Dark Tag Blog

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The other day I came across this article in The Independent: Is this the death of the male novelist? The lonely life of a man writing fiction in 2025.

It reminded me of something I'd been thinking of for a while, especially every time I picked up a book in a genre like science fiction/fantasy written by a man, to find he'd written yet another book with mostly female protagonists (sometimes with laughable results, where the protagonist is dressed up as a woman but behaves like a stereotypical male rogue. Yes, Jack McDevitt, I'm looking at you!).

Don't get me wrong, I love books with female protagonists, especially since as a woman it's easier to identify with the characters. But I like more variety than that.

Up until around 2000, I felt I was reading fiction written by both men and women, in all genres. Some writers completely transcended their sex, but others provided either a male or female gaze with which their protagonists viewed their world, and I thoroughly enjoyed being exposed to both. As a woman, it's also interesting to get a peek into the mind of male protagonists, when created by a strong male writer.

Now, it's hard to find any novels by men, including in genres like science fiction/fantasy, which just a few decades ago, they dominated.

Because it seems, men have stopped reading fiction, while women today are the prime readers of it. Most of us who have men in our lives have heard them say they prefer non-fiction, but even so, if they're from earlier generations, they got encouraged to read when students, with a wide range of books to choose from, many written by men, if they needed to identify with their own sex. In my youth, I knew men who were as excited by fiction as I, and even had their own ambitions to be writers. A long long time ago...

And now, without a market, unless they are able to or want to create strong female-driven narratives, a lot of men just aren't bothering to write anymore either.

While I've thoroughly appreciated the representation of my sex across the literary landscape, with strong independent female characters and all that, I find I'm really missing the male gaze in fiction.

I wonder, if any women are reading this, do you feel the same way?

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We all know that the best-laid plans can go awry. However, when it happens to us, we marvel at how it happened.

Getting swept up in the euphoria of finally ticking a checkbox off the list of things one wants to achieve in life is easy. Likewise, one can be quick to make promises to others and to oneself, and to plan a multitude of projects. Sometimes, those projects get done promptly and with the same fervor as the previous, fueled by the momentum. Other times, one gets lost in the sea of ideas, overwhelmed by the possibilities, and distracted by the mundane.

I was a victim of the latter. Ideas swirled in my head for new stories, but they never flew off the page as quickly as before. New projects at work worried my brain and took up way too much space. Preoccupation with real-life events took me away from the imagined worlds that live in my mind.

The result is pieces of a literary tapestry that is yet to be woven. Small bits and pieces of stories that I'm slowly knitting together.

But here is my promise to you and to myself. Two new short stories will see the light of day by Fall 2025. Stay tuned here and on social media for more information. I'm taking my time, but I'll eventually get to where I want to be. Isn't it all about the journey?

With this, I leave you with a track from Montreal artist KevinMxDermott intitled Take Your Time.



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Promises, promises. 

We did it. 2024 was a great year for us. We are now published authors and, not going to lie, it feels amazing. But now what?
With all the excitement of the book launch for This is What We Are and Other Stories, writing new material for a follow-up book has been easier said than done. 
Marketing a new book takes time and energy. With a full-time job and familial responsibilities, it is sadly one or the other in order to not burn the candle at both ends. 
So, if the second anthology doesn't pop up in 2025, know that it's not because we are sitting on our laurels. However, I promise myself and any readers that are interested, that I will have at least one story ready to go by the end of the year. So stay tuned and sign up to the newsletter for a FREE story in the months to come. 
Happy New Year!

Some images from the book launch.

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I didn't know when I was building relationships with the staff at a local bookstore that many years later, it would come in handy when looking for a place to have a book launch party. 

Stopping at Type Books is always a fun experience and they even have added a French book section for children recently.  Independent bookstores are an amazing part of the community.  They are a place to get books you wouldn't necessarily get anywhere else and nurture the artistic communities in their neighbourhood. I believe it's fitting that Nora and I are launching our self-published book at Type Books. ​

Join us at our launch party on Thursday, November 21st, 2024 at 6:30 pm to 9:00 pm. We'll have refreshments and read some excerpts of the book. If you want us to sign your copy of the book, it will be our great pleasure to do so. 

See the invitation below and let us know if you will come and say hello by clicking on the RSVP button. 

​See you there! 
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This is What We Are and Other Stories is finally available for purchase on Amazon! If you want the print book, you'll have to wait a little more, but the ebook is ready just in time for the Thanksgiving long weekend in Canada. 

​https://a.co/d/iGPSfoga.co/d/iGPSfog

If you give it a read and you like it, don't forget to leave a review! 
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It's done. I clicked the publish button. Our ebook will be available on Amazon in about 72 hours. So exciting! 

The print version is still in the works since we're having some trouble with the cover, but we will hopefully have copies in our hands for sale by November. When we do get our hands on those copies, we'll be sure to make them available at our book launch. 

Stay tuned for the book launch date and details!
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We're really racing towards the Fall deadline that we've given ourselves for the launch of our anthology. There is so much to do, so much to think about. 

I'm currently formatting the book using Atticus. It's pretty easy to use and I'm happy with it so far. The next step is to get it finalized and up on the distribution platforms that allow us to get our book to readers. 

Amazon is the first that comes to mind. 

Please let me know where you get your books.

Where do you get your books?

What type of book do you prefer?

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I was recently told by several people that my writing was reminiscent of the Twilight Zone stories. Nothing could have made me happier. Growing up, I couldn't get enough of watching the old episodes and then the more recent ones as well. Although they often gave me nightmares, I continued watching them with interest. Not because I enjoyed being scared (although maybe there was an element of that, I'm sure), but because the stories were strange in a way that made me think and wonder about life through the lens of the absurd and fantastical. 

I still remember the one classic episode from 1960, Eye of the Beholder (spoiler alert), where the audience doesn't see anyone's face and we just know that a woman is about to have a life changing surgery on her face. The suspense and the reveal at the end of the episode in which everyone but the woman looked like pigs left me in shock and wanting more of the same. 

In a similar fashion, I try to take the people on a journey with my writing in which there are twists and turns and an ending that might not have been what the reader anticipated. I enjoy creating fantasy worlds with struggles or themes similar to our own that make us think and reflect on our lives and situations. 

So when someone tells me that my story makes them think of the Twilight Zone, I take that to be the best compliment someone could give me. 

I'm super excited to share my stories with everyone in the new anthology, This is What We Are and Other Stories. We're working on getting the book out this Fall. Sign up for the newsletter to get updates on launch dates. 
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Triggers for writing fiction are different for everyone, I think. 

Mine can be landscapes hurtling by on a train in a foreign land, astonishing confidences of friends, my own adventures, especially those not easily explained.

My instinct when feeling a writing trigger coming on is to write something otherworldly in the realm of science fiction or fantasy. 

The story I'm writing right now is like that.  My dreams had been surprising me lately.  Then they gave me an idea....

The Dreams of Others

He drew his hand back, his fist the size of a ham, and swung at me, missing as I skipped out of the way. A rush of excitement and fear jolted through me as I raised the baseball bat and struck his red thick-jowled face once, twice, thrice.  

At first he howled, but once his nose broke and blood spewed from his mouth along with a few of his teeth, he made a choking sound.  As I bashed him across the face a final time, he fell on the kitchen floor, silent. The bat hung limply from my hand, blood dripping from its tip. At last, I thought, at last. 

The walls of my kitchen blurred, then I was outside, the bat gone from my hand, watching my little brother swinging on a tire hanging from the tree at their cottage. I was so happy, there were tears in my eyes. Why had I thought him dead?  I started running towards him and then….

I jolted upright in my bed, my heart thundering in my chest, my eyes a bit wet. For a moment I felt so disoriented that I was surprised to see Henri lying beside me, before I remembered he was right where he was supposed to be. 

I just killed my husband, I thought muzzily. And my brother was alive. I shuffled off the bed and to the bathroom where my head cleared, the dream hangover gone. I never had a brother, and my lovely Henri looked nothing like the lout I’d struck with the baseball bat. 

As I returned to bed still emotionally wrenched, I promised myself, as I had many times before, to see someone about this. It happened almost all the time now, leaving me exhausted throughout the day.  
​
​I was dreaming the dreams of strangers.....

More to come soon!

If you write or are thinking of writing, what has inspired you lately? ​