The Fantastic And The Felial: A Speculative Evening With Edward Ahern

An accomplished editor, poet, writer of literary and speculative fiction, Edward Ahern's readings this evening at PoemAlley will place chief attention to what he humorously calls that "affection focus and money drain", his five grandchildren, for whom he wrote The Witch Made Me Do It (Gypsy Shadow Publishing Company), a 2015 collection of fairy and folk tales crafted with a contemporary beat.

Amassing more than 200 published poems, short stories and four novels since first putting pen to paper at age sixty-seven, Ed is sure to have plenty more from which to draw upon, like the 25 eerie and light-hearted stories of Capricious Visions (Lulu, 2016), a fantasy collection, and C.P. Dunphey's Year'sBest Transhuman SF 2017 Anthology, Volume 1 (Gehenna & Hinnom Books, 2017), among others.

Accumulating numerous awards along the way, his work has appeared in ten countries and (with reprints), 195 publications, with several pieces available for recorded listening on Audible.

Besides sharing and critiquing work in numerous writing groups, including the Fairfield Scribes and the Poets' Salon, Ed's exacting eye comes from serving as member of the review board for the online genre magazine Bewildering Stories, where he oversees five editors, and has contributed to Primal Elements (OWS Ink, 2018), a poetry anthology built around the Four Elements, and the locale-themed fantasy/science fiction anthology from Bards and Sages Publishing, 2016's The Great Tome of Fantastic and Wondrous Places (Volume III, The Great Tomes series), an e-book edited by Calvin Demmer.

Ed applied a degree in journalism from the University of Illinois to a stint as a reporter for the Providence Journal and has served in a wide range of positions and organizations, from Navy diver/bomb disarmer anf intelligence officer stationed in Germany and Japan, to working both for a Canada-based paper manufacturer and the same company that owns the New England Patriots.