History That Never Was

Home of Dawn Vogel: Writer, Historian, Geek

Review of Mermaids Never Drown

| October 25, 2023

Mermaids Never Drown, edited by Zoraida Córdova and Natalie C. Parker (Feiwel and Friends, 2023), is a wonderful collection of stories of a variety of creatures in the seas, including but not limited to mermaids. The stories range from humorous to dark, but frequently include fraught relationships between mothers and daughters, often as a part […]

Recent Fantasy Publications

| February 21, 2023

If you’re looking for a fantasy story or poem to read, here are a few of my recent fantasy publications, along with some of my collections! My flash fiction piece, “Patience,” appeared in Wyldblood Magazine in October of last year. It’s a brief piece about working to get what you want, but not being impatient about […]

My Fantasy Collections

| July 26, 2022

If you’re looking for books for a lover of fantasy, I’ve got a few books you could check out! If you’d prefer short stories, Denizens of Distant Realms is half a dozen fantasy short stories with dragons, witches, fairies, cats, and more. If instead, you’d like a book that’s primarily poetry with a few stories, What […]

Fun for Friday: Merfolk Inspired Images

| May 13, 2022

For this week’s Fun for Friday, it’s image prompts, all on a merfolk-related theme without being just about merfolk! The first image is a forest scene with a lightbulb-shaped vessel holding water and a very small merfolk, along with a ladybug perched atop the bulb and an ant to the left. The second image is […]

Defending Home in What If I’m a Merfolk?

| July 29, 2021

One of the themes that runs through a number of the pieces in What If I’m a Merfolk? is the idea of merfolk defending their home. While the ocean is vast and has plenty of hiding places for creatures like merfolk, it’s still important to them to defend their territory from things like incursions of humans […]

Looking for Some Fantasy Reads?

| June 24, 2021

If your idea of a great summer read is something from a world of fantasy, I’ve got a couple of books that might fit the bill! What If I’m a Merfolk? spans traditional fantasy and more modern fantasy, but presents a load of interesting merfolk poetry and a handful of short stories, all dealing with […]

What If I’m a Merfolk?: Big Fish

| October 20, 2020

The new story that appears in What If I’m a Merfolk? is “Big Fish,” which is a very short flash piece. It’s told in an unusual style for me, in that it’s a first person story in which the narrator responds to unstated questions from an unseen and unheard second character. But for this story, […]

What If I’m a Merfolk? Out Today!

| August 4, 2020

My first collection comprising mostly poetry is out today! What If I’m a Merfolk? features 23 poems and 3 stories about being a merfolk or becoming a merfolk. The majority of the poems were written during Mermay this year, and I paired those up with a handful of other pieces of merfolk poetry and fiction I’ve […]