Silver Blade Issue #18 is live, and includes my fantasy story “An Honorable Aunt”.
This was one of those stories it was fun to write simply because I was getting inside the heads of people who view the world so differently from me, that it was a stretch of intellectual–and perhaps empathetic–muscle to show their thoughts and feelings. I think once you read the story it’ll be obvious what I mean, but I will say, just about every character in the story did something to surprise me at some point. Caris especially. Although in hindsight, it couldn’t have turned out any other way.
Therese Arkenberg's first short story was accepted for publication on January 2, 2008, and her second acceptance came a few hours later. Since then they haven't always been in such a rush, yet her work appears in places like Beneath Ceaseless Skies, Analog, Daily Science Fiction, and the anthology Sword & Sorceress XXIV. Aqua Vitae, her science fiction novella, was released by WolfSinger Publications in December 2011.
She works as a freelance editor and writer in Wisconsin, where she returned after a brief but unforgettable time in Washington, D.C. When she isn't reading, writing, or editing (it's true!) she serves on the board of the Plowshare Center of Waukesha, which works for social, economic, and environmental justice.