New short story from me live now!

In college, for one of my fiction writing classes (for extra credit even I think), I wrote a story barely 1000 words that was the form of an email from a middle schooler to her counselor about sexual harassment and assault she experienced. This was around 2018-2019, and I’d been reading about it in the news and studies about the prevalence of it in schools with both boys and girls. I was going to become a secondary teacher, after all, and I needed to be prepared.

The story, which I simply called “Lina’s Story,” while being short and in the form of an email, was also unusual because it contained a lot of struck through words, representing the things she chose not to say and deleted.

Out of all the pieces I wrote in college, it became recently the one I was most interested in getting published if I could find the right place—which was hard, because my edited 1000 word version for flash fiction sites didn’t take, probably because it was a middle grade story, and the children’s publication I tried rejected it. But a new publication appeared in the form of Whirligig Lit—a spinoff of Epistemic Literary—and their first issue was going to be called “Taking a Stand.” It was worth the shot.

And they accepted it!

“Lina’s Story” is now available to read online here. I am so glad to finally share it.

Since 2018 or so, there have been several middle grade stories that deal with the subject. My favorite so far is What Happened to Rachel Riley? by Claire Swinarski. I look forward to the expansion of dealing with this topic in middle grade, especially from more diverse backgrounds and genders.

P.S. I recently made a zine—check it out and buy here!

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