It’s Release Day 2026! Congratulations to all who celebrate.

I do.

Or at least I am, this year. Release Day is an initiative from CreativeMornings — a chance to spur creative types like you and me to actually put things out into the world. And word of this event came to me in the last six weeks, and I realized that it can probably spur me to put something out in the world, since I have a few creative projects on the go at any one time, and at this moment, I have a few that frankly, needed the nudge.

Because there’s always a risk with self-driven projects. Mostly that risk is one of just sitting on something and never letting it out into the world. Or polishing it continually. Or getting frustrated and stopping just short of the moment when it could go live and actually get you some creative momentum. And feedback.

Anomalies, a short story collection

For the past year plus I’ve been working on a collection of short stories. Like, written, sequenced, self-edited, sent out for three different rounds of human editing, re-edited. Repeat.

Some of these stories are more than ten years old, but I’ve managed to put them all together into a somewhat coherent world, quite similar to our own — with a pleasantly escalating rhythm of absurdity and pathos and drama. And now I’m in that pre-publication moment of circling a number of critical activities: design, formatting, polishing, etc. It’s happening, but slowly.

But then along comes Release Day and I realize: hey, I could actually put a couple of stories from the collection together with some other stuff and make a fun little short story sampler to give away. Get some feedback, build some hype, you know, that kind of thing. And so I did. It’s called Pre-Anomalies.

Strange, dystopian, heartbreakingly funny (or just wistful) little things. The full collection, Anomalies, is coming Autumn 2026. The sampler is the taster. Download it free, or grab the epub on Amazon for less than the price of a coffee.

That’s it.

Oh, except I also went ahead, while I was releasing things, and dropped a new rap song on Spotify and Apple Music. That’s also fun. It’s called Payin’ Dues and it’s an upbeat, peppery and fun track. Could be the song of the summer! Go ahead and stream it a bazillion times if you’d be so kind. Also: shouts out to Bone 40 for the beat and the mix and Nox for the mastering. Sounds pretty good, I think.