Josh Pearce

Someday Someone’s Gonna Steal Your Carbon | Fiction | Mythaxis, Summer 2025 | Quinn: nervous, violet-haired, edging toward her late 50s with a queasy apprehension, hands on either side of the growing mass in her midsection.

Microcosmus of Mystery | Fiction | Kaleidotrope, Spring 2025 | He was dozing in his backyard with his sons asleep on either side—one on each arm—when the quality of shadow shifted.

A Clockwork Gun | Fiction | Bourbon Penn #35 | Along the edges of the collapsed cities, safely enough away from their ground zero downtowns, Lenore Briar prospected through layers of Fordite and plastiglomerate.

Witches in Cold Mountain Halls | Prose Poetry | The Skull & Laurel Issue 003 | In cold mountain halls in which nothing lives • in newt tunnels in amphibian den • through melt mountain runoff runnel • waterfall walls and subterran cistern…

Mare Nubium | Poetry | Amazing Stories, December 2025

Lacus Solitudinis | Poetry | Kaleidotrope, Autumn 2025

False Dandelion | Poetry | Utopia, August 2025

Our Lady of the Atom | Poetry | Analog, July/August 2025 | 2025 AnLab Finalist

Touch This Cancer, It Probably Won’t Bite | Poetry | Nightmare, March 2025 | Audio

Lacus Odii (Lake of Hate) and Buttons and Soap | Poetry | Radon Issue 9 | Author Interview

Time and Heat | Poetry | Star*Line 48.1

where no one can hear your scream | Poetry | Kaleidotrope, Winter 2025

Of Men and Monsters: Josh Pearce Reviews Dust Bunny | Non-Fiction | Locus Online

Planet of the Apiarists: Josh Pearce Reviews Bugonia | Non-Fiction | Locus Online

All Your Bass Are Belong to Us: Josh Pearce Reviews Tron: Ares | Non-Fiction | Locus Online

Long Live the New Flesh! Josh Pearce Reviews Together | Non-Fiction | Locus Online

Do You Believe in Love After Life? Josh Pearce Reviews The Shrouds | Non-Fiction | Locus Online

Risky Business: Josh Pearce Reviews Mission: Impossible — The Final Reckoning | Non-Fiction | Locus Online

2024

Fast Women, Loose Lips, and Treasure Ships | Fiction | Analog, September/October 2024 | Notes | The gas giant Mokumokuren was covered with many great storms, like the eyes of its namesake peering through holes in the blank wall of space.

At the Sexbot Park | Fiction | On Spec #128 | Dixie took her companion to the sexbot park almost every day, weather permitting.

Cargo Cult of Mars | Fiction | Factor Four #33, March 2024 | There is a robot on Mars. This is a problem.

Imago Dei | Fiction | Flash Fiction Online, January 2024 | Jaya picked up the girl two miles past the burning car, that Buick Cutlass with the carbonized skeletons in the front seats, fire crews already working on it.

Abacus Beads and King of the Mister Men | Poetry | Twenty-two Twenty-eight, December 13, 2024

Mare Tranquillitatis | Poetry | Abyss & Apex Issue 92

Rocket Garden | Poetry | Kaleidotrope, Summer 2024

The Glass World | Poetry | Star*Line 47.2

The Weather on Other Planets | Poetry | Kaleidotrope, Winter 2024

You End Up Becoming Yourself: A Review of Brandon Cronenberg’s Infinity Pool | Non-Fiction | Seize the Press Issue #10

2023

A Perfect Day for Babelfish | Fiction | Weird Horror #7 | Babelfish aren’t actually fish.

Button Mashing | Fiction | Flash Fiction Online, September 2023 | In a back corner of the arcade is a curtained-off private alcove, just big enough for two people to squeeze in side-by-side at the scrolling, blinking altar of the video game cabinet.

Wax People | Fiction | Tales from the Moonlit Path, Fiendish Father’s Day 2023 | Curious burial rites of certain swamp dwellers give us the myth and magic of Wax People.

The Hivemind’s Royal Jelly | Fiction | Diabolical Plots #97, reprinted in the Year’s Best Arthropod Fiction, Vol. 1 | The figure seated on the other side of the plain metal table has a blank look on its face, like its creator gave up halfway through forming its features.

Strange Scum | Poetry | Pyre Magazine, Fall/Winter 2023

Centric | Poetry | New Myths, Issue 64

Glory to the Worm | Poetry | Asimov’s, July/August 2023

Irises | Poetry | ellipsis… Volume 59 2023

I Want to Feel You from the Inside: A Review of Cronenberg’s Crimes of the Future | Non-Fiction | Seize the Press Issue #7

Previously

Fisher Witch | Fiction | Pyre Magazine, Fall/Winter 2022 | Scarlet’s lover called her a witch the day he ended things, even though that wasn’t quite fair—she only knew the one spell.

The Dragon Queen of Mars | Fiction | James Gunn’s Ad Astra #11 | Regan Drake’s inert body lay against the rust-orange rubble of Martian ground, her silver pressure suit glinting in the sun like a razor blade that had not yet oxidized.

Polydactylism | Fiction | Tales from the Moonlit Path, Summer 2022 | Something big was coming down the line, some big change in Yusuf’s life.

Play Devil | Fiction | Bourbon Penn #27 | From the curtained alcove behind the baptismal pool, Jessie could see the entire sanctuary where Pastor Ron was preaching to the congregation.

Where Were You When Time’s Arrow Hit My Shadow’s Heart? | Poetry | On Spec #121

Mare Serenitatis | Poetry | Asimov’s, July/August 2022 | Notes

A Conspiracy of Smiles | Poetry | Star*Line 45.2

Flowerpot | Poetry | Dreams & Nightmares 121

Men: Written and Directed by Alex Garland, Reviewed by Josh Pearce | Non-Fiction | The BSFA Review #18 (Summer 2022)

Freehold | Fiction | Dark Matter Magazine, October 2021 | It was almost opening ceremony, and I was on corpse duty, dragging fresh dead from the funeral home…

Mare Cognitum | Poetry | Analog, November/December 2021

Lacus Felicitatis | Poetry | Star*Line 44.2

The Conqueror Worm: Josh Pearce Reviews Dune: Part One | Non-Fiction | Future-SF Digest #13

Unnamed Government Agency | Fiction | Bourbon Penn #21 | The three agents were created white for this assignment, given the ability to blend with and elicit help from the locals.

Lovers With Plutonium Hearts | Poetry | On Spec #114 | Audio

Lacus Autumni | Poetry | New Myths, Issue 52

Knots, Sirena, Hortus Conclusus, Firefly Storm, and Fortune Teller | Poetry | Twenty-two Twenty-eight, September 11, 2020

Self-Assembly Required | Poetry | Asimov’s, September/October 2020

Her Dress | Poetry | Eye to the Telescope, Issue 37

Mare Anguis | Poetry | Mithila Review 14

Lacus Excellentiae | Poetry | Dreams & Nightmares 115

Your Parenthetical Life | Poetry | On Spec #113

Cloud Flower | Poetry | Not One of Us #63

On the Edge of Forever | Poetry | Star*Line 43.1 | 2020 Rhysling Nominee

Planck | Poetry | Analog, March/April 2020 | 2020 AnLab Finalist

Galaxyfire | Poetry | Arsenika Issue 5, Winter 2020

Triumph of the Skies | Fiction | Kasma SF | It’s a big galaxy. There’s always a war going on in it somewhere.

Philemaphobia | Fiction | Cast of Wonders 379 | “Amanda,” Mother said, as soon as she came in from school: “Amanda,” in that tone of voice that said she was so tired of being angry about this.

Leave Your Iron at the Door | Fiction | Analog, May/June 2019 | Minnie Mirv, long-stepping, smooth-handling, slow-hand, quickdraw, she: got her pockets full of reaction mass, lighting off her rocket spinal-tap at ball-squishing g’s. | Notes

Polydactyl | Fiction | Bourbon Penn #17 | Even running flat out, you know you will not make it to the broken-down, rusting shell of the school bus before she and he do what they do.

Please Hang Up and Try Again, Semi-Rigible People, and Slaves to the Weather | Poetry | New Reader Magazine Vol. 2 Issue 7, “Herald”

The Storm | Poetry | New Myths, Issue 48

Beautiful Machines, Flower of You, Colors, Mare Humorum, and Mare Marginis | Poetry | Twenty-two Twenty-eight, September 13, 2019

Recursing | Poetry | Liquid Imagination, August 2019

Sapiens Sapiens | Poetry | Polu Texni, July 2019

Breathe, Spaceman | Poetry | Polu Texni, May 2019

Office Romance | Poetry | Star*Line 42.2

Spider Star | Poetry | Star*Line 41.4

Citizen Cirrus, One Up, and Before the Monarch | Poetry | Multiverse Anthology

Mountain Peak | Poetry | Twisted Moon, Issue 4

Selections from the Wolfmonth Catalog of the Fairyland Regional Fürni Store | Fiction | InterGalactic Medicine Show, Issue 64 | Klädskåp—made of the highest-quality particleboard. Takes you to a small, kind of rundown vacant lot where it’s always autumn and never Halloween. | Notes

Three-Body | Poetry | Analog, September/October 2018, reprinted in The Heartbeat of the Universe | Notes

Further Laws of Robotics | Fiction | Nature Futures, June 13, 2018 | Inspector Warren’s job was to enforce the Further Laws of Robotics. | Notes

Give Me a Spacetime | Poetry | Electric Athenaeum #01

Theodroid | Poetry | On Spec #107

Sensorium | Fiction | Bourbon Penn #15 | Instead of coins, because she had no allowance, Amelia dropped the shiniest pebbles she could find down the garden wishing well, standing on her toes to look over the stone wall and watch them disappear.

The Leftovers | Fiction | The Colored Lens, Winter 2018 | “There’s more of them suicides on the TV,” Nancy hollers at me from the other room.

Such Were the Faces of the Living Creatures | Fiction | Beneath Ceaseless Skies #245 | There are parts around here where the mercury hot springs absorb a goodly amount of background radiation and, being metal and all, ‘vaporate straight away into the air.

Boat and Rocket | Poetry | Space and Time Magazine #130

The Attic, Without, and Queen of Blades | Poetry | Chrome Baby #64

Objects in Space | Poetry | Asimov’s, January/February 2018 | Audio

Smith | Fiction | Andromeda Spaceways, Issue 69 | All of the lawmen in the state are massing on the street when the man comes around. Their guns in hand.

Falling in Love with Martians and Machines | Fiction | Clarkesworld, Issue 135 | Audio | I can’t deny the thrill of the race circuit. I like being at his side as he balances on the edge of cryogenics and fireball.

Medical Bills | Poetry | Polu Texni, November 2017

The Sweet Life | Poetry | Polu Texni, October 2017

Robotanist 1148’s Report | Poetry | Eye to the Telescope, Issue 26

On the Express | Poetry | Abyss & Apex, Issue 64

The Man Who Embraced His Own Fungus | Poetry | Not One of Us #58

Sunfrozen | Poetry | Polu Texni, September 2017

The King Crab | Poetry | Polu Texni, August 2017

Fresnel Day | Fiction | Kasma SF | The man on the bandstand is nervous, you can see from here, and not just because that, in order to face the gathered crowd, he has his back to the open pit of a fully populated Dark Lair.

A Theory of Gravity | Poetry | Analog, July/August 2017 | 2017 AnLab Finalist

Wiseclock Revolution | Fiction | TQR | omnia vanitas

Non-Zero | Poetry | Grievous Angel, May 2017

The Body Electrician | Poetry | Star*Line 40.2

A Letter to the Dead | Poetry | Not One of Us #57

Quiverfull | Fiction | Bards and Sages Quarterly, January 2017 | The hospital eunuchs bring him back awake by adjusting the chemicals in his drip.

Deus Ex Parasitus | Fiction | Perihelion, December 2016 | The job to cut out Creek’s brain is going perfectly well until it all goes completely wrong.

Jenny Cola | Fiction | The Colored Lens, Spring 2016 | The vending machine in the science building sometimes glitched and coughed up two cans for the price of one, so I always made the walk across campus to it, even on the days I didn’t have bio classes.

Text Based | Fiction | Kasma SF (originally published in Aoife’s Kiss) | You are alone in the dark. What do you do?

A Citizen’s Guide to the Kingdom of Heaven | Fiction | Orthogonal: The War at Home | Max believes that Heaven and God are not real until people make them so, until people build them.

Zero Sum | Poetry | Outposts of Beyond, July 2016

The Distant Future | Poetry | Eye to the Telescope, Issue 21

And Then There Were Infinite | Fiction | New Myths, Issue 32 | Author Interview | “Do you ever feel like you’re standing with your finger in the dam of reality?”

Just Imagine | Fiction | Passing Out Victorious | Jonathan, he says, where did this bucket of Legos come from?

Pizza Night | Non-fiction | Lip Service West, Chapter 14 | So here we are, you and I, sitting on the side of the Interstate just outside of Phoenix, trying to hitchhike to Tucson—one desert shithole to another.

Beekeeper Kings, Curves Like A Waist, and Hack It | Poetry | Analog Press, Vol. 4

The Printer Repairman | Fiction | Kaleidotrope #13 | His shop is filled with enough chemicals to give you a contact high, vapors of ink and solvents that could make you see things, if you spent any amount of time in the backroom…

Sandcastles | Fiction | Electric Spec, Vol. 5 Issue 4 | I see much from the roof of my house. I like to sit under the white awning that shades me, with a bottle of water, and look at the wonders of my city.

Baleen Whale and (Look at Us) | Poetry | Chiron Review #95

An Elm Sleeps, Isn’t It Enough, and There’s Some Type of Mollusk | Poetry | Jones Av. XV/3

Beehive Arrangement of Glass | Poetry | Jones Av. XVI/2

Unfolded Their Sails | Poetry | Anemone Sidecar Chapter 13

After Only So Much | Poetry | Blood Lotus #17

After Rain and Cathedral Bells | Poetry | The Centrifugal Eye, Vol. 5 Issue 4 | Author Interview

This Is What You Say | Poetry | Censored Poets

Prairieprayer | Poetry | Unquiet Desperation, Vol. 1 Issue 10

A Socialist Butterfly | Poetry | Transfer 92

6 Modern Technologies Animals Invented Millions of Years Ago | Non-Fiction | Cracked.com | Our species takes a lot of pride in technology, to the point that it’s pretty much the one thing we lord over all the others. But maybe we’re too quick to pat ourselves on the back…

6 Things That Shouldn’t Explode (But Did Anyway) | Non-Fiction | Cracked.com | Michael Bay is right: Somewhere, right now, something is exploding.

It’s Not Cheating If It’s With Your Clone: Josh Pearce and Arley Sorg Discuss Mickey 17 | Non-Fiction | Locus Online

Shadow of a Vampire: Arley Sorg and Josh Pearce Discuss ‘Salem’s Lot | Non-Fiction | Locus Online

Check Out Any Time You Like: Josh Pearce and Arley Sorg Discuss Cuckoo | Non-Fiction | Locus Online

What to Expect When You’re Expecting a Chestburster: Arley Sorg and Josh Pearce Discuss Alien: Romulus | Non-Fiction | Locus Online

Exit, Pursued by a Kaiju: Josh Pearce and Arley Sorg Discuss Godzilla Minus One | Non-Fiction | Locus Online

High Evolutionary: Arley Sorg and Josh Pearce Discuss Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem | Non-Fiction | Locus Online

Resident Alien: Josh Pearce and Arley Sorg Discuss No One Will Save You | Non-Fiction | Locus Online

Uncanny Valley of the Shadow of Death: Arley Sorg and Josh Pearce Discuss The Creator | Non-Fiction | Locus Online

Let the Right One In: Josh Pearce and Arley Sorg Discuss Talk To Me | Non-Fiction | Locus Online

The Black Guy Dies First: Arley Sorg and Josh Pearce Discuss They Cloned Tyrone | Non-Fiction | Locus Online

Another Dimension, Another Dimension: Josh Pearce and Arley Sorg Discuss Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse | Non-Fiction | Locus Online