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In this issue: Original short stories by A.L. Goldfuss (“Woman with no Face”) and Y.M. Pang (“How I Became MegaPunch, or Why I Stayed with Dylan”); flash fiction by A.Z. Louise (“Single Origin”) and Shane Halbach (“So. Fucking. Metal.”); and poetry by Terese Mason Pierre (“Appeal to the Dopplegänger”) and Tristan Beiter (“The Knitting Bowl”); and an essay by CL Clark.
Cover art by MoVille/Adobe Stock Image
In this issue . . . Alice Goldfuss weaves a biting tale of resistance in “Woman with no Face” and Y.M. Pang offers a fresh twist on a superhero navigating relationships in “How I Became MegaPunch, or Why I Stayed with Dylan”; for flash fiction, A.Z. Louise brings coffee and witches together in “Single Origin” and Shane Halbach’s “So. Fucking.Metal.” puts the Death in Death Metal; for this month’s poetry we bring you Terese Mason Pierre’s “Appeal to the Dopplegänger” and Tristan Beiter’s “The Knitting Bowl”; plus, this issue features an essay by The Unbroken author C.L. Clark: “The Fiction of Peace, The Fantasy of War.”
I met Fawn in line for the bog witch’s coffee. At first, there was a man standing between us, but after a few days of waiting, he wandered off. Most people did, but not Fawn and me. We started talking once we were beside each other, sharing the food we’d brought. I’d brought a flask of bourbon, which she hated (and still hates to this day), but she gamely worked her way through it with me.
In this issue . . . Alice Goldfuss weaves a biting tale of resistance in “Woman with no Face” and Y.M. Pang offers a fresh twist on a superhero navigating relationships in “How I Became MegaPunch, or Why I Stayed with Dylan”; for flash fiction, A.Z. Louise brings coffee and witches together in “Single Origin” and Shane Halbach’s “So. Fucking.Metal.” puts the Death in Death Metal; for this month’s poetry we bring you Terese Mason Pierre’s “Appeal to the Dopplegänger” and Tristan Beiter’s “The Knitting Bowl”; plus, this issue features an essay by The Unbroken author C.L. Clark: “The Fiction of Peace, The Fantasy of War.”
With Ankuin I wanted a protagonist who was intelligent, powerful, and savvy. I wanted the reader to find pleasure in watching her work, as she outmaneuvered an enemy who ostensibly had every advantage. Sure, Ankuin raises ethical questions, but her story is so heartbreaking and her revenge so intoxicating that those questions don’t really land until the story is over.
so married / by skin / even my fingers rush to study / every dry groove you carve across / my own face, our face, / the single self, splitting into / foil and forgetting
Baron Samedi pounds the drums and the whole floor shakes. That’s his thing, earthquakes. I heard the Skull Suckers played Santa Monica and the Baron literally brought the whole place down during a blistering solo of “The Devil May Ride.”
Work wood on a potter’s wheel, mold it, / warmly glowing with oil eased in so it / forgets that it was never soil, never clay.
Any superhero origin story is, in essence, a tale of loss and recovery. You gain superpowers, but what do you lose? Your old job (lame as it was), potentially old friends (if they were really friends), and your old lifestyle. You gain the power to protect—or destroy—the things you or other people hold dear, but lose the chance to ever live an ordinary life.
As an American millennial, my country has been legally at war for more than half of my life. As a Black person in the United States, and as someone aware of the displacement and genocide of indigenous Americans, I would say the country has been at war with itself since its beginning. War seems as ubiquitous in fantasy novels as it does in the real world.
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