Playing with Forms

Playing with Forms

Necronauts: Moonshine Murmurs Podcast, Episode #14 In this episode, host Carol Mitchell and Ryan Habermeyer discuss Habermeyer’s novel Necronauts, the role of form in story writing, and more. Carol Mitchell is a consulting editor with Stillhouse Press and a term professor in the English Department at George Mason University. She holds an MFA from George Mason and is the author of several books for children, one novel for adults: What Start Bad a Mornin' and the short story collection, A Good Haunting. Ryan Habermeyer is the author of the novel Necronauts and the short story collections Salt Folk and The Science of Lost Futures. His award-winning stories and essays have appeared in Conjunctions, Alaska Quarterly Review, Copper Nickel, Massachusetts Review, DIAGRAM and others. A Fulbright Scholar who has lived, studied, and taught in Poland, Scotland, Spain, and Mexico, he is Associate Professor of Creative Writing at Salisbury University in Maryland. A transcript of this episode is available here [https://drive.google.com/file/d/1VE1hf08vZhZ1rr31G-Fvg8velGUOnVgC/view?usp=share_link].

Mining the Horrific

In this episode, host Carol Mitchell and Kristina Ten discuss Ten’s short story collection Tell Me Yours, I'll Tell You Mine, the origin of the stories, Ten’s influences, and more. Carol Mitchell is a consulting editor with Stillhouse Press and a term professor in the English Department at George Mason University. She holds an MFA from George Mason and is the author of several books for children and one novel for adults: What Start Bad a Mornin'. Kristina Ten’s debut short story collection Tell Me Yours, I'll Tell You Mine was published in 2025 by Stillhouse Press after winning our horror fiction contest. Kristina's stories appear in The Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy, We're Here: The Best Queer Speculative Fiction, The Best Weird Fiction of the Year, and elsewhere. She has won the McSweeney's Stephen Dixon Award for Short Fiction, the Subjective Chaos Kind of Award, and the F(r)iction Writing Contest, and has been a finalist for the Shirley Jackson Award and the Locus Award. Ten is a graduate of Clarion West Writers Workshop and the University of Colorado Boulder's MFA program in fiction, and has received fellowships from the Ragdale Foundation and the Martha's Vineyard Institute of Creative Writing. A transcript of this episode is available here [https://drive.google.com/file/d/135nmhYuO5WcYJF9-D3yMmoTjeBl3weO2/view?usp=share_link].

Throughlines: From Poetry and Community to Healing

In this episode, host Carol Mitchell and Alicia Elkort discuss A Map of Every Undoing, Alicia's beautiful poetry collection; writing through trauma; and the importance of community in writing. Carol Mitchell is a consulting editor with Stillhouse Press and a term professor in the English Department at George Mason University. She holds an MFA from George Mason and is the author of several books for children and one novel for adults: What Start Bad a Mornin'. Alicia Elkort’s first book A Map of Every Undoing was published in 2022 by Stillhouse Press after winning our book contest. Her second book of poetry recently won the Two Sylvias Press Wilder Poetry Book Prize and will be published in 2026. Alicia's poetry has been nominated several times for the Pushcart, Best of the Net, and the Orison Anthology, and her work appears in numerous journals and anthologies. She reads for Tinderbox Poetry Journal where she also writes reviews. For more info or to watch her two video poems: https://aliciaelkort.mystrikingly.com/ [https://secure-web.cisco.com/12G5YYWyQC5As587qN_dxZdgzywqd04ErP3zdr-yCQOffGYu6eEPBMCMHJbSkR6wq3L4_sXZaD5i4Yus5BZH4ebzlI7w4ilKOnAeL3xRCwJHQ_LcSoE7hnqlbhJJ3B1mS2-4WNQ2_qWtNygPRYetCOOQh9rviOXZ5iGHMVp5zSWIKS7yFx5SzjfX-FiiEpQbf4zJrLlAXbJjCH5ikF82xWk60GVzRYuln_TJEUeo8JfmLzUZQu3eIh55VJg0SnJ-Fmb71Jw7VU0MfiIo_NnHrbLK1FW2UlmbqxA_H5fFY5OG2AFhPDDaVYLjyHmbb5_L-C0j5cCE6phgGtR_xaVP_Yr8tOvQszcO5Jw_NIlWrIj5jfky2YR-nkcTO_IfXCOYFvDEbLwVOzwiLcIKUOAU6wng4f2vs4KXSisGOdru0Ud_lddi4rB8lpwda4kC5_ioV/https%3A%2F%2Faliciaelkort.mystrikingly.com%2F] A transcript of this episode is available here [https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Mi9qTb4Lek9xXv-2ltxFRqreRtu5obwt/view?usp=share_link].

More than Human: Moonshine Murmurs Podcast, Episode #11

In this episode, host Carol Mitchell and Miranda Schmidt discuss Leafskin, Miranda's beautiful book of prosepoetry (not a typo) and the unavoidable physical and psychic connections between humans and nature. Carol Mitchell is a consulting editor with Stillhouse Press and a term professor in the English Department at George Mason University. She holds an MFA from George Mason and is the author of several books for children and one novel for adults: What Start Bad a Mornin'. Miranda Schmidt’s work circles the folkloric, the familial, queer magic, and the more-than-human world. Their writing has appeared in TriQuarterly, Orion, Electric Literature, Catapult, Phoebe, and more. With an MFA from the University of Washington and a PhD from Bath Spa University, they have taught creative writing at Portland Community College, the University of Washington, the Loft, and the Portland Book Festival. Their ongoing newsletter and teaching project, Writing Toward Nature, explores methods for bringing the more-than-human more deeply into our writing craft. Miranda’s debut novel, Leafskin, just out from Stillhouse Press, is a story of queer love and family-making. Rooted in folklore and poetry, Leafskin explores acts of creation in our time of environmental destruction. A transcript of this episode is available here [https://drive.google.com/file/d/13TMiHvAj_Vo9nEmhX8ZtnT5PAdrRnHZW/view?usp=share_link].

Patience is a Weapon, an interview with author Samuel Ashworth

Patience as a Weapon: Moonshine Murmurs Podcast, Episode #10 In this episode, host Carol Mitchell and Sam Ashworth, author of The Death and Life of August Sweeney have a lively discussion about his fascinating novel and paths to success as a working author.  Carol Mitchell is a consulting editor with Stillhouse Press and a term professor in the English Department at George Mason University. She holds an MFA from George Mason and is the author of several books for children and one novel for adults: "What Start Bad a Mornin'." This podcast was produced with assistance from Jon Miller. SAMUEL ASHWORTH is a professor of creative writing at George Washington University and a former columnist at The Rumpus. His fiction and nonfiction have appeared in the Atlantic, the Washington Post, Longreads, Eater, and many others. He graduated from the George Mason Creative Writing MFA program, where he was one of the inaugural Cheuse Center fellows. He now lives with his wife and two sons in Washington, DC. The Death and Life of August Sweeney is his first novel. A transcript of this episode is available here [https://drive.google.com/file/d/1BVcyZlAQd1utoDD--_Sq0TmNDvQgGmDR/].