
Some exciting updates to share, beginning with a very nice honor for one of my poems. "Vampire in the Glass," which I turned into a gothic rock song on YouTube, has been selected as a top finalist to be included in Wingless Dreamer's printed poetry anthology, Mourning in Metaphors, available now in paperback, hardback, and ebook!

Work on the Visual Companion continues, and two of my vampire origin stories have been completed. Here are exceprts from these poignant, tragic tales: "On the night Simeon found his way back to Vicus, when he snatched his father in his arms and drank him to his end, it was not until this first satiating fill of mortal blood, that the terror of his transformation dawned upon him. But even as it did, so too did his unique immortal gift, for as he touched his father’s face he sensed thoughts and memories, that even amidst betrayal and murder, his father’s love was undimmed. The clockmaker’s heart grew still, and Simeon wept, shuddering with fury for what he had done. He removed his father’s spectacles, to keep with him always, and swore to nevermore take human life, unless it be from those who preyed upon others."
- Death Cries from the Mountains, the vampire origin of Lord Simeon Vietto de Rhoda
"The days stretched, the nights lingered, and she spent countless hours at her prison window watching the sky, or the curling white of the river. Time and again she saw, or imagined she saw, a man in black on the dark grounds below, returning her gaze. Some nights she watched him unceasingly, staring down as he stared up, until in a long blink she lost him, and found herself wondering whether he’d ever really been there. Her parents matured into their sickly grey with bitterness, speaking no more of their barren daughter, widowed too young, and lamenting instead of their eldest son’s estrangement—Martin’s protest for the ill-treatment of his sister. But the Baron and his wife could not forgive the ruin of their prospects, nor especially the loss of their place at court, and continued to put the blame to Vaela, with her father’s ruinous gambling past long forgotten."
- from The Life and Death of Vaela Audette de Massein
