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Cover art by MoVille / Adobe Stock Image
Nov. 2022 (Issue 85)
Nonfiction
Editorial: November 2022
In this issue’s short fiction, Z.K. Abraham’s protagonist finds a strange allure in the sounds coming from next door in “The Typewriter,” and Aimee Ogden’s “SOC 301: Apian Gender Studies (Cross-Listed with ZOL 301)” explores a different kind of dorm life. In flash fiction, Simo Srinivas takes us on an unusual quest in “Plum Century” while Kelsea Yu’s “Harvest of the Deep” takes us on a harrowing journey underwater. For poetry, we have “The Space Between Seconds” by Kelsey Hutton and “The Werewolf and the Fox Spirit Are Neighbors” by Amy Johnson. Plus an interview with A Phoenix First Must Burn and Eternally Yours editor Patrice Caldwell. Enjoy!
Flash Fiction
Harvest of the Deep
After a decade of abyss-diving, it wasn’t the jagged stalagmite teeth, puckered slate skin, or uneven, fin-like growths that chilled Lifang; it was the creature’s expression—lidless eyes and too-wide jaws shaped like a perpetual scream.
Nonfiction
Editorial: November 2022
In this issue’s short fiction, Z.K. Abraham’s protagonist finds a strange allure in the sounds coming from next door in “The Typewriter,” and Aimee Ogden’s “SOC 301: Apian Gender Studies (Cross-Listed with ZOL 301)” explores a different kind of dorm life. In flash fiction, Simo Srinivas takes us on an unusual quest in “Plum Century” while Kelsea Yu’s “Harvest of the Deep” takes us on a harrowing journey underwater. For poetry, we have “The Space Between Seconds” by Kelsey Hutton and “The Werewolf and the Fox Spirit Are Neighbors” by Amy Johnson. Plus an interview with A Phoenix First Must Burn and Eternally Yours editor Patrice Caldwell. Enjoy!
Fiction
Poetry
The Space Between Seconds
When rain hurls itself against the diamond glass / with the suicidal passion of a gothic hero, transforming / my window into the white, glycerin eye / of a dark castle, gnarled and hiding among thick trees
Author Spotlight
Author Spotlight: Z.K. Abraham
I think oppressive expectations and self-criticism, and the negative emotions associated with these, are the main deterrents to beginning writing. We have many obligations and demands we prioritize and manage on a daily basis because we have to, because they are habits, because we don’t have expectation/emotion tied up with these items, and because we often value what is expected/imposed on us as inherently more worthy of our time and sacrifice. Writing can be easy when we are more fair with ourselves.
Flash Fiction
Plum Century
It takes the lieutenant one hundred years to climb the hill to Lao Po’s house. By then, the warlords have come and gone, the Republic has risen and fallen, and developers have been petitioning the ruling party to demolish Lao Po’s hilltop hut for decades.
Poetry
The Werewolf and the Fox Spirit Are Neighbors
Beneath a gibbous moon / the werewolf howls and hunts / for her keys. Again.
Author Spotlight
Author Spotlight: Aimee Ogden
When I wrote the story, I didn’t want the insects to anchor too closely to any singular real-world equivalent; in fact I went back and forth a few times with how they worked, changing their logistics and building in some of the in-world fallout of having bees as a fundamental fact of life, in order to keep them from drifting closer to being one clear metaphor or another (because I found that drifting very easy to do!) Being a woman is a lot of things, personally and interpersonally, societally, and I wanted the bees to be a lot of things too.
Fiction
Nonfiction
Interview: Patrice Caldwell
I love getting to explore new worlds, to fall in love with characters who become real to me, and be moved by the words on the page. Genre fiction got me through the height of the pandemic, and it’s also gotten me through so many times when I felt unmoored. Just being able to dive into a world, to for a moment be somewhere else, it’s the best gift.
