United States
Diverse creative writing skills and years of market research experience make me ideal for copywriting, content creation, and other creative pursuits.
Published Works
Earlier last week, Georgia Governor Brian Kemp signed the controversial HB 481 "Heartbeat Bill" into law. This measure will criminalize all abortions performed after fetal cardiac activity can be detected, which can happen as early as six weeks of pregnancy. Several women have already against the bill, including actress Alyssa Milano.
Back in December, ARTS ATL introduced readers to Matthew Terrell and his fictional cookbook, The Magnolia Bayou Country Club Ladies Auxiliary Cooking and Entertaining Book .
If you don't yet have plans for spring break, you might consider heading to the Chattahoochee National Forest just north of Gainesville, Georgia, and doing some hiking through the pristine natural wilderness. While you're there, be sure to hike the Mark Trail, named for the title character in Ed Dodd's iconic comic strips, which have been in syndication for over 50 years.
We've all done it: bought a new and exotic ingredient for a specific recipe only to be left wondering what on earth to use it for afterwards. That expensive condiment sits forgotten in the refrigerator until it eventually expires. That odd-looking vegetable waits in the crisper and inevitably gets tossed in the trash. This unintentional waste can make us feel like it isn't worth it to try new foods if we're just doomed to throw half of it out anyway. We go back to buying the same comfortable...
We drank it to the dregs back then; the speckled fannings swirling in the bottom of a pot of weak tea; the same leaf brewed over and over all day as we assessed each new cup for its nuance, trying to discern how it differed from the previous one, finding meaning...
I'm late. Tea with Nobue-san ran long. That fat pompous asshole just wouldn't quit talking. Now I'm having to sprint all the way across Gion while trying to look like I'm effortlessly gliding on air - not an easy task in these ridiculous platform geta, but no one's gonna pay top dollar for a geiko caught panting like a cow in labor.
Radio, Performance, & Podcast Audio
Childhood summers can be picturesque: the sunny days, the parks, the lemonade. Atlanta writer Alayna Huft-Tucker writes in her short story "The Summer of Bubbles" about the other side of those days, as a mother. She shares it in the "City Lights" studio for the "Storytellers" series. Those golden mornings are going.
How does one make friends? Anyone who has moved to a new town or just finds themselves socially bereft knows it can be difficult to connect with complete strangers. That is at the center of Alayna Huft-Tucker's story "Walk Right Up." It's a part of the ongoing series "Storytellers," which collects first-person narratives from writers around Atlanta.
ADULT CONTENT****** Yesterday's Daughter by Alayna Huft Tucker Originally performed at Naked City Still Life with Mason Jars by Shannon M. Turner Gentrified by Theresa Davis Originally performed at 7 Stages Home Brew
(starts around 7min.) A story about the physical bond we have with our kids, and something that happened very early in my daughter's life that threatened to break that bond.
The Center for Chemical Evolution is a collaboration of researchers from a dozen institutions that have joined together to study the chemistry associated with the emergence of life.
From memory, Alayna Huft Tucker tackles one of the most grueling spaces of time to fight against, Atlanta summers. Featured in Episode 2 | Season 1
The Five Hundred is a monthly flash-fiction challenge that has been going on since 2011. Every single month there is a prompt released through their mailing list and anyone can submit their work where it will be posted online.
Web Content
Learn more about how the types of pests we treat affect your home and why pest control is a must for every savvy homeowner or renter: Ants enter your home in search of food or shelter. Where there's one, there's hundreds.
They’re every homeowner’s greatest insect foe — a bug that can actually eat your house. How do you know if your home has them, and what do you do if you find them? Here’s what you need to know to identify and eradicate these house-munching insects.
Waking up to a bed bug infestation is a real wide-awake nightmare. These pervasive pests are hard to find and even harder to get rid of. Here's what you need to know to keep your home bed bug free so you can rest easy.
Short Fiction
I heard a Joanna Newsom song on the radio, of all places - I didn't think anyone played her weird folksy harp songs that go on for seemingly forever and assault your ears if you're not ready to hear them, at least not on the radio for public consumption- while I was driving down Ponce yesterday in a thick fog of traffic, and I thought of you, Natalie.
Dip a brush into milky white ink. Hold it there. Don't swish. Don't swirl. Allow the ink to wick itself up between every thin bristle. Slowly pull against the edge to drain the excess. Dip, and pull again. Dip, and pull again. Lift up out of the milkbowl; does the brush now feel laden with cream?
I unearthed it from an old box of childhood memorabilia stored in my parent's garage, a bit crushed now, but otherwise intact. Two scalloped white paper plates stapled together at one end like a clamshell, the outside decorated in tiny rainbow-colored rhinestones, each nestled in a dimpled pool of dried craft glue.
Father and mother never returned after they brought me to the okiya. It is very old thinking to have no use for a girl child, but father and mother were already very old when they had their girl child, too old to try again for a son. Okaa-san had use for me.
Bzzzt. Another ticket buzzes out of the feeder. Eric tears it off while it's still hot and studies it carefully, and without even watching what his other hand is doing, begins to set out the various saucers, spoons, and cups necessary to fill the order. All it needs now is the coffee.
Blog Excerpts
One thing I've learned about pregnancy is that regardless of the weather, you're hot all the time. I'm a bit embarrassed to admit just how much gelato I've consumed in the last few months. Enough to build a slip 'n slide for a penguin, probably.
I've been entertaining the idea of this recipe in my head for ages. Long before berry season I dreamed of these little bite-sized treats and couldn't wait for my favorite fruit to ripen so that I could make these over and over throughout the warmer months.
You know that smell. When you unexpectedly walk into a cloud of that sweet and salty aroma at festivals and faires, you know exactly what you've stumbled upon. Kettle corn. You can smell the metallic tinge in the air from the fiery-hot cast iron kettle being super-heated, the charred smell of burning wood cracking and blistering open under the kettle belly, and the almost sun-kissed hay-like smell of the corn kernels bursting open as they explode from the intense heat.
I have had so many potatoes this winter that I'm ready to just chuck the rest of them out the window. But until thin little spring asparagus starts peeking up out of the dirt and tomatoes swell up with sun on the vine, I've had to make do by reinvigorating some of my winter staple foods, potatoes especially.
Right now I’m combatting this need for refreshing fruit flavors with the last of winter’s citrus. I just annihilated an entire red grapefruit with lunch, sliced into wedges like an orange, making little smiles of rind as I chomp down on each one. I never eat grapefruit like that for some reason. I always see grapefruit served so preciously, either sliced into thin naked supremes on top of a fragile salad, or as I’ve chosen to serve it in the recipe I’m sharing with you today – broiled with a...
Thank you all for the incredible response I've received to the news of my cookbook, The Japanese Pantry, finally going on sale. It feels really good to hear that so many of you were excited about it and had been anticipating it for some time.
Press
The Bleux Stockings Society, a literary group and monthly live reading event at the Highland Inn Ballroom & Lounge led by female-identifying and non-binary folks, has been testing the staying power of audiences' waterproof mascara for the past three years.
Today we'd like to introduce you to Alayna Tucker. Alayna, can you briefly walk us through your story - how you started and how you got to where you are today. I never saw myself as a writer. Growing up I was always headed toward a career in art, possibly as an illustrator, though even [...]
Atlanta boasts one bustling lit scene. Though long-running sweetheart series such as Song and Scene Missing and Write Club pack out reading events week after week, there's still something - for lack of a better word - missing. Writers Amy Stufflebeam and Ellaree Yeagley noticed this, too.