain. As I was curating this list, I realized that all of these stories are centered around food, in one way or another. Food as the inciting incident, food as the setting, food as the raison d' etre. Hey, it's the holidays. I hope you gobble them up.

• Can i offer you a nice egg in this trying time by Iori Kusano in Uncanny Magazine, about what happens when you can't find your way back to the place that made you feel special.

• The Excessive Use of Pickled Foods by Leora Spitzer in khōréō, about the flavors that become a link to your past even when you're light years away from home.

• Anniversary Apple Pie by Avra Margariti in Deathcap and Hemlock, a deliciously wicked recipe you should definitely not try to make at home. Or in your den, for that matter.

• Sharing a Meal at the End of the World by Anya Ow in Haven Spec, about a dystopian future where food is one of the few ways one can be truly ungovernable.

• The Restaurant of Object Permanence by Beth Goder in Diabolical Plots, about the objects that become talismans of memories and what falls through the cracks.

• Bonesoup by Eugenia Triantafyllou in Strange Horizons, about food as a way to cure what ails you — if cooked properly, as your Greek cannibal granny intended.

Books that Blew My Mind

This month, I was blessed with an ARC (Advanced Reader Copy) of Kika Hatzopoulou's Threads That Bind, that publishes on June 2023 from Penguin Teen. "Descendants of the Fates are always born in threes: one to weave, one to draw, and one to cut the threads that connect people to the things they love and to life itself. The Ora sisters are no exception. Io, the youngest, uses her Fate-born abilities as a private investigator in the half-sunken city of Alante."

Reader, I was absolutely blown away by this book. If I didn't know it was a debut, I never would have guessed: the writing is just so confident, so mature, the prose is doing 10 things at once. The sunken city of Alante is utterly fascinating and three-dimensional and real. The characters are brilliant. Io, the main character, has my whole heart thread. The Greek myth elements are weaved (sorry, not sorry) throughout in a mesmerizing, and utterly unique way that had me gasping for more. And yes, as a Greek author myself, I can't begin to tell you how soul-affirming it was to read a Greek myth based fantasy by a Greek author FINALLY! More of this, publishing, please.

And that ending! No spoilers, but I can't wait for more!

I didn't read as many books in 2022 as I hoped, but here's a video with all my 5 star reads of the year. (Please follow me on TikTok, if you can tolerate the clock app.)

Tarot Tip for Writers: Let go of your darlings

Where I do a monthly tarot card draw just for you, and use the cards as a vehicle to talk storytelling and story crafting, because I never like to not overcomplicate things.

The theme for this month is "holding on." Both the 4 of Pentacles (on the right) and The Hanged Man Reversed (on the left) speak to a reluctance to let go of things. What are the passages, scenes, or plot-points that you're holding onto a bit too tight, even though a little voice inside tells you they don't quite work? And what would happen to the story, if you let your darlings go? Do you dare find out? I think we all have darlings, when it comes to writing. These darlings can be mannerisms, an illogical love for alliteration, the inability to not write things in threes. (You caught me.) These darlings can also be plot devices (Hero has amnesia! A fatal accident kills the hero's parents! There's a Tardis-like field around the magical world, so everyone can understand each other's language—oops, you caught me again.) These darlings can even be, and often are, whole chapters, or whole characters. And contrary to the popular adage, no, I don't believe you need to kill them. Not permanently. But if something in the story isn't clicking for you, I do believe you need to take a gentle, loving hand, pick up your darling, and place it in a safe, padded Google doc for a while.

See how your world shapes without it. You might like it.

Monthly Giveaway Winner

Every month, I'm doing a little giveaway for those of you who have subscribed to this newsletter. So subscribe, if you haven't already! One winner, picked at random, will be able to choose between a query critique, a 1st page critique, or a 3-card tarot reading.

If you get a follow up email after this, congratulations, you're this month's winner!