About

I didn’t know I would follow in my birthmother’s footsteps

But here I am.

Laurie, my birthmom (left) and Anti-Nancy, my aunt (right) at my Dayton book launch.

My birthmom and her sister are both readers. My birthmom reads runes, and my aunt reads tarot. I found my birthmom when I was 31, or, actually, she found me. Long story. But suffice it to say, intuitive reading runs in my family. Their website is Safe Harbor Tarot and Runes at tarot-runes.com They are still reading. They are the grand dames of the psychic fairs, well known in the Midwest. (Pop in on their site and ask for a reading. They are wonderful. Tell them you heard about it from Laurie’s son!)

I was raised a Southern Baptist kid in rural Missouri and Texas by an Evangelical preacher dad and a mom who would later become a nurse. I was raised to be a good Christian boy. I had been taught by church, by the media, by society that Tarot was evil, the work of the Devil, and that a demon lived inside the deck. The numerous TV episodes, movies, etc that made tarot scary made me frightened of it for most of my life. Until I met my birthmom at 31, and her sister not long afterwards, and received my first reading in 2007.

Understand that I was also raised to believe that drinking was wrong, cursing, dancing, and don’t get me started on how same-sex attraction was seen in rural Baptist churches. You can guess. I learned that tarot was a both a tool to help people talk about what was truly making them anxious or afraid or excited. And that my intuitive gifts might help people find clarity when they needed it most.

So, now, I’m a gay tarot reader who sings “Oh I wanna Dance with Somebody!” all the time—here we are. I have been interested in spirituality and magic and astrology for many years, and my own weird ability to know things I couldn’t know that has always been a part of my life. Because of my relationship with my birthmom, my BirthMom and aunt have been giving me readings and telling me how they interpret cards and runes for awhile. In the last year, I decided to finally take my own intuitive nature seriously. I liked runes (my birthmom’s favorite tool ) but I really felt drawn to Tarot–(maybe the pictures, the symbols.) I started training, taking tarot classes with an amazing teacher (The Tarot Lady, Theresa Reed— pop on her site and tell her I sent you!) Now, I feel called to start reading for others.

In my mundane life, I am a creative writing teacher, a fantasy writer, and an artist. My writing has been published in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, Lightspeed, tor.com, Fat & Queer, Yukon North of Ordinary, Fantasy, The Walt Whitman Quarterly Review and other magazines and journals. I have a collection of short fiction, The Angels of Our Better Beasts, which was longlisted for the Sunburst Award, and my fiction has been a finalist for the 2020 Eugie Award and the 2020 World Fantasy Award for short fiction. I have a PhD in English. I also have a wonderful partner who lives in TN, while I currently live in Ohio.

I just finished creating a solo art show called, “The Further (Queer) Adventures of Yukon Cornelius,” that reimagined the prospector from the 1964 Christmas Special as a gay man committed to helping “Hiddens” (Monsters) adapt to living in a world with often fearful humans.