The new anthology from the University of Wisconsin Press chronicles personal experiences of living out and about in Chicago. My essay “Lesbian Movie Night” will appear.

This project is a utopian re-imagining the world 30,000 years ago, Pangea.  The twist is all the members of society (plant-human hybrid creatures,  Neanderthals, and people) are equal. Men, women and all people thrive in a sustainable, community-based world where magic is their technology. Information is exchanged biochemically and woven into the natural landscape. The more I imagined this green and dynamic place, the clearer it became that this world might have been entirely possible, might even be the pretext to the world we have today.

Book one details the back story of Pangea, and its later fall at the hands of the villain Markus. He casts a spell so vile, it ends up obliterating magic from our world. Book two describes how magic reaches present day thanks to the efforts of Queen Eeva, and to our heroine, Claire, who must train for the war of her life. Book three is where the two worlds collide, Claire and a group of recruits travel back in time to face Markus in the ultimate showdown, where everything is at stake, magic and power and thousands of years of human suffering— if only Claire can get it right this time.

In the 1980’s Dubuque was a land that time forgot, where old school beliefs were upheld despite advances in technology and plumbing. Follow our narrator on her coming of age journey, battling her hoarding grandma, Eunice, and dodging the smack down from her abusive dad. Often absurd but always authentic, this story may just give you the gumption to decide for yourself if your childhood will stay broken, or whether you do get a say about that in the end.