http://michael-chin-3orp.squarespace.com/portraiture daily 1.0 2023-02-17 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/56f4ce6f8259b5654138b37e/1458884300567-M2X4JGD2JOE3R3XUATZW/image-asset.jpeg Home Photo Credit: Michael Eldredge https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/56f4ce6f8259b5654138b37e/1458884300567-M2X4JGD2JOE3R3XUATZW/image-asset.jpeg Home Photo Credit: Michael Eldredge https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/56f4ce6f8259b5654138b37e/1624114696627-JOUX2HPHZVS925CU7VC4/Chin+Michael+headshot.jpg Home http://michael-chin-3orp.squarespace.com/shortliterarywork daily 0.75 2025-06-03 http://michael-chin-3orp.squarespace.com/popculturewriting daily 0.75 2026-08-02 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/56f4ce6f8259b5654138b37e/cf2dd1c5-9b35-4e47-b688-bcfc7cc0fc22/austin.jpg Pop Culture Writing Wrestling I write for SEScoops, and have previously contributed to TheSportster. 411mania, and Sportskeeda. In addition, I am the author of "Ranking All 287 WrestleMania Matches Ever," featured on Buzzfeed in March 2014. This 68,000 word oopus was shared via Twitter by parties including Michael Phelps, Jim Ross, Mother Jones, and Bill Apter, and referenced live on the WWE Network by John Bradshaw-Layfield. I also wrote, "The Top 300 WWE Superstars of the WrestleMania Years" on Medium. My third and seventh full-length books, The Long Way Home and Territories compile a large swathe of the literary fiction I’ve written related to wrestling, and my full-length essay collection Stories Wrestling Can Tell meditates on my life and family through the lens of wrestling fanhood.. I have authored two wrestling-centric chapbooks that are available now, Autopsy and Everything After and The Leo Burke Finish (check the Books and Chapbooks page for more details). Music I was a co-founder and the content manager for The A Cappella Blog and co-wrote The A Cappella Book. I partnered with VIBBIDI to write narratives about the experience of listening to different albums (not exclusive to a cappella). You can visit those write-ups here. TV & Film I contributed a handful of articles related to TV and film at ScreenRant. http://michael-chin-3orp.squarespace.com/blog daily 0.75 2026-08-02 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/56f4ce6f8259b5654138b37e/39b8fb36-729d-4b6b-ae0f-85e4d28ece3b/D73434_004.JPG Blog From 2012 to 2022, I update my blog, Three Words That Became Hard To Say at least twice per month with stories from my life, miscellaneous criticism, musings, and occasional bits of fiction. The title of the blog is a reference to the lyrics in an Avett Brothers song called "I and Love and You." I titled each post using three words. http://michael-chin-3orp.squarespace.com/podcasts daily 0.75 2026-07-25 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/56f4ce6f8259b5654138b37e/83e135a3-0615-4943-9f17-ff1d66ade820/stories+of+stories.webp Podcasts My podcast was titled Stories of Stories. Roughly once per month, I posted a podcast discussing the background of a specific creative project or process. The podcast remains available iTunes. Alternatively, you can listen online or download each episode via PodOmatic. In early 2019, after 47 episodes, the podcast came to a close. In spring 2020, I started a short-run, ten-episode podcast, The Short Way Home, to promote my book The Long Way Home. Each episode discusses one of my favorite professional wrestling matches and shared an excerpt from the book. The episodes are available on the Stories of Stories feed. In summer 2020, I recorded a short-run, four-episode podcast, Rewind, devoted to 1990s nostalgia. The episodes are available on the Stories of Stories feed. In addition, you can hear me as a guest on the Hoot n Waddle Limited Engagement podcast, the Dixon Schwabl One More Thing podcast, and on two separate visits to the The Sisyphus Effect (episode one and episode six). http://michael-chin-3orp.squarespace.com/bio daily 0.75 2026-07-25 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/56f4ce6f8259b5654138b37e/c8bfb1cd-723a-4b19-ad47-6b5afbde75ac/image0+%2812%29.jpeg Bio and Contact - Bio and Contact Essentials I was born and raised in Utica, New York and currently live in Las Vegas with my wife and son. I serve as an Associate Professor in Residence for the Honors College at UNLV. I'm an alum of the MFA program in creative writing at Oregon State University and the MA program in writing at Johns Hopkins University. I completed my BA at The State University of New York Geneseo. Books I am the author of seven full-length books. My latest is a short story collection called This Year’s Ghost (JackLeg Press, 2025). My previous books are the short story collections You Might Forget the Sky was Ever Blue (Duck Lake Books, 2019), Circus Folk (Hoot ‘n’ Waddle Press, 2019), The Long Way Home (Cowboy Jamboree Press, 2020), and Territories (Serving House Books 2025). I also authored the novel, My Grandfather’s an Immigrant, and So Is Yours (Cowboy Jamboree Press, 2021) and the essay collection Stories Wrestling Can Tell (Cowboy Jamboree Press, 2023). My chapbook, Autopsy and Everything After, won The Florida Review's Jeanne Leiby Chapbook Contest (2017-2018). I previously published two other chapbooks, The Leo Burke Finish (Gimmick Press, 2017) and Distance Traveled (Bent Window Books, 2018). Recognition I won Bayou Magazine's Jim Knudsen Editor’s Prize for Fiction (2014) and Prime Number Magazine's Flash Fiction Contest (2017). My piece, “Training” was selected for inclusion in Best Microfiction 2019. I've previously published or have work forthcoming in over 250 different publications, including Bat City Review, The Pinch, The Normal School, Passages North, Barrelhouse, Hobart, Gulf Stream Magazine and Prairie Schooner. Editing I was a co-founder and managing editor for 45th Parallel, an international literary journal based out of Oregon State. I currently serve as a contributing editor for Moss, an online literary journal of the Pacific Northwest. Interviews You can read interviews with me via: The UNLV News Center The Pinch Normal School Write What You Want Sequestrum The Rappahannock Review (2015 and 2017) Orson's Review Coffin Bell Milk Candy Review NFReads. Contact You can follow me on Instagram or Threads at MichaelTheChin or email me at mikec at acappellablog dot com. http://michael-chin-3orp.squarespace.com/books daily 0.75 2026-07-25 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/56f4ce6f8259b5654138b37e/1584566320146-H3Z35RT3OUKZ031SWZ9H/The+Long+Way+Home+Cover.png Books https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/56f4ce6f8259b5654138b37e/2b110fa0-45ec-41f0-9152-ba4de2526b18/Michael+Chin+This+Year%27s+Ghost+Book+Cover.jpeg Books A company that rents out ghosts. A woman who can answer any question posed to her. A world in which dogs have disappeared. This Year’s Ghost (JackLeg Press, forthcoming in 2025) is a short story collection that explores personal identity and relationships in an ever-changing world through the lens of speculative stories. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/56f4ce6f8259b5654138b37e/a38026ba-8c71-47e6-b0fa-98d9846771be/Chin+Territories+Cover.png Books Territories (Serving House Books, 2025) is a collection of linked stories that begins when the lure of professional wrestling draws a teenage girl away from her father. She stages a match in the fenced-in confines—the steel cage—of a local tennis court. From there, a journey reminiscent of Gulliver’s Travels unfolds as she voyages to different territories across North America to learn her craft, fall in love, and discover a unique combination of conflict and camaraderie within the eccentric subculture she’s chosen to build her life around. The book is available now via Bookshop.org, Amazon, and elsewhere. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/56f4ce6f8259b5654138b37e/034112b2-dafd-480f-88a2-98fde6a6b2c6/Stories+Wrestling+Can+Tell+Cover.png Books Stories Wrestling Can Tell (Cowboy Jamboree Press, 2023) recognizes that professional wrestling is a spectacle. Beyond that, though, it can be a source of emotion, an inspiration, and an evocation of nostalgia. Wrestling can be a love story. And wrestling, too, can tell stories of immigration, advancement, and inheritances passed amongst family. These are the stories this essay collection shares, with forays into the absurd, the speculative, and the lines between four generations of men from the author’s family. You can read a review of Stories Wrestling Can Tell from The Pro Wrestling Studies Association here. The book is available now from Bookshop or Amazon. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/56f4ce6f8259b5654138b37e/1624114845298-LEQM0WCOZCSZAVBW2S3E/Immigrant.png Books In My Grandfather’s an Immigrant, and So Is Yours (Cowboy Jamboree Press, 2021) Billy Chen grows up half-Chinese in a conservative small town in Upstate New York. The times are changing as relationships transform, the town’s history is uncovered, and the 2016 presidential election looms. My Grandfather’s an Immigrant and So is Yours probes the personal and the worldly, the timely and the timeless in a fragmented coming of age tale. This my debut novel. The book is available now from Bookshop or Amazon. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/56f4ce6f8259b5654138b37e/1583278761486-9Q7MN3J4INVZLSG5KCE8/The+Long+Way+Home+cover.png Books The Long Way Home (Cowboy Jamboree Press, 2020) tells stories of grapplers and ghosts, a cowboy and a tigress, devoted fans, family, lovers, and Andre the Giant’s bastard daughter. This full-length collection explores stories from the world of professional wrestling that walk a razor’s edge between fact and fiction, the world we know and its underbelly. Featuring work originally published in Passages North, Shenandoah, Gravel, Cherry Tree, Miracle Monocle, and others, the collection approaches a world of violence with a sensitive, but incisive eye toward what makes us all human. You can read a review of The Long Way Home from Another Chicago Magazine here, and a review from Sundress here. You can buy the book now from Bookshop or Amazon. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/56f4ce6f8259b5654138b37e/1565758155033-EYUD7HU2BHLZQLTPAVQX/Circus+cover.JPG Books Circus Folk (Hoot ‘n’ Waddle, 2019) includes linked stories about a self-trained lion tamer, a trapeze artist who falls to her death every night, conjoined twins and the lost love of their lives, and three bearded ladies who converge on the same traveling show. This full-length collection explores the inner lives and origins of circus performers, including forays into the speculative and surreal in work originally published with Sequestum, Flapperhouse, Spry Literary Journal, Twisted Vine Literary Arts Journal, Five 2 One Magazine, and others. Read what Kirkus Reviews has to say about the book here, and read a review from Heavy Feather Review here. You can read an interview about the book at Twist in Time Literary Magazine. The book is available now, direct from the publisher, via bookshop.org, from Small Press Distribution, and on Amazon. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/56f4ce6f8259b5654138b37e/1553619031943-D2XZH5ZJON6BDD9DEUVH/everbluecover.jpg Books You Might Forget the Sky was Ever Blue (Duck Lake Books, 2019) includes stories about a third grade teacher in Baltimore trying to make sense of the 2016 election campaign to students, a teenage sexual assault survivor making his way through a changed world, and a boy is raised to believe he’s Hulk Hogan’s little brother. This book includes experiments in form with a social conscience, including work originally published in Hobart, Iron Horse Literary Review, Bayou Magazine, Front Porch, Waccamaw, Prime Number Magazine, and elsewhere. You can read my guest blog post about the book at Orson’s Review as well as interviews centered on it at Cease, Cows and Longridge Review. Read what Kirkus Reviews has to say about the book here, read a review from Heavy Feather Review here, read a review from Cease Cows here, and read a review from Linden Avenue Literary Journal here. The book is available from the publisher, bookshop.org, Amazon, and Barnes & Noble. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/56f4ce6f8259b5654138b37e/1553618849376-7V3T119XB5H9SEEBOUN5/Autopsy.JPG Books Autopsy and Everything After (Florida Review, 2019) is a collection of flash fiction chronicling the journeys of a professional wrestler, with the occasional foray into the supernatural. This chapbook won The Florida Review's Jeanne Leiby Chapbook Contest (2017-2018). It is available from The Florida Review at their online store, as well as at conferences and events. While my stock lasts, I’m also selling signed copies for $12 (via PayPal only)—use the info on my contact page to reach out if you’d like to buy a signed copy directly from me. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/56f4ce6f8259b5654138b37e/1534275285854-3GX09CSE11860OWABECX/Distance+Traveled+Cover.jpg Books Distance Traveled (Bent Window Books, 2018) is a hybrid chapbook in which prose poems ostensibly centered on basketball craft a novella about aging, divorce, friendship, and a cross-country road trip. The publisher, Bent Window Books, is no longer in operation. I am happy to provide a free digital (PDF) copy of the chapbook to interested parties upon request. Please use the information from the Bio and Contact page to reach out if you are interested. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/56f4ce6f8259b5654138b37e/1534275404468-K1AVI0Z5R4SXMAESD222/image-asset.jpeg Books The Leo Burke Finish (Gimmick Press, 2017) is a hybrid chapbook, featuring twenty-three prose poems and a lyric essay that explore professional wrestling and its intersections with my own life and our larger contemporary culture. The work is published alongside writings from Frankie Metro and Brian Rosenberger for a project called The Three-Way Dance from Gimmick Press. It's available now via The Gimmick Press Store and Amazon. http://michael-chin-3orp.squarespace.com/poems-2017 daily 0.75 2026-09-17 http://michael-chin-3orp.squarespace.com/short-stories-2017 daily 0.75 2026-07-24 http://michael-chin-3orp.squarespace.com/flash-fiction-2017 daily 0.75 2025-12-13 http://michael-chin-3orp.squarespace.com/forthcoming-work daily 0.75 2026-09-17 http://michael-chin-3orp.squarespace.com/all-non-fiction daily 0.75 2026-09-17 http://michael-chin-3orp.squarespace.com/this-years-ghost-extended-cut daily 0.75 2025-04-06 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/56f4ce6f8259b5654138b37e/7ec83ffa-08e6-4948-8f2d-2d0c21518168/Michael+Chin+This+Year%27s+Ghost+Book+Cover.jpg This Year's Ghost (Extended Cut) I never realized until I published my first short story collection the number of iterations one might go through before settling on the right permutation of pieces to arrive at a successful book. I’d been submitting versions of the manuscript for about five years before JackLeg Press picked it up. I thought it would be fun to share some of the stories that were part of this collection at one time or another but didn’t make the final cut. Full text of each story available free online via the links below. “Monitor” A new mother discovers she can catch glimpses of her child’s future via her baby monitor, published via Ponder Review. “Crackers, Guide Us All” A cat named crackers goes mad with the implications of time travel and ongoing changes to the timeline, published via Sick Lit Magazine. “The Damned” The post-apocalyptic gets very personal when precisely the wrong combination of friends and lovers take refuge together as the world burns, published via Bowery Gothic. “Matryoshka” A woman traps vile men in her dollhouse village, published via Mania Magazine. “Next Move” A bereaved child and a ghost play chess, published via Charge Magazine “The Arrival” Survivor’s guilt racks a man who survived the end of the world as he knew it, published via Jellyfish Review. http://michael-chin-3orp.squarespace.com/contact-wells daily 0.75 2025-05-12 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/56d9b7181d07c0cd16df5f11/1457378862003-QC8PO9E2LYVHW06IWNC5/image-asset.jpeg Contact http://michael-chin-3orp.squarespace.com/read-me-wells daily 0.75 2025-05-12