https://www.cheyenneshaffer.com/blog daily 0.75 2026-01-30 https://www.cheyenneshaffer.com/blog/january-news-amp-favorites monthly 0.5 2026-01-30 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/667436153e7a0653e2a7f575/7f84b5cb-b2f5-4369-9e24-6da4c1a85488/SufferingtheOther.jpg Blog - January News & Favorites First, I do have one writing update to mention. As we go into 2026, I have a couple of publications pending. One hasn’t announced their TOC yet (not sure if they will do an official announcement for it, but I don’t want to step on any toes just in case) but the other has, so I am absolutely in a place to tell you that “Ursula the Powerful,” which originally appeared in the anthology Shift, is now going to be reprinted in the charity anthology Suffering the Other! This will be coming out through Dim Shores, and they’ve already released the cover art and full TOC list. The book should be upcoming within the next few months. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/667436153e7a0653e2a7f575/0d64e062-e818-4490-baa3-9c6579455706/5.jpg Blog - January News & Favorites Now, on to favorites talk! The most interesting and inventive novel I read this month was certainly The Strange by Nathan Ballingrud. This one is hard to categorize, taking from the traditions of science fiction, horror, and westerns all fairly equally. Set in an alternate history where space travel progressed much earlier, we follow the daughter of a diner owner on 1930s Mars following the Silence, or the time when all communications with Earth mysteriously ceased. The protagonist of this one is pretty unlikeable, yet I still found myself growing frustrated for her, especially in the first act of the book as events happen to her to propel her into the rest of the story. I also think there’s a lot of power in allowing a teenage girl to be an unlikeable protagonist; though I haven’t read many westerns, my very limited experience with the genre suggests that their protagonists are often very morally gray or even unlikeable men. If an entire genre can thrive with such characters, it surely shouldn’t be a problem for that same unlikability to transfer to a teenage girl, should it? https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/667436153e7a0653e2a7f575/45fcc6f4-399c-4407-8836-f0666ce3331f/6.jpg Blog - January News & Favorites This was also apparently the month of the unlikeable character, because both of Emma’s parents were unbearable. It was honestly impressive how much Derby got me to hate these characters, especially since Emma’s mother was going through a lot during the story that should have made her more sympathetic. I did feel bad for her, but I was able to do so without actually liking her. Emma’s father, on the other hand, I didn’t like or feel bad for; he was just atrocious. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/667436153e7a0653e2a7f575/307d1a7e-c4f7-452b-9a2f-58eb86e4c6a0/2.jpg Blog - January News & Favorites Finally, I’d like to mention the anthology I read this month (and last; it took a full 32 days to get through). The Weird: A Compendium of Strange and Dark Stories edited by Ann and Jeff VanderMeer is a powerhouse of a book. At over 750,000 words, this is quite possibly the longest book that I will ever read in my life, and it collects a century of weird fiction, exploring both the old idea of the weird tale as well as the New Weird movement. While it’s absolutely not an exhaustive list of valued weird fiction, it is very comprehensive, and it worked well for me as a more formal introduction to the genre (I’d read weird fiction prior to this, of course, though I’m going to be studying it more intentionally this semester and wanted to get some background in before I got started). https://www.cheyenneshaffer.com/fiction daily 0.75 2025-08-02 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/667436153e7a0653e2a7f575/cfc38bc8-70f3-447b-815c-5ffc524a2522/7.jpg Fiction https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/667436153e7a0653e2a7f575/0e2bf6fe-a52a-4f70-9ae9-de20d502041a/6+Shift.jpg Fiction https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/667436153e7a0653e2a7f575/97113354-0db2-4314-86e6-35e632b6d372/5+Colectivero.jpg Fiction https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/667436153e7a0653e2a7f575/7a7fb7b4-dc98-41f4-bcea-0ddf5b2d5a56/4+Adirondack+Mysteries.png Fiction https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/667436153e7a0653e2a7f575/32a166d3-aef4-4356-ae32-5b5f53979d2b/3+Beware+the+Light.jpg Fiction https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/667436153e7a0653e2a7f575/c5eb966b-760e-4aff-a44a-9a8e9b91ef52/2+Factor+Four+Magazine+11.23.jpg Fiction https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/667436153e7a0653e2a7f575/3a5f50ea-e153-4a52-a87d-d5f6a172503c/1+Aseptic+and+Faintly+Sadistic.jpg Fiction https://www.cheyenneshaffer.com/home daily 1.0 2026-03-30 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/667436153e7a0653e2a7f575/da6fadbd-d2b2-4780-8bb0-7024d0acabd6/Chey1plusCat.jpg https://www.cheyenneshaffer.com/contact daily 0.75 2024-06-20