My finalist short story for the Republic of Letters competition is out! With an incredible introduction by judge Clara Hillis:

EVERYBODY LIES AT A FUNERAL twitches with the queasy suspicion that not all is as it seems this small town. Virginia Lemon is a tough-as-nails protagonist with an addictive aura, the kind I hope to find any time I crack the spine of a new novel. The story itself definitely exists in the same cinematic universe as Gillian Flynn's Sharp Objects. I was drawn by its eerie atmosphere and feverish montage of cuts between phantasmic winking Christmas lights, a nightmare fuel dinner preparation, and what really happened to Steve Munchauser.