09/30/2025 PRETEND YOU DON'T SEE HER-A New Anthology from Kandisha Press

Happy Release Day to Kandisha Press, owned by Jill Giradi and Erin Prime.

PRETEND YOU DON'T SEE HER is their latest all female anthology. I was honored to write the introduction to what I believe is a very important anthology published by Kandisha Press, an anthology that could not be more relevant in today's world.

Foreword by Candace Nola

Published by Kandisha Press/2025

Hello Readers,

I’ve been a fan of Kandisha Press for quite a while now, and absolutely every title they’ve published has been packed full of incredible talent, voices, and stories. This one, PRETEND YOU DON’T SEE HER, may be the best one yet. I do not say that lightly, nor dismiss any title that has come before, but I do mean to say that this one hits different. Perhaps it’s the global climate at this particular moment in time, maybe it’s the horrific news that we are faced with every time we open a screen, any screen, or maybe it’s the sheer exhaustion of simply being a woman. 

What do I mean? If you are a woman, from any walk of life, then you already know. The authors that grace this anthology have given birth to stories that scream in capital letters of exhaustion, pain, rage, and injustice. These are stories that demand your attention. Stories that command you to sit down, shut up, and pay attention, especially those readers that need to hear it the most. Stories that are beautifully written, eloquent, and creative.

Within these pages you will journey through loss, heartbreak, rejection, disappointment, betrayal, and abuse at every turn; enough to make your blood boil, to make your heart pound in rage, to make you seethe in anger, just as the characters in these stories do. And just when you think you will take up a torch and pitchfork and find a way into the book to dish out your own brand of justice, these ladies merely smirk at you, give you a wink, and show you how it’s done.

Their words are intelligent, furious poetry bleeding across pages steeped in truth, emotion, and a reclaiming of self. These stories, while being everything that you want a horror story to be, are also snapshots of real women speaking their truth, finding their courage, and becoming empowered. As the phoenix will rise from the ashes, so too, do these women, time and time again.

I’ll leave you with this final statement: to these incredibly talented authors, to any woman that has suffered in silence, that has endured more than their fair share, that has had to claw their way up from the bottom of the abyss just to survive one more day, and to every woman still suffering, I see you.

Thank you to these authors for this exquisitely written anthology. Thank you to Kandisha Press for standing up for women of every background, for seeing every voice, and for recognizing our worth. I applaud you.

-Candace Nola

Sept. 2025

Releases Sept. 30, 2025.

Add it to your Goodreads here:

Pretend You Don't See Her: The Invisible Woman by Jill Girardi | Goodreads