Welcome to Lord Kitchener’s Kafe — I’m so glad you stopped by! The coffee here is really good. American, Italian, French, Australian, Viennese, Turkish, Moroccan— you name it, Hamza can make it, and it’s all good. I can’t speak to the quality of the tea, but by all means give it a shot if that’s your preference. Then grab a stool and let’s chat!

I’m Emma. I started writing fiction in the summer of 2022. I have a couple dozen short stories — four of them featuring this very coffee house! — as well as a few longer works.

I dabble in different genres, although all of my stories explore transgender themes. What I’m most interested in writing about, regardless of genre, are people and relationships. Some of my stories are believable and others aren’t, but it’s both my hope and my goal that the characters in every story are believable. So, here’s my attempt to put the stories in some buckets. Don't worry if stories are in more than one bucket. Life's messy that way, sometimes!

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Coming Out Stories. The experience of coming out (or being discovered) is a big moment for many in the trans community. Often, the experience is traumatic; sometimes it is uplifting. It is an important element in many of my short stories, including Wittgenstein's Illusion, its companion story, The Bridge, Virtue and Valor, Hobson's Choice, Logan's Ride, On Faith, Resolving Reese, Neva Eva, Evan, and I Love Mondays. The novella Who Makes Intercession? is a coming out story. It is also a recurring and important theme in my four-part novel, An Aria for Cami.

More-or-less real world, strong romantic elements (but sex, to the extent it comes up, advances the story without being central to it). For short stories, I would include Wittgenstein's Illusion, The Bridge, Virtue and Valor, Comfort and Joy, Tenebrae, Natalie Makes Breakfast, I Love Mondays, and Zion. For longer works, Full Force Gayle and Who Makes Intercession, which I wrote for BC contests, fit here, as do two of my novels, An Aria for Cami and Always and Forever.

Real world, with a heavier dose of steam. Two more-or-less real stories where the sex is more central to the story are William's Tell (a short solo) and the novel Duets, which is the prequel to An Aria for Cami. When I started writing here, I thought my stories would have a lot more sex in them. My muse, as it turns out, seldom pointed me in that direction.

Real World, focused on loving relationships that are NOT romantic. These stories explore relationships with parents, siblings, friends, and others. For short stories, Hobson's Choice, Logan's Ride, Inheritances, Resolving Reese, The Feast of Stephen, Uplift, Jim's Enterprise, Embraced, and Neva Eva, Evan belong here. The Thanksgiving-themed novelette Parables is definitely in this category; arguably Midsummer is as well, though it is not set in modern times. For novellas, include the two-part series Software Update, which is a continuation of Ricky’s classic, Reprogramming Your Life. The loving relationships explored in Software are friendships among trans authors, and it is a bit of a love letter to the BigCloset community.

Slice of life Cheyenne's Mountain is a simple story of a transwoman facing her fears about appearing in public en femme, and Yolanda’s Smile is a vignette about a chance encounter at a shopping mall. I can't think of another category for them!

Stories dealing with difficult issues. The stories in this bucket all center on darker and more difficult issues that may be hard for some readers who have had their own share of darkness to contend with. Read the cautions posted on each of these stories with care and consider them before you read. Earthen Vessels, This Honorable Court, Sundown, Zora and the Greek, and the novella Quentin Cromwell and the Truth Speaker all address anti-trans bigotry. The Doorway and The Mulligan both look at the particular emotional struggles of closeted transwomen. The Mulligan, Sundown, and For Us, the Living all involve suicide, and The Doorway discusses it. Finally, my longest work, Kern, is a novel about a transwoman who was rejected by her family, but is called back to deal with her father's health issues.

Fantasy, Myth, and the Supernatural. I have several short solos in this category. The first pair involve characters from Greek mythology (Xanthe and Homer's Odyssey). I also have a high fantasy story written in an epic style (Glave of Truth), and a variation on the classic encounter with a wish-granting genie (If Wishes Were Horses). I wrote a short, dystopian SciFi story in February of 2025 off of a challenge prompt by Erin (Dawning Realization), which doesn’t exactly fit in any other box, but this one’s at least close. For longer pieces, I wrote a novelette-length ghost story for Halloween in 2023 called Nocturne. Finally, my novella Strange Manors contains a supernatural element.

Humor. My most popular work here is a 20-chapter humorous SciFi series called Maximum Warp. Strange Manors, the two-part novelette Being Beatrice, and the short story Resolving Reese are, like Maximum Warp, (mostly!) comedies. Finally, Gullible Travails is a short satire, and Supply and Demand is a bit of humorous seasonal fluff, with all the nutritional value of Peeps. Sometimes, like Larry the Cucumber, I feel the need to sing a silly song.

Historical Fiction. The novelette Midsummer is set in the time of the Vikings, though no actual historical characters are in the story. Maybe think of it as more of a period piece.

FanFic. The short story Which Road to Camelot is adapted from the opening sequence of John Boorman’s cult classic Excalibur, and Glave of Truth was inspired by a scene in The Return of the King. Jim's Enterprise is kinda-sorta fanfic, since it uses imagery from the original Star Trek, but . . . well. You decide. Maybe it doesn't really belong in this bucket. My ten-part SciFi/Action-adventure series Decision Matrix is more of a traditional type of FanFic, being based in the universe of The Matrix movies. You don’t need to watch any of the movies, much less all of them, to follow the story. Although, you’re seriously depriving yourself if you don’t watch at least the first movie!

Holiday Stories. I've found over the course of time that I've written a number of holiday-themed stories. Or at least holiday-related. Christmas, obviously -- Comfort and Joy and The Feast of Stephen are definitely Christmas stories, and both the novella Who Makes Intercession? and its related short story, Embraced, are Christmas-adjacent. Resolving Reese is a New Year's story, and Supply and Demand features a stoned Easter Bunny. I have three holiday-themed novelettes — Parables is a Thanksgiving story, Nocturne is kind of a Halloween story, and Midsummer — I know this will be a shock! — involves the Summer Solstice. Finally, the short story I Love Mondays has to do — rather loosely — with Labor Day. If Hallmark wanted to kill its normie audience, it could hire me!

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Connections between stories. My stories absolutely can be read on their own. But certain characters do appear in more than one story, and knowing a bit more about the characters can sometimes add to the enjoyment of a story. Here are the story connections:

Hobson's Choice and Earthen Vessels.

Tenebrae and Comfort and Joy.

Who Makes Intercession? and Embraced.

Wittgenstein's Illusion, The Bridge, Virtue and Valor, and Full Force Gayle.

Duets, An Aria for Cami, The Feast of Stephen, This Honorable Court, Sundown, and Parables.

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By length. Another way to slice and dice is by size, and whether you have only twenty minutes, or you want to fill a rainy day at the beach, size matters. So here’s a listing by length, shortest (about 1000 words) to longest (around 230,000 words):

Short stories (7,500 words or less): Neva Eva, Evan (1046), Supply and Demand (1111), Natalie Makes Breakfast (1359), Jim's Enterprise (1390), Which Road to Camelot (1331), The Feast of Stephen (1426), Wittgenstein's Illusion (1549), Dawning Realization (1663), I Love Mondays (2396), Zora and the Greek (2559), Yolanda’s Smile (2632), Gullible Travails (2750), Inheritances (2943), Comfort and Joy (3082), Cheyenne's Mountain (3122), The Bridge (3219), Tenebrae (3398), For Us, the Living (3618), Logan's Ride (3718), Resolving Reese (3823), Glave of Truth (4078), Homer's Odyssey (4103), On Faith (4158), Earthen Vessels (4201), Hobson's Choice (4241), The Doorway (4462), If Wishes Were Horses (4849), Zion (4915), Sundown (5137), Xanthe (5448), Embraced (5475), The Mulligan (5571), William's Tell (6013), Virtue and Valor (7005), and Uplift (7242).

Novelettes (7,500 - 17,500 words): Midsummer (8794), Being Beatrice (9402), Parables (10,128), This Honorable Court (11,752), Full Force Gayle (14,429), Nocturne (15,601).

Novellas (17,500 - 40,000 words): Software Update (21,437), Quentin Cromwell and the Truth Speaker (27,868), Who Makes Intercession? (32,213), and Strange Manors (32,892).

Novels (over 40,000 words): Always and Forever (47,363), Decision Matrix (53,494), Duets (68,727), Maximum Warp (142,397), An Aria for Cami (211,161), Kern (233,433).

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Note about publications: Two of my novels have been published by Doppler Press and are available on Amazon for Kindle. Doppler published Duets as a standalone ebook in October of 2023, and subsequently published its sequel under the title "Aria" as a series of four books -- The Holly and the Ivy, Trials and Temptations, Bring Down the Curtain, and Reformer’s Fire. While you can read these books here, if you buy them on Amazon, I have donated all proceeds from sales to BCTS. So if you buy the stories on Amazon, it will help support continued access to all of the other stories here. Please help if you can.

I hope that you enjoy the stories!

Emma Anne Tate