For Writers Who Feel the Pull of the Moon
A creative sanctuary for weird fiction and genre-bending storytellers—especially those building creative lives in the margins
We're Building Something Different
The story of Full Moon Fiction and why it exists
From the time I could walk, I was dreaming about horses. By the time I was a teenager, I was competing. By the time I was 19, I was on my way to nationals. I had a plan. I had a future. I knew exactly who I was supposed to be.
And then, in one fell swoop, everything changed.
Who Is K. E. Koontz?
Seemingly overnight, severe neurological disorders took over my body—muscle spasms, lack of coordination, exhaustion so deep I couldn't stand. I lost 80% of my vision in one eye and 40% in the other.
Horses were gone. Not "take a break and come back later" gone. Gone gone.
Every plan, every dream, and every version of my future-self crumbled. My life was in shreds, scattered like something I couldn't pick up or put back together.
All I had left were words.
Rebuilding in the Dark
What no one tells you about rebuilding your life from scratch is that it's expensive and it's isolating.
I grew up poor, raised by a single mother in rural America. When chronic illness took riding from me, it also took my job. I had no income, no health insurance, and no idea how to become a writer when I could barely afford to eat.
Everywhere I looked, money was needed.
Want to take a writing course? $200. Want to attend a conference? $500 plus travel. Want to hire an editor, a cover designer, a formatter? Thousands. Even the affordable options assumed you had time, energy, and a few hundred dollars to spare.
Then I found NaNoWriMo.
Fifty thousand words in thirty days. Free, communal, energizing for countless writers. But for someone whose body and schedule was unpredictable, it felt like another door I couldn't walk through.
I felt locked out of the very community I so desperately needed.
The system wasn't built for people like me. It was failing. I was failing.
Finding My People (Finally)
Eventually, I managed to dig myself into the writing community known as Writeblr.
There I found people who understood that some weeks you don't write at all, who got excited about weird fiction and stories that don't fit neatly into marketable boxes, and who weren't interested in pretending writing was only for the healthy, the wealthy, or the traditionally successful.
And slowly, painfully, I reshaped not only my career but my entire life around writing.
But getting to this point was beyond hard.
And it was lonely.
Sometimes, it's still lonely.
The Lonely Parts They Don't Talk About
I can only write between my full-time job and between severe health flare-ups—which means not often. Some months I write every day. Some months I write nothing at all because my body won't let me.
The writing world doesn't always know what to do with people like me.
People who can't commit to a daily word count, who write slowly, or in bursts, or not at all for weeks at a time. People who love the dark, strange, uncomfortable stories that make readers squirm. People who are navigating creativity while also navigating chronic pain, fatigue, and a body that feels like it's actively working against them.
This year, I turned thirty.
A decade ago, I lost horses. A decade ago, I thought my life was over. And now, ten years later, I'm still here. Still writing. Still building.
Why Now? Why at Thirty?
I've spent the last ten years learning how to create when the world tells you that you can't. I've learned how to work with my body instead of against it, that rest is part of the creative process, and that there's no "right way" to be a writer.
And I've learned that the writing community I needed at twenty still doesn't fully exist.
There are pieces of it scattered across the internet. Supportive writing groups here, affordable resources there. But there's no single space that says: "This is for writers with chronic illness. This is for writers who grew up poor. This is for writers who love weird fiction and stories that don't sell as well as romance or thrillers. This is for all of you, and you don't have to apologize for any of it."
So I'm building it.
Full Moon Fiction, and everything within it, is a statement I'm making.
You belong here. Exactly as you are. With all your limitations and all your strange ideas and all your bad pain days. And if you need help, you can find it here.
What Full Moon Fiction Means to Me
Full Moon Fiction is my legacy.
It's the thing I want to be remembered for. Not just the books I write under K.E. Koontz, but the space I created for other writers to grow, to rest, to belong. I want FMF to outlast me. I want it to be the place where a twenty-year-old writer with chronic illness finds community and doesn't feel so alone. I want it to be the reason someone keeps writing when everything else tells them to stop.
I want it to matter.
And if you're reading this—if any part of my story resonates with you—then you're part of why it matters.
You're why I'm doing this.
Welcome Home
What's Next?
2026:
2027:
Physical event presence + Virtual Writing Retreats
2028: