Story of the Month Club features a variety of authors and genres each year. Contributors for 2016 have been selected.
Curating Editor: Jessica Brawner
Art Director: Sandra Wheeler
January
Kevin Ikenberry
Kevin’s head has been in the clouds since he was old enough to read. Ask him and he’ll tell you that he still wants to be an astronaut. Kevin has a diverse background in space and space science education. A former manager of the world-renowned U.S. Space Camp program in Huntsville, Alabama and a former executive of two Challenger Learning Centers, Kevin works with space every day as a Space Operations Officer with the U. S. Army. A veteran of more than twenty years of military service, Kevin mentors veteran authors new to writing. Kevin lives in Colorado with his wife, two daughters, a fish and a cat who tries to eat said fish. His home is seldom a boring place.
Please visit his website at http://www.kevinikenberry.com/
February
Steven L. Sears
Steven L. Sears has worked as a Writer, Story Editor, Producer and Creator in Television, Film, digital media and animation. His lengthy career has encompassed over fifteen separate Television series, including RIPTIDE, THE A-TEAM, HARDCASTLE & McCORMICK, STINGRAY, WALKER-TEXAS RANGER, HIGHWAYMAN, HOLLYWOOD DETECTIVE, GRAND SLAM, JESSE HAWKES, SUPERBOY, S.H.E. SPIES and many other Television favorites. After Producing SWAMP THING for USA network and RAVEN for CBS, he soon moved to a series that has made its mark in Television and pop culture history, as Co-Executive Producer of the wildly popular series XENA – WARRIOR PRINCESS. He followed that up by co-creating the latest incarnation of the legendary comic book heroine SHEENA for Sony/TriStar Television, which ran for two seasons. Still involved in Film and Television, Steven has moved into the literary realm with several publications in the works, including VILLEANNE, written with popular author Peter J. Wacks, and STALAG-X, a graphic novel co-written with New York Times Bestselling author Kevin J. Anderson.
March
Derek Muk is a writer and social worker from California. His short stories have appeared in various online and small press magazines, including “The Haunted Academy” (Novella-Midnight Frost Books), “Fiction On The Web,” “Whispers From The Past: Fright and Fear” (anthology), “Dark Eclipse,” “The Dead Walk” (anthology), “13 Magazine,” “Diabolic Tales 3,” “Both Barrels of Legends of the Monster Hunter I and II,” “The Trigger Reflex: Legends of the Monster Hunter II” (anthology), “Suffer the Little Children” (anthology), “Splatter: An Anthology of Horror,” “Death Rattle,” “Dark Things II” (Anthology), “Anthology of Ichor: Hearts of Darkness,” “Twisted Tongue Magazine,” “Static Movement,” “Sex and Murder Magazine,” “Sinister Tales,” “Night to Dawn,” “M-Brane SF,” “Sonar4 E-Zine,” “The Ethereal Gazette,” “7th Dimension Magazine,” “Switchblade Magazine,” “ESC! Magazine,” “Scorched Wings Magazine,” “Hardboiled,” “Masque Noir,” “Detective Mystery Stories,” “Dawnsky,” “The Pinehurst Journal,” “Mystery Forum Magazine,” “The Green Queen,” “Kracked Mirror Mysteries,” “Golden Visions Magazine,” “Crossroads Magic,” “The Street Corner Magazine,” “Calliope Magazine,” “Unspoken Water,” “Space and Time Magazine,” “Infernal Ink Magazine,” “Tales of the Talisman Magazine,” “The Horror Zine Magazine,” and “Parabnormal Digest.”
He has three chapbooks published: “Three Parts,” “The Sacrifice and Other Stories,” and “Sin after Sin.” In addition to writing, he enjoys reading, traveling, museums, art, dining out, and meeting new people. He has a bachelors and masters degree in social work.
“The Occult Files of Albert Taylor” is his first full length collection of short stories. His author website address is: http://theoccultfilesofalberttaylor.wordpress.com/
April
Andrew Hogan received his doctorate in development studies from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Before retirement, he was a faculty member at the State University of New York at Stony Brook, the University of Michigan and Michigan State University, where he taught medical ethics, health policy and the social organization of medicine in the College of Human Medicine.
Dr. Hogan published more than five-dozen
professional articles on health services research and health policy. He has published fifty-one works of fiction in the OASIS Journal (1st Prize, Fiction 2014), Hobo Pancakes, Subtopian Magazine, Twisted Dreams, Thick Jam, Midnight Circus, Grim Corps, Long Story Short, Defenestration, Foliate Oak Literary Magazine, The Blue Guitar Magazine, Flash, Stockholm Review of Literature, The Beechwood Review, Short Break Fiction, Cyclamens and Swords, Children, Slippery Elm, Churches and Daddies, Birds Piled Loosely, Spank the Carp, Pear Drop, Festival Writer (Pushcart Nominee), Shalla, Lowestoft Chronicle, Fabula Argentea, Mobius, Thrice, The Lorelei Signal, Fiction on the Web, Sandscript, and the Copperfield Review.
May
A Colorado native, Sam Knight spent ten years in California’s wine country before returning to the Rockies. When asked if he misses California, he gets a wistful look in his eyes and replies he misses the green mountains in the winter, but he is glad to be back home.
As well as being Distribution Manager for WordFire Press, he is Senior Editor for Villainous Press and the author of four children’s books, three short story collections, two novels, and more than a dozen short stories, including a novella co-authored with Kevin J. Anderson.
A stay-at-home father, Sam attempts to be a full-time writer, but there are only so many hours left in a day after kids. Once upon a time, he was known to quote books the way some people quote movies, but now he claims having a family has made him forgetful, as a survival adaptation. He can be found at SamKnight.com
June
(No photo provided)
David Perlmutter is a freelance writer based in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. The holder of an MA degree from the Universities of Manitoba and Winnipeg, and a lifelong animation fan, he has published short fiction in a variety of genres for various magazines and anthologies, as well as essays on his favorite topics for similar publishers. He is the author of America Toons In: A History of Television Animation (McFarland and Co.), The Singular Adventures Of Jefferson Ball (Chupa Cabra House), The Pups (Booklocker.com), Certain Private Conversations and Other Stories (Aurora Publishing), Orthicon; or, the History of a Bad Idea (Linkville Press, forthcoming) and Nothing About Us Without Us: The Adventures of the Cartoon Republican Army (Dreaming Big Productions, forthcoming.)
July
A writer of speculative fiction, J.L. Forrest scrawls from the frosty Rocky Mountains, from the Old Country of Roma, Italia, and from the wet techno-forests of the Pacific Northwest. A second collection of his short stories, Miniature Truths, will be available autumn, 2016, along with new additions of the first two books of Eternal Requiem. You can find him at http://jlforrest.com.
August
Jessica Brawner, online at www.jessicabrawner.com, sprouted in the wilds of South Texas and plotted ways to spend her life traveling the world. She has been remarkably successful at that endeavor, and is now based in the Los Angeles area. Twelve years ago she discovered the wonders of Science Fiction and Fantasy conventions and has spent the years since working as a booth babe, volunteering for bands and vendors at conventions all over the country. Now she has taken those experiences and written a book: Charisma +1: The Guide to Convention Etiquette for Gamers, Geeks, and the Socially Awkward.
In addition to her convention activities, Ms. Brawner has developed and taught self-defense classes, worked as an event planner, an entertainment agent, a computer teacher, and an executive assistant.
Visit her website, or find her online on FaceBook and Twitter @JABrawner
Photo courtesy of Honey Lindburg
September
Peter J Wacks was purportedly born in California sometime during 1976. He has always been amazed and fascinated by both writing and the absurdity of the world in general. Throughout the course of his life, he has hitchhiked across the States and backpacked across Europe on the Eurail. Peter writes a lot, and will continue to do so till the day he dies. Possibly beyond.
He is a bestselling cross-genre writer who has worked in various capacities across the creative fields in gaming, television, film, comics, and most recently, when not busy editing, he spends his time writing novels. He began in the creative fields as a child actor & model, Most notable as an extra on ‘Revenge of the Nerds’ and ‘Thunder Alley.’ At age 6 he began writing short stories, and was first published in high school (1992), a time in which he was also a top ten honorable mention for the NCTE award (1993).
In gaming he was the lead designer and storyline writer of Cyberpunk CCG, a consultant for Allegiance, and both a writer and editor for multiple books in the Interface Zero line. After the Cyberpunk CCG project he spent a month in L.A. as a consultant for the T.V. show Alias, helping the studio determine the viability of converting the show into a CCG. In the mid 2000’s he decided to focus on his original passion, writing stories, once more. His first novel, ‘Second Paradigm’, was published in 2008.
Peter’s first comic, ‘Behind These Eyes’, garnered a finalist spot for the Bram Stoker in 2012. Currently, he has published 5 novels, 4 novellas, and appeared in 16 anthologies.
He has been a panelist, guest speaker, and Guest of Honor at a combined total of over 250 conventions, Trade Shows, Organizations, and Colleges – including GAMA, Mensa Colorado, & UCLA.
When he isn’t working on the next book he can be found practicing martial arts, playing chess, drinking Scotch or IPA, or fighting with swords.
October
A Colorado native, Sam Knight spent ten years in California’s wine country before returning to the Rockies. When asked if he misses California, he gets a wistful look in his eyes and replies he misses the green mountains in the winter, but he is glad to be back home.
As well as being Distribution Manager for WordFire Press, he is Senior Editor for Villainous Press and the author of four children’s books, three short story collections, two novels, and more than a dozen short stories, including a novella co-authored with Kevin J. Anderson.
A stay-at-home father, Sam attempts to be a full-time writer, but there are only so many hours left in a day after kids. Once upon a time, he was known to quote books the way some people quote movies, but now he claims having a family has made him forgetful, as a survival adaptation. He can be found at SamKnight.com
November
December
Frank Martin is a prose and comic writer that always enjoys exploring new genres and mediums. Story of the Month Club featured his short story “The Sandman” in the summer of 2015. He has an urban fantasy anthology series Modern Testament currently published by Insane Comics. Also, his debut horror novel Skin Deep/Ordinary Monsters was also recently released with Burning Willow Press. Frank lives in New York with his wife and two kids.