Halfway through 2026!

We’re halfway through 2026, and I’ve had 1 story + 1 essay + 6 speculative translations + 1 zine published! BONUS: two novelettes I translated will be coming out soon, too!!!

January 2026

• “Shorthand” by Monica Louzon in After the Storm Magazine (~2,530 words)
  If you like librarian drama and books that make pearls (like oysters), then this story is for you!
  “I crack the ancient geography book open, and the pages whir ominously in my hands as they fall open to reveal the glowing pearl…”

February 2026

• “Above the Sand, Under the Skin” by Ramiro Sanchiz in Translunar Travelers Lounge (~3,150 words)
  A headless robot giantess’s body washes up on the beach and slowly transforms a nearby village.
  “They said afterward that the first fisherman who’d gone down to the beach that morning had found her, but when the people from the village hurried to see what the tied had carried in, no one claimed to be the person who’d discovered her…”
  
• “Damnatio Memoriae” by I.A. Galdames in Neon Dystopia (~5,140 words)
  If you lived in a constantly-surveilled future and had plenty of pills to help you forget and regulate your present, would you even want to face your past?
  “Just over a year ago today, I’d been preparing for a Día de los Muertos party. Tonight, however, the nighttime rain showered my long purple hair – which carried the same mutation as the warrior heroine Giwargis – and fell into my new bionic eyes…”
  

March 2026

• “The Abyss in the Depths of Her Eyes” by Isis Aquino in foofaraw press (~2,410 words)
  One hot summer night before he goes off to college, Lenny picks up a distress call from a spaceship that has fallen through a blue hole and found itself orbiting Earth.
  “Lenny opened the window to let in a little fresh air before bed. For weeks, the summer heat had seemed to stick to the walls, but that night, it relented. The moonlight reflected off the stream below, and in the clear sky above…”
  
• “On SFT and the ISFDB” by Monica Louzon at Speculative Fiction in Translation (reprinted in Small Planet #1 in May 2026)
  In which I air my frustrations with how the Internet Speculative Fiction Database handles crediting translators, and question how complicated adding another field might actually be for the ISFDB admins behind the scenes.
  “Rachel Cordasco’s essay on *finding* translated speculative fiction from February 2026 is a fascinating read, and consistent with my own observations of (and struggles with) finding speculative fiction in translation – because this is still an uphill battle…”
  

April 2026

• “Knight in Shining Armor” by Erick J. Mota in the anthology Solarmarx published by Future Fiction (~5,710 words)
  Confined to a solar-powered tobacco plantation, Maya learns to learn more about the world beyond the finca’s borders… and about her mother.
  “Father has never allowed me to see what’s beyond the finca’s borders. He says that if I want to get some sun and contemplate a desolate panorama, it’s better to do so close to the house…”

May 2026

• “Letters from a Dead Girl” by Santiago Eximeno in Dreams & Nightmares Magazine #133 (~410 words)
  What would you do if letters from a dead girl suddenly started showing up in your mailbox?
  “We found the dead girl’s letters in our mailbox. Lost between bills and advertisements, we would have missed them if we hadn’t noticed the calligraphy on their envelopes…”
  
• “Rest in Peace, Master Pruner” by Daniel Badosa Moriyama in The Orange & Bee (~1,960 words)
  After the Master Pruner’s death, the mayor of Collodi desperately tries to save his village from the compulsive lies that are turning its denizens into a forest.
  “Dear Signore Lorenzini, My name is Sergio Giannettino, and I write to you from the town hall of a most excellent village called Collodi. As mayor, it is my honor and great sorrow to share with you…”
  

July 2026

• “The Pilgrim” by Monica Louzon was included in The Zine Machine‘s Summer ’26 Edit! (~100 words; illustrated by yours truly!)
  When chased by soldiers through the mountains and armed only with a banana and a prayer, what would you do?
  “Switchbacks below delay the soldiers, but they’ll catch me. There’s no bridge spanning this ravine, and I need one…”
  
  

Coming soon in 2026!

• “A Falling Boeing 767, Spinning Slowly” by Roberto Bayeto (~8,270 words) will be published by Chatterbox! Literary in July 2026!
  
• “The Sea’s Decree” by Armando Boix (~8,900 words) will be published by Adventures BookZine in 2026!