History That Never Was

Home of Dawn Vogel: Writer, Historian, Geek

My November 2024 Publications

| December 3, 2024

I had two new pieces out in November this year: a flash fiction story and a poem. My flash fiction piece was “We Dream in Color,” a post-apocalyptic story with queer characters, in Toad Shade Zine. This one came out of a one-hour flash fiction writing challenge and was inspired by an image of a […]

Dead-Starred Futures Poems

| November 28, 2024

My collection of dystopian science-fiction, Dead-Starred Futures, includes seventeen poems, which range across time and space. There are a couple of poems that look at the climate change crisis on Earth, including “Elemental Crisis” and “Temperance Lost”. There are many more poems that look at science-fictional future wars (like “Last Stand” and “Under Siege”) or colonization […]

Eight Plus Years of The Trouble with the Tick-Tock Tabby

| November 26, 2024

The Trouble with the Tick-Tock Tabby was one of the first things I self-published, back in 2016. At that point, I’d been writing for publication for more than seven years. And since 2016 was eight years ago (!), that means I’ve been writing for fifteen years, which is a wild thing to think about. But […]

An Early Novella in Cross & Circle

| November 21, 2024

Cross and Circle was one of the first long-form pieces I wrote and published. I originally thought it would be a short story, but the word count kept creeping up, and I realized it was actually going to be closer to a novella length (it’s a little shorter than the official SFWA novella lower limit, […]

My Steampunk Books

| November 19, 2024

If you love steampunk, I’ve got plenty of book options! First, my Brass and Glass trilogy is a completed series of action and adventure steampunk, involving airship pirates and whiskey. The first book, The Cask of Cranglimmering, introduces you to the crew and world, and the other two books take the story to its conclusion. If you’re […]

The Empress in A Tarot of Sorcery and Sages

| November 14, 2024

The Empress tarot card represents expression, creativity, and nurturing, as well as motherhood and/or fertility. In A Tarot of Sorcery and Sages, this is represented by a haiku and a poem. The poem, “A Spell for Docile Dryads,” looks at a balance between nurturing nature and nurturing the humans who depend upon nature for their livelihood. […]

Weathering Youth Out Today!

| November 12, 2024

Today’s the day! My latest collection, Weathering Youth, is out today! Within its pages, you’ll find younger protagonists and protagonists with a more youthful outlook, regardless of age. The stories range from humorous to dark, within the realms of fantasy, sci-fi, and horror! This is my largest collection to date, with almost fifty stories and poems! […]

October 2024 Publication!

| November 5, 2024

I had one new story out in October this year–“Child’s Play” appeared in Bullet Points volume 7. This is a story involving a woman who’s on the run and the kids who inadvertently get caught up between her and her pursuers. It combines the military sci-fi theme of Bullet Points with a somewhat sweet story of […]

Weird History in Unfixed Timelines Omnibus

| October 31, 2024

Unfixed Timelines Omnibus collects three volumes of my fantastical and weird history stories and poetry, along with essays explaining the real history that I altered into fictional versions of history. The stories and essays touch on the Veiled Prophet from St. Louis in the nineteenth century (a weird mix of a civic organization with racist […]

Drabbles in Dead-Starred Futures

| October 29, 2024

My collection of dystopian science fiction, Dead-Starred Futures, included a handful of drabbles, stories told in exactly 100 words. All five of these stories were also reprints, which saw their initial publications in a variety of venues. “Litany” was a piece inspired by an abandoned building covered in graffiti that was presented to us in a […]