It’s New Year’s Day somewhere (specifically, where Joanne lives), and the contest is now officially open for entries!

There’s an official tag for contest entries. The fourth drop-down menu under “Add a Story” is labeled “contests.” Scroll down and click on “2024-01 January - New Year’s Resolution Story Contest.”

Somehow, in a fit of enthusiasm punctuated by lots of exclamation points, I volunteered to be a judge for our 2024 New Year’s Writing Contest, even though this site alone is full of better and more accomplished writers. You know what they say about fools rushing in. Choirs of angels are undoubtedly waving cheerfully from their LazyBoy recliners and calling out, like Jamie Lee Curtis, “Make good choices!”

Tomorrow many Americans will celebrate our distinctive Thanksgiving holiday. It’s a difficult time for many in the trans community, especially those who have been rejected by their families. But it’s also a time to count blessings and give thanks. I didn’t want the occasion to pass without giving the thanks I can only articulate in this space: my deep, profound, and heartfelt thanks for every member of this community. For the women and men who have read my stories and for the incredibly talented authors whose stories have touched me this past year.

So, I'm trying something different. A couple things, I guess. I'm writing a Halloween story, and I haven't done one of those before. It's not done, but I've posted the first part today. I plan to post a chapter a day until the 31st, so the clock is now ticking. I have to figure out how it ends, write it, edit it, and get it posted, between now and Halloween. I haven't done that to myself before either. My problem, I think, is that I don't have enough stress in my life!

I hope you enjoy the story.

Get a sneak peak at short stories some of our authors identified as their “favorite children!”

It’s a beautiful morning, and as I was drinking my first morning coffee (no, I never stop at one!), I was thinking back to the stories that first captured my attention, and my heart, at BC. Two came to mind, each by an author that hasn’t posted here in years.

The first is Rebecca Anderson’s series Wild Horses, a heart-breaking story of love, transformation, life and loss from an author whose prose is absolutely amazing. I think I found this story through a Google search, and it brought me to BC.

I'm incredibly excited -- My first book is available on Kindle!!! Appropriately enough, the very first installment of Duets (then "Duet") was posted on BC almost exactly a year ago. All proceeds will go to BC, so I hope anyone who liked the story will be inspired to purchase it and give a review! :D The revised version of the first few chapters is now available on the site as a teaser.

So, for the very first time I created cover art for one of my stories. I’m feeling ridiculously pleased about this trivial technological breakthrough on my part!

What do you think? :D

— Emma

Sesame Street used to have a segment where they would say the the episode was brought to you by a letter of the alphabet, and would do all sorts of goofy things involving that letter (See, for example, the Beatles take-off, “Letter B.” Words of wisdom, sure enough).

So, today’s blog post is brought to you by the word “mattress.” There are lots of things that can be said about mattresses, and probably no small number have actually been said, in stories posted on this very site. Why, mattresses figure in lots of plot lines. Some, quite prominently.

I just posted the first two chapters of a new series I’ve been working on. Currently I think it will be around 40-50 thousand words when finished, though I have been known to underestimate. From time to time.

I’m still traveling for a bit, so I’m likely to be a bit erratic in both my posting dates (I was going to post Friday mornings US East Coast time, but I had a bit of time today and don’t know what tomorrow will bring) and in my responses to comments. Rest assured, however, that I absolutely will respond to comments, even if I’m a bit slower than usual.

It’s been almost a month now since I posted a story or a chapter.

And you’re thinking, “yes, and?” And so you should.

But I realized that, from the time I posted the first chapter of my first story here (appropriately, July 4, 2022 — there were fireworks!) until March 4, 2023, I posted something at least once a week. Over 50 separate chapters or solos, and over 450,000 words.

I had received some good technical suggestions on writing from a couple of the experienced authors on this site (which, by the way, is one of the really wonderful things about this community!) and decided it was worthwhile going through and fixing some of my earlier postings. The suggestions had to do, primarily, with paragraph breaks and nuances relating to punctuation, not substance.