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I Would’ve Asked
Fiction by Phebe Jewell Mom hates convenience stores, so when she drives me straight to the 7-Eleven after picking me up from the hospital this time, I know she’s run out of ideas. Parking in front, she keeps the engine running and hands me a five without saying anything. Mom knows how hard it is…
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Star of Wonder
Fiction by S.A. Cosby Latisha took a long drag off her Newport as Calvin came through the door of their trailer. The cold December wind tried to sneak in with him; he slammed the door shut as he shook himself, tossing light flakes of snow on the floor. Latisha thought he somewhat resembled a bear.…
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Last Christmas
Creative Nonfiction by Lina Lau 2022 This Christmas, Mom is bedridden. Bundled in blankets, propped up by pillows. Railings keep her contained. Dad bought a hospital bed after her most recent fall, knowing once her broken ankle healed, she would no longer be able to support herself. The hospital bed and a single bed for…
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Keep Swinging: Golf and Writing
By Brett Lovell I have an eight-year-old daughter and a five-year-old son which means I don’t have time for hobbies. I especially don’t have time for a hobby, like golf, that can consume up to four or five hours of my day; driving to the course, warming up, and playing eighteen holes means it takes…
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Road Trip in A Place Where a Different You Once Lived
Fiction by Sumitra Singam is a melanoma sun scorching your driving hand while your other sneaks pineapple lumps and chocolate fish, sips of L&P sugar-rushing you straight back to CDs and spaghetti straps and first kisses. It’s single-lane highways stretching long as a piece of string, sweet as bro, until a logging truck slows you…
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Turning a Hobby into a Profession
by M. Scott Douglass As a young man in the 1960s and 70s, my whole world was wrapped around sports, especially baseball. That kind of youthful infatuation could be considered as a hobby, but it was something I took seriously, especially since those who are good enough became professionals and got paid to play the…
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Fly and Fly
Creative Nonfiction by Miriam Gershow I am six and don’t know how to ride a bike. I won’t know how for seven more years. Children will call out names as they pass my mother holding onto the back of my banana seat, me wobbly and long-limbed, hunched over handlebars on the sidewalk in front of…
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The Nitty Gritty Interview with Wilson Koewing
By Charlotte Hamrick As I was reading Jaded by Wilson Koewing, I surprised myself with how often I would think this is one of the best stories I’ve ever read, only to think the same thing at the next story. There is something in the way Wilson writes that brings to mind oral stories passed…
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The Song Once More
A review of Jesmyn Ward’s Sing, Unburied, Sing by Tom Funk Imagine a world where you know from your early teens that the future holds no bright prospects for you. A world where you cannot hope to rise above the rural subsistence farming of your parents. You have no money. Your schools have been substandard,…
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The Fractured Mirror: Taking Your Half with You
By Edward Karshner During my 2022 summer fellowship at Berea College Special Collections and Archives, I nerded out over many variants of familiar folktales. I love the idea that stories and traditions continue to evolve, grow, change. One story, however, was new to me. It has haunted me ever since I read it. It’s a…