Fiction/Nonfiction: fiction

  • Sforzando by Timothy Reilly

    It’s a story about tuba lessons, kind of. It goes in unexpected directions, and also contains some good tuba trivia (18 feet of tubing!).

  • Signs of Suffering by AD Schweiss

    This is how it starts: I want to make it home sober but there’s a bar sitting perfectly just between the station and my house and I need to sit somewhere in between until my jaw can loosen up; the stink of your burnt car still in my nose. Schweiss uses repetition and a slow…

  • Blueberries by Chris Scott

    This story is way too short. It’s a bit of a John Marrs-type concept – people start getting texts from alternate-universe versions of loved ones. Put me on the preorder list for the novel already.

  • The Prank by Amy DeBellis

    A group of kids set up to prank a peer, but things go sideways. The reveal in this story made my jaw drop.

  • Endlings

    A ghost story revolving around a fictionalized version of Ed and Lorraine Warren, who you likely know of if you don’t know the names. Written in the lyrical and absorbing language typical of Machado: I told him the truth, or the truth as best as I understood it: I was born under an erratic star…

  • This Didn’t Happen

    A story of a possible crime, told in all a clever way: What would you do if you saw something worse? Maybe a car slamming into another and driving off? Or a brick being thrown through a window? Or a murder? You might have guessed that I saw one of those. I can neither confirm…

  • Viewer Discretion Advised

    Lukas isn’t exactly a natural with women. His first date with Amy ends in a way neither expected. This story made me gasp, laugh and cringe all at the same time. I seem to be putting every single Katherine Plumhoff story I find in here. I swear I didn’t know this was her work until…

  • Quantifying the Dent of Bob

    The narrator of this story is a project manager in the most Project Manager sense. She’s trying to use work do move on from her husband’s death, but she’s the last to realize how poorly it’s working. I love the way this story slowly unravels as more of the narrator’s life is revealed.

  • The Ultimate by Robin Becker

    At an amusement park in a dystopian future, Miss Polly holds a spot in line for a terminally ill customer: I’m a line-sit for the Ultimate Roller Coaster. At first, I thought the job would be depressing, everyone standing in line waiting to ride-n-die, but what I do is altruistic. I’m helping my clients out,…

  • Sting

    A creepy camping story with and ending that’ll haunt you. The perspective shift in this story is done brilliantly, and the ending will linger for a while.