Under my real name, I’ve published both fiction and non-fiction over the years. But when my creative interests underwent a profound sea-change, a few years back, and I undertook my “Great Work,” as the Alchemists would have it—a series of epic metaphysical SFF novels with Arthurian themes set in the near-future of the Pacific Northwest—I adopted the pen name, Dana Rail. It’s the name I call myself when I put on my Wizard’s Hat and my Cloak of Invisibility, and sit down to work in my writer’s studio, a converted shed I call “the Birdhouse.”

I don’t really know why, but there’s something about this calculated obscurity that gives this reclusive writer, at least, the mental space and freedom to concoct stories with complete freedom of imagination, without that hectoring “real world” voice carping in my head—the one that sounds so much like a bemused teacher or scolding relative.

The cool thing is, I know I’m not the sole occupant of that Alternate Reality of Deep Magic I love to visit on a daily basis. There are others like me out there, not entirely at home in our post-postmodern world of dreary chaos and vast nonsense. I hope to connect with some of those via my stories, and this blog.

Let’s Connect!

Readers of this blog are invited and encouraged to comment at the bottom of each post. We’d love to hear from you, and we’ll try to comment back!

My main social outlet is Twitter. I’ve also set up shop on Instagram and Mastodon. If you’re on any of those platforms, give me a toot.

All my social links can be found on my Linktree page.

If you’d like to pop me an email, scroll down to the contact form.

Representation

Like my fine-feathered sometime-collaborators, Haydn Crowe and Sydney Wren, I am repped (and unfailingly encouraged) by the amazing Maura Phelan and her brilliant editor, Meredith Hays, of Green Light Literary.