Xauri’EL Zwaan is a mendicant artist in search of meaning, fame and fortune, or pie (where available); a Genderqueer Bisexual, a Socialist Solarpunk, and a Satanist Goth. Zie has published short fiction in, among other places, Galaxy’s Edge, Polar Borealis, Transform the World, and We’re Here: The Best Queer Speculative Fiction of 2022. Zie lives and writes in a little hobbit hole in Saskatoon, Canada on Treaty 6 territory with zir life partner and two very lazy cats.

•          •          •

“Opportunity Knocks” was my first ever published piece; it was originally printed in 2011 in Spectra Magazine, one of the earliest experiments in an online-only format for short speculative fiction. It sadly soon fell victim to the exigencies of fast-changing digital marketplaces, but it was a harbinger of the future. I was in a bad place when I wrote this; I try to be a bit more upbeat these days, but I think the raw hopelessness and anger of it is still valuable.