New Animal by Ella Baxter “‘I think you might be trying to get away from those things, because of your sadness, which is so uncomfortable that it’s almost unbearable—but I promise you, running away from that sadness is like trying to run from your own shadow.’” When New Animal was published, it was salaciously (and,…
There is a notion, particularly among reactionary conservatives, that LGBTQ folk, though that is not the term the likes of Gavin McInnes use, have only existed since the 1960s. A blinkered opinion based on ignorance and queer as a three-dollar bill that utterly ignores landmark works of queer culture like The Boys In The Band,…
Patricia Wants to Cuddle by Samantha Allen At first, Amanda registers it as a dog or a bear, but it looks almost human, its contours twisting into an expression that is equal parts hunger and despair - a deep, almost prehistoric longing. The critique of books as “lightweight” or “women’s fiction” tends to be veiled…
Motherthing by Ainslie Hogarth “He’s not like his mother because he has me, and I will save him. We’re special, Ralph and I. I can cure Ralph. Because it’s what I was born to do. Remember that, Abby, vanquishing this depression is your true calling as a wife.” The strange, almost twee setting of Ainslie…
The first stories, at least in the Western tradition, were sung. Going back to ancient Greece, long before the written tradition, foundational narrative works such as The Iliad and The Odyssey recited in poem form, often with the accompaniment of a lyre. A bardic tradition carried on well into the 14th century by the troubadour…
Because of the Climate Crisis, we often think about nature and the environment on a large, often global scale. The question then asked is what can we, as cities, states, and nations, do to protect the earth and offset global warming. There is utility in this way of thinking. In fact, the Climate Crisis has…
Chrysalis by Anna Metcalfe “She has a power over the people who find her; once you’ve known her, it’s hard to go back to a time before.” While there is always an attraction to a manic, frantic, crisis-led novel, Chrysalis instead unfolds in a still, calm, and even slow manner. This works to maintain an…
At the first glance, Katy Telling’s pamphlet Bell Jar Barbie reads like a physical manifestation of a Valium-infused surrealist dream of a 1950s housewife. The twelve-page mini book is printed on a similar shade of pink as the Smith memo papers Plath wrote The Bell Jar and many of her poems, creating a magical-poetic synthesis between Telling’s experimental work…
Nightbitch by Rachel Yoder “To what identities do women turn when those available to them fail? How do women expand their identities to encompass all parts of their beings?” Explorations of female rage always make for an interesting read, to me - but Nightbitch managed to pique my interest further. What if rage became so…
When most think of great literary nations, Ireland is likely not the first place that comes to mind, literal statues of writers in Dublin notwithstanding. Despite some high profile, and somewhat overrated works of impenetrable literary fiction by James Joyce, and what is thought to be the first instance of vampire fiction – but isn’t…
