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Dear Authors, Readers, and ALL Supporters of Wicked Taxidermy Press,

It is with a heavy heart and the deepest regret that I must make this difficult announcement. For several years, I have been battling significant and progressing health issues, which I had hoped I could overcome to bring the Nemesis to fruition. Unfortunately, my health has continued to decline, particularly impacting my cognitive functions – specifically memory, focus, and the ability to sustain the complex work required for editing, formatting, and marketing a book to the standard you and your wonderful stories deserve.

Due to these severe and ongoing health challenges, which now necessitate me stepping back from many professional responsibilities and going on disability, I have made the agonizing decision that I can no longer complete and publish the Nemesis.

To the authors whose brilliant work was selected for this anthology: I am so profoundly sorry. I know you entrusted me with your stories, your creativity, and your patience, and I have carried the weight of that trust, and now the guilt of not being able to fulfill my commitment, every single day. There are no words to adequately express how deeply I regret letting you down. You deserve to see your work celebrated, and my inability to make that happen through Wicked Taxidermy Press is a source of immense personal sorrow.

After my first stroke of the last decade, I assured you that you retained all rights to your stories and were free to submit them elsewhere. I want to reiterate that now with utmost sincerity: please take your incredible stories and find them the perfect homes they deserve. Your work is valuable, and I truly hope to see it published and celebrated by others who can give it the platform it warrants. I have been so honored to have read them, and I thank you for sticking with me and believing in this project for as long as you have. Your patience and understanding have meant more than you know.

Regarding the future of Wicked Taxidermy Press: While the website may remain online as an archive for a time, it is highly unlikely that Wicked Taxidermy Press will be accepting any new submissions, holding future contests, or publishing new works from other writers. My health simply does not permit it.

Thank you, from the bottom of my heart, to everyone who has supported Wicked Taxidermy Press over the years – the writers who submitted, the readers who showed interest, and everyone who believed in what we were trying to do. And once again, to the authors of the Nemesis, my sincerest apologies for this outcome. I wish you nothing but the absolute best in your writing careers and hope your stories find the wide readership they so richly deserve.

With profound regret and gratitude,

Shannon Graves
Editor & Organizer, Wicked Taxidermy Press

Available Now!

Fifteen flavors of the apocalypse, from demons to dragons and every ghastly ghoulie in between! With the fall of man comes the rise of what dwells in shadow, the world now a dark and uncharted territory.

Here be monsters.

Apocalyptic Monsters is a curated collaboration of some of the most exciting and varied authors exploring speculative fiction today.

In Development

Members Area – This will be a unique space with articles on craft, workshops, and networking opportunities. It will also be a space where members can weigh in on what we put our literary efforts into next.

Currently membership is OPEN to all authors while we build this community.