Hey everybody, M. here,

As I mentioned in my earlier post about the release of the new issue of Chthonic Matter Quarterly, it was a really busy weekend for me in terms of fiction-related news! On Saturday I received my copy of Kingdoms Trembling in the mail, and as I’ve mentioned in a few other places online, the physical copy of this book is nothing short of stunning.

The illustration by Matthew M. Skillern absolutely explodes off the cover with colors so vivid I don’t think a picture on a screen can really capture it. That said, here are a couple of pictures to give you a feel for what I’m talking about!

If you’re stopping by for the first time and are wondering what this wizardry is that you’re looking at, Kingdoms Trembling is my debut sword & sorcery collection from DMR Books, containing 12 previously unpublished, bloody, action-packed tales that immerse you in the bizarre, dangerous world I first created and introduced in my stories The Tears of Blood and The Eye Within The Eye, which can be found in DMR’s two Die By The Sword anthologies. (And you can now get the first of those for free to read in e-book format, in DMR Books’ new digital sampler, The Battle Rages On).

Kingdoms Trembling was picked as a 2026 Summer Read by Publishers Weekly and has already been receiving some thoughtful praise from die-hard fans of the fantastic (I’m planning on highlighting more of that in the coming weeks).

In addition to the beautiful illustration and book design, I’ve also included an image of the table of contents here, so you can dig the unique naming convention I adopted when I was writing these stories, which I think sets the tone for a rare kind of reading experience.

But rather than taking it from me, you should see for yourself!

So if you’re into sword & sorcery, dark fantasy, weird horror, and all that other good stuff, grab yourself a copy today and see what all the hype is about!

A Few Thoughts About My Substack Experience So Far
Again, for those only now just becoming familiar with my work, you can follow me on Facebook, where I have been since time immemorial, and on my relatively new Substack to get more frequent updates and occasional posts related to film, literature, comic books and magazines from my youth, and other sorts of things that are broadly associated with my creative interests but aren’t strictly the kind of news on my fiction being published that you will read here.

On the topic of Substack, I have been having a lot of fun in the Substack Notes lately, engaging in more of the types of conversations I used to have on other social media platforms about 15 years ago, before algorithmic manipulation started making polite and insightful discussions more and more difficult.

That said, it is not quite living up to the promise of letting me get my stuff out to everyone who might enjoy it, at least not yet, but I’ve only been there a short time. So if you’re on there, follow me and subscribe! I might actually start making good use of that newsletter with some long-form content the way I keep saying I’m going to soon (it’s been a hectic couple of months, that’s my current excuse!).

Anyway time for me to go work on some stuff, take care everyone!
-M.

Hey everybody, M. here,

The first official weekend of summer brought with it a couple of exciting developments over here! First the news on my latest story release since it was chronologically the most recent, then I’ll get to the next news item pertaining to my new book Kingdoms Trembling in a separate post, because there’s enough information today for two!

The Summer 2026 issue of Chthonic Matter Quarterly officially hit the shelves on June 21 and is now available in print and e-book format. The issue contains my story What’s Behind The Walls and tales of terror from six other authors. I’ve written up a quick synopsis of the story, which goes a little something like this:

Arthur Loos just wants to get rid of the pests in his apartment. But they keep getting weird and more baffling, and everything else does too. Who, if anyone, is responsible, and who, if anyone, can help? And what the hell is actually behind those walls? 

That description hardly scratches the surface, though, so pick up a copy yourself to see what it’s really all about!

If you’re familiar with my work you may have seen me mention this a few times already, but just in case you’re just stumbling onto this blog for the first time, What’s Behind The Walls is a thematic followup to my tale of urban paranoia and grody coatings Sticky, which appeared in the Winter 2024 issue of CMQ.

If you dug Sticky, get ready for more body horror, more high anxiety, and more love or something like it in the new story.

I should add that while both stories stand fully on their own so you don’t need to read one to appreciate the other, if you’re interested in seeing what these two tales of disintegration add up to when you put them together, you can still grab a copy of the Winter 2024 issue of CMQ.

Also, Chthonic Matter Quarterly offers yearly subscriptions. So if you want be sure that you won’t miss out on an issue of the quarterly anthology series that’s publishing some of the most innovative and thought-provoking weird horror out there today visit the Chthonic Matter Press website and sign up!

CMQ offers yearly back issue bundles, too, so if you haven’t picked up that Winter 2024 issue yet, you can get it and catch up on the rest of the issues that came out that year.

And I’ve got more coming this year from Chthonic Matter, too, with the Nyctalocos: A Collection of Night Terrors themed anthology slated to hit the shelves in August, containing my story Sherman Dismantled And Afloat.

Keep an eye out here for more news on that and more! Take care everyone.
-M.

Hey everybody, M. here,

Just wanted to make a quick update: the Summer 2026 issue of Chthonic Matter Quarterly, which will contain my short horror story What’s Behind The Walls, should be out sometime on or around June 21.

If you’re dropping by the for the first time and haven’t seen me mention it before, the story is a thematic followup to my story Sticky which appeared in the Winter 2024 issue. So grab that one and get in the zone for the new, unspeakable terrors on the way!
-M.

Hey everybody, M. here,

I’m thrilled to announce that my debut sword & sorcery collection Kingdoms Trembling is now available for purchase in print and e-book format!

As you may have read elsewhere, the book was picked as a 2026 Summer Read by Publishers Weekly, so grab yourself a copy today to see what all the hype is about!

These twelve never-before-published, intertwining tales follow warriors and madmen, sorcerers and vagabonds, princes, criminals, and more as they battle their way through a weird, wild, violent world in disarray; a world on the edge of cataclysm, with bizarre, terrifying threats at every turn!

Visit the DMR Books website for a more in-depth teaser of what to expect from Kingdoms Trembling, and get ready to immerse yourself in a mindbending world of action and adventure like you’ve never experienced before!

If you’ve taken the dive into Kingdoms Trembling and want more, don’t forget that you can still get the two stories in which I introduced that world, The Tears of Blood and The Eye Within The Eye. They are available in the Die By The Sword anthologies, and the first is also available in DMR Books’ free digital sampler released a few months ago, The Battle Rages On.

Busy day today over here at M. Stern Headquarters so I’ve gotta run, follow me on Facebook or Substack, and if you dig the book, spread the word! Take care everybody!
-M.

Hey everybody, M. here,

It was a big week for news over here last week, with DMR Books announcing the official release date for Kingdoms Trembling (scheduled to be published on June 8) and the accompanying big reveal of the incredible cover illustrated by Matthew M. Skillern. With all of that going on, I had some news that I was able to get up on here and there on social media, but am a little late in posting here on the blog, namely that I received my contributor copy of Walpurgis Witcheries in the mail towards the end of last week.

The seasonal scorcher of a cover by Adam Burke on this one (done in the same style as his work found on the cover of Walpurgis Witcheries’ companion volume, 2022’s Samhain Sorceries) is a beauty to behold and the stories found therein are already getting a lot of kind words, so pick one up and get into it!

It’s available on Amazon in paperback and for Kindle, and DMR Books mentioned last week that it is now in-stock and available via the DMR Books website.

The anthology contains my short story The Wandering One and the Witchdance, and eight other new sword & sorcery tales set around the Walpurgisnacht festival in the Harz mountain range of medieval Germany, from some of the most vibrant imaginations writing sword & sorcery and dark fantasy today.

My story contains the first appearance of the character Vodoberex, the story’s titular Wandering One (you can get a taste of what you’re getting into with the teaser from the first page that I’ve posted here).

I had considered it a little bit back when I was writing the story, but the more I think about it the more I would like to bring Vodoberex back for more action and adventure. Where, when, and how? Only time will tell. But if you dig The Wandering One and the Witchdance and would like to see its cryptic hero appear on the page once again, give the anthology a review and mention it, let me know (here, on Facebook, or on Substack), and/or spread the word about the book and the story to anyone who might enjoy the story!

Horror and science fiction on the way
With so much happening on the sword & sorcery side of things lately, I don’t want to neglect to mention that I’ve got quite a bit on the way in terms of my horror and science fiction stories as well!

In the next couple of weeks you should be hearing more about the upcoming issue of Chthonic Matter Quarterly, in which you will find my tale of urban living and all those things that infest one’s apartment and one’s heart, What’s Behind The Walls, a thematic followup to my story Sticky which appeared in the Winter 2024 issue.

In August you can look forward to my story Sherman Dismantled and Afloat which is slated to appear in the Nyctalocos: A Collection of Night Terrors anthology, and in September get ready to jump into the squared circle and go toe-to-toe with my science fiction comedy Kayfabe in the Strange Tales of Space and Time anthology from Burial Books.

I think that should get me up to date for the moment, at least here on this author blog. Should have lots more on the way in the coming weeks, so stay tuned!
-M.

Hey everybody, M. here,

I’m excited to share that DMR Books announced the official release date of Kingdoms Trembling earlier today, as well as some information about the book that you can check out on the DMR blog.

Mark June 8 on your calendar, fans of the fantastical, the weird, the wild, the bizarre, and the bloody, because that is the day that my collection Kingdoms Trembling hits the shelves!

Along with the announcement of the release date came the reveal of the absolutely amazing cover illustration by indie comic artist Matthew M. Skillern, who did the illustration for the Die By The Sword Vol. II anthology (which you can see below) and whose work has appeared in all sorts of other incredible places as of late, including on sketch cards in a few recent Star Wars trading card sets.

The cover beautifully captures the mind-bending energy and intense action you will find within the pages, so get ready for early June! And if you want to read more about what Matthew M. Skillern has done and what he’s up to at the moment, you can check out his webpage or follow him on Facebook.

And as the DMR blog mentions, Kingdoms Trembling takes place in the same world that I debuted in two stories in the Die By The Sword anthologies. So if you have not yet checked out The Tears of Blood and The Eye Within The Eye, two tales of Ulxedomus, the exiled Crown Prince of K’Zal, you can still pick them up in those two anthologies to get yourself in the zone.

Or if you want to read the first story, The Tears of Blood, for free, you can download the new DMR Books digital sampler, The Battle Rages On which contains my story and a selection of other sword & sorcery tales new and old that DMR has recently released, to give those readers curious a feel for what the publishing house is about.

I’ve got a lot more coming up in these next few weeks so stay tuned here, follow me on Facebook, or check me out on Substack. Over on Substack I have been mostly posting short fiction/publishing-related updates after getting quickly sidetracked from writing about other stuff, but I might get back to writing Substack-exclusive content one of these days.

Take care everyone, and get ready for June 8!
-M.

Hey everybody, M. here,

Stuff has been moving fast over here, at such a pace that I have not had the chance to update the blog about some big stuff going on over the past week or two. So I’ll just jump to today’s big announcement: I am thrilled to say that the hotly-anticipated Walpurgis Witcheries anthology from DMR Books, the follow-up to 2022’s popular collection of seasonal sword & sorcery Samhain Sorceries, is now available for purchase!

You can grab one direct from Amazon, or order from the DMR webstore so that you can make sure to get a copy of the limited-edition Two Tales of Witchery chapbook, containing two additional stories and for sale only directly from DMR online or at the DMR table at book shows.

Walpurgis Witcheries contains nine stories of blood & thunder set in and around Germany’s Harz mountain range and the Walpurgisnacht festival. Among the tales you will find my new story, The Wandering One And The Witchdance. What can you expect? Here’s an idea:

In the Ottonian era of the Holy Roman Empire, an unknown warrior with an odd name arrives in a village at the edge of the Harz Mountains. The pagan festival to celebrate the start of spring, though formally banned and rededicated to St. Walpurga, is soon to begin. But that arriving stranger, Vodoberex, has other business in those hallowed mountains as the festivities get underway. For he is the Wandering One, there to stare in the eye hideous terrors known to most only in glimpses and shadows, and to do battle with them!

And in keeping with that, one of the things I missed posting here earlier in the week is that I had the pleasure of appearing on the Monsters, Madness and Magic podcast to discuss my story in Walpurgis Witcheries and some other sword & sorcery and writing-related topics with a few other authors who have stories appearing in the book (including podcast host J.R. Young).

Pick up a copy today and get ready for much more to come!
-M.

Hey everybody, M. here,

With so many announcements in the last few weeks it seemed like a good idea to give a full rundown of everything publishing-wise that should be on the way this spring, summer, and early part of fall, and also recap what has happened this year so far. So without further ado, let’s get started:

Walpurgis Witcheries arrives at the end of April
As was announced last week, Walpurgis Witcheries is on the way on its titular day (April 30) from DMR Books, and my story The Wandering One and the Witchdance will be appearing alongside eight other tales of blood and thunder set in and around Germany’s Harz Mountains in Saxony’s pagan past.

And I’ve got some exciting company on the table of contents! Among the excellent authors slated to appear in the book, you will find the author of the classic Bard series from the ’80s Keith Taylor, author Ethan Sabatella who I appeared alongside in Die By The Sword I and II, and Justin Young, who is both an author and the host of the great Monsters, Madness and Magic podcast. And that’s only a few! You can see the full table of contents over on the DMR blog.

I’m happy to be appearing in this followup to the very well received Samhain Sorceries, and some other news about this book just broke: DMR is going to be releasing a special, limited-edition chapbook titled Two Tales of Witchery alongside Walpurgis Witcheries, featuring two additional authors.

Chthonic Matter Quarterly, Summer 2026 issue on the way this summer
Early in the summer (I think in June but I’m not entirely sure) my story What’s Behind The Walls is slated to appear in the Summer 2026 issue of Chthonic Matter Quarterly. The story is a thematic followup to my story Sticky, which appeared in the Winter 2024 issue.

As I always mention when talking about this one, you can still pick up that issue if you want to get a feel for what you’re in for when the new one arrives! And as I also always mention, you can grab a subscription for a full year’s worth of CMQ over on the publisher website, so you don’t miss out on my upcoming story or any of the other fascinating, thought-provoking, and of course fear-inducing horror to be found within its pages.

My first sword & sorcery collection, Kingdoms Trembling, coming in June!
June is the month, everyone, when my collection of all-new sword & sorcery stories Kingdoms Trembling should be hitting the shelves. Featuring 12 previously unpublished tales set in the world that I first introduced in the Die By The Sword anthologies. We’re still a ways out, so there’s a bunch of stuff I still can’t reveal but suffice it to say you’ll have some amazing stuff to feast your eyes on as the release date gets closer!

Appearing in Nyctalocos: A Collection of Night Terrors in August
As I announced just a few weeks ago, I happy to say that in addition to appearing in CMQ later this year, I will also have a story in the upcoming themed anthology edited by CMQ editor and publisher C.M. Muller, The collection is called Nyctalocos: A Collection of Night Terrors, and my story is titled Sherman Dismantled And Afloat. I don’t think it’s a spoiler to say that this one has all the paranoia, anxiety, body horror, and human drama you can expect from my work in CMQ, with only a fraction of the sleep!

You can see the full table of contents and pre-order the book over on the Chthonic Matter website.

Kayfabe makes it way to the squared circle in September
Get ready to rumble, because my science fiction comedy Kayfabe is going to be busting loose from the pages of the Burial Books science fiction anthology Strange Tales of Space and Time in September.

The anthology release was rescheduled from the summer but it looks like everything is on schedule for the fall. You can visit the Burial Books website to see the full table of contents for this one and some of Burial’s other upcoming projects. Pre-order for the book should be kicking off in May!

And don’t forget to grab a copy of Weird Tales to Haunt Your Reptilian Brain from last year while you’re over there, the horror anthology containing my short story #FireOfLove and a bunch of other great and disturbing tales.

So that is everything that is on the way at the moment, any new developments will, of course, be shared as soon as I can share them! There’s plenty in the offing, but in case you’re looking for stuff that you can read right this second, here’s a recap of what’s been happening this year so far.

Read The Tears of Blood for free in The Battle Rages On e-book
In March, I was excited to have my short story The Tears of Blood reprinted in DMR’s free digital sampler The Battle Rages On. The story, which originally appeared in Die By The Sword Volume I, introduces Ulxedomus the exiled Crown Prince of K’Zal and a whole world of characters, deadly threats, and weird phenomena that will be revisited in Kingdoms Trembling. If you want to get ready for the collection this summer, and you want to see what DMR Books is all about, you can download The Battle Rages On for free!

Find me on Substack!
After eons of having my only authorial social media presence be on Facebook, I have launched a Substack newsletter which you can subscribe to and/or find on-site at The Sternstack. It’s only been about a week, but I have to say I am having a lot of fun with it. I sort of surprised myself by starting to do reviews of old issues of Dr. Strange that I unearthed as I have been going through my boxes of comic books from when I was a kid, and I have more, different kinds of content planned for the near future.

I am still just figuring stuff out about the platform and I barely have anyone looking at my stuff right now (which hopefully will change), but I’m enjoying doing the kind of writing I do there a lot. It’s something I used to do quite a bit years ago, usually in venues where I felt like I was wasting my time because of the limited reach. Hopefully this will prove to be the right place to do it, and I’ll be able to both spread the word about my fiction there and entertain people further with the Substack exclusive stuff. We’ll see! So if you’re over there or just like newsletters, follow and/or subscribe to The Sternstack!

Knot on Tree, Fire on Stone anthology still available for purchase
And finally, if you don’t want to wait to read some of my most recent work, and particularly if you like period pieces, you can still pick up my short cosmic horror story set in Julio-Claudian Rome, The Magician in the Knot on Tree, Fire on Stone anthology from UK indie publisher Harvey Duckman Presents. I love the story, so check it out!

I think that about wraps it up for the moment, should have more news coming soon on all of the items mentioned above and hopefully even more! Take care everyone!
-M.

Hey everybody, M. here,

It’s been forever since I’ve started up a new social media presence. None of the other major ones, for whatever reason, ever really appealed to me, so I’ve continued using Facebook as my only online social channel for spreading the word about my fiction, just because i was there when it was relatively new and I’m a creature of habit. And I’ve done it while complaining much of the way, as the continued reduction of organic reach has rendered the attempt to get my updates to people who might enjoy my work oftentimes more frustrating than effective. Neither have the platform’s ongoing promotion of garbage content and AI slop, and the apparent desire to become a place where chatbots spam other chatbots given me warm feelings about it. That said, I’m still active on Facebook, still sometimes post stuff there that doesn’t make it over here, and it makes me happy to get a new follower every once in a while. So if you’ve enjoyed one of my stories and you’re using Facebook, check me out on there and give me a follow.

But I’ve been thinking more lately about the need to be in more places online, especially with an unprecedentedly big summer release schedule coming up for me (which includes a number of stories in anthologies and my sword & sorcery collection Kingdoms Trembling). The reality is that any social media platform can take a dump in a day and there’s nothing you can do about it, so it doesn’t hurt to diversify.

Beyond that, some of the ways Facebook has deprecated long-form content in the past few years has consistently irked me. And the overall shape of the internet has made the idea of driving a ton of direct traffic to this blog you’re now reading, much as I’d love for it to be otherwise, seem a little old-fashioned and unlikely if not quixotic. So all of this added up to me deciding to launch a presence on Substack.

Poking around the platform in the first few days of using it in earnest (after literal years of sitting there staring at the dashboard), I’m having mixed feelings. My imagining it as throwback to a different era of social media that had not fallen victim to the many things that make the online world agonizing and deleterious seems to have been a bit of a pipe dream. But I think I might be able to do some interesting stuff with it, so feel free to visit The Sternstack if you are so inclined.

I guess you could say it is more of a “soft launch” at this point, as I’m just figuring out the platform. I’m envisioning it as a place where I can both keep people who are interested in my work up to date with what I’ve got coming out via the newsletter, and send out additional exclusive content in topics that relate broadly to my fiction. With this in mind, I’ve just recently posted a review of a comic book from the early-’90s, a sort of writing I haven’t done in a long time but that I think some readers might find entertaining. I’ve got some other ideas I’m likely going to experiment with as well. So if there’s anything you read over there and enjoy, let me know, like and subscribe, share, etc. It’s really up to the readers how this one comes together and grows. I’m open to suggestions!

Take care everybody!
-M.

Hey everybody, M. here,

Earlier today DMR Books announced the table of contents for the upcoming Walpurgis Witcheries anthology (slated to hit the shelves on April 30), so I can finally reveal that I am going to have a story in this one! Among the nine brand new tales of might and magic in this collection you will find my story The Wandering One and the Witchdance.

Walpurgis Witcheries is the followup to the hugely popular Samhain Sorceries anthology, and like its predecessor features all sword & sorcery and dark fantasy tales themed around a particular festival with pagan origins (in this case, Walpurgisnacht, a holiday that has served as a celebration of St. Walpurga since the Middle Ages, but still draws costumed revelers to the Harz Mountains in Germany each year to honor its more ancient significance).

Along with the excellent stories there is, as you can see, an absolutely beautiful cover by artist Adam Burke, who also provided art for Samhain Sorceries (take a look at both and tell me those won’t look amazing next to each other on the shelf!). So get ready to ring in spring with weird witchcraft and the clang of sword striking against sword!

And since the release date lines up with the Walpurgisnacht festival in April, that also means that you’ll be able to get your hands on some new sword & sorcery by yours truly before the arrival of my collection Kingdoms Trembling in June!

Plenty more about Kingdoms Trembling on the way in the coming months, but if you want a taste of the weird world you’ll encounter when June comes around, don’t forget that you can find the story that introduced the fictional universe that the collection returns to, The Tears of Blood, in the recently released DMR Books digital sampler The Battle Rages On for free. Or if you prefer print, don’t mind paying, and want a bunch of other, different great stories along with it, you can still grab a copy of the story in the first Die By The Sword anthology (not to mention its direct followup, The Eye Within The Eye, in the second volume of DBTS).

More news soon, take care everybody!
-M.