Welcome! Start Here, Please!

Welcome to My Page!

Vocal is my writing home.

I love to create short stories with twists or unreliable narrators, soft sci-fi, psychological horror (can't do gore!), and I dabble in poetry and informative articles occasionally.

My beige writing flags are killing off my characters (or breaking their hearts), overusing exclamation marks, commas, (and parentheses), and adding unnecessary twist endings.

I have been putting off making a guide or table of contents for awhile because I am not an organized person by nature...but I've seen so many of my fellow creators here successfully assemble one of these and I think, oh hey that's so smart, I need to do that!

I am not sure how to best structure this so I'll just start with the ones that Vocal seemed to like enough to feature as Top Stories and then I'll go from there?

Actually, no. Changed my mind. I'm going to start with MY favorites that didn't get much attention.

Like I told you, organization is not my thing... coffee is my thing.

My Own Personal Favorite (Story) Children

These are mostly ones that I wrote pretty early on here before I had many readers or any subscribers. I love these stories though and feel a little bad that they got buried by a bunch of my terrible haiku attempts and way too many limericks hahah. If you have time to read one of these, I would love to hear your thoughts! :)

Sigh of a Damned Soul - This is possibly my favorite thing I've written, a soft sci-fi story about the fate of the crew of the Nevermore, a scout ship on a terraforming mission to Epsilon 9

The Amalgamation Game - Chapter 1 of a story that I still want to revisit, weird things are happening at a school and one girl is trying to get to the bottom of it and find her missing friend

Emily Ethereal - I still start cracking up whenever I think of this ghostly tautogram

Get Rich or Die Trying - mysterious boxes are appearing on doorsteps... and inside? Millions of dollars or instant death...

The Lost Children of the Caravan - I loved this idea. It isn't my best writing (too much telling and not enough showing) but I hope to revisit and expand this one some day!

Vocal Top Stories/Poems

Senescence - a tautogram about the passage of time - this was my first Top Story and I got it on my birthday, how fun, right? and then awhile later, Vocal actually did give us a Tautogram Challenge! Did I go a little wild with those? Yes. Did I win? No. Did I have fun? Hell yes!

A Titanic Error - a funny sci-fi short story about time travelers who go back to finally right a terrible wrong that has been haunting people for decades

What The F is Magical Realism? - a rant about my own inability to understand this genre and a sad attempt at writing a magical realism story

The Octopus Dilemma - this was one of my personal favorites to write! Hard to describe without giving away the ending though! A scientist is investigating cephalopod consciousness and...things happen.

Man's Best Friend - funny story narrated by a special pet

Mirror of a Murdered Soul - psychological horror story, check the content warnings first!

New Feature? Content Warnings, please and thank you! - an article about why I thought Vocal should give us a feature/ability to add content warnings

Let Me Tell You About This Book I Just Read... - a review that I did of a wonderful chapbook of poetry by a fellow Vocal writer

"Welcome to Flight" - a funny interpretation of a challenge prompt set in the Old West

She Danced the Skies on Laughter-Silvered Wings - an adventure story based on my grandmother's flying days in her teens

The Sensations of Nothingness - a poem describing the experience of resting and resetting in a float tank

Laundry Day with Executive Dysfunction - microfiction about the perils of laundry day

One of Us Died at the Birthday - microfiction about birth trauma

Hear Ye, Hear Ye! Content Warning Tags Are Here (ye)! - a celebration at the release of the content warning tag feature and advice on how/when/where/why to use it

Distraction Game - it's all in the eyes - microfiction set in a crowded bar

Marshmallows, how deeply I despise thee - a story about how much I abhor marshmallows...better to just not ask lol

Eyes Are The Windows - a creepy psychological horroresque story about a scientist haunted by the death of his grandfather

Zucchini and Red Onion Pasta - a recipe for my favorite dish (and also a bit of a parody of the standard recipe blog)

Meet-cute at the Corner Table - a romantic story set in a moody café

Top Stories that were selected for Vocal's Resources Section

How to Navigate Your Vocal Dropdown Menu - yep... the title about says it all haha

How to Respond to Comments on Vocal - a walkthrough of all the anxiety that I (and many of us based on the comment section!) feel around the dealing with that same comment section feature... and then a little bit of real advice at the end

FAQs

just kidding... definitely not frequently asked by any stretch of the imagination

Center Stage with Donna Renee - if you are interested in hearing more about me and my lack of a writing process though, here is an interview that I got to do as part of the amazing series (Creators in the Limelight) by the wonderful Heather Hubler

I will try to add to this list when I have time and focus (so actually I probably won't) ... but thanks so much for stopping by my page!

I absolutely love hearing your thoughts in the comments (despite the anxiety spike that I get from the notifications) and I try to reciprocate as much as I can.

Oh, and you can find me here on INSTAGRAM where I post pretty much the exact same things and can't quite figure out how to do reels but I'd love to connect with you there!