New Story Release in Uncanny Magazine – “A Recipe for Hope and Honeycake”

My new Bramblewilde story, “A Recipe for Hope and Honeycake,” was released yesterday in Uncanny Magazine Issue 56!

I originally saw “A Recipe for Hope and Honeycake” as a spring story. After all, the climax hinges on winter turning into spring. I was surprised when Lynne and Michael of Uncanny decided to publish it in January and release it for New Year’s. But now, I see how perfect that choice was – furthering the story’s message of hope after a difficult year.

“A Recipe for Hope and Honeycake” is a gentle story of the ways sweetness and warmth and light (and occasional sarcasm) sustain us, and of finding the courage to look forward in the midst of heartbreak and burnout. It features a character from my previous Uncanny story “Bramblewilde,” along with a cast including a hive of wise bees, Pan, and a stubborn dreamer of a grocer’s daughter.

It was written at the height of my pandemic burnout, at a time I constantly found myself looking around and asking “Why do I still feel so anxious about something that’s just about ‘over?’ What do I need?” It was a time when many caretaking and home tasks had fallen on me – a routine I both found comfort in and sometimes felt trapped and suffocated by. Like Brambewilde and Pan, I sometimes wondered why I bothered – or how I was going to dig myself out of this heavy, freezing blanket of snow I felt trapped under.

Luckily, Bramblewilde’s bees knew the answer – and weren’t afraid of giving Bramblewilde (or through the writing of the story, me) a sarcastic little kick when they needed it.

I was additionally interviewed in this issue by Caroline M. Yaochim, where I got to talk more about the inspiration for “A Recipe for Hope and Honeycake,” baking, The Wind in the Willows, and my dream of one day writing an entire book of interconnected Bramblewilde stories.

If you’d like some sweetness and hope for your new year, you can read the story here, and the interview here.