Today I’m thrilled to reveal the cover of a project very close to my heart, Choices: An Anthology of Reproductive Horror. This anthology releases on September 30th and ebook pre-orders are open right now! Paperback preorders are also available via B&N and I will make further updates as Choices becomes available in more markets.
Before you buy it – and you really, really should buy it because the stories within are incredible – I want to tell you a little bit about how Choices came to be.
All fiction reflects our reality, but horror has a unique way of giving voice to our pain, our trauma, and of course, our fears.
The horror I’ve always lived with is the horror of being a woman. I live in a place where I can access reproductive care with ease, but I’ve always known many women–and other people of marginalized genders–didn’t have that access. And I’ve always known there were, are, people fighting to remove the access I have.
When Roe V Wade was repealed, I felt the terror and anguish of not just my friends in the US, but of every uterus owner who wanted to control their future, their destiny. The concept for Choices was born that same day. I wanted to provide space for the collective scream all of us carry with us every day, knowing that no matter where we are in the world, the enemy will set their sights on our reproductive rights eventually. That we are never truly safe, that we can never truly know who in our friend groups, our families, will fight for our rights–and who will vote for the people who take them away.
It took a long time for the concept to become a book. I knew this book would depict sexual violence and extreme gore, things anathema to many publishing companies; there was a very short list of publishers who might take it, and it took me several months to build the courage to pitch one of them. I spent more months crafting the perfect call for submissions, ensuring that all people of marginalized genders felt safe to submit. And I spent an agonizing two months reading 150 incredible stories and whittling that number down into something I could actually publish.
Now here I am, at the end of it all, sharing this magnificent cover with you and hoping you’ll peek within its pages to see the stories within. They’re some of the most terrifying, heart wrenching, vengeful, and in some cases even victorious stories I’ve ever read, and I am so honoured to have the opportunity to share them, and this magnificent cover, with you.
Here’s a little more about what you can expect to find within the pages of Choices: An Anthology of Reproductive Fiction:
As the horrors close in around us, we turn to story to process our fears, our desires, and our futures. In Choices: An Anthology of Reproductive Fiction, nineteen writers whose reproductive rights are under threat explore the stories of those who, like them, have had their choices stolen from them:
The horror of being forced to carry a child you don’t want.
The catharsis of taking revenge on a man who stole your right to choose.
The tragedy of being threatened by the world for having a baby you do want because you’re “the wrong gender”.
The pride of knowing you fought for a better future, even if that future claimed your life.
These stories serve as a reminder of the power of choice and the importance of fighting for every human’s right to choose their own future.