Tag: Short Story

Three laps in Callie’s cruising to the sounds of her thoughts since the bosses don’t allow earbuds while working. On Wednesday her therapist said, “Write your thoughts down, Callie. Write them down and reread them each week to see if you’re really dizzy bonkers, as you say.” And then she ... Read More

The two of us lay sprawled in his bed, his white calf socks the only item of clothing between us.… ... Read More

After I left Edison, I was surprised to see Julie again. / I saw her in a bookstore in Jerusalem. She had that distinct blonde hair that struck my soul and made me pray to her as if she were an esteemed member of The Church of Jesus Christ of ... Read More

He watched the couple through their window until it went dark then stumbled back into the shadows of his driveway and through the moving drift of the banana trees and elephant ears gathered at his front door.... by Taylor Melia Elyse Mahone ... Read More

It was a Tuesday afternoon when Ellen Wong decided to try the newly opened massage parlor five minutes’ drive from home. She heard it was cheap. Daughter at school, husband at work, colors in the dryer, whites in the washer. Honey barking at passing dogs three times her size from ... Read More

Leah, my best virtual friend, is a writer like me. Writers know all the secrets in the world, and we aren’t ashamed to admit it, in writing. Paradoxically, she still knows more than I do. So, I paraphrase to myself the Bellman from “The Hunting of the Snark:” “I’m not ... Read More

Eight steps for developmentally editing characters. 1. Make a character list... 2. Identify frequency... 3. Code characters... 4. Amalgamate main characters... 5. Amalgamate secondary characters... 6. Give divine introductions... 7. Create character timelines... 8. Repeat ... Read More

You cannot go back.  Leah had sketched the words on every scrap of paper, every grocery list, even the coupons she handed over at the store, the newspapers she bound with string and set out for recycling.  They, too, bore her new mantra beneath the bylines—four words from a soft-tipped ... Read More

You’ll stumble over the pronunciation of her name. When you ask your friend Aida, who is Puerto Rican, how to say it, she’ll tell you that she doesn’t know and that all Dominicans.... Kate Scarpetta grew up in Northeastern Pennsylvania and spent her youth playing sports and climbing trees. She ... Read More

Here was the game plan: we were going to sneak into Mom’s house, stuff her cats into sacks, and drown them in the lake. A backyard bonfire for everything else—the towers of mildewed newspapers reaching almost to her living room ceiling; the army of painted figurines standing at attention all ... Read More

You must choose. Once the baby makes its way out—and he will make his way out in a splash of fluid after the kind of crowning you won’t soon forget—the moments that make up your life will cease to be ones you choose. It is August. The trees wilt in ... Read More

It has been years since it happened. She is a still mother. Meaning, she keeps her body very still and she still considers herself a mother. She is rigid about this.... Nicole Miyashiro writes fiction and poetry and is an editor for the Pennsylvania Center for the Book at Penn State ... Read More

His friends were also there to see what might go wrong, and Ned was fine with that.... Nicole Miyashiro writes fiction and poetry and is an editor for the Pennsylvania Center for the Book at Penn State University. She has published stories, poems, and reviews, including one Pushcart Prize nominee. She ... Read More

He's a man of his word. A man whose mouth shrinks against his teeth when he smiles, as if recently stripped of a mature mustache, and who wears socks with clogs in the summertime to account for Florida air-conditioning.... Nicole Miyashiro has recent or forthcoming work in Clever Girl Magazine, Life in ... Read More

What captures your interest most in your work, now, as a reader? I’m interested in lyrical flow and urgency, and savor moments when all other story elements blend to elevate these two and keep the story moving. What are you working on now? Right now I’m working on a collection ... Read More

She could be sitting up in bed, studying her lines; she might, at any moment, fling off the covers and pass by the window in stunning silhouette. She doesn't. But thirty minutes later I'm still watching when the light goes out. I am close enough to see all of the ... Read More

This killer whale broke surface twelve feet out, arching its oily mass out from the water, and then it dove, aimed in our direction. One of us grabbed the shotgun. Our catch was good, but orcas could eat our salmon right through the nets, swarm us in packs of up ... Read More

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