Award-winning author Dr. Ryan Habermeyer reading from his book ‘The Science of Lost Futures’ on March 24
Guest educator’s specialty is creative writing with an emphasis in fiction and experimental prose narrative
Article by: Rosa Linda Reynoso
His scholarly research focuses on transnational fairy tales and the cultural history of the monstrous and grotesque. He also welcomes discussions on that which is weird, bizarre, strange, cryptic, absurd, otherworldly, satirical, spectral, uncanny or otherwise inexplicable.
On Thursday, March 24, guest author Dr. Ryan Habermeyer will discuss his short story fiction collection “The Science of Lost Futures” during a reading sponsored by Del Mar College’s (DMC) Cultural Programs Series and the DMC Libraries. The College encourages patrons to wear masks or face coverings and distance at individual discretion.
The free reading begins at 11 a.m. in Wolfe Recital Hall located in the Fine Arts Center Music Building on the Heritage Campus at Kosar and Ayers. For more information, contact DMC associate professor of English Sara Kaplan at 361-698-1427 or skaplan@delmar.edu.
A prize-winning collection full of quirky humor and intelligent absurdity, “The Science of Lost Futures” is a winner of the Boa Short Fiction Prize. Habermeyer’s award-winning stories include an enormous foot that washes ashore just outside the city limits prompting fear and fascination, a man who responds to an advertisement for a “no experience necessary” cosmonaut training program and a woman who collapses inside the black hole she is growing on her shoulder.
In other stories, a neighbor mysteriously grows parsnips in the shape of his dead wife’s kidney, a sleep-deprived worker searches for love in a doll factory and a former Nazi is adopted as a household pet. Drawing on urban legends, internet hoaxes and ancient medical folklore, these stories full of cage-rattling unusualness go beyond science fiction and magical realism to create a captivating collection of fabulist narratives that revel in the alien and the absurd.
The Pushcart Prize nominee’s work has been published in several literary journals and in publications including Hotel Amerika, Bat City Review, Cimarron Review, Fiction International and Carolina Quarterly among others.
Habermeyer earned his master’s degree from the Program for Poets and Writers at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst and a doctoral degree from the University of Missouri. Currently, he serves as assistant professor of English at Salisbury University in Maryland.
Learn more about the author by visiting ryanhabermeyer.com.
Del Mar College empowers students to achieve their dreams. We offer quality programs, individual attention, outstanding instruction through faculty with real-world experience and affordable costs to credit and noncredit students in Corpus Christi and the South Texas Coastal Bend area. Nationally recognized while locally focused, we’re ranked in the top two percent of community colleges in the country granting associate degrees to Hispanic students (Community College Week). Del Mar College focuses on offering our students programs that match current or emerging career opportunities. Whether students are interested in the fine arts, sciences, business, occupational or technical areas, students get the education they need for the future they want at Del Mar College.