WTF, Missouri?
Dreamspinner spins out of control
NBCC finalists announced
Where the Crawdads Sing was best selling book of 2019
RITAs cancelled over RWA kerfuffle
More works enter the public domain
Recent Fiction
Joshua, by Jordana Jacobs
Inside the ovaries of my husband’s grandmother, Sylvie, resided an egg the size of a grain of sand that would have been Hannah, my brilliant and accomplished mother-in-law.
Recent CNF
Freddy Krueger is Not Real, by Dina Peone
I was under the covers in my sister’s bedroom, deep asleep, while flames spread from a nearby candle.
Bystander
by Jen Bergmark
Technically, you needed only one eye to take a photo, but you needed the other to see.
Across the Street
by Lee Martin
Over the next few weeks, a series of strange and unsettling incidents occurred. On more than one night, Glory was jarred from sleep by angry shouts coming from across the street.
Some Things Are Decided Before You Are Born
by Marissa Glover
Doctors cannot tell you when you’re born / how many pitches your arm contains.
Foal
by Lois P. Jones
In your next life you will be / birthed in needles / of hoarfrost, your eyes still / in the blue gauze between
The Mourner’s Song
by Roy White
You can die in January if you want, / and lots of people do, but this far north, / nobody gets into the ground till spring.
Songs We Play When We Pretend We’re Ourselves
by Benjamin Thomas
There’s a piano player in the restaurant on the night Zoe tells you she’s pregnant.
Heaven
by Mike O’Mary
“Put on your winter coat and get a warm blanket,” I told my daughter. “We’re going out to look at Christmas lights.”
Grace
by Joseph Fasano
You’ve seen them in the deep sleep / of the season: figures sitting in a garden, / light on their faces as you enter.
Living With Lies
by Gita M. Smith
Whenever someone asks me, “So, what do you do?” I like to say, “I am a crash test dummy tech for the National Highway Traffic Safety folks.”
Clemency
by Cady Vishniac
A dead ringer for Josey. She sneezes as she walks into the pharmacy, and I look up from the newspaper I’m not supposed to be reading.
Fireside
Required Reading
*
Keep Moving: Notes on Loss, Creativity, and Change
by Maggie Smith
The 2020 Pushcart Prize Winners
Edited by Bill Henderson
Winner of the National Book Award in Fiction
Trust Exercise
by Susan Choi
Debunking Copyright Myths
by Janet Fries and Jennifer Criss
from Copyright Alliance
Don’t Be a Jerk to Your Online Humor Editor
by Chris Monks
from Vulture
An Amputee Looks Through a Ring
by Dina Peone
from Poor Yorick
Becoming Dr. Seuss
by Brian Jay Jones
The Three Words That Almost Ruined Me As a Writer
by Sonya Huber
from Literary Hub
The O.Henry Award Winners
Edited by Laura Furman
The Long, Winding Road to Publication
by Russell Rowland
from The Millions
