History That Never Was

Home of Dawn Vogel: Writer, Historian, Geek

Fun for Friday: March 2021 Prompts

| February 26, 2021

It’s nearly the beginning of March, so it’s time for another month’s prompts. The words this month are all pretty random, though I suspect you could get some March or spring-inspired pieces out of what I’ve included here. There’s also a photograph of a marching band that you could work in with the other prompts […]

“A Sixteen Step Plan to Supervillainy” in Coast to Coast Stars

| February 25, 2021

When I’m writing in a superhero universe, I generally write heroes and not villains. But for “A Sixteen Step Plan to Supervillainy,” I decided to try out the other side of the fence. After all, villains believe themselves to be the heroes of their stories, so why not write a sympathetic villain story? “A Sixteen […]

World-Building Recommendation: World Roulette

| February 24, 2021

One of my recent Kickstarter rewards was the World Roulette Deck from Light Grey Art Lab. It’s a deck meant to assist in world building for creative projects, with a really interesting setup on the individual cards, which are meant to be stacked and layered in interesting combinations as you’re creating a world. As the […]

Cover Reveal for Barren!

| February 23, 2021

The next book I’ll be publishing this year is Barren, a post-apocalyptic novella. This novella has been a long time in the making. It started as a short story that many people thought felt like the beginning of something longer. I tried to make it a novel, but novella wound up being the length it worked […]

Revising Short Fiction: On Screen or On Paper?

| February 22, 2021

I learned how to edit my papers for high school and college by printing out drafts, reading through them, and marking them up with red ink (or whatever funky colored pens I had). But that was in the halcyon days of dot matrix printers, which, in the household I grew up, at least, had a […]

Fun for Friday: AtlasObscura for Writing Prompts

| February 19, 2021

If you like weird places and things of the world, AtlasObscura is a great site that collects information about all sorts of unusual things. You can navigate it by picking a country or city, or do searches for other specifics. Their Twitter feed is also a great way to get random ideas for writing prompts, […]

MoonTree Readers Takeover Day!

| February 18, 2021

Today’s another exciting day for Promise Me Nothing!  I’m taking over my friend Jesikah Sundin’s MoonTree Readers Facebook page to talk about Promise Me Nothing and more! If you’d like to join the fun, request to join the Facebook page now! I promise to kee18p any potential spoilers to a minimum, so you don’t need to worry if you haven’t read […]

Review of Planet Fleep by Sherry D. Ramsey

| February 17, 2021

Sherry D. Ramsey’s Planet Fleep (2018) is written for kids between the ages of 9 and 12, but it’s an enjoyable book for older readers as well! With action, adventure, and science, it’s a brief but fun book about family and exploring a potentially dangerous planet with only wits and a teacher robot to protect the […]

Promise Me Nothing Out Today!

| February 16, 2021

Today is release day for my young adult contemporary fantasy novel, Promise Me Nothing! It’s available in ebook or print format from all of the usual locations! Supernatural Reform School or Horrifying Death Trap? Dedwydd Academy is meant to be a third chance for Briar Williams, exiled from the fae realm of Idyll for her part […]

Tips on Speculative Detective Fiction

| February 15, 2021

Many people like to read mystery stories or detective fiction, but if you’ve never tried your hand at writing it, it can be a challenging genre to tackle, especially when you add speculative fiction elements. Here, author Tyler Hayes breaks down some of the pitfalls and advice for writing speculative detective fiction. It’s a fantastic […]