A bunch of my fellow writers have been posting their awards eligibility lists for this year, so I had better join the party!

In 2024 my eligible works are my new short fiction collection, Pick Your Potion, plus the four original (never-published-before) short stories inside it:

1. “The Magic in Our Hands” (3,400 words). A young woman chooses between a couple of magical powers she shows affinity for, but given the magical community she’s entering, has she made the right choice?

I wasn’t used to a lot of cleaning, anyway, but now with chunks of crystals jutting out of my hands it’s three times as hard. Harder to hold a brush, harder to not injure myself, harder to keep the sharp edges of my crystals from scraping against the glass. None of the other magic types have anything near as cumbersome growing out of them. Zach finds me on my knees in the entrance-way with cracked and bleeding hands, and says, “We can sand down those fresh crystals for you in a couple of weeks. They won’t get in your way as much, then. But good to get used to them as they are for now, don’t you think?”

2. “Overnight, a Forest Grew” (1,500 words). A perfumer’s assistant wakes up to find millions of trees have erupted under her city overnight.

What was left of my apartment floor was covered with puffs of fluro yellow wattle flowers, architectural debris, pooled water, and showers of eucalyptus leaves. Two eucalyptus trees had shot up into my living room and into the apartment above, straight through the plaster and wood and concrete. The trees had carried my once ground-level apartment at least an additional floor into the air, and from that vantage point I could see through half-broken windows that there was barely a stretch of five metres anywhere without a tree in it. Outside did not smell like city anymore.

It smelt a lot more like the bush.

3. “Smol Animaux” (1,800 words). Amongst the COVID lockdowns, a struggling new mother appreciates the comfort of some imaginary pets, but later realises that something is very wrong.

It’s not an exaggeration to say that those imaginary animals saved my life. When I buried my hands in their plush fur, my brain told me they felt soft and silky. When I lay on the couch I felt their warmth on my chest, above the roundness of the baby, or the weight of them curled on my lap. They never needed to eat, or excrete waste, or go to the vet. They had permanent good moods. I could hear the purr of the cat and the occasional excited yip of the dog, even if no-one else ever could. Just because they weren’t real, that didn’t stop them from calming me. It didn’t stop them from making me smile, or from providing me with comfort and companionship when I had no-one else.

4. “Marina, Hel and Cady Save the Universe” (6,000 words). As everyone else in their lives starts existing on concerning auto-pilot, tempting portals open up for our three teenage girls – but are the portals trying to kill them?

“Mum, have you seen the hole above the kitchen?”

Her mother switched off the vacuum and Marina repeated the question.

“The hole?” Her mother appeared to think for a moment. “Oh, yes. Don’t worry about that. We’ll get it fixed soon.”

“Fixed?” said Marina. “Are we talking about the same hole? The one with the beach in it?”

“Yes,” said her mother, smiling and reaching for the power button again. “It’s not important, Marina.”

As always, I’ll also be posting my end-of-the-year recommendations list in the not-too-distant future. I’m looking forward to sharing the stories I read and loved this year!