Hey everybody, M. here,

I received the good news yesterday that the current Backerkit campaign that The Arcanist: Fantasy Publishing is running for its upcoming releases reached its stretch goal, which means that my sword-and-sorcery novelette Gnawed Bones will be appearing in Mordschlag Magazine #0.

I’m super excited to have a story in this hotly-anticipated new sword & sorcery and tabletop gaming-themed magazine, published and edited by James D. Mills (who recently did a wonderful review of Kingdoms Trembling) and Lee Patton.

If you haven’t yet, you can still check out that Backerkit for a few more days and help the magazine hit its next stretch goal.

More news to come on this one very soon, take care everyone!
-M.

Hey everybody, M. here,

Happy to share the news that the Nyctalocos: A Collection of Night Terrors anthology, containing my new horror story Sherman Dismantled and Afloat, is now available for purchase!

The book is this year’s annual themed anthology from Chthonic Matter, the publisher behind Chthonic Matter Quarterly (where my stories have appeared twice so far, most recently with What’s Behind The Walls in the Summer 2026 edition).

You can pick up a copy of Nyctalocos in print or digital either from Amazon or, even better, directly from the publisher, where you can also get subscriptions and back issue bundles of CMQ.

Check it out and enjoy!
-M.

Hey everybody, M. here,

If you have been following the goings on in the sword & sorcery and heroic fantasy world lately you’ve likely heard about the hotly-anticipated launch of Mordschlag Magazine, a publication focused on fiction and tabletop gaming from the editorial team at The Arcanist: Fantasy Publishing. I’m excited to share that, having hit its first funding goal in only a matter of hours, The Arcanist just announced its first backerkit stretch goal for the magazine: a new sword & sorcery tale by yours truly!

So if reading Kingdoms Trembling has you wanting more mind-bending action and adventure done my way, soon, head over to Mordschlag’s Backerkit and back the project!

I’d love to say more about the story, but all I can tell you right now is that it’s new and it takes place in a world you haven’t seen before. For anything more, you’ll need to make sure that this one appears on the table of contents for Mordschlag #0.

And if you’ve been hearing my name and still have yet to check out my new book, don’t hesitate to grab yourself a copy of Kingdoms Trembling from the mighty DMR Books and see what everyone’s talking about!

More news to come, take care everyone!
-M.

Hey everybody, M. here,

I’ve had quite a bit going on since the other week at the Detroit Festival of Books with D.M. Ritzlin, so much so that I’ve been losing track of what I need to post and where.

So I’ll start with the most recent news, which is that I had the pleasure of appearing on the always excellent Rogues in the House podcast the other day, where I discussed the inspiration behind a few of the weird ideas on display in Kingdoms Trembling and my stories in the Die By The Sword anthologies, the art and craft of writing weird stories, and a bunch of other good stuff.

Had an excellent time on the podcast talking with James D. Mills (the mind behind The Arcanist: Fantasy Publishing and the author of Ashen Rider) and L.D. Whitney (author of the Jangar series and publisher of CLIFFHANGER!) Watch the episode of the podcast on YouTube and see for yourself!

Recent reviews of Kingdoms Trembling
I’ve been kicking around the idea of revamping the rarely-updated “Press” section of my webpage for a while, but since some excellent reviews of Kingdoms Trembling have been appearing since the book came out, I figured I’ll worry about the Press page later.

So if you have been hearing about Kingdoms Trembling and want some insightful critical perspectives on it (or stumbled onto this website by accident and have read this far and still want to know what it’s all about) here are a few recent, excellent reviews.

Earlier this month the aforementioned James D. Mills reviewed Kingdoms Trembling on his Letters from the Arcanist Substack, in which he calls it:

“…an excellent read and breath of fresh air for folks looking for something different. It’s a masterclass performance of composition and imagination… It cherishes its Sword & Sorcery blood, but isn’t afraid to branch out to serve the immersion. There isn’t a weak story in the contents.“

And that’s just a small snippet, so check out the full review and subscribe to his Substack while you’re at it.

And in June, author and musician John Zaremba likewise did an incisive deep-dive into the book with his video review on YouTube, exploring highlights from his favorite tales therein, themes he detected throughout, and lots more (including the perennial mystery of my first initial). Well worth a watch!

After you check out those two, very thoughtful and thought-provoking explorations of Kingdoms Trembling, grab yourself a copy of the book from DMR Books, give it a read, and see what you think!

More news to come
One of the reasons I wanted to get this blog entry up today is because I’ve got some more announcements coming up pertaining both to horror and sword & sorcery stories pretty quick here, and I didn’t want to get too far behind.

So I should be back once or twice in the coming weeks with more updates. As always, you can check me out on Facebook and on my relatively brand-new Substack.

Take care everyone!
-M.

Hey everybody, M. here,

Happy to say that I had a wonderful time at the Detroit Festival of Books AKA Detroit Bookfest, where I was once again helping D.M. Ritzlin spread sword & sorcery to the world at the DMR Books table. Big thanks to anyone who dropped by and grabbed a copy of Kingdoms Trembling or any of the other great titles available from DMR, and to anyone who just came by and shot the breeze as well!

And if you happened to be eyeing Matthew M. Skillern‘s beautiful illustration of my new book at the table but didn’t get a chance to pick it up on the spot, you can, of course, still order one from DMR directly or get one from Amazon today!

Much more to come. Now I’m going to go wait and see if I got my sunscreen on quickly enough to avoid a sunburn. Take care everyone!
-M.

Hey everybody, M, here,

Had what you might call a discombobulating weekend (albeit a largely enjoyable one minus an extended loss of electricity) which wiped me out a bit, so I spent a lot of time yesterday engaged in the meditative task of re-bagging and boarding my old comic book collection and old magazines to recuperate. This, along with some other obligations, kept distracting me from writing this blog. But here I am with some very exciting news to share.

I’m thrilled to say that I will be once again returning to the pages of Chthonic Matter Quarterly. This time I will be appearing in the Winter 2027 edition with my story The Move Out.

The story is the third in a thematic triptych that begins with my story Sticky from the Winter 2024 issue, and continues in my story which was just released a few weeks ago in the Summer 2026 edition, What’s Behind The Walls.

So you’ve got a while to go before you can see the horrific, paranoid, and dare I say occasionally humorous places where I take the third one (and any attempt at offering more detail at this point would be a spoiler too far beyond what the title might already imply). But the second of these thematically linked tales, What’s Behind The Walls, is brand new, so if you have yet to see what that one is all about you can pick up a copy of the latest issue of CMQ and dig into it along with six other new, thought-provoking and disturbing works of dark fiction by some excellent other contemporary authors.

And if you’re looking for more of my work in that vein, you can of course also start at the beginning and grab a copy of the Winter 2024 issue of CMQ if you have not checked it out yet.

Also always worth mentioning that you can get back-issue bundles and subscriptions straight from the publisher over at the Chthonic Matter website. So you can catch up on what’s come out so far and be one of the first to get CMQ in your mailbox four times a year.

I realized that with all the excitement going on over the past few weeks, between the release of my sword & sorcery collection, Kingdoms Trembling, from DMR Books and What’s Behind The Walls coming out in the latest issue of CMQ, that I ended up getting the pictures of my contributor copy of the new issue of CMQ posted everywhere I have an internet presence besides here on this blog. So I am including them here now throughout this post. As you can see this one is a beautiful book to hold in your hand (as issues of CMQ always are).

I think the two issues I’ve been published in so far look pretty cool next to each other as well.

If you are digging these stories and want more, fear not, you won’t have to wait for 2027 for a new one. There is still more horror to look forward to from me (and from Chthonic Matter Press!) this summer.

Next up, in August, my story Sherman Dismantled and Afloat will be appearing in Chthonic Matter’s Nyctalocos: A Collection of Night Terrors themed anthology.

So get ready for that one and stay tuned for more news! Take care everyone!
-M.

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.