Brockton Writers Series 11.01.23: Suzan Palumbo

Suzan Palumbo is a queer Trinidadian dark fantasy/horror writer, Nebula Award finalist and co-founder of the Ignyte Awards. Her debut short story collection Skin Thief: Stories will be published by Neon Hemlock in October 2023. Her novella, Countess, will be published by ECW Press in Spring 2024.

A Gothic Writer’s Tribute to Fog

I’ve loved the Gothic in all it’s literary and artistic forms my entire life. Give me damp castles, crumbling abbeys, ruined estates, dead space ships, becalmed boats, dilapidated strip malls, and abandoned apartment complexes housing dark secrets, in any region or even in outer space. I will be rapt. 

Unlike the tragic heroines fleeing dark mansions on the classic gothic Romance pulp covers we are familiar with, I run towards the Gothic. I seek out its aesthetics daily and use them as inspiration for my writing and art. A difficulty I’ve encountered in accessing the palpable, brooding mood I adore is that I live in a cookie cutter suburb. The Gothic, if it exists here, is fittingly hidden by sunshine, or perhaps more sinisterly, behind the closed doors of my neighbours’ homes. That is, unless a thick fog creeps into the community. Then, the Gothic arrives at my doorstep and seeps into my creative brain.

The fog was generous with me this past November. It enveloped our streets for several days, muffling sound and filtering light. Each morning while it remained, I ran out into its shroud to welcome it with my smartphone camera. Each day, the street where I live became otherworldly in a different way. Here are some of the transformations I captured:

(Suzan Palumbo, 2022)

The first day, the trees at the intersection were black silhouettes, backlit by a sickly sun. I half expected to encounter a horseman riding through the mist towards me, headless and determined. The light was so beautifully eerie, like the world was part of an old black and white movie. It was cool, noir-tinged, and glorious.  

(Suzan Palumbo, 2022)

The next day, the gazebo near the play structure had transformed into a spectral meeting place. The light was warmer. I sensed that if I walked the path of fallen leaves between the trees to the benches, I would encounter the ghost of a child waiting to whisper a secret to me. If you stare hard enough, you can almost picture someone sitting on the bench, waving at you, hoping you’ll come sit with them. 

(Suzan Palumbo, 2022)

On the third day, I ventured to the nearby catchment pond. There was no wind and the heavy fog had turned the water into a silver mirror which blurred the boundaries between the water and sky. I found myself staring at the monochromatic reflection of a dead tree near the edge of the pond. Angled the way it was, it was as if the tree was watching its doppelgänger reach its branches deep underwater, where they didn’t belong. 

(Suzan Palumbo, 2022)

The fog did not return on the fourth day. The weather pattern changed and there was sunshine and blue skies for a week. It reappeared however, at the end November, with ice and snow. I went out to the catchment pond again. The mood there had shifted. Ice added sparkle where before the grays and whites produced by the filtered light were flatter. This was glorious Gothic glamour. I imagined a fog queen wrapped in a charcoal cloak, walking along the icy edge of the pond, her face forever hidden by mist. 

The fog hasn’t returned since November. I look out for it every morning. It’s beautiful and fleeting. I never take its presence for granted. Its transformative qualities are an endless source of inspiration for me as writer. 

If you’re ever craving something Gothic, I encourage you, if it’s safe, to go out into the fog when it descends. Perhaps you will see the fog queen or envision a child whispering, or maybe you’ll be haunted by a vision that is uniquely your own.

If you’re interested in seeing how my love of gothic has worked its way into my published short stories, my short fiction collection Skin Thief, published by Neon Hemlock, will be out in fall 2023. I’ll have updates on my website, Suzan Palumbo: Horror, Dark Fantasy, Weird Writer (wordpress.com)

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Brockton Writers Series 11.01.23: Fran Skene

Fran Skene is a retired librarian who has written in a variety of forms. Two one-act plays were produced in the 1990s and later she published a poetry chapbook. She is a co-author of the SF novel Windship: The Crazy Plague, available from Amazon. Most recently, some poems and stories were accepted by the online magazines Polar Starlight and Polar Borealis.

Journaling is one way I cope with all that’s going on in my life and the world. Here are two of many pieces that were written during a Callanish Society writing workshop. Callanish, a nonprofit society in B.C., supports people whose lives have been affected by cancer.

Late Dusk to Dawn

May 2020

It was late dusk, my one full day in hospital. I’d been sleeping. I heard a voice reminiscent of my daughter’s and opened my eyes. There she was, standing at the foot of the bed.

“Sweetie pie, how nice to see you!” I exclaimed.

Then I blinked; no one was there.

Of course not, since no visitors were allowed. After a moment of shock and a feeling of loss, I realized I’d dreamt her, between sleep and waking. “Oops,” I said, again out loud.

A nurse came into sight from behind a curtain. “Are you all right?” she asked. I explained what happened and she laughed and said something intended to assure me I’d not gone crazy. What I didn’t say to her was that I was all too ready to imagine someone I loved, there in person.

It was easy to feel okay in that hospital while medical staff came and went, some of them students in the nursing program at the nearby junior college. But early evening was slow. Hour after hour of light fading and no one there except for two roommates sleeping behind curtains. I could text people on my phone, or read more Covid news.

I’d not brought my laptop, so I begged paper for writing on, but I was so involved in a project that I couldn’t get into a new story or poem. The feeling of isolation increased. And I wondered why no one had come to clean the bathroom, or why staff were not in PPE, or why I’d been asked only the most cursory of questions during admission to this non-Covid wing the day before, which meant that’s all they’d asked my roommates as well.

But the vision of my daughter, and the assurances of the nurse, her friendliness, did help. The rest of the night was okay, and I made it through until morning.

***

Finding Hope 

It was early 1980. I was flying across the country, the last leg of a trip home from a visit to a friend in New York state. I was still mourning the end of a relationship.

I wrote a poem about that flight. Look down, it starts. Look down as you follow the afternoon sun to the west. Look at the amazing geography of the country you live in. And that did help. For a short while, I could look into the future without despair.

Looking at and smelling and hearing the world around me has always brought hope with it. I remember as a child seeing the Milky Way across the night sky in our small town, or more recently when the planet Mars was at its closest, so close that it reflected off the Fraser River near my home. A reflection of Mars! Not just the moon, or lights from airplanes coming to or from YVR.

I remember the sound of chopping wood in a section of forest by the river path. I got to the source, and saw a pair of pileated woodpeckers the size of ravens. And I remember an actual raven in a highway rest stop, a bird far bigger than I expected. Yes, it was scavenging, but to my eyes it was magnificent. My brother and I were returning from a trip to bury our mother’s ashes in Revelstoke Cemetery.

Poetry itself, the writing and reading of it, also gives me hope. Also journaling, or writing plays or fiction or creative nonfiction, or drawing and painting, or printmaking. And I love learning about the lives of famous artists, women especially. I envision myself in a studio doing what they do, perhaps getting inspiration from the forest or desert outside.

At the same time, sitting here at my desk, typing this, lifts my spirits.

Brockton Writers Series 11.01.23: Liz Howard

Liz Howard is the author of Infinite Citizen of the Shaking Tent, which won the 2016 Griffin Poetry Prize, and Letters in a Bruised Cosmos, which was shortlisted for the 2022 Griffin Poetry Prize and the Trillium Poetry Prize. Born and raised on Treaty 9 territory in Northern Ontario, she currently lives in Toronto.

To learn more about Liz before her upcoming reading with BWS, please look at the Griffin Poetry Prize‘s page about her work.

Wednesday, January 11th, 2023—6:30 p.m.

Brockton Writers Series presents readings by:

Suzan Palumbo

Kathy Friedman

Liz Howard

Fran Skene

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Special note: As we adapt with current social distancing regulations, we’re happy to announce our event will be hosted in-person at the Glad Day Bookshop, located at 499 Church St., Toronto. We will also live stream the event on the Brockton Writers Series YouTube channel! The event starts at 6:30 p.m.

The reading is PWYC (suggested $3-$5) and features a Q&A with the writers afterward. Books are available for sale.

 If you’d like to donate, please do so here.

Many thanks to the Ontario Arts Council for their support.

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GUEST SPEAKER

“I Have A Voice Here: Writing as a Doorway to Community, Belonging, and Agency” by Chris Kay Fraser

Chris Kay Fraser is a writing coach and founder of Firefly Creative Writing, a small business in Toronto that helps people reconnect to the joy and power of writing. She has devoted her life to walking with others to strange, raw and delightful places words can reach.

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READERS

Suzan Palumbo is a queer Trinidadian dark fantasy/horror writer, Nebula Award finalist and co-founder of the Ignyte Awards. Her debut short story collection Skin Thief: Stories will be published by Neon Hemlock in October 2023. Her novella, Countess, will be published by ECW Press in Spring 2024.

Kathy Friedman is the author of the short-story collection All the Shining People (Anansi, 2022). She was a finalist for the Writers’ Trust Bronwen Wallace Award for Emerging Writers, and her writing has appeared in Grain, Geist, PRISM international, Canadian Notes & Queries, and the New Quarterly, as well as other publications. She is also the co-founder and artistic director of InkWell Workshops. She lives in Tkaronto.

Liz Howard is the author of Infinite Citizen of the Shaking Tent, which won the 2016 Griffin Poetry Prize, and Letters in a Bruised Cosmos, which was shortlisted for the 2022 Griffin Poetry Prize and the Trillium Poetry Prize. Born and raised on Treaty 9 territory in Northern Ontario, she currently lives in Toronto.

Fran Skene is a retired librarian who has written in a variety of forms. Two one-act plays were produced in the 1990s and later she published a poetry chapbook. She is a co-author of the SF novel Windship: The Crazy Plague, available from Amazon. Most recently, some poems and stories were accepted by the online magazines Polar Starlight and Polar Borealis.