Short Stories

“Oxen at the Well” (Roi Feaneant Literary Press), July 2022)

“The Dreams of Babylon” (The Bookends Review, May 2022)

“The Falseness of Prophecy” (Flashes of Darkness, The Whisky Blot, May 2022)

“A Place of Dangerous Beasts” (Pangyrus, November 2021)

“Let Them Swim” (YA story for Eduland, Hong Kong) — to be published exclusively in China

“Midianites” (9th Story Studios, The Wicked Library and Extra Wicked podcasts, forthcoming)

“The Appearance of Horses” (Adelaide Books, Literary Award in Short Fiction Anthology 2020, vol. 2, spring 2021) — finalist

“Retribution,” a prose poetry translation of the Grendel’s Mother episode in Beowulf (EKL Review, April 2021)

“First Kings” (Sequestrum, winter 2020) — Runner-up for the editors’ Reprint Award

“Hosea” (Belle Ombre, summer 2020)

“The Artist Spoke” (Litbreak Magazine, April 2020) — an excerpt from Part V of my work in progress, The Isolation of Conspiracy

“Weird Soliloquies” (briars lit, Volume 3, August 2019)

“First Kings” (North American Review, fall 2019)

“Madison” (Central American Literary Review, March 2019) — Part IV of my work in progress, The Isolation of Conspiracy.

“Medieval Music from Midwestern Universities” (Adelaide, #17) — an excerpt from Part III of my work in progress, The Isolation of Conspiracy

“Vox Humana” (Blue Lake Review, June 2018) — extends the story of Crowsong for the Stricken

“Planes” (ink&coda, August 2017) * — the story originally appeared in Lavender Wolves Literary Journal, Issue 3

“Beside Running Waters” (CommuterLit, May 11, 2017) * — the story originally appeared in Constellations, and was previously reprinted in Literature Today, vol. 4

“The Glance of Orpheus II” (Adelaide, spring 2017) — excerpt of the second section of the work in progress, The Isolation of Conspiracy

“Meditations on the Word” (Floyd County Moonshine, 9.1 — the first section of the work in progress, The Isolation of Conspiracy

“The Glance of Orpheus” (Lakeview Journal, 5.1) — excerpt of the second section of the work in progress, The Isolation of Conspiracy

“Beside Running Waters” (Literature Today, volume 4) * — a reprint which originally appeared in Constellations

“Crowsong for the Stricken” (Flyleaf) *

“Crowsong” won the 2015 Editors’ Choice Reprint Award

“The Curvatures of Hurt” (Fiction on the Web, October 2015) *

“Sheol” (Southern Humanities Review, July 2018) *

“Erebus” (Everest, Spring 2017) *

“The Ancient World” (The Snapping Twig, December 2014) *

“Bitterness on the Tongue” (Blue Bonnet Review, October 2014) *

“Season of Reaping” (Festival Writer, August 2014) *

“The Drama of Consonants” (ink&coda, Summer 2014) *

“Planes” (Lavender Wolves Literary Journal, Issue 3) * — “Planes” has been posted at the journal’s website under Recent Publications. Also, listen to the story here, one of WUIS Public Radio’s featured Scary Stories.

“Scent of Darkness” (Black Denim Lit, March 2014) * — read as a Kindle download or see the website for an array of downloadable versions. Also, read on Wattpad 

“Beside Running Waters” (Constellations, fall 2012) *

“Crowsong for the Stricken” (Noctua Review, spring 2012) *

“Primitive Scent” (Tulane Review, fall 2011) * — read on Wattpad

* Stories are from Crowsong for the Stricken, a forthcoming book.

“Melvill in the Marquesas” (The Final Draft, fall 2010) — an excerpt from the novella Weeping with an Ancient God, archived here

“The Composure of Death” (Pisgah Review 5.2)

“Walkin’ the Dog” (Spilling Ink Review #1)

“Unnatural Deeds” (Leaf Garden #8) — download pdf version or purchase print copy from lulu.com

“Missing the Earth” (Oak Bend Review, March/April 2009)

“Missing the Earth” was a Top 25 Finalist in Glimmer Train’s Fiction Open, winter 2004/2005

“A Wintering Place” (Eleven Eleven #6) — read on Wattpad

“An Alabaster Moon” (PANK #3)

“Communion with the Dead” (The Chariton Review 31.2) — read on Wattpad

“In a Strange City” (Eureka Literary Magazine 11.1)

“When the Night Is New” (A Summer’s Reading, 2002) — self-published — read on Wattpad

“Fische Stories” (Glimmer Train Stories #43)

“Mix” (Paris Transcontinental #15)

“Chinko” (Chiricu 7.1)

Other Publications

“The Abduction of Aeschere: A Few Words Regarding a Few Words in My Translation of the Grendel’s Mother Episode) Academia Letters, July 2021)

“Cultural Trauma and the Postmodern Voice” (Eclectica Magazine, April/May 2021) — excerpt from Trauma Theory as an Approach to Analyzing Literary Texts

“Abreat v. Abræd: Reconsidering the Grendel’s Mother Episode in Beowulf” (Academia Letters, January 2021)

“The Alluring Obscurity of Noir: A Lesson before Writing” (Big Other Folio: Robert Coover, fall 2020)

“See What I See: Interview with Greg Gerke” (Rain Taxi, spring 2020)

“Ted Morrissey’s Autobiographical Statement” (Litbreak Magazine, April 2020)

“On ‘First Kings'” (North American Review November 2019)

“‘The Celebration Goes On’: A Review of The William H. Gass Reader” (review, North American Review, September 2019)

“Ingots” (Haunted Waters Press, May 2019) — “Ingots” is part of my “Laertes Sonnet Sequence.”

“Obsolescence” (Prime Number Magazine, Issue 1) — “Obsolescence” is part of my “Laertes Sonnet Sequence.”

“Pilgrim” (the tiny journal, January 2019) — “Pilgrim” is part of my “Laertes Sonnet Sequence”

“Shroud” (Bellevue Literary Review, spring 2019) — “Shroud” is part of my “Laertes Sonnet Sequence”

“The Pedigree of Self-Publishing” (North American Review, 301.2)

“Professor Tolkien’s Rebel Readings of Beowulf” (North American Review blog, March 17, 2015) — an expansion of the review of Tolkien’s translation that appears in NAR 300.2

“A Dragon-Worthy Treasure,” a review of J.R.R. Tolkien’s translation of Beowulf (North American Review, 300.2) — archived here

“The Loss of Intellect” (North American Review blog, April 14, 2014)

“Composing Interlacing Narratives,” a review of William H. Gass’s novel Middle C (North American Review, 298.4)

“The Psychic Origins of Creativity” (North American Review blog, November 18, 2013)

“Beowulf Waits for an Audience” (North American Review, 298.1)

“Researching the Rhythms of Voice” (Glimmer Train Press’s Writers Ask #54)

“Painful Commerce” (The Muse: International Journal of Poetry #1.2)

Collected in The Muse:  An International Journal of Poetry, 1.2, edited by Pradeep Chaswal, Deepak Chaswal and Mohammad Arif.

“Twitterpation Nation” (Slush Pile Magazine #7)

“Recognizing a Masterpiece:  William Gaddis’s Reinterpretation of Flemish Art” (The Gaddis Annotations:  Critical & Interpretive Essays)

“Fannie Barrier Williams” (Encyclopedia of African American Women Writers, Greenwood Press)

Zeitgeist and the Zone:  The Psychic Correlation between Cultural Trauma and “Postmodern” Literature (dissertation for the Ph.D. in English studies, Illinois State University, 2009) — available via ProQuest, document 3528249

An updated and indexed edition of Zeitgeist and the Zone has been published by Edwin Mellen Press under the new title Trauma Theory As a Method for Understanding Literary Texts.