History That Never Was

Home of Dawn Vogel: Writer, Historian, Geek

Review of The Daughter of Doctor Moreau by Silvia Moreno-Garcia

| October 18, 2023

The Daughter of Doctor Moreau by Silvia Moreno-Garcia (Del Rey, 2022) is a reimagining of The Island of Doctor Moreau, set in Mexico during a period of civil strife in the nineteenth century, and focusing on Doctor Moreau’s daughter and an overseer of his hybrid creations. Carlotta Moreau has grown up with a strange sickness, but […]

“Aethervirales” in Droplets from the Universe

| September 26, 2023

Of the stories in Droplets from the Universe, “Aethervirales” appears on first glance to be the least suited to collection of joyful and humorous sci-fi. After all, it begins with a murdered person. But I included it in this collection because the protagonist of the story solves the case and has a happy ending. As the […]

Have You Checked Out Dead-Starred Futures?

| September 21, 2023

Have you had a chance to check out Dead-Starred Futures yet? It’s filled with very short stories and poems, all along the theme of dystopian sci-fi. The stories are generally dark, though there’s occasional humor interspersed with the darkness. Dead-Starred Futures is available in ebook only, wherever you like to buy ebooks!

My August 2023 Publications

| September 7, 2023

I had a couple of new things out in August this year! The first is that my flash fiction story, “The Truth of Their Tunes,” was reprinted in The Little Cozy Book from Wyngraf, who originally published this story on their website. Now it’s collected with other cozy fantasy stories! The second is my dystopian sci-fi […]

“Undecided” from Droplets from the Universe

| August 29, 2023

The story “Undecided” was my attempt to write a sci-fi story that used a so-called “soft” science, cultural anthropology, to solve a problem. The story has a lot of other sci-fi tropes–aliens and hard science among them–but the actual crux point is somewhat unexpected. I also adore the characters I wrote for this story–two extremely […]

Dead-Starred Futures Out Today!

| August 15, 2023

Today’s the day! Dead-Starred Futures is now available! If you like your science-fiction on the darker and dystopian side, this is the collection for you! It’s also all bite-sized fiction–nothing longer than 1,000 words, and quite a few pieces that are closer to 250 or 100! Visions of the future aren’t always gleaming starships and utopias. […]

Fun for Friday: Sci-Fi Tropes!

| August 4, 2023

If you like writing science fiction, check out this list of 101 sci-fi tropes! Sure, you probably don’t want to write a story that just follows the trope precisely, but this list might spark some ideas on ways to subvert the tropes or blend two or more into an interesting mash-up!  

Dead-Starred Futures Cover Reveal!

| July 18, 2023

My next collection, Dead-Starred Futures, is out August 15, 2023, and it’s time to reveal the cover! This collection is all tiny pieces–flash fiction down to drabbles and poetry, so it will be a quick read but bursting with all sorts of dystopian and post-apocalyptic science fiction. It’s a darker counterpart to Droplets from the Universe. Visions […]

“First Rights” in Droplets from the Universe

| June 29, 2023

My flash fiction piece, “First Rights,” is a sci-fi story involving salvage operations for high-end merchandise, the sort that might be tagged with an RFID chip. After all, if it’s valuable enough to tag, it’s certainly valuable enough to steal, right? In addition to its appearance in Droplets from the Universe, “First Rights” can also […]

Review of Danged Black Thing by Eugen Bacon

| June 14, 2023

Danged Black Thing by Eugen Bacon (Apex Book Company, 2023) is a collection of short stories, the majority of which have been previously published. A handful of the stories are co-written with other authors, but all of them display Bacon’s distinctive storytelling voice. Favorites in this collection for me were “When the Water Stops,” a […]