Honorable Mention

23 September 2024

In advance of the official notice in the next issue of Writer’s Digest magazine, I have learned that one of my essays, Unexpected Ending, was awarded an honorable mention.

I am truly grateful for this award and continue to lok for another venue to place that essay.


Publication

15 July 2024

Unfolding, an essay that had been nominated for a few competitions (without ultimately winning), has found a home in TriQuarterly.

It is a braided essay that weaves my retelling of Japanese creation myths with the story of my creation and evolution as a sexual and loving person.


Publication

26 June 2024

Near the end of 2023, I learned that a piece I had written for Queer Adventurers had been longlisted for their Queer Travel contest.

Abroad is the story of the first time Hiro and I traveled outside of Japan, when we flew to Phuket in 1995


Publication

5 June 2024

I am trying to remember how Carded, a short CNF piece on my first Tarot reading when I was fourteen, came to be. Most likely, it was written into one of my earlier memoir drafts, but at some point, I decided to calve it and let it stand on its own.

Wild Roof Journal accepted Carded a few months ago and my piece has gone live on their website, here.


Publication

8 May 2024

At some point in late December of 2022, I had a kvetch session with Aileen Weintraub and Megan Margulies, also known as The Witches With Pitches. I had hit a wall in querying and revisions, and after I moaned, they asked me to consider the themes in my memoir. That session was the seed for my latest essay.

When I first wrote Desire, Desiring, Desired in June of 2023, I immediately worried. Where could this frank, funny, and very sexual essay find a home? Sure enough, the magazines and outlets I had sent it to either rejected it outright or ignored it. I had one last option, uncertain though I was that it would work. I submitted it to Roxane Gay’s The Audacity, for her Emerging Writers Series.

The acceptance letter delighted me and, with the kind editing of Meg Pillow, Dr. Gay’s colleague, Desire, Desiring, Desired got even better. Today it went live at https://audacity.substack.com/p/desire-desiring-desired. I am so grateful to those who helped it come into existence and those who offered it a home.

CW: This essay explores my understanding of physical and emotional love and, as such, contains descriptions of consensual sexual activity.

The Abduction of Ganymede
The Rapture of Ganymede, artist unknown, ca. 1529

Acceptance

26 April 2024

An essay I wrote about my first experience with tarot cards when I was fourteen has been accepted for the June issue of the Wild Roof Journal. I look forward to sharing the link!


Updates

21 April 2024

I’m planning to launch another round of querying early in May when my essay for The Audacity’s Emerging Writer Series. The last query I sent out was on October 6, 2023. What has changed since then?

The memoir itself has been completely restructured and re-imagined. In seeing my progress, one of my mentors said, “I am BLOWN AWAY.”

This is where the memoir stood last November. The timeline covered twenty years in a direct chronology.

This is where things are now (and I’m doing one final listening pass for a last polish). The timeline has shrunk to the ten years I was in Japan. However, there are now flashback chapters and citations from medical, historical, cultural, and literature references, creating a far richer tapestry for the reader.

I also worked with six other outstanding writers in a memoir proposal workshop led by Greg Mania and revised my proposal. Take a look at the new overview here. I’m proud of this work.


News

21 March 2024

I received a green light from the editors of The Audacity, to share the following: Roxane Gay has selected my essay, Desire, Desiring, Desired, about the ways I came to understand both the physical and emotional aspects of my sexuality, for inclusion in her Emerging Writers series. It sounds like the essay will go live in May after a round of edits in April. I am ecstatic.


Publication

17 March 2024

A section called Privacy, from an earlier revision of my memoir, has gone live in Invisible City, a publication of the University of San Francisco’s MFA program. Please find it here.


Acceptance

21 February 2024

It kills me not to share any of the specifics, but an essay I wrote about the ways in which my understandings of both physical and emotional evolved during my twenties was accepted by a major online promoter of new writers. I’ve signed the contract, but until there’s an official release date, I am going to zip my lip. With all the good news since the start of the year, I can’t wait to start querying again in April.


Finalist

16 February 2024

Rejections are par for the course when writing, but a rejection that also makes it clear that I had become a finalist in a genre that had at least 700 applicants? Wow.


Acceptance

6 February 2024

In December, I submitted a fifteen-page chunk from the then-current version of my memoir to a literary magazine. The magazine accepted it and sent a few line edits for me to review. I’ll be sharing the link when it goes live later this year.


Contest Longlist Winner

9 January 2024

I submitted an essay about a trip Hiro and I took to Phuket back in 1995 to a contest run by Queer Adventurers. That essay was one of five longlisted entries, and although it did not win, it will appear on the website later this year. Updates soon!


New Author Photo?

11 December 2023

During a holiday party this past weekend, my good friend Bienvenido posed me for this incredible photograph. I love it and am looking forward to its book jacket moment.


Revising Again

10 October 2023

Within hours today, two people offered identical feedback on my manuscript: start it in Japan.

And I am now reviewing the themes throughout the manuscript so that when I reorganize the chronology, I can better add the right flashbacks and context. I used to think I was writing a hybrid memoir, but now I see it as more of a collage or a patchwork, inviting the reader to follow along on the myriad ways my brain connects from one narrative to the next memory, from one incident to the historical context for it.


Book Review

10 September 2023

My review of The Male Gazed, by Manuel Betancourt, appeared in the September online edition of Hippocampus Magazine.


My First Listicle Essay

14 June 2023

Many, many thanks to Brevity Blog for sharing my numerical thoughts about my first ever Association of Writers and Writing Programs conference earlier this year.


Book Review

6 June 2023

My review of Without Saints, by Christopher Locke, appeared in the June online edition of Hippocampus Magazine.


Querying Again

25 May 2023

After an intense round of revisions prompted my excellent beta reader feedback, I have compiled the next round of twenty agents to query, armed with letters, proposals, writing samples, synopses, and more. Fingers crossed!


Finalist!

18 May 2023

I received word from Columbia Journal that an essay I submitted in January of 2023 was named a finalist for the Online Prize for Nonfiction. Although I did not ultimately win, the nomination was indeed an honor.


Book Review

1 April 2023

My review of the incredible Brother Alive, by Zain Khalid ran in the Rain Taxi spring print edition. You can order a copy here.


Beta Readers

21 February 2023

Six people received copies of the latest revisions to Crying in a Foreign Language: The Deity that Answered My Plea. One of my readers, a member of the manuscript’s dramatis personae, has now read through four revisions. Of this latest version, he shared the following with me.

…Your ability to use turns of phrase so adroitly keeps the reader glued to the pages. I binge read it…yet again. An agent and publisher would be remiss not to grab this up….Outstanding work, my friend. So raw with emotion and honest. I loved it, as I have most of your other rewrites, but this one really is good. You are an inspiration, truly.

Todd Jay Leonard on 25 February 2023

Finalist!

15 February 2023

I received word from CutBank that an essay I submitted late in 2022 was named a finalist for the Montana Prize for Nonfiction. Although I did not ultimately win, the nomination was indeed an honor.


Publication

2 February 2023

The fourth issue of the Messy Misfits zine included a brief excerpt from my memoir-in-progress. The issue is free to download here.


Book Review

15 December 2022

A beautifully written collection of essays. I highly recommend it.

My review of Halfway From Home, by Sarah Fawn Montgomery, appeared in the December online edition of Hippocampus Magazine.


Award for Non-Fiction

thank you to White Enso!

15 November 2022

In September, I wrote an essay about the first day of a trip Hiro and I made to the East Coast of the United States. I submitted Bending Time to a literary journal called White Enso that focuses on connections with Japan. To my delight, that essay won their award for non-fiction for their November 2022 issue.


AWP W2W Mentorship Program

10 September 2022

What an amazing opportunity this is!

I was stunned to receive word that not only had I been selected for Season 17 of the incredible Association of Writers & Writing Programs’ Writer to Writer mentorship program, but that my mentor, Garrard Conley, author of the intensely eye-opening Boy Erased, personally selected me based on my application materials.


Book Review

10 August 2022

An amazing book that helped me rethink some of my own prejudices.

My review of Another Appalachia: Coming up Queer and Indian in a Mountain Place by Neema Avashia appeared in the August online edition of Hippocampus Magazine.


15 June 2022

Research Article

A topic in which I am personally invested is marriage equality, and I had the opportunity to compare and contrast the marriage equality arcs within the United States and Japan in an article for the JETs on Japan Forum, a publication of the Sasakawa Peace Foundation in association with the United States Japan Exchange & Teaching Programme Alumni Association.

That article grew out of personal research which also resulted in the marriage equality timeline I shared to my blog.


Craft Essay

9 June 2022

I was not expecting to see my name!

One of my favorite writing teachers, Allison K. Williams, included a mention of one of my blog posts on hybrid memoir in her essay on that very topic.


Podcast Appearance

9 June 2022

Adam James Cohen, the host of Second Adolescence, was a dream interviewer.

My interview with Second Adolescence spoke to the ways in which my closet and grief resulted in a different teenage experience, and to how it wasn’t until I arrived in Japan that I was able to undergo a true adolescence, one that united me with authentic intimacy. Have a listen, please.


Podcast Appearance

5 June 2022

My first podcast appearance was with the UK activist, Sam Wise.

Listen in! or listen out! Sam and I talked about marriage equality, my experiences in Japan and much more. He was an excellent interviewer and came well prepared with in-depth questions.


Book Review

13 May 2022

My review of Body Work: the Radical Power of Personal Narrative by Melissa Febos appeared in Brevity’s blog.


Book Review

7 March 2022

An outsider’s look at the coming-out process, Affliction posed many challenges for me.

My review of Affliction: Growing Up with a Closeted Gay Dad by Laura Hall appeared in the March online edition of Hippocampus Magazine.


Craft Essay

7 March 2022

Friend and colleague Kristen Paulson-Nguyen recommended me to share this essay with Hippocampus Magazine.

There are few things I dreaded as the injunctive to print out and re-type my memoir’s manuscript. This essay describes the choices I made.


Craft Essay

29 December 2021

Dinty Moore, the editor of Brevity Magazine, selected my essay on meditation for the magazine’s last blog entry of 2021.


Book Review

6 December 2021

My first published book review let me speak to the charms of a very delightful book.

My review of Special Topics in Being Human: a Queer and Tender Guide to Things I’ve Learned the Hard Way about Caring for People, Including Myself by S. Bear Bergman appeared in the December online edition of Hippocampus Magazine.


Craft Essay

15 November 2021

My ten years in Japan, as filled with incredible experiences as they were, set in motion a series of life-altering changes.

The New York office of an organization I once worked for in Tōkyō called CLAIR (Council of Local Authorities for International Relations) ran an essay I wrote about how Japan changed my life. Scroll down on the page I linked to to see it.


Craft Essay

7 October 2021

Never mind the pretension of using both my middle initials, In So Many Words was a mid-90s fictional attempt to describe the events that now appear in my memoir.

My essay on the choice between fiction and memoir appeared in Brevity magazine’s online blog.


Craft Essay

15 July 2021

My first essay on writing encapsulated the frustrations I felt during the first year of revisions to my manuscript.