BOARDING The thing about los Hondureños, es que como dice mi abuela, hablan hasta por los codos. They talk even out of their elbows. I will never get through a Tegus-bound plane ride without holding an…
Essay by J. A Tyler • Milk Fed made me want to ingest a mountain of delicious, sugary, fatty foods—donuts, chips, pizza, candy—then sprint into the arms of some lusty entanglement. Yet the novel also gave me bouts of…
Suzanne Grove: On your list of “Seven Deadly Sins: Common Errors,” creating false suspense via the withholding of information earns the second spot. I appreciate the distinction you make between what you call “plot questions” and questions that tease…
In high school, you know a girl who disappears months before graduation. One day, she stops coming to school, and you never see her again. Usually, you avoid the other Muslim kids—the ones who dance to bhangra music during…
She had become clumsy. She’d dropped the mug she loved, the green one the color of an aspen leaf, with its fluted skirt at the bottom. Either she’d knocked it to the floor, or worse, forgotten it was in…
Nine of us cram into Brad O’Neill’s dad’s Buick, a girl to each lap, and Gulp’s snugging my middle before all the doors crash shut. I look back to see his tanned cheekbones; it’s really him, Gulp North, under…
Albert Liau: The Five Wounds is a fantastic reading experience. It is an immersive story, and for those of us who are looking, we can find craft elements being used to these degrees that at least I had not…
I become quite pretty in the winter, in the dim afternoons with sheet metal skies. I line my lips with brown, burgundy, wine and whiskey stains. I crave bright fruits as though they’ll substitute the daylight—sunset persimmons, sunrise grapefruit,…
Dear Great-Great-Great-Great-Great-Granddaughter, You probably don’t exist. I have never wanted to be a mother, and that will probably never change. Still, every time my tribe reaches out to those of us pursuing higher education, we are asked what we…
SADIE HOAGLAND: John, I so enjoyed reading The Fear of Everything. Each story balances humor and darkness so well, and each piece held the sort of “good surprises” I love in fiction—the unexpected turns. I think one of my…
