An Interview Between Max Wolf Valeria and j/j hastain

MWV:  What is the relationship of the body to identity, and how does language intercede–or not?  For me, body (corpuscle and feelings therein) and page (what for me is one of contemporary languages’ core impetuses) correlate in stippling-like processes, always … Continue reading →

I AM HOLDING YOUR HAND Official Release

In case you missed it amongst the holiday/New Year’s/list obsession hoopla, we are excited to announce the official release of I AM HOLDING YOUR HAND from Myfanwy Collins. A mixture and collection of both short stories and flash fiction, I AM … Continue reading →

Let Us Assist With Your Stress-less Holiday Shopping

Feeling a little fuzzy on what to buy your angsty cousin/high school bestie in need of some hip-ening/secret lover/any neat-but-difficult-to-buy-for-person in your life this holiday season? Quit googling top ten holiday gift lists and scoot on over to the [PANK] … Continue reading →

The Lightning Room with Danielle Pafunda

From the June Issue, Danielle Pafunda’s startling “from The Book of Scab.” We love this interview. 1. When have you ever lost your taste for beauty? I never lose my taste for beauty, but often lose my taste for Beauty, … Continue reading →

The Lightning Room with Jaclyn Watterson

Once upon a time it was the month of May and we published “We Act” from Jaclyn Watterson. Now Jaclyn answers some questions. 1. In the 2008 election cycle, how would have your gang of girls helped Hilary Clinton secure … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Lo Kwa Mei-en

Four Poems + five questions make for nine very special pieces of reading from Lo Kwa Mei-en. 1. What geography do you trust the most? Trust, for me, is more meaningful as an intentional act rather than a state of … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: JR Fenn

JR Fenn discusses existential crises, growing up, and her story “Altogether,” published in the June Issue. 1. Why write to the screams of seagulls? Wouldn’t it be better if you were doing so to the screams of a Flock of … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Brett Elizabeth Jenkins

Brett Elizabeth Jenkins’s “Scheherazade,” previously published. Recently published, this interview about the piece. 1. What would you change your middle name to? I am too lazy to actually go through with changing my name (didn’t even do it when I … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Kate Rutledge Jaffe

Kate Rutledge Jaffe’s wonderful Two Poems were in the June Issue. 1. Why are poets obsessed with collecting various things? Some of us are hoarders – of words, images, animated gifs… Collections can have a near-sublime impact. And the act … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Devan Goldstein

On writing and marriage, in response to “Three Short Essays for Aubrey Hirsch.”  1. How did your wife react to these essays when you showed them to her? Did you clear it with her before sending them off? What, if … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Masin Persina

Read Masin Persina’s Five Poems here, and then read his responses to six questions below. 1. Where did you get the idea to use pieces of New York Times articles in creating these poems? The New York Times poems came … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Randolph Pfaff

Randolph Pfaff, everybody, his Two Poems and his responses. 1. Whose name do you want on your laminated name tag? Someone else’s. I don’t want weird customers writing poems about me that use my real name. 2. What have you … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Kirstin Scott

Below you will find responses to questions regarding Kirstin Scott’s June published piece “Advice for the Female Fetus.”  1. What advice have you provided to your fetus? I was mostly worried about oxygenation and all that, but I did try … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Annie Hartnett

Presenting responses to questions regarding “Dead Alice,” from Annie Hartnett, in the May Issue, ladies and gentlemen. 1. How would you react if a dead lover wrote you letters? I’d send them a care package. Things they might miss from life, … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Amanda Smeltz

From the May Issue, “Crown for a Natural Disaster,” by Amanda Smeltz. 1. In those moments you feel you are too stupid to write a poem, how do you stop yourself from doing it? I don’t. I’m too stupid to … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Kate Folk

“The Ninety-Sixth Day” by Kate Folk was a part of the May Issue. 1. Who would you kidnap? Why would you kidnap them? I would not kidnap anyone. Look, I’ve seen “Fargo.” I know stuff would keep escalating, and next … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Eliza Smith

We questioned Eliza Smith about “Little Beast,” published the June Issue. Ghost stories, hauntings, fear in writing, racing pulses. 1. Why are you fascinated with ghost stories? Because everyone has one. My dad, who is one of the most level, … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Suzanne Richardson

Two Poems and this interview from Suzanne Richardson. Prepare yourself. 1. Who would you curse? How would you do it? I’m really not into cursing anyone. I’m not interested in focusing bad energy on anyone. I’m interested in exploring deep … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Laura Kochman

Laura Kochman wrote Five Poems, which we published in the May Issue. Now Laura will discuss the science of beaches and women in the woods. 1. Why did you choose to form these poems in the shape of prose? The … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Nandini Dhar

These Three Poems were published in the June Issue. 1. Why can’t a king ever marry a king? Absolutely can. But that’s not how it happened in the world I am writing about, and I try to stay honest in … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Jonathan Starke

Writing and bodybuilding, that’s a combination we can get sweaty over. Below Jonathan Starke responds to questions about his piece “Between Them,” published in the June Issue. 1. What was your finishing combination when you were a boxer? I liked … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Caleb Curtiss

We brought you Caleb Curtiss’s “A Taxonomy of the Space Between Us” in June. Below, Caleb discusses poetry’s fascination with death and time, amongst other topics. 1. Your essay begins very poem-like but then transitions into an essay. Why did … Continue reading →

The Body, The Rooms by Andy Frazee (A Review by J. A. Tyler)

What follows is the ninth in J. A. Tyler’s full-press of Subito Press, a series of reviews appearing at [PANK] over the course of 2012, covering every title available from Subito Press. J. A. Tyler’s previous full-press reviews have covered … Continue reading →

Nine Months by Paula Bomer (A Review by Dawn West)

There are plenty of books and films about men fleeing domesticity, about men who resist the surrender of self that making a family requires, about men who are ambivalent about being a husband and a father, with all its joys … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Hazel Foster

Can you remember back to April? Refresh your memory with this piece, “Jana Lives in This House,” and this interview with author Hazel Foster. 1. Who do you want living in your house? Ideally me, but I don’t have a … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Elizabeth Cantwell

These three wonderful poems from Elizabeth Cantwell were in the August Issue. Now, Elizabeth discusses structure, sparrows, and continuity. 1. What made you choose to move the poems from prose shape to stanzas and then back again? Originally these poems … Continue reading →

Maidenhead by Tamara Faith Berger (A Review By Helen McClory)

  Coach House Books   176 pgs/ $18.95 CAD   I struggled for a long time with this review. Maidenhead has been well-received in reviews across the internet, but my personal response was murky, confused. My copy is dog-eared and when I … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Oliver Bendorf

Oliver Bendorf’s Four Poems appeared in the May Issue. Below Oliver responds to our questions about Excel, fucking, and locomotion. 1. What have you used Excel for lately? I use Excel to track my “life list,” which is a list … Continue reading →

Bartleby, the Sportscaster by Ted Pelton (A Review by J. A. Tyler)

What follows is the eighth in J. A. Tyler’s full-press of Subito Press, a series of reviews appearing at [PANK] over the course of 2012, covering every title available from Subito Press. J. A. Tyler’s previous full-press reviews have covered … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Hillary Walker

The amazing “Eureka, California” was published in the June Issue. Below, author Hillary Walker discusses why “things of quality have no fear of time.” 1. What fictional character would you climb on your honeymoon? I think I’d like to get … Continue reading →

Interview with Louise Phillips, author of crime novel, Red Ribbons

  Why crime, Louise? Why for you as a writer and why for us as readers and moviegoers etc? What is it about crime, horror, violence, murder, and in particular serial killers, that we find so captivating and compelling? I … Continue reading →

Dora: A Headcase by Lidia Yuknavitch (A Review by Dawn West)

I, and many other sensible folks, believe that women should have primary control over our own bodies and stories, and Lidia Yuknavitch, my spirit animal, is no exception. Yuknavitch’s Dora: A Headcase, her divine whore of a debut novel, is … Continue reading →

A Forsley Feuilleton: If Richard Yates Wrote A Novel Called Tao Lin. . . – Act Two

Lil B is Miley Cyrus, Ellen DeGeneres, and Dr. Phil.  But he’s also ‘Alt – Lit’. . . at least that’s what I’ve been told.  But I’ve been told a lot of things.  Andrew Marantz, in a New Yorker essay … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: D Gilson

D Gilson’s “Call & Response” was a part of our June Issue. D Gilson responds to our calls below in regards to life blood, truck stops, and trust. 1. Why does no one ever ask when did someone know they … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Anderson Holderness

“Giddy Up Hannah Montana” from Anderson Holderness was a part of our May Issue. Alter egos, animal sounds, and titles are all discussed below. 1. What would you build and then bury in the backyard? Nothing comes to mind immediately. … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Keith Dunlap

From the May Issue, Keith Dunlap’s “The Clepsydra.” Below, Keith answers our questions, we especially like number 3. 1. What would you like your soul to be made of? Something communicable. Sometimes I am sitting in a room with a … Continue reading →

The Listeners By Leni Zumas (A Review By Helen McClory

  Tin House   352pgs/$15.95   Some books require you to focus when reading. They jingle with loose connections you are meant to, as an active reader, hold together for the curren to pass through. While reading The Listeners, I flailed … Continue reading →

A Forsley Feuilleton: If Richard Yates Wrote A Novel Called Tao Lin. . . – Act One

Neon Glittery, Hannah Fantana, xTx, Crispin Best, Sam Pink, Guillaume Morissette, Yumbo Tuff, Gabby Gabby, Buffet Feline, Frank Hinton, Carnivorous Judy, Moon Tzu, Socrates Adams, Reginald Reginald, and Beach Sloth are all pseudonyms that belong to – as the high … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Dana Diehl

Dana Diehl’s lovely piece, “When The Water Leaves Us,” is a great read for your Wednesday, for any day. Below Dana provides all the answers. 1. How would you improve Kevin Costner’s Waterworld? More releasing of Krakens. Put Alan Rickman … Continue reading →

After the Witch Hunt by Megan Falley (A Review by Jason Carney)

Write Bloody Books 120 pgs/$8.84 Beautiful lines, harsh realities, absolute truths, and precise images combine in the poems offered in After the Witch Hunt by Megan Falley to create a book that sings in an authentic voice. This is Falley’s … Continue reading →

A call to the arms of love: on the love of film as a politics of film, on critique-as-love and love-as-revolutionary-force, in memory of Alexis Tioseco, Nika Bohinc and my father; or, another letter I would love to read to you in person

On September 1, 2009, Filipino Canadian film critic and founder of Criticine, Alexis Tioseco and his girlfriend, Nika Bohinc, were killed at home in Quezon City, “in an apparent burglary staged by three armed men who fled the scene.” From … Continue reading →

Good Intentions by Jeff Lacy (A Review by David Atkinson)

310 pgs/$18.95 Many of us forget that the people involved in the criminal justice system are still people. After all, the only contact many of us knowingly have with such people is through the news, such not being a common … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Ashley Inguanta

Ashley Inguanta’s “It’s End Of The World Karaoke” appeared in the May Issue. Below, Ashley speaks about how the world turns certain, fiction vs. non-fiction, and songs for the end of the world. 1. Being also in Orlando, I noticed … Continue reading →

The Birdwisher by Anna Joy Springer (A Review By Helen McClory)

Birds of Lace 108pgs/$10 I found this a difficult book to read, though it was short, and beautifully put together and in parts as light as souffle. ‘A murder mystery for very old young adults’, it describes itself within, and … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Georgia Bellas

Georgia Bellas’ beautiful, “Recipe for a Winter’s Day in Three Courses,” was a part of the May Issue. Here Georgia speaks on summer meals, Goodwill glasses, and endless vacations. 1. How many courses would you prepare for a summer meal? … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Neal Kitterlin

These Two Poems written by Neal Kitterlin appeared in the May Issue. Below Neal discusses sneaking in writing, the skin of prose poems, and the best songs to listen to while cutting one’s ear off. 1. How do you sneak … Continue reading →

Good Grief by Stevie Edwards (A Review by Gretchen Primack)

Write Bloody 112 pgs/$14 I just wrote up a piece for a literary magazine’s Contributors’ Blog, and in it I described what I look for in poems: “I admire the poet who keeps a gleam in his rolled eye. I … Continue reading →

“An Unbearable Lightness”

My friend Leslie remarked via email that she was “somewhat jealous” of my impromptu adventure, to which I replied “don’t be.” There’s no envy to be found in fright, in flight, in a series of decisions made on the fly … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Kristi DeMeester

From the May Issue, Kristi DeMeester’s “The Beautiful Nature of Venom.” 1. What’s with literary fiction’s fascination regarding collarbones? Is it the sound that word makes? I’ve always found a strange beauty in that which is fragile. The physical collarbone … Continue reading →

Moon Is Cotton & She Laugh All Night by Tracy DeBrincat (A Review by J. A. Tyler)

What follows is the seventh in J. A. Tyler’s full-press of Subito Press, a series of reviews appearing at [PANK] over the course of 2012, covering every title available from Subito Press. J. A. Tyler’s previous full-press reviews have covered … Continue reading →

Books We Can’t Quit – A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess

Chosen by: Kenny Mooney A Clockwork Orange is, after Burroughs’ Naked Lunch, one of the most important novels I have ever read. And that is as much to do with what it led me on to read, as it is … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Ryan Bradford

Read Ryan Bradford’s “Post Apocalypse” here, and then follow it with this interview. Or do it the other way around. You’re an individual, make your own decisions. 1. How would you end the world? I’d shut down the internet. It … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Blaze Dzikowski

Blaze Dzikowski wrote “Corporate Birthday” and we published it in April. 1. What faces do you see on trains? It was a tram actually, a streetcar. Most faces are turned off, as their owners are somewhere else. Seeing eyes belong to … Continue reading →

Three Squares a Day With Occasional Torture by Julie Innis (A Review by Meg Tuite)

Foxhead Books 188pgs/$15 There are moments, hours, days in a lifetime that you actually feel like you have gone somewhere to a point on a map that doesn’t exist. That is the power of great writing. You’ve been transported from … Continue reading →

A Forsley Feuilleton: I Can’t Watch Another Ape Shit Without Going Ape Shit

The seventh and newest installment in the Planet of the Apes franchise, The Rise of the Planet of the Apes (2011), has been rotting, unwatched, at the bottom of a duffle bag filled with a year’s worth of my dirty … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Kelley Bright Leidenthal

We published these Two Poems by Kelley Bright Leidenthal in April and then asked her these questions. 1. When have you pretended to be in hate? I very rarely pretend to hate. It’s not nearly as fun as pretending to … Continue reading →

Fast Machine by Elizabeth Ellen (A Review by Helen McClory)

Short Flight/Long Drive Books 380 pgs/$11.95   Some books have a colour palette. Certain colours tinge the prose, or give the impression of appearing in the furniture, scenery, shadow, across the spread of tales.  This occupies a bleed zone between poor remembrance of … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Richard Bentley

Richard Bentley and his Three Poems, from the April Issue. 1. “Bears In The Street” has this epic collapse in the last stanza, compared to how the other stanzas are constructed. What was your intent behind that? A crash. Possibly … Continue reading →

In Conversation with Nuala Ní Chonchúir

Irish writer Nuala Ní Chonchúir’s fourth short story collection Mother America has just been published by New Island: “In Mother America and other stories mothers tattoo their children and abduct them; they act as surrogates and they use charms to cure childhood illnesses. The story … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Zachary Buscher

“Terminal Boredom,” from Zachary Buscher, was in the April Issue. 1. What ribbon do you always earn? The kind that makes my pigtails look hot. 2. What makes a man a man? All I know is that a man cannot … Continue reading →

What Teachers Make by Taylor Mali (A Review by Joy Mushacke Smith)

Putnam 197pgs/$11.99 The end of the school year. The time when even your favorite students start to get under your skin. Grades are due. Assignments are missing. You’re tearing off each calendar day with the ferocity required to wrestle an … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Kenton K. Yee

Back in May there was Kenton K. Yee’s “Try My Shank.”  1. How has working in the world of finance influenced your writing? Two finance guys sit down next to a mysterious stranger at a bar. “Stocks had a bad … Continue reading →

The Lola Quartet by Emily St. John Mandel (A Review by Dawn West)

Unbridled Books 288pgs/$24.95 If the crime thriller, bildungsroman, and domestic realism genres all got together for drinks in a smoky blue-toned jazz club and went home in a needy haze of swamp heat, passing abandoned businesses and ignored newsstands, to … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Wendy C. Ortiz

The amazing and well-worth-your-time to read, “Interiors,” was published in the April Issue. 1. What are you willing to destroy for love? My definitions of love have completely been wrung out, stretched, flung out into space and back in recent … Continue reading →

Domestication Handbook by Kristen Stone (A Review By Helen McClory)

Rogue Factorial 96pgs/$TBD   Domestication Handbook, not appearing, by its thickness (slender) or its cover (of bloodied and pounded meat arranged in symmetry) to be really a handbook on some aspect of farming, is in fact a book of finest … Continue reading →

Tony Hogan Bought Me An Ice-Cream Float Before He Stole My Ma by Kerry Hudson (A Review by Kirsty Logan)

Chatto & Windus 266pgs/£12.99 The first line of Tony Hogan Bought Me An Ice-Cream Float contains four swear-words, which sets the tone perfectly for what’s to come. This is the story of a Scottish childhood: the women all struggling, screeching … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Glen Pourciau

Glen Pourciau’s “Inside,” from the April, Issue can be found here. 1. Are you sorry for Huey Lewis and The News? I admire their music. I feel sorry when I hear the news, but I do not feel sorry when … Continue reading →

American Poet by Jeff Vande Zande (A Review by Brian Fanelli)

Bottom Dog Press 160 pages, $18   American Poet is a novel filled with scenes that are all too familiar to anyone involved in a local poetry community. Jeff Vande Zande successfully depicts awkward open mic nights, workshops, and competitive … Continue reading →

A Forsley Feuilleton: I was Facebook ‘friends’ with Patrick Wensink before Jack Daniels sent him the nicest cease and desist letter ever

If your desire for attention is anything like mine, you have a Facebook account. If your Facebook account is anything like mine, it includes a ‘news feed.’ If your ‘news feed’ is anything like mine, it’s filled with pictures of … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Carina Finn

Carina Finn’s “#11″ from the April Issue is here. 1. Are you a Twitter thug? I’m not sure what a twitter thug is. I like twitter, sometimes; sometimes I forget that it exists. I like it because it feels like … Continue reading →

Song & Glass by Stan Mir (A Review by J. A. Tyler)

What follows is the sixth in J. A. Tyler’s full-press of Subito Press, a series of reviews appearing at [PANK] over the course of 2012, covering every title available from Subito Press. J. A. Tyler’s previous full-press series have appeared … Continue reading →

Fractured West #3 (A Review by Dawn West)

Fractured West 42pgs/£4.99 The third issue of Fractured West, a petite magazine of short fiction, is a testament to the notions that brief doesn’t mean empty, that a single scene can show you a life, and that a handful of … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Leah Nielsen

In March there was “Say Spilt Milk” by Leah Nielsen. 1. Is there an open Krispy Kreme in Massachusetts? The only one I saw there was closed. I think there used to be one in Springfield, but it closed. Sigh. … Continue reading →

Fuckscapes by Sean Kilpatrick (A Review by j/j hastain)

Blue Square Press 100pgs/$12 I have spent a few days in Sean Kilpatrick’s fuckscapes and need to name the disturbances (induced by reading this book) I feel in my body, as well as the awareness of the rare beauties within … Continue reading →

A Forsley Feuilleton: Franz Kafka should have spent his time rolling dice with confidence on the corner instead of writing letters in confidence on the paper – Act Three

I went to Vegas because I believed that leopard pattern spandex and rusted tinfoil sailor hat wearing street schizophrenic when he grabbed my little tattooed arms and said, “Franz Kafka should have spent his time rolling dice with confidence on … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Ryan Mohr

This great little number from Ryan Mohr, “It’s All Pretend,” from the March Issue. 1. Where did “It’s All Pretend” come from? I knew I wanted to write a sad and dark, yet perhaps optimistic story about love. I think … Continue reading →

Zee Bee & Bee (aka Propeller Hats for the Dead) by David James Keaton (A Review by Simon Jacobs)

Open Casket Press 148pgs/$10.99 “…And With These Hats We Shall Fly”  1. “Shiver Moments” The premise to David James Keaton’s novella Zee Bee & Bee (aka Propeller Hats for the Dead) ought to be enough: a themed bed-and-breakfast in which customers … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Kate Fujimoto

From the March archives, Two Poems from Kate Fujimoto. 1. What is the weirdest thing you’ve married? All marriage, ever, is weird. 2. Where did these poems come from? A black moth whispered them into my ear on a moonless night … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Emily Testa

Emily Testa wrote “The Crown Prince of Irkutsk Oblast” and we published it in March. 1. What title would you like to hold in a past dynasty? Empress Supreme 2. Do you keep up with others when they have something … Continue reading →

A Mind of Winter by Shira Nayman (A Review by Brian Libgober)

Akashic Books 332 pgs/$15.95 Set a few years after the end of the Second World War, A Mind of Winter opens with protagonist Oscar musing about the irony of his impending indictment for crimes against humanity.  They say that an … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Matt Sailor

These Two Stories from Matt Sailor were a great addition to our March Issue. 1. How would you have ended the E.T. video game? Really, for all I know, the game could have a remarkable ending. But I’ll never know, because … Continue reading →

I Have Blinded Myself Writing This by Jess Stoner (A Review By Helen McClory)

Short Flight/Long Drive Books 192 pgs/$12.95   Experimental Fiction. What comes to mind when you read or hear these words? For me they conjure up feelings of eager apprehension, similar to walking into a free exhibition at a small, untested … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Katya Apekina

From the March Issue, Katya Apekina’s “The Deaths of Max Morozov.” 1. What mutant power does Max have that allow him to keep coming back to life? I don’t know! The story started off with me wanting to write a … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Steven Casimer Kowalski

We loved this mini-series (of which, it is revealed below, there are more), “Three Must-Haves,” from Steven Casimer Kowalski in the March Issue. 1. Why would anyone spend so much money on objects? I don’t know if Bruce Robinson wrote … Continue reading →

Scattered notes on love, counterpublics, queer time, the care industry & Frank Ocean’s “Thinkin Bout You”

From Dr. Herukhuti’s Ocean’s of Love Letter: Is one black man loving another man the revolutionary act of the 21st Century?: In choosing to communicate through the simile, “I feel like a free man,” rather than saying he was a … Continue reading →

A Beautiful Marsupial Afternoon: New (Soma)tics By CAConrad (A Review by Diana Arterian)

Wave Books 240pgs/$18 “Every single thing can now be highlighted as a possible WAY to a poem. It’s true to say the poem is there, it’s right there, it’s always there, and it’s waiting, actually waiting for us.”  The bulk … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Adrienne Gunn

In regards to Adrienne Gunn and this piece she wrote for us, published in March, “Girl in America.” 1. How does one summon the whore within? In the case of Girl in America, it’s as easy as the addition of … Continue reading →

Self-Titled Debut by Andrew Farkas (A Review by J. A. Tyler)

What follows is the fifth in J. A. Tyler’s full-press of Subito Press, a series of reviews appearing at [PANK] over the course of 2012, covering every title available from Subito Press. J. A. Tyler’s previous full-press series have appeared … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Kelli Anne Noftle

Kelli Anne Noftle’s engaging piece, “Moving,” appeared in the March Issue. 1. How has poetry shaped your flash fiction? Do you find the two genres blur together sometimes? I find that they are blurring and bleeding into one another the … Continue reading →

A Forsley Feuilleton: Don’t Ever Antagonize The Horn

Thomas Pynchon has, for almost a century, maintained his privacy – successfully dodging The Media’s muckraking microphones and cankerous cameras – in this hi-tech era when even the most reclusive of recluses have Twitter accounts where they announce every shit … Continue reading →

the unfirm line – Krief

“Now I can say, you’ve got me. Just me. And I can say, take it or leave.” Krief, “La Verite” The act of giving yourself to someone you love, and yet having the strength to tell them to decide. Inner … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Chad Redden

In March came “The Listening Glass” by Chad Redden. 1. Your use of white space between stanzas is generous. Was this intentional when creating “The Listening Glass”? Yes, the space between stanzas and within some of the lines is intentional. … Continue reading →

My world is empty without you/World is empty: on love songs, state violence, & Michael Laney

On Monday night, Charlotte police officers shot and killed Michael Laney. Laney was handcuffed in police custody at the time of his murder. In nearly all mainstream coverage of this police execution, journalists have named Laney as an “armed robbery … Continue reading →

Variations of a Brother War By J.A. Tyler (A Review by Ryan Werner)

Small Doggies Press 116 pgs/$12.95 Fairness, love, and war are usually dealt with in that order. This says nothing of the truths found within the inversions, the war in love and the love of fairness and how it’s only a … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Joshua Michael Stewart

“Night of the Living Blues” from Joshua Michael Stewart was published in the  March Issue. 1. Is it a requirement to obtain a poetic license to write a poem involving music in some shape or way? Poetic License? I guess … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Sarah Henning

Sarah Henning had Four Stories in the March Issue. 1. Does breastfeeding really work in the bonding of a child to its mother? From what I understand (not being a mother myself!), both bottle feeding and breastfeeding are good times … Continue reading →

On Feeling Red: a failed essay about eczema, riots, Mesut Özil and Zinedine Zidane, the Belarus Free Theatre, neoliberalism, austerity and the Eurozone, KLM Airlines, Derek Jarman, Mary Magdalene, clingy women, feminist killjoys, melancholic migrants, contamination, sickness, health, racism, capitalism, totalitarian patriarchy, “the barbaric,” suicide economies, refusing to leave your shit at the door, showing your wound, not getting over it, feeling it, still feeling it.

(Note: Having not written at the [PANK] blog for nearly a year, I apparently thought the best way to make up for that absence would be to stuff an entire year’s worth of posts in one. I am definitely doing … Continue reading →

Wichita by Thad Ziolkowski (A Review by Sara Lippmann)

Tonga Books 256 pgs/$16 It takes a certain kind of writer to pull off a wild rumpus of a book. (Particularly, when there are no accompanying illustrations of teeth and eyes and claws.) Acclaimed poet (Our Son the Arson) and … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Virginia Konchan

From the March Issue, Six Poems by Virginia Konchan, and now this interview. 1. What wouldn’t Napoleon do? “My” Napoleon (in the lineage of Susan Howe) wouldn’t convert on his deathbed, betray emotion, harbor regrets, or talk just for the … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Isaac Butler

We published Isaac Butler’s great piece, “In the Heart Library,” in the March Issue. 1. What would you like your heart to be made of? Given the history of heart attacks on both sides of family, probably adamantium, the indestructible … Continue reading →

The Bee-Loud Glade by Steve Himmer (A Review by Helen McClory)

  Atticus Books 224 pages/$9.99 Sitting in a cafe full of bustle, greasily-lit against the mist outside and pungent with the unsettling reek of poorly-brewed grounds dumped into an open bin, I open this book at its beginning, and suddenly … Continue reading →

Three Ways of the Saw by Matt Mullins (A Review by David Atkinson)

Atticus Books 216 pgs/$7.99 In recent memory, it seems that much of the fiction that receives significant critical attention is the writing that is unusual.  Whether this means fiction that experiments with language, fiction that challenges what a story is … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Rebecca Hazelton

From the March Issue, Three Poems by Rebecca Hazelton. 1. Where would you like to wash up? Things that wash up seem melancholy for me, though I suppose it’s all in how you look at it—I could view these items … Continue reading →

A Forsley Feuilleton: Franz Kafka should have spent his time rolling dice with confidence on the corner instead of writing letters in confidence on the paper – Act Two

There aren’t many like you – members of that almost non-existent subculture of Americans who practice the ancient art of reading words – and the few peers that you do have aren’t reading these words.  They are reading the words … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Melissa Yancy

In March came Melissa Yancy’s “Boolean Napoleans.” 1. Do you put the boo in Boolean? I’d like to think so. I’d like to think I put the lean in Boolean, too. 2. Are you a leaker? Sadly, yes. At work … Continue reading →

Cataclysm Baby by Matt Bell (A Review by Joseph Michael Owens)

Mud Luscious Press 118 pgs/$12 Matt Bell’s Cataclysm Baby has been a tremendously difficult book for me to review. I’ve read it twice now and still find myself at a loss for words, though, admittedly, it’s a loss in an … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Kimberly Ann Southwick

From the March Issue, “Near Sonnet for S” by Kimberly Ann Southwick. 1. What would a far sonnet look like? You would have to squint to see it. When you reached out, it wouldn’t be there. Maybe they write them … Continue reading →

F-Stein by L. J. Moore (A Review by J. A. Tyler)

What follows is the fourth in J. A. Tyler’s full-press of Subito Press, a series of reviews appearing at [PANK] over the course of 2012, covering every title available from Subito Press. J. A. Tyler’s previous full-press series have appeared … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Lisa Ahn

From the April Issue, “Blown,” by Lisa Ahn. 1. How many bodies have you left in the Everglades? I’m sure I’ve buried at least three or four incarnations of myself – the self-destructive teen, the cloudy drunk, the fear-sodden twenty-something. … Continue reading →

Books We Can’t Quit: Microserfs by Douglas Coupland

Chosen by: Alicia Kennedy Original Publication Date: 1996   Sometimes I think, I miss the places I used to go in those books I used to read. I don’t really know what it means. Do I miss being adolescent, spending … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Ian Brown

In April, “Fuck You Superman” from Ian Brown. 1. Would you ever tell Superman to go fuck himself to his face? Oh boy – what a question. No. Definitely no. I mean, assuming I was living within the realm where … Continue reading →

The Postmortal by Drew Magary (A Review by Steven Casimer Kowalski)

Penguin 384 pgs/$10  The Postmortal is a book about a near future in which humans develop a “cure” for aging.  Take the cure, and you’re locked in at the same age until an outside force like cancer or a bullet … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Carly Berg

You should read Carly Berg’s amazing story, “Oysteresque,” over and over. 1.How did you walk the fine line of delusion in “Oysteresque”?  Well, it was based on a dream, so I just kind of went with that. 2. What undersea … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: María Elvira Vara Tatá

From the March Issue, “La Muda y La Tonta,” by María Elvira Vara Táta. 1. If your hair was a pendulum, what would you have hanging at the end? A lie detector. That way, I wouldn’t be able to lie … Continue reading →

Reality, Reality by Jackie Kay (a review by Helen McClory

Picador Press   240 pages,  £12.99   Jackie Kay’s voice in my head is clear and light and dancing, a young river through green grass. I’ve been to see her read poetry twice, and both times reveled in that voice, … Continue reading →

A Forsley Feuilleton: the Hollywood Machine started feeding unoriginal ideas to unsuspecting movie-goers as a cheap alternative to risk

Last Memorial Day weekend I went to Rasputin – the music/movie store from Berkeley, not the ‘Mad Monk’ from Siberia – to get a war flick, not a magic dick.  I planned on honoring our country’s fallen soldiers by lying … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Jared Yates Sexton

We were so excited to have this great story from Jared Yates Sexton in the March Issue, “A Man Gets Tired.” We were also excited about Jared’s answers to these questions. 1. How do you look when you get drunk? … Continue reading →

Treasure Island!!! by Sara Levine (A Review by Lynne Weiss)

Tonga Books/Europa Editions 176 pages/$15.00 Anyone who loves reading has discovered at some point the book or the character that seems to offer a model for how to live. Some find it in Dostoevsky, others in Austen, or Bronte, or … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Christopher Woods

These two photos from Christopher Woods were a part of the March Issue. Now Christopher answers our questions about them. 1. What made you get started with photography? I have always been interested in visual art. In fact, years ago … Continue reading →

Win with Shut Up/Look Pretty

Did you read Shut Up/Look Pretty? You can win goodies from Tiny Hardcore! Each chapter of my contribution to the book, Local God (a novella about four boys in a terrible punk band at Stirling University), is titled with a song … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Erin Stalcup

Erin Stalcup’s “Why Things Fall” was a lovely addition to our March Issue. 1. What would you shoot off a lover’s head? An owl made of mica. Wouldn’t that be beautiful? (Yet, while my father is a great archer who … Continue reading →

Living Arrangements by Laura Maylene Walter (A Review by Dawn West)

BkMk Press  175 pgs/$12 Laura Maylene Walter’s Living Arrangements is a collection of finely honed stories, all deeply concerned with place and memory. Her stories are quietly resonant–beneath the everyday veneer of each of her characters, Walter clarifies their internal … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Alexander Allison

“A New Person” from Alexander Allison appeared in the March Issue. 1. What if I wanted to pity your narrator in “A New Person?” What would you do about it? Pity is powerless and self-abasing. Pity seems like a condescending … Continue reading →

Creatures Here Below by O. H. Bennett (A Review by Martin Macaulay)

Agate Bolden 272 pgs/$10 O H Bennett’s Creatures Here Below is an accomplished and compelling novel. Structured around character-titled sections, the author pushes us into the lives of Mason and his mother Gail. They share top billing in terms of … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Joshua Dalton

Joshua Dalton’s great piece, “The Showrunner,” is from the February Issue. 1. Who is going to play you in the made-for-cable movie? What network do you hope picks it up? I’d love to say Joseph Gordon-Levitt, but Philip Seymour Hoffman … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Eduardo Gabrieloff

These three wonderful poems by Eduardo Gabrieloff were published in the February Issue. 1. What have you walked into lately? I walked into the darkest catacombs this side of the Mississippi. Let me tell you, it wasn’t pretty. The stench … Continue reading →

A Forsley Feuilleton: Franz Kafka Should Have Spent His Time Shooting Dice With Confidence On The Corner Instead Of Writing Letters In confidence on the paper – Act One

This month I’ve only written one Forsley Feuilleton – I’m writing the second right now.  I blame my lack of productivity on my lack of brain activity, and I blame my lack of brain activity on my lack of nourishing … Continue reading →

A Cloth House by Joseph Riippi (A Review by Thomas Michael Duncan)

Housefire, 2012. 94 pgs/$7.99 Everyone has the capacity for several different types of memories, one of which is the flashbulb memory. A flashbulb memory is a highly precise snapshot sort of memory, one that sticks with a person for a … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Reed Gaines

From February, “Hikikomori Romance,” by Reed Gaines. 1. How did you react when you got the acceptance letter? At first, I was ecstatic. Then, I had to roll my eyes. This poem is the only thing I have in publication, … Continue reading →

They Hover Over Us by Richard Fellinger (A Review by Dawn Zera)

Snake Nation Press $25.00 In his solid collection of short stories, They Hover Over Us, the 2011 winner of the Serena McDonald Kennedy Award for fiction, Richard Fellinger writes about Pennsylvania’s rust belt so vividly that I nodded and winced and … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Carol Deminski

Carol Deminski’s “The Price of Luxury” was published in the February Issue. 1. What would be your other other car? The International Space Station. I’d love to be a space tourist. 2. How would you feel about knowing a man … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Ryan Bradley

Ryan Bradley answers questions about his story, “West,” as seen in the February Issue. 1. The narrative of “West” is very puzzle piece like, slowly coming together to give us a full picture. How did you go about structuring “West” … Continue reading →

Zazen by Vanessa Veselka (a review by Helen McClory)

Red Lemonade (2011) 256 pages, $15.95 Please note: this review is quite effusive. If I don’t overtly order you to go out and buy a copy of this book, it’s only down to my sense of propriety. How otherwise could … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Eleanor Bennett

From February, “Ancient Steps,” these photographs from Eleanor Bennett. 1. What got you into photography? Who are your influences? I started taking photos four years ago for a project in which you had to capture the biodiversity in your neighbourhood. … Continue reading →

Wild by Cheryl Strayed (A Review by Alan Stewart Carl)

Alfred A. Knopf 336 pgs/$25.95 Whenever I’ve collected a particularly burdensome number of writing rejections, I like to make myself a thick-cut sandwich and fill a bottle with water and take a trail up into the hills. As I hike, … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Christine Fadden

From the February Issue, this great little piece from Christine Fadden, “Little Rubber Houses.” 1. What food would you sit on naked? My boyfriend is cooking swordfish in mango sauce right now, so off the bat, I’d say mango. Maybe … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Mary Kovaleski Byrnes

Do you remember December? Remember December by reading these poems from Mary Kovaleski Byrnes and then reading this interview. 1. What does it take to rattle your world? That weird, alien sound pond ice makes when it’s warming up.Tomatoes that … Continue reading →

With One’s Own Eyes by Sherwood Anderson (A Review by J. A. Tyler)

What follows is the third in J. A. Tyler’s full-press of Subito Press, a series of reviews appearing at [PANK] over the course of 2012, covering every title available from Subito Press. J. A. Tyler’s previous full-press series have appeared … Continue reading →

A Forsley Feuilleton: Stanley Kubrick Wanted A Taste, A Second Taste, Of Terry Southern’s Lamb-Pit

I love fucking Terry Southern. . . that came out wrong.  I never fucked the writer, at least not proper fucked.  But I have been fucking him intellectually, off and on, for a few decades now.  By that I mean … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Sophie Klahr

“Say When” from Sophie Klahr was published in the February Issue. You should read it now. 1. What animals, real or otherwise, is a woman made out of? Sneaky ones. 2. Which crime would you prefer not to contain? I … Continue reading →

A Hollow Cube is a Lonely Space by S.D. Foster (A Review by David Atkinson)

Eraserhead Press 108 pgs/$9.95    As a preliminary matter, I am not an expert on bizarro fiction. In all honesty, I’ve never been able to truly define what it is, or is not. I’ve never been able to really be … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Amy Letter

From February, “Blue Alyssa And The Sad Gray Crab.” 1. What would you do if you ran into yourself? Jump out of the car and make sure myself was okay. (There was a time when I would’ve joked that I’d’ve … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Devan Goldstein

Devan Goldstein’s wonderful piece, “Five An Hour,” appeared in the February Issue. This hour Devan answers six questions. 1. What factory would you work the line? What would be the fringe benefits? The Dream Factory. I imagine that working the … Continue reading →

My Untimely Death by Adam Peterson (A Review by J. A. Tyler)

What follows is the second in J. A. Tyler’s full-press of Subito Press, a series of reviews appearing at [PANK] over the course of 2012, covering every title available from Subito Press. J. A. Tyler’s previous full-press series have appeared … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Brittany Shutts

We loved this story, “Babymaking,” in February and we love it now and also we love this interview with Brittany. 1. Why doesn’t anyone make an abortion pact? Nobody would give you any presents. 2. What movie has people having … Continue reading →

Sweet Nothing by Nate Pritts (A Review by Brian Fanelli)

Lowbrow Press 107 pages, $13  American poet and critic Ezra Pound once described a poetic image as something that should capture an emotional and intellectual complex in an instant of time. Nate Pritts’ latest collection of poems, Sweet Nothing, is … Continue reading →

Why I Hoard Books & Why I Won’t Read Them

So many books I haven’t read Anna Karenina; The Pale King; The Night Circus; Silver Sparrow. These are a few of the physical books in front of me, suspended in the air by blood red “floating shelves” bolted to the … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Christopher Citro

Remember November, when the temperature was turning and the snow was just starting? Now that those things are gone, remember these Five Poems from Christopher Citro, from the November Issue. 1. What happened the last time you ventured out beyond … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Eugenia Leigh

These Three Poems from Eugenia Leigh were published in the February Issue. Eugenia enjoyed answering all our questions. 1. What would be the first thing you did when you get out of prison? Lie down in a field. Or seek … Continue reading →

A Forsley Feuilleton: I Would Have Obeyed Those Gods, Became A Dunce, And Joined The Confederacy

I read John Kennedy Toole’s A Confederacy of Dunces last month.  But it was too late.  My life was damaged beyond repair.  If I had read it ten years ago as a high school student, I would have a career, … Continue reading →

Inferno (A Poet’s Novel) by Eileen Myles (A Review by Helen McClory)

271 pgs/$16 OR Books, 2010   Imagine you come into a room all wooden and light, say it’s a bar, or an old converted church. You’ve come in out of the NYC street (LES or East or West Village) into … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Stephen Mills

In the February Issue, there was this great piece, “Sex Education,” from Stephen Mills. 1. Why is it always funny when a guy gets raped in a tv show or a movie?   Watch a few episodes of HBO’s Oz and … Continue reading →

Shoulda Been Jimi Savannah by Patricia Smith (A Review by Jason Carney)

Coffee House Press 116 pgs/$16  Patricia Smith’s newest collection, Shoulda Been Jimi Savannah, evokes a sense of history and self-awareness combined with precise storytelling and the most crafted verse. Each poem delves deeper into the mythology of her family, her … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Mike Dockins

In January, “Letter To Iredell From The Yucatan” by Mike Dockins. 1. What made you choose the stanzaless structure of this poem? This was not the first of what is now a collection of 21 epistolary poems, making up my … Continue reading →

Further Interpretations of Real-Life Events by Kevin Moffett (A Review by Amye Archer)

Harper Perennial 240 pgs, $10 I first met Kevin Moffett on a cool April evening when he cracked open my skull with an ice pick and settled into my brain for the next three weeks.  Okay, so maybe he wasn’t … Continue reading →

Nectar by Lisa Bellamy (A Review by P. Jonas Bekker)

Encircle Press 24 pgs/$12.95   I staggered out of the theater after Waiting for Godot. Jeez, I griped to Peter, That’s it? We’re all just wind and gristle? Yep, he said after a minute, and I knew he was trying … Continue reading →

A Forsley Feuilleton: They Are Two Different Games But In The End They Are The Same

“There goes Roy Hobbs, the best there ever was in this game” – that’s what the protagonist of Bernard Malamud’s The Natural wanted people to say when he walked down the street.  And they would have.  He was a baseball … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Jennifer Pieroni

From January, “Life on the Dead Tree” by Jennifer Pieroni. Jennifer answers questions about climbing, eating, editing, rapping, and witnessing. 1. When was the last time you climbed? How high was it and what did you see? I don’t climb … Continue reading →

Little Red Riding Hood Missed the Bus by Kristin Abraham (A Review by J. A. Tyler)

What follows is the first in J. A. Tyler’s full-press of Subito Press, a series of reviews appearing at [PANK] over the course of 2012, covering every title available from Subito. J. A. Tyler’s previous full-press series have appeared at … Continue reading →

the unfirm line – Grandaddy

“Yeah is what we had, no we never knew Good, good is what we understood” Grandaddy, Yeah is what we had I help raise two children. They are young now, and I try to teach them the basics: manners, kindness, … Continue reading →

No Award for 2012 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction; Franzen Seethes

  On my way home from work, I said to myself, “I’m not going to write about this. I don’t care.” Welp– As you probably know, the winner of the 2012 Pulitzer Prize For Fiction was “No Award,” written by … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Gabrielle Lucille Fuentes

In February, this wonderful piece of fiction from Gabrielle Lucille Fuentes, “The Lights.” 1. Why did you choose to write “The Lights” in second person? This started as an exercise from Noah Eli Gordon based on Eula Biss’s essay “Time … Continue reading →

Books We Can’t Quit: The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster

Chosen By: Ally Nicholl Bullseye Books, 1988 272 pgs/$6.99 I discovered The Phantom Tollbooth at the appropriate age and in the usual way. I was about nine, and it was a battered old copy I came across in the schoolroom … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Robert Rothman

In February, “Arrow” from Robert Rothman. 1. If you were Cupid, what projectile would you use? Love is savage but an arrow with its expanding tip rips and ravages. I would use a dart that pricks interest, that causes the beloved … Continue reading →

A Forsley Feuilleton: They Have Since Cut Their Hair Off, Sued Their Fans, And Are Probably Opening A Chain Of Vegan Restaurants

When Robert Johnson went down to the crossroads and called upon Satan to rise from the fires of Hell to tune his guitar, he didn’t have dollar signs in his eyes and titties on his brain.  Material possessions were of … Continue reading →

God’s Autobio by Rolli (A Review by David Atkinson)

Now or Never Publishing 233 pgs/$17.95 To be honest, I wasn’t really sure what to expect when I picked up God’s Autobio by Rolli. I hadn’t heard a lot of talk about the book. In fact, I hadn’t really heard … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Eric Higgins

“The Inexact Nature” by Eric Higgins was published in the January Issue. Now, Eric discusses prostitution, restraining orders, and illegalities. 1. Who would you prostitute? What would be your pimp name? I wouldn’t prostitute anyone. To prostitute someone seems deeply … Continue reading →

Legs Get Led Astray by Chloe Caldwell (A Review by Ryan Werner)

Future Tense Books 168 pgs/$12 I remember being young because I still am. What is there to say about it? I met a lot of people, didn’t have sex with most of them, and then either left them or was … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Benjamin Rybeck

In January, “Back-Story” by Bejanmin Rybeck. “The real story isn’t starting yet.”…. 1. When is the real story starting? The idea of “the real” is but a construct used to mediate “the imaginary.” Which is to say, it’ll start on … Continue reading →

Death Wish Winner Announced

Congratulations to Martha Williams on winning the Death Wish Book Giveaway. Death Wishing author, Laura Ellen Scott, had this to say about judging the wishes submitted and making the difficult decision to choose just one: “So hard to choose! I … Continue reading →

A Forsley Feuilleton: Flavor Flav Is A Classically Trained Pianist, Tom Petty Has A Dirty Fish Tank, and Selena Gomez Is Starring In Harmony Korine’s New Flick

Dostoyevsky used to watch his wife shit, G.G. Allin voted for Jimmy Carter, Jerry Garcia tongue-kissed his older sister on her deathbed, Diana Ross hated the movie When Harry Met Sally, Elizabeth Taylor is a beer enthusiast, Kirk Douglas collects … Continue reading →

Not Merely Because of the Unknown that was Stalking Toward Them by Jenny Boully

84pgs/$14 Tarpaulin Sky, 2011   In this prose-poem hybrid, the texts of Peter Pan have been enmeshed, re-corded, and spun into a thickness of sensual detail and slippery cross-reference. Under Boully’s fingertips, Neverland has burst open like a sodden swollen root, … Continue reading →

Make a Wish and Win Free Books!

Laura Ellen Scott’s excellent and quirky debut novel, Death Wishing (Ig Publishing, 2011), is set in post-Katrina New Orleans. In this wonderfully reimagined world, random dying wishes are granted by some unknown and arbitrary power. Wishes that can cure cancer, magick-away … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Matthew Gilbert

In January, these Two Poems from Matthew Gilbert. Now, this interview. Read both today. 1. How does one feign virginity? In the same way you fence: in the suburbs where I was raised (a cow-town parents brought us to as … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Jeffrey Kingman

Jeffrey Kingman’s Two Poems were published in the January Issue. Jeffrey answers violent questions about drumming, comfort, and body shots. 1. What’s with poetry’s fascination with crows and winter? Crows are big and handsome and outspoken. Yet not obnoxious like … Continue reading →

My Dead Pets Are Interesting by Lenore Zion (A Review By Thomas Michael Duncan)

TNB Books, 2011. 228 pgs/$14.99 In the title essay of her collection, My Dead Pets Are Interesting, Lenore Zion recounts how she told a man on their first date about her dog being hit by a car. He didn’t want … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Mika Seifert

This wonderful piece, “Blackbox” by Mika Seifert, was published in the January issue. 1. Whose body would you hide in the ocean? The body of Julio Cortazar who was an axolotl. 2. What would be in your black box? Mostly … Continue reading →

A Forsley Feuilleton: Gary Shteyngart Can Afford As Many Bottles of Vodka And “Double-Cured-Spicy-Soppressata-And-Avacado” Sandwiches As He Craves

As far as the schools of literary criticism go – and damn do they go far, so far that you need a dozen diabeticless Labrador Retrievers with MFAs to fetch them – I’ve always favored those theories, like Historical-Biographical criticism, … Continue reading →

L’Vis Lives! by Kevin Coval (A Review by Brian Fanelli)

Haymarket Books 103 pages, $16 Renowned poet Patricia Smith writes in the introduction to Kevin Coval’s newest collection of poems, L’Vis Lives, that his latest offering is a “relentless book, brave and uncomfortable.” Indeed, Coval’s collection is brave and forceful … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Matthew Battles

You must read “For Provisional Description of Superficial Features” by Matthew Battles. And, also, you must read this interview. 1. How would you murder someone using Wikipedia? Well, I suppose I’ve specified one way of doing so, but it’s beyond … Continue reading →

Shenanigans! by Joseph Michael Owens (A Review by David Atkinson)

Grey Sparrow Press 100 pgs/$9.99 I’ve heard that by the time Bukowski was really into the swing of things as a writer, he had stopped reading much of anything.  He did not feel that most of what he came across … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Ashley Farmer

These Four Stories by Ashley Farmer were published in the January Issue. 1. What position of power do you want to hold in Farm Town? Well, in the “real” Farm Town world, Tom is in charge. He’s animated and benevolent … Continue reading →

A Letter from the Fictional Character, Geneva, to her Author, Myfanwy Collins

Engine Books, March, 2012, $14.95   Dear Myfanwy Collins, I want to thank you for telling my story, and the story of the others too, especially the women. I’m glad you didn’t just write down all the terrible. That you … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Evelyn Somers

“Viral” by Evelyn Somers was published in the January issue. 1. How is a baby like a virus? To be literal, one person gives it to another; it can live inside you for quite a long time, too. My son … Continue reading →

Hot Pink by Adam Levin (A Review by Joseph Michael Owens)

McSweeney’s 256 pgs/$18 Sometimes, other people really sum up your thoughts more perfectly than you can—at least in a single statement:  Dude just got his foot off everybody’s throat and now he’s back ALREADY. That’s what Adam Novy (The Avian … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Sheila Macavoy

It would do your week justice to start out by reading or re-reading “At The Off Ramp” by Sheila Macavoy, published in January. Then follow that up by reading this interview. 1. Why did you start it? Seemed like a … Continue reading →

A Forsley Feuilleton: An Open Letter To The Anti-Ginger Grocery Store Night Managers Across This Once Tolerant Nation

I know you are going to do with this letter what you did with all the others: throw it, while laughing, into the wastebasket labeled, “Letters From Fiery Tempered Firecrotch Ex-Employees.”  But I quit another Night Stocking job at another … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Marcus Speh

“The Sodomized Dictator” by Marcus Speh appeared in the January Issue. 1. Where is the sodomy in this story or do you prefer to create titles to your work that misdirect your reader’s expectations? The sodomy is not in the … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Gary McDowell

These Two Poems by Gary McDowell were in the January Issue. Read the wonderful poems and read this wonderful interview. 1. Why are poets so fascinated with autumn? Fall.  The Fall.  Falling.  In love.  Out of love.  Darkness.  Leaves.  Leaving.  … Continue reading →

Books We Can’t Quit: The Virgin Suicides by Jeffrey Eugenides

Chosen by: Dawn West First Published in Hardcover: April 1, 1993. Farrar, Straus and Giroux 256 pgs/$10.99 “What are you doing here, honey? You’re not even old enough to know how bad life gets.”  “Obviously, Doctor, you’ve never been a thirteen-year-old girl.” … Continue reading →

The Beauty Bar (or outside)

No need to describe the weather–”Chicago night winds in March” will suffice. We stood outside the Beauty Bar, the five of us–three bent at the seams by alcohol, one (of the aforementioned three) neared systemic shutdown. He led our court. … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Gwen Mullins

Gwen Mullins’s great work of fiction, “Domestic Violence”, was published in the January Issue. 1. What do you need to sleep? Two full glasses of wine (but no more than that), a list of things I have to do so … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Sherri H. Hoffman

Sherri H. Hoffman’s work of fiction, “Blue”, was published in the January Issue. Sherri answers these intriguing questions. 1. What animal would you like to be crossed with? A Hawksbill sea turtle. Cool facial tattoos and full sleeves. Plus they’ve … Continue reading →

A Forsley Feuilleton: In The Good Old Days You Could Use Books To Beat Your Perverted Boyfriends Into Submission Without A Problem

Everyone’s talking about the future of the book.  Most aren’t actually ‘talking’ about it.  They are Tweeting, Skyping, and Facebooking about it, trading one-liners back and forth over the internet – that collective consciousness of search engine optimizing keyword articles, … Continue reading →

Flood Letters by Karin Gottshall (A Review by Aiden Arata)

Argos Books $10 In an age when apocalyptic threats have become a plague unto themselves—whether one kneels at the alter of spirituality, science, or general confusion—a collection of letters from a protagonist beyond salvation may seem like overkill.  Karin Gottshall’s … Continue reading →

So There! By Nicole Louise Reid (A Review by Janet Freeman)

Stephen F. Austin University Press 176 pgs/$12   Reading Nicole Louise Reid’s short story collection So There! is like reuniting with someone you thought had left the planet years ago—or in this case, a host of someones: sassy, fearless girls … Continue reading →

The Mimic’s Own Voice by Tom Williams (A Review by David Atkinson)

Main Street Rag 97 pgs/$9   There are few things in life, at least for me, as captivating as a puzzle. As much as my mind craves answers; answers that leave other lingering questions are the sort that I find … Continue reading →

The Real Folk Blues

At the end of “Cowboy Bebop,” protagonist and general badass Spike engages in one final shootout with his rival. Bullets fly, the rain falls–all that you’d expect in a finale. Leading up to the last episode, “Cowboy Bebop” felt rushed … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Danez Smith

“First Time/Four Times” by Danez Smith was published in our December Issue. All the sexual questions we could think of for Danez are answered here. 1. How did you come up with hula hooping in a woman’s valley? I was … Continue reading →

A Forsley Feuilleton: I Gave Up The Roadwork Of The Fight-Game For The Drinking Of The Lit-Game – Act Three

You don’t think writing is like fighting, that to get intellectual you have to get physical?  You think I’m crazy for comparing writers to fighters, the lit-game to the fight-game?  Then what do you call Haruki Murakami, the acclaimed Japanese … Continue reading →

Dan Holloway’s The Company of Fellows: A Review by Andrea Mullaney

Meet Tommy West. He’s the hero of Dan Holloway’s The Company of Fellows, a new Oxford-set crime novel, and he’s a man of many attributes. In fact, so many that I began taking note every time a different ability or … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Fiona Chamness

“Jerking Off” by Fiona Chamness was included in the December Issue. Fiona responds to our queries. 1. What are the dangers in getting it on with yourself in a moving Greyhound bus? The bathrooms are tiny and feature many objects … Continue reading →

Morocco by Kendra Grant Malone & Matthew Savoca (A Review by Gina Myers)

Dark Sky Books 116 pages/$10 Inappropriate relationships and illicit affairs have long been the stuff of literature. Morocco, a new collection of poetry from Dark Sky Books, contributes to this tradition but strips away the romance, showing things for what … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: AT Grant

In December, “Four Pieces from Wake” by AT Grant. Grant will now take our questions. 1. How would you stop your dead sister from leaking? Words live and die in the holes and through the words her blood leaks. Sometimes … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Nathan Tavares

Nathan Tavares’s “Interior Spaces” was in the December Issue. Nathan answers questions about dressing slutty, cheating lovers and hidden rooms. 1. How would you dress slutty as a guy? For me, it would be wearing anything other than my usual … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Marianne Colahan

“Disappear Behind Us” by Marianne Colahan was a great addition to our December Issue. 1. What would you hunt? If I had to hunt? If it was my job to be a huntress? I’d be terrible at it. I’d prefer … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Robb Todd

This great story, “All You Need is Love (and a Job (Or Maybe Not a Job)),” by Robb Todd was published in the December Issue. 1. What would be the most inappropriate costume you would wear on Halloween? There’s such … Continue reading →

A Forsley Feuilleton: I Gave Up The Roadwork Of The Fight-Game For The Drinking Of The Lit-Game – Act Two

Those poets, the young happy rich people dressed like old sad poor people, spoke the truth:  after I moved from Phoenix to San Francisco and gave up the roadwork of the fight-game for the drinking of the lit-game, the only … Continue reading →

A Patchwork of Rooms Furnished by Mistakes by J. Bradley (A Review by P. Jonas Bekker)

Deckflight Press $2.oo Fort Myers, August 2002  I should have fended off the emotard when he gnawed your hands, then spat your own fingerprints back.   The pelt hangs in my chest. I try not to wear it. I try … Continue reading →

the unfirm line – Frank Hinton

“You are perfect and clean and floating. Everything was clean about us. Everything was perfect until you burned away.” Frank Hinton, “All Of The People In These Pictures Are Dead Now.” I read once that burning was the best form … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Lisa Marie Basile

In December, we published Four Poems by Lisa Marie Basile from “Andalucia”. You can read the four poems here and buy the book here. 1. How does no one mean to carry their burdens to good places? The first time … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Catherine Campbell

Catherine Campbell’s “Ways To Swim” was published in December. Now, Catherine takes the time to answer some questions. 1. What CD would you include in an insemination kit? Elton John’s “Goodbye Yellow Brick Road.” 2. Who would you carry a … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Gregory Wolos

In December there was “Dr. Moreau’s Pet Shop” by Gregory Wolos. 1. What songs would be on the first album of Dr. Moreau’s Pet Shop Boys? “My Sweet M’ling”; “Kiko in the Dumps”; “Svidridgaylov’s Dream”; “Fay Wray Fay”; “Lost Soul Growl.” … Continue reading →

The Letter All Your Friends Have Written You by Caits Meissner and Tishon (A Review by Amye Archer)

Well&Often Press $15.95/76 pgs. In the preface to The Letter All Your Friends Have Written You, Caits Meissner and Tishon impart to us that they have only been friends for five years, but their poems speak to one another in … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Lisa Bellamy

These Two Poems by Lisa Bellamy were published in November. In regards to all kinds of things, Lisa answers our questions. 1. What puppet or Muppet would you assassinate? Why would they have it coming? Plenty of puppets have it … Continue reading →

Lavinia Ludlow’s alt.punk: A Review by Sara Thomas

Lavinia Ludlow’s novel alt.punk(Casperian) concerns Hazel, a thirty year old Safeway manager with a cleanliness obsession, writing habit and layabout actor boyfriend. After the latter’s stray pubes eventually get too much for her, she meets the somewhat unstable Otis, lead … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Justin Anderson

The great story, “So, They Are Not Wholly Defenseless”, by Justin Anderson was in the December Issue. Justin answers interesting questions with interesting answers. 1. What suit do you wear when you have dinner? Clubs. No, really, I’m from the … Continue reading →

A Forsley Feuilleton: I Gave Up The Roadwork Of The Fight-Game For The Drinking Of The Lit-Game – Act One

Jake ‘The Raging Bull’ LaMotta, Muhammad ‘The Greatest’ Ali, Johnny ‘Mi Vida Loca’ Tapia, Arturo ‘Thunder’ Gatti, Bernard ‘The Executioner’ Hopkins – those were my childhood idols.  I wanted to do what they did.  I wanted to make a living … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Matthew Mogavero

In November, this poem titled “Man Who Lost His Wife at the Knife-Throwing Show” by Matthew Mogavero. Matthew gives us some answeres here. 1. How could you lose your wife at a gun show? Girls don’t like guns. 2. What … Continue reading →

(T)ravel/Un(T)ravel by Neil Shepard (A Review by Brian Fanelli)

  Mid-List Press $13/85 pgs Neil Shepard’s latest collection of poems, (T)ravel/Un(Travel), takes the reader across the landscape of time and place, through crowded marketplaces of China to sacred temples in Bali that are home to secret burial chambers of … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Jon Sealy

John Sealy’s “Then Come Home to Settle” was in the December Issue. Here, Jon answers questions about deal breaking movies amongst other topics. 1. Can you really tell college aged women based on the size of their beer guts? The … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Emma Torzs

“In Fairytales” by Emma Torzs was a part of the December Issue. Emma answers questions about secrets, poetry and fascination. 1. Do you ever shout at a protagonist in a fairy tale to not go in the castle/village/wolf’s mouth? Nah. … Continue reading →

Whitney.

Whitney and my mother are inexorably linked within my memory. They did not know each other. Or maybe they did in the way black women know each other quite well–a sort of underground communication through wormholes connecting history to history, … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Tim Suermondt

In December, there were these two poems by Tim Suermondt. Now, there is this interview where Tim answers questions about them. 1. Why wouldn’t Jesus pop and lock in lieu of doing the cha cha? I wouldn’t be surprised if … Continue reading →

A Forsley Feuilleton: Buy the ticket, take the ride. . . and crack open a bottle of rum

The Rum Diary comes out on DVD tomorrow, and I haven’t been this terrified since the Halloween night it opened in theaters. I took the 14 Muni Bus to its midnight-showing and a limbless hobo offered to tuck me into … Continue reading →

Books We Can’t Quit – Safekeeping by Abigail Thomas

Anchor Books April, 2001 (hardcover originally published by Knopf, 2000) Chosen by: Amye Archer   Maybe it’s the educator in me, but I have, throughout my reading lifetime, creating a series of benchmarks that a book must reach in order … Continue reading →

the unfirm line – Miracle Legion

“Far away from home, but never far away from me.” All For the Best, Miracle Legion. I have always had a shaky sense of “home.” I have lived in many places in my life, cementing to none. Never the real … Continue reading →

The Rebel Wife by Taylor M. Polites (A Review by Tyler Grimm)

Simon & Schuster $15.99/304 pgs. The Rebel Wife, expertly written by Taylor M. Polites, is a genre-subverting novel, framed within the Southern Gothic tradition that is very much a meditation on the purposeless of death, which is immediately evident in … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Lisa Lim

In December, the wonderfulness that is “Mi Madre” by Lisa Lim. In February, the wonderfulness that is her interview with us.

Literary Los Angeles: Old Money, Oil Money, and The Big Sleep

For several months now I’ve been sitting with The Big Sleep, utterly absorbed in its stylish mischief but without any idea of what I might add to the conversation. It is a novel about which it is almost impossible to … Continue reading →

Gallimaufry: It’s So Hard To Say Good-bye To Yesterday, Whatever That Means

Hello. As you may or may not know, this is my last post for my Gallimaufry column. That’s right: it’s time to say good-bye. And as you may or may not know, there are many ways to say good-bye.

The Latest in Cyberspace Fashion

A part of me wants to complain. Something about the land of the social misfits irritates me, but I keep my mouth shut–at times–because I consider it a personal problem, one easily fixed by my removal from the networks. I … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Neelanjana Banerjee

What a great story, that is, “The Golden Deer” by Neelanjana Banerjee. Full of power and lines, it is a must read from the December Issue.

All Her Father’s Guns by James Warner (A Review by Thomas Michael Duncan)

Numina Press $13.95/200 pgs. The United States of America is heavily divided, possibly more so now than anytime since the end of the civil war. Strict bipartisanism and our elected representatives’ inabilities to cross party lines is one of the … Continue reading →

A Forsley Feuilleton: I’m funny how? Funny like a clown? I amuse you? I make you laugh?

In the days following last week’s Forsley Feuilleton, I wanted to surf the internet naked, vulnerable both physically and emotionally, yelling like Emmett Ray at the end of Sweet and Lowdown: “I made a mistake! I made a mistake!” Last … Continue reading →

Best Lesbian Erotica 2012, edited by Kathleen Warnock: A Review by Nikki Magennis

This book is overflowing with graphic sex. That might sound like a duh thing to say about a collection of erotica, but it’s the thing that struck me most forcibly while I was reading it. Close-up, vigorous, vivid sex scenes, … Continue reading →

Gathered Here Together by Garrett Socol (A Review by David Atkinson)

Ampersand (&) Books $15.00/230 pgs. As my layman’s understanding of the human brain informs me, human attention is drawn to differences as opposed to similarities.  We are surrounded by immense amounts of information during almost every moment of every day … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Eric Ellingsen

“The People Called Endless” by Eric Ellingsen was published in the November Issue. Eric answered questions for us about laziness, poets and benches.

Ask The Author: Riley Michael Parker

Riley Michael Parker’s “Silver Dagger” appeared in the November Issue. He answers a lot of questions about houses for us.

The Third Reich by Roberto Bolaño (A Review by Joseph Michael Owens)

Farrar, Straus, and Giroux $14.95/288 pgs I made a mistake in writing this review, or, perhaps more specifically, before writing this review: I read a couple reviews online. I did it on a whim and it was only because I … Continue reading →

A Forsley Feuilleton: The seducing letter I got in the mail from Marie Calloway

Give The Rumpus five buckaroos a month and they’ll send you a Letter in the Mail almost every week from a more important person than yourself – like Dave Eggers, Nick Flynn, Emily Gould, and Jonathan Ames.  By buckaroos I … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Mary Jane Newton

November showed these four poems by Mary Jane Newton. Mary Jane talks about comic strip characters, Duran Duran and stanza building.

If All They Had Were Their Bodies?

I’ve returned several times to the title of Michelle Reale’s new chapbook, If All They Had Were Their Bodies (Burning River, 2011), posing it as a question of its characters. What if these characters—these vulnerable, sometimes cruel, and often-mistreated children, … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Jesse Damiani

In November, three great poems from Jesse Damiani. Read the subtleties of our questions and in Jesse’s answers here. 1. Will you drink what we give you? Any drink that PANK wants to give me is a drink worth drinking (unless … Continue reading →

Call For Submissions: Specter Magazine’s Hip-Hop Issue

Submissions for Specter Magazine’s first themed issue, The Hip-Hop Issue, are now open. We’re looking for fiction, poetry, non-fiction, and art/photography which embodies a hip-hop aesthetic. The Hip-Hop issue is scheduled for a June 4th, 2012 release (subject to change). … Continue reading →

Jason Bredle’s Smiles of The Unstoppable (A Review by Joseph Goosey)

Magic Helicopter Press $11.95/76 pgs. “AT NIGHT WE’D BANDAGE OURSELVES WITH GAUZE AND VISIT RESTURANTS / TO DELIGHT OTHER’S OF STORIES OF WHAT HAPPENED:” REGARDING JASON BREDLE’S SMILES OF THE UNSTOPPABLE.” When Mike Young said hey will you review Jason … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Rachel Bunting

Two amazing poems from Rachel Bunting were in the November Issue. Rachel discusses the poems and how life is an act of collection in our interview. 1. What have you pulled of your mouth lately? The obvious (and truest) answer … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Jennifer A. Howard

In November, “The Fiber Optic Heart” by Jennifer A. Howard. Jennifer answers questions about throwing, swimming and drinking. 1. What is the download speed of your heart? What would you like it to be? The units here would be love … Continue reading →

PULP AND PAPER By Josh Rolnick (A Review by Sara Lippmann)

University of Iowa Press 192 pgs/$16 Reading is a solitary experience. We sit alone, we read alone; and yet, in the hands of an adept and gifted writer we are never alone. We are in the trusted company of characters … Continue reading →

A Forsley Feuilleton: He was eating my prose as the typewriter shit it out

William F. Buckley, the conservative writer from the right ruling class, owned a King Charles Spaniel named Rowley.  Eli Cash, the Western writer from the film, The Royal Tenenbaums, ran over a Beagle named Buckley.  Because the title character in … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Susan Lago

“Songs From the River” by Susan Lago was in the November Issue. She discusses the story, and herself, in this interview. 1. If you could swim through anything, what would it be and why? If I could, I would swim … Continue reading →

Theater State by Jack Boettcher (A Review by P. Jonas Bekker)

Blue Square Press 198 pgs/$12 In Theater State, Jack Boettcher’s debut novel, published by Blue Square Press, the world has become what we wanted it to be. And yet, it isn’t exactly what we thought it would be. Although Boettcher … Continue reading →

the unfirm line – Sarah Rose Etter

“Then the pinholes move and I can only see the wall, but I know he is still there …” Sarah Rose Etter, Chicken Father. Every now and then, the simplest lines mean the most to a reader. They pull memories … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Sam Martone

Sam Martone’s “A Map/A Method” was a wonderful part of the November Issue. Sam maps out some of his thinking by answering our questions. 1. What would motivate you the most to go into the woods? A girl wanting me to … Continue reading →

A Forsley Feuilleton: I believe he once claimed to have reeled in a marlin with one hand and beaten a bear in arm wrestling with the other

Even though Woody Allen is still sticking his wrinkled pecker into Soon-Yi, his ex-girlfriend’s adopted daughter, I support the great filmmaker unconditionally.  It’s time to forget about his scandal and start shunning those writers that still use it as an … Continue reading →

Blackwash Canal by Jason Labbe (A Review by Jana Wilson)

H_ngm_n Books 33 pgs At first glance Jason Labbe’s new chapbook Blackwash Canalis a faulty play with form. In the first section entitled “Six Poems for X” Labbe’s exemplary language is lost in the over-reliance of form that it becomes … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Andrea O’ Rourke

Two great poems by Andrea O’ Rourke were a part of the November Issue. Andrea responds to questions about a variety of things. 1. Would you rather be the first woman or the other woman? Why? Neither. Both of these … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Sarah Malone

Sarah Malone’s “Light At New Latitude” appeared in the November Issue. Here, Sarah answers questions about time, awkward jokes and walks of shame. 1. What is the most awkward joke you have ever told? My subconscious is probably using this … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Lauren Schmidt

Two Poems by Lauren Schmidt were part of the October Issue. Lauren answers questions about her face, her purse and her poems. 1. How do you wish you were disfigured? I don’t know if this makes me dull, but I … Continue reading →

Henge

I was three when my biological mother left me. I don’t remember her leaving. I don’t recall a feeling of loss. I remember a book from my childhood, Are you My Mother? A baby bird hopped between animals asking, “Are … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Mike Miner

In December, Mike Miner’s “The Rematch”. Mike took the time to answer questions about robberies and convenience stores. 1. Who would you fight again? What would be the outcome?   I would not fight my little brothers again. I have … Continue reading →

Books We Can’t Quit – S.F.W. by Andrew Wellman

Random House January, 1991 Chosen by David Atkinson I have to admit, I’m a little nervous to talk about this book.  For a lot of people, certain books take on an almost sacred character.  They speak to a part of … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Barrett Bowlin

“Pictures From the Coast of France” by Barrett Bowlin is a wonderful piece of fiction that graced the November Issue. It is an absolutely engaging story, much like Barrett’s answers here. 1. How would you react if you found a … Continue reading →

territories of folding by TC Tolbert (A Review by j/j hastain)

Kore Press 38 pgs, $13 In territories of folding TC Tolbert saying “needless to say I am hegemony” is pleasantly destabilizing in the same way that a crystalline or jeweled brick that one comes upon by surprise while meandering might … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Peter Kispert

In November, Peter Kispert’s “Lowndes County, GA”.  Answered here are questions posed to him about his writing and this piece. 1. Why would someone start a fire in a paper mill? How would you do it?   Well, I imagine … Continue reading →

The Marriage Plot by Jeffrey Eugenides (A Review by Joseph Michael Owens)

Farrar, Straus and Giroux 416 pgs, $15 “In Professor Saunders’s opinion, the novel had reached its apogee with the marriage plot and had never recovered from its disappearance. In the days when success in life had depended on marriage, and … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Grace Hobbs

“Fortune’s Conjecture” by Grace Hobbs is in the November Issue. Grace answers questions about the structure of the story and marraige, among other things, for us here. 1. Why did you choose to structure your story using mathematical concepts? If … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Mike Rosenthal

In November, was Mike Rosenthal’s “Crumbles and Gumbles”.  Mike answers questions about his ideas, boats and drinking with his parents. 1. What nickname would you be called if you were in a power couple? Guy Fieri. 2. What do you … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Stacy Lynn Austin

“Mount Bonnell” is a piece by Stacy Lynn Austin, a part of the October 2011 issue. Stacy answered all kinds of interesting questions for us, and for you. 1. What would you do on a second honeymoon? I’ve never been … Continue reading →

Etcetera’s Mistress by Thom Ward (A Review by Brian Fanelli)

Accents Publishing 57 pages, $10 Thom Ward’s latest collection of poems, Etcetera’s Mistress, isn’t a book to merely breeze through. Like all good poetry, Ward’s poems demand time and energy on behalf of the reader. The poems range in scope … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Tessa Fontaine

Tessa Fontaine’s “There Are Places To Reach That Are Equal And Violent” is a piece of the October Issue. Here, Tessa answers questions about triangle boobs, dictators and Communism. 1. Why did you choose to have the title also be … Continue reading →

Dear Marie Calloway

I’m no angel. Hold yourself with care. I’m old enough to be your mother. But I’m no one. Lidia Yuknavitch, Rachel Resnick, Cheryl Strayed, Chelsea G. Summers, Antonia Crane, Susie Bright, Kerry Cohen, Sue William Silverman, Ethel Rohan, and Dylan … Continue reading →

the unfirm line – Shome Dasgupta

“Again they stuck their heads back into the earth & laughed & sang songs until their lungs were full of land.” Shome Dasgupta, from {C.} An MLP Stamp Stories Anthology Again, I wait for Spring, wait for the warm sun … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Michael Shea

Two Poems by Michael Shea are a part of the October issue. Michael talks about his influences and what’s following him. 1. What mythical beast would make a terrible appliance? Probably most of them. I mean, you might think a … Continue reading →

Gallimaufry: A Compendium Of Compendiums Regarding Wine, Bluff-Calling & English Majors In Prison

Compendium #1: Wine/Movie Pairings There are tons of lists that help you pair wine with food. But what about lists that help you pair wine with movies? Well, here it is: the definitive wine-movie pairing list. Chacayes Malbec 2003 Pairs … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Vic Sizemore

“As The Spirit Moves” by Vic Sizemore is a part of the October issue. Here, Vic discusses religion, West Virginia and where this story came from. 1. What would it take to make you walk a great distance? I have … Continue reading →

Mule & Pear by Rachel Eliza Griffiths (A Review by Kim Loomis-Bennett)

New Issues Poetry & Prose 97 pages/$15 Mule & Pear contains voices of black women literary ghosts and their creators, collected and collaged. This is poetry made by a reader for readers—not ordinary rush-to-get-to-the-end-readers, but for those readers whose intimacy … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Ocean Vuong

In October, these Three Poems by Ocean Vuong were a wonderful addition. 1. Why are poets making everything pregnant? What would the episode of Maury figuring out who and who is not the father of these pregnant metaphors be like? I … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Meghan Lamb

Meghan Lamb’s work, “Mosquitoes”, appears in the October issue. Meghan discusses here how editing affects her writing and where the story came from. 1. How can nipples look like a rubber ducky? It’s an association thing. I do this a … Continue reading →

How the Gingrinch Stole Christmas!

All the Whos down in Whoville liked Christmas a lot, But the Gingrinch, he did not. He hated Christmas and everybody who lived. It was because his heart was three sizes too small and his head two sizes too big. … Continue reading →

The Victor

No one, they say, moves to Camden, NJ by choice. Camden is, comparatively speaking, no worse than north Philadelphia or west Baltimore or at least two of Washington, DC’s quadrants. None of these cities are inhabitable, so they say, but … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Justus Humphrey

In October, Justus Humphrey’s “Baltimore IKEA”.  Here, Justus responds to questions about weddings, funerals, Swedish meatballs and prose versus poetry. 1. Is IKEA the new forest we wander around in search of meaning? Maybe so. I think it’s a place … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Benjamin Walker

Benjamin Walker’s piece, “Pay No Attention to That Land Behind the Curtain”, appears in our October issue. Here,  Benjamin answers questions about the military and his writing. 1. What made you choose to entwine The Wizard of Oz with “Pay … Continue reading →

Mad for Meat by Kevin Simmonds (A Review by Ally Nicholl)

Salmon Poetry 78 pages/$17 When I first sat down to write a review of Kevin Simmonds’ poetry collection ‘Mad For Meat’ I had the uneasy feeling that I would end up using sentences like “Simmonds serves up prime cuts of … Continue reading →

A Christmas Cheer

Admittedly it’s uncouth or uncool, perhaps even tacky to write about my financial straits, but it’s bugging me I can’t afford to buy my son a Christmas gift this year. Do you ever want to give up? Well I do, … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Jason Lee Norman

Jason Lee Norman’s “Beautiful Girls” is a part of the October Issue. Here Jason answers our questions about his porch, where the story came from and being an editor. 1. Does summer always get better when the bodies start appearing? … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Clara Changxin Fang

In October, these three beautiful poems from Clara Changxin Fang. Here, she answers our questions about American eating, poets and the acrobats of desire. 1. Where in the poetic license guidelines does it state that all poets must write at … Continue reading →

If I Were A Poor White Single Mother

I read something at Forbes today because several of my friends on Facebook had linked the article. Here it is. If I Were A Poor Black Kid. The author, Gene Marks, describes himself as a “short, balding, and mediocre public … Continue reading →

Hack by Dmitry Samarov (A Review by Brian Libgober)

The University of Chicago Press 184 pages/$18 If Augie March were a real person, it seems likely that his memoirs would have turned out a lot more like Hack than the novel Saul Bellow ended up writing.  Consider the basic … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Matthew Vollmer

In October, “Gary” by Matthew Vollmer left us panting anxious and fulfilled. Here, he answers our questions. 1. Why did you choose to make “Gary” in a breathless structure? My guess–because I have a terrible memory–is that it’s just the … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Saehee Cho

“Units of Measurement” by Saehee Cho is a part of the September Issue. Here, Saehee answers questions about collections, mourning and hair. 1. What have you collected and measured? Sugar, butter, cream, flour, cocoa 2. How is taking a shower … Continue reading →

Books We Can’t Quit – Jesus’ Son by Denis Johnson

Harper Perennial December, 1993 Chosen by Andrew Bales Fuckhead Goes to the Moon [and Turns Back]… Jesus’ Son might as well be the literary world’s nineties gospel; the book of Johnson. The collection of interconnected stories— the bulk of which … Continue reading →

Literary Los Angeles: Los Angeles Book Club

Sorry I haven’t posted in a long time (I wonder what percentage of total blog posts on earth begin with the phrase “Sorry I haven’t posted in a long time”).  I will plead the excuse of having had an additional … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Matt Snee

“Ninibe and Tyyrehenus” by Matt Snee is a part of the October Issue. Here, Matt answers all our questions about the story. 1. Where did you get the names Ninibe and Tyyrhenus? The names in the story are taken directly … Continue reading →

Gallimaufry: Reading Lorrie Moore

If you’ve ever read Lorrie Moore, you know she’s a genius in the tragicomic world of literary fiction. If you’ve never read Lorrie Moore, then you will have no idea what this post is about, and for this I’m sorry. … Continue reading →

Bearded Women by Teresa Milbrodt (A Review by David Atkinson)

ChiZine Publications 250 pages/$21 I do not think anyone would argue that most people are not overly attracted to the unusual, the bizarre.  Freak shows would never have been so prevalent if this was not the case.  Certainly, modern views … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Corrina Bain

In September, Corrina Bain’s Two Poems. Read them if you pine. 1. What kind of terrorism would you invent? The obvious answer is sex terrorism. But it’s so been done. 2. How does one paint a Russian stripper onto an … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Anya Groner

In the October issue is the wonderful “One Man Ponzi” by Anya Groner. All these question responses are brilliant, we really like them, they feel like exactly what we need. 1. You have a budget of $5 to create a … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Regina Marshall

“Wave and Particle” by Regina Marshall is a part of the PANK September Issue. We love her final answer. 1. What kind of dots do you like connecting? I have trouble finding dots, so I don’t try to make connections. … Continue reading →

In the Time of the Blue Ball by Manuela Draeger (A Review by Alicia Kennedy)

The Dorothy Project 136 pages, $16 A succinct description of Manuela Draeger’sIn the Time of the Blue Ball (Three Post-Exotic Stories)would be:a children’s cartoon about a bumbling detective, set in a postapocalyptic dream. With that out of the way, you … Continue reading →

50 Word Stories: From The Special Issue Editor

For the last few months I read submissions for this special Stamp Stories edition of [PANK], and with each new submission, the realization came louder: writing stories in 50 words or less is not about condensing beginning, middle, and end … Continue reading →

Gallimaufry: A Letter From The “Words With Friends” Corporate Office

Dear Concerned Citizen: We at Words With Friends received your letter regarding our—as you put it—“uncanny similarities to the board game Scrabble.” Believe it or not, you aren’t the first person to bring this to our attention. In fact, we … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Stefanie Freele

In September, we published “Scantily Clad Submissive Women” by Stefanie Freele. It will bring you back to summer if you read it. It will bring you back to a lot of things if you read it. If you haven’t read … Continue reading →

Meat is All by Andrew Borgstrom (A Review by Sean Ulman)

Nephew 41 pages, $10.00 The opening line grants “the noise” knowledge and equates sound to smell (“noise like a scent”), and Meat Is All steadily metes out sensory guiding sensors for all five senses, but on my initial read my … Continue reading →

“between the typeset” by mensah demary

my writing life is different. its previous state outlined in an earlier essay, here–now–is where i note the dissimilarities. it is 5 AM and there’s no time to putter. the urgency to write is here–now–evident inside my blood slowly circulating … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: John McKernan

Two Poems by John McKernan are in the September Issue. It would be good to start your week by reading them. 1. Other than Cinderella, what fairy tale character would you cremate? What would you do with its ashes? I would … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Court Merrigan

In the September Issue is “The Cloud Factory” by Court Merrigan. Court answers our questions here. 1. Union or non-union labor – who would you want working in the cloud factory? Non-union. Temp work only.  No benefits, no contracts. 2. … Continue reading →

The Little Bride by Anna Solomon (A Review by Sara Lippmann)

Riverhead Trade 320 pgs, $10 A great novel is everything. To live wholly inside something else for a while  — isn’t that why we read? Yet it can be tough to find works that sustain without the slightest unevenness, that … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: John Jodzio

John Jodzio’s wonderful, resonating piece, “This Is All The Orientation You Are Gonna Get”, appears in the September Issue. Here, John speaks with us regarding hands, eyes and The Bucket. 1. If you were a cookie doctor, what would be your field … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Danielle Shutt

Danielle Shutt’s “Narcotic Winter” is an addition to our September Issue. Danielle speaks with us here about cocaine, dead bodies, and angels. 1. If someone offered you cocaine on the blade of a knife, would you accept? Nah. I have … Continue reading →

How the Days of Love & Diphtheria by Robert Kloss (A Review by Kenny Mooney)

Nephew 50 pgs, $10 Robert Kloss writes like he has a fever. Anyone familiar with his short fiction will know that his work has a kind of delusional quality to it, as though each line has been crafted through blinding … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Shira Richman

Shira Richman’s Five Poems appear in our September Issue. Here she speaks with us about interview questions and where these poems came from. 1. How long would you wait for coffee? It depends on how delicious the coffee is and with whom … Continue reading →

Rust Fish by Maya Jewell Zeller (A Review by P. Jonas Bekker)

Lost Horse Press $15.00 Childhood memories, how important they are. The very earliest impressions we experience as children, the places we grow up in, they shape who we are later in life. It seems that, the older we get, the … Continue reading →

Gallimaufry: More Plans By Herman Cain

Everyone knows about Herman Cain’s 9-9-9 Plan. But what about his other plans? Here’s your chance to familiarize yourself with them. 3-2-1 Plan Herman Cain will hand out little joystick-like paddles with a red button on top. Simply push the … Continue reading →

Damned by Chuck Palahniuk (A Review by Stanton Hancock)

Doubleday 256 pgs, $14 Madison Spencer has it all.  Rich Hollywood A-list parents, houses all over the globe, private jets to shuttle her wherever she desires to go, all the perks of the super-elite.  There’s just one problem – she’s … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Kit Frick

Kit Frick has Five Poems in the September Issue. Here she answers our questions about the moon, an apocalypse, and Reader’s Digest. 1. Why are all poets so fascinated by the moon? This is actually an idea I’ve been obsessing … Continue reading →

A Shiny, Unused Heart by J.A. Tyler (A Review by David Atkinson)

Black Coffee Press 110 pgs, $12.95 I could start out this review by telling you what A Shiny, Unused Heart by J.A. Tyler is about.  Perhaps I would mention that the book is the story of a man who learns … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Kirstin Chen

“After Me Comes the Flood” by Kirstin Chen is part of the September Issue. You should read this story on a rainy day, you should read this story any day. Here, she provides us with an equally engaging interview. 1. … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Tess Patalano

Tess Patalano has Two Poems published in the September Issue. It would do you good to read them both. Here, she answers our questions about poet co-habitation and her writing. 1. How would you cool off between murders? Oh geez … Continue reading →

A Moment in the Sun by John Sayles (A Review by Joseph Michael Owens)

McSweeneys 955 pgs, $24 A Moment in the Sun is a tricky book for me to review. At 955 pages, it’s definitely the longest book I’ve read since McSweeney’s last “big book,” The Instructions by Adam Levin (which I highly … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Aimee Vitrak

“How To Be A Better Girl” by Aimee Vitrak is part of our September issue. Here, she talks about all kinds of interesting things related to her piece. 1. When you were in seventh grade, were you obsessed with brand name … Continue reading →

Baby and Other Stories by Paula Bomer (A Review by Dawn West)

My sister was always the one who talked about getting married, having babies. She wanted six children. That’s always what she said, and it’s always disturbed me. I thought, even when I was very young, that having so many babies … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Suzanne Marie Hopcroft

Two Poems by Suzanne Marie Hopcroft are an addition to the PANK September Issue. She speaks with us here about larcenies, vices and smuggling. Consider this interview, and her poems, your Halloween treat. 1. What mythical animal would you cut … Continue reading →

In the Time of the Blue Ball by Manuela Draeger, translated by Brian Evenson (A Review by J. A. Tyler)

In the Time of the Blue Ball is the tip of an iceberg. Translated by Brian Evenson, this book is a collection of three stories from Manuela Draeger’s ten story catalog featuring Bobby Potemkine, a hapless quasi police officer assigned … Continue reading →

Gallimaufry: Less Successful Fruit Drink Names

Surrogrape Mother Murderberry Splash Switchblade Vurpberry Watermeloncholy Salmonella Punch Lemon-Lime In The Time Of Cholera Dysentery Cherry Goiter A-pear-ances Can Be Deceiving Vasectomelon Splash Kiwi de Magnesia SacriliJuice! Banana Dilemma Orange “The Shakes” Crush

Bring Down the Chandeliers by Tara Hardy (A Review by Brian Fanelli)

Write Bloody Press 85 pages, $15 Bring Down the Chandeliers is not a collection of poetry for the faint of heart, prude, or squeamish. At times, Tara Hardy’s poems can be unsettling, as they address rape and incest, using raw, … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Wendy Xu

Wendy Xu’s Three Poems appear in the September Issue. Here she answers our questions about where the series came from and theme songs. 1. If you were my father, what would you carry?   A grocery list. And hopefully my … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Kevin Vaughn

In August we published “Two Poems”, “The Savage Curtain” and “Aubade”, by Kevin Vaughn. You can get some extra details about them here, where he talks about style and distance among other things. 1. Why did you choose couplets as … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Claire Burgess

In the August Issue were “Two Stories” by Claire Burgess. She answers our questions about various parts of her stories. 1. What would you leave to someone in your will? No easy-peasy leaving. Competitive, fast-paced treasure hunt. There will be … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Lindsay Norville

Lindsay Norville’s “Our Song” is in the August Issue. She discusses the elementary schoolyard, fatherly relationships, her love life, and illicit behavior. 1. What were you dreaming of in the schoolyard? Rainbows and unicorns. I kept it PG. Very Lisa … Continue reading →

Gallimaufry: New (And Improved?) Choose Your Own Adventures!

Lost In A Cave! Oh, no! You are lost in a cave and you’re desperately trying to find a way out! Really, you have nobody to blame for this misfortune but yourself. Also, Daniel, who drugged you, tied you up, … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Sarah Layden

“The Woman Who Was A House” by Sarah Layden is a part of the PANK August Issue. Here, she talks with us about a lot about the wonderful story, how it came into being. 1. What if the woman was … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Karrie Waarala

Way back in June, when the days were just getting longer and the summer romances were just getting hotter, Two Poems by Karrie Waarala appeared in our June Issue.  Her poems are wonderful and here she discusses with us more like it was a … Continue reading →

Boundaries by Elizabeth Nunez (A Review by David S. Atkinson)

Akashic Books $22.95 Tension is not usually comfortable in actual life.  In fact, most people do what they can to avoid having tension in their lives.  Strangely enough, though, tension seems generally necessary for stories to hold reader interest.  If … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Blake Kimzey

Blake Kimzey’s work “Up And Away” is part of the September Issue. It is a wonderful piece and a great way to start your week would be to read it, and again if you already did. Here, he speaks with … Continue reading →

Stories For Women

if you think you read this previously on a personal blog which no longer exists, i have two words for you: prove it. My wife says I should listen to her more often. Perhaps. Then again, Frank Ocean’s Nostalgia, Ultra grows … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Ruby Labrusciano-Carris

“A Third Floor 11:47 Story” by Ruby Labrusciano-Carris is a part of the August Issue. Here, we talk to her about her incluences, her secrets and her future. 1. What was your reaction when you found out PANK accepted this … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Art Taylor

Art Taylor’s fine instructional work of fiction, “Mastering the Art of French Cooking”, appears in the PANK Special Crime Issue. He speaks here about recipes, relationships, and writing. 1. What meal would you make to kill someone you love? What … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Aaron Michael Morales

“An Excerpt from Eat Your Children” by Aaron Michael Morales is a part of our PANK Special Crime Issue.  Here, Mr. Morales answers our nitty questions about his work and about nunchucks. 1. How would you eat my children? Actually, … Continue reading →

Four Books of Poetry by Cristin O’Keefe Aptowicz (A Review by Alicia Kennedy)

Write Bloody Press Various page counts, $15 each The titles drew me to Cristin O’Keefe Aptowicz’s first four books of poetry: Dear Future Boyfriend, Hot Teen Slut, Working Class Represent, and Oh Terrible Youth. They promised tales of the all-important … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Chris Offutt

“An Excerpt From “Hit Monkey” by Chris Offutt is part of our Crime Issue. Here, he speaks with us about training killer monkeys, body delivery and his favorite poem, among other things. 1. Does a poet need to have a … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Anthony Neil Smith

“Excerpt From The Baddest Ass” by Anthony Neil Smith appears in the Special PANK Crime Issue. He answers our questions about prison, protection, and pariahs. 1. How do you protect yourself from white people? Well…agree with them? Having watched enough jeering crowds … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Andrew Brininstool

In the September issue is “Wild Honey” by Andrew Brininstool. If you haven’t read it already, this is the perfect piece/interview combination to start your weekend. 1. What would your church look like if you built one? It would look … Continue reading →

Daddy’s by Lindsay Hunter (A Review by Joseph Owens)

Featherproof Books 217 pages OK, before I dive into this review, I feel compelled to offer my two cents on an issue I personally feel is pressing. “Experimental literature” is kind of a nebulous term and ultimately a misnomer. Though … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Claudia Cortese

These Three Poems by Claudia Cortese are a part of the August Issue. When asked to answer these questions, we were stoked she said yes. 1. Would you ever tell your parents the quality of sex you had the other … Continue reading →

Gallimaufry: Just Another Day At The Gym

Boot Camp Class Okay, everyone, let’s start with some stretches! Ready? O-kay. Let’s begin with the arms in the air, and raise them…and raise them…and raise them! Come on, people, you just got caught swallowing 1.2 million dollars in canary … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Christopher Lirette

Christopher Lirette has Two Poems published in our August issue. He elaborates on many wonderful subjects here. 1. Do you ever have dreams of becoming a real life Green Arrow? Would you use regular arrows or trick arrows?   While … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Eric Shonkwiler

Eric Shonkwiler’s “For The Man After Me” is an addition to the PANK Special Crime Issue. 1. What would you do that would be worth being hunted over? Run away with a senator’s wife.  Kill a man.  That sort of … Continue reading →

The Gambler’s Nephew by Jack Matthews (A Review by David Atkinson)

Etruscan Press $12.75 Perhaps I am just prejudiced against historical novels, but to me there seems to be a distinction between historical novels and novels that are set in a historical place and time.  In the way I draw the … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Kyle Minor

Kyle Minor’s “How To Fire A Bullet” is a powerful, thrusting piece that appears in the special Crime Issue. Here, he answers all our questions about bullets and shots. 1. Is this how you would actually fire a bullet? You … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Emma Sovich

Four poems of a collection by Emma Sovich appear in our August issue. They’re a great read for these rainy fall days. Here she answers our questions about the collection and about bodies both stone and real. 1. Why would anyone … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Michael Glaviano

Michael Glaviano’s Three Poems are presented in the August issue. He responds to our questions about his lines, his writing and where he came from. 1. How does a room affect what accent you take? If there’s food in the … Continue reading →

Freight by Mel Bosworth (A Review by Morowa Yejidé)

Folded Word Press $14 It isn’t often that a story allows us to simply muse, to contemplate the high and the low of things, but Mel Bosworth’s Freight does just that.  This novel is aware of its own kind of … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Caleb Johnson

You can tell just by the title, that Caleb Johnson’s piece in our August issue, All The Things You Think You Need But Really Don’t, is amazing and will have a resonance that stems far and wide. Caleb talks here … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Marcelle Heath

Marcelle Heath’s short fiction, “Christina Heppel”,  is a great addition to the August issue. Here she answers questions about riots, stick wielding, and where characters come from. 1. What have you wielded a stick like?   I’ve wielded a stick like a … Continue reading →

The Body is a Little Gilded Cage by Kristina Marie Darling (A Review by J. A. Tyler)

In short: Kristina Marie Darling’s The Body is a Little Gilded Cage is the best book that Darling has written and the best book that Gold Wake Press has produced. I’ve read Darling’s previous Night Songs (also from Gold Wake … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Corey Ginsberg

Corey Ginsberg’s Two Poems appear in the August issue. Here she answers our questions, and they make our day. 1. Have you ever been in the Shiva position? What was that like?   Not while tethered in my corporeal human … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Gary Sheppard

Gary Sheppard’s, wonderful fantastic piece of fiction appears in the August issue. Titled “Do You Understand, Perfectly, The Weeknights? Positively Mean Them?, you can read it here. 1. How did you come up with the following line: “My hand in … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Laura Bender

In the July issue appears Laura Bender’s “The Tiger Below.” She answers our questions quick and dirty. 1. Would you rather chase tigers or waterfalls? I’m not sure exactly how you’d chase a waterfall, I should ask TLC, but it … Continue reading →

Gallimaufry: The Worst Thing

There is nothing worse than getting a paper cut. Some people will try to argue differently, but those people are always wrong and we should feel sorry for them. Some people will try to tell you they experienced something worse … Continue reading →

Damascus by Joshua Mohr (A Review by Tyler Grimm)

Available October 2011 from Two Dollar Radio 208 pages $16.00 “A life without art was like skin without tattoos, boring and empty and pale.”    - Joshua Mohr (Damascus) We’ve all been to seedy bars. Hell, some of us practically … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Carlie St. George

Carlie St. George’s wonderful, wonderful, wonderful piece, “V”,appears in the August issue. It’s already mid-September so if you haven’t already, you absolutely must read it here. 1. How do you dress your panic in the morning? I think panic’s the … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Jacob Dawson

Jacob Dawson’s “Chunk” appears in the August issue. Here he elaborates. 1. What would you whore yourself out for? I would whore myself out to get a book published for sure. Wouldn’t think twice about it. 2. Who would you … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Molly Laich

Molly Laich’s riveting story “The Sting” appears in the August issue. Her answers to our questions, here, are just as amazing. 1. How would your career begin at Smith & Wesson? I will never ever ever work in an office … Continue reading →

Hough & Helix & Where & Here & You, You, You by Lea Graham (A Review by J. A. Tyler)

Hough & Helix & Where & Here & You, You, You is Lea Graham’s first full-length collection, as well my first date with No Tell Books, and both are a solid way to begin something new. The physical product is … Continue reading →

First Impressions (Or A Letter to My English Composition Students) (Or “We’re Not Hesher.”)

Before we go any further discussing objective versus subjective descriptions or read essays by Heather Rogers and EB White or beat ourselves over the head with anymore comma splices or discuss how some of you begin a paragraph in past … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Christine Ha

“The Virtues of Being Mary” by Christine Ha is a part of our July issue. She will now take our questions. 1. What is the weirdest thing you’ve worn that was secondhand? I wouldn’t say this is the weirdest secondhand … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Jessica Dyer

Jessica Dyer’s “Uses for a Uterus” is an excellent addition to the July issue. Here, the uterus conversation continues. 1. How would you use your uterus? Well, I just came back from Body Worlds and saw some pretty traditional uses … Continue reading →

Gallimaufry: The Second-To-Last Supper

And as they were reclining at table and eating on this, the second-to-last supper, Jesus looked around at his guests. There was James The Greater and, to a lesser extent, James The Lesser. There was John and Peter, who, you … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Casey Hannan

Casey Hannan’s piece, “Piano Hands”, appears in the July Issue. He tells us here about his crushes and plans for seduction. 1. What key do your hands play when you crack your knuckles?  The key of I wasn’t a music … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Erin Keane

Erin Keane’s two poems are part of the July issue. She speaks with us here about her writing process and the reality of poetry. 1. What’s my budget to work with to make the room something? Empty your pockets onto the table. If … Continue reading →

Domestic Apparition by Meg Tuite (A Review by Anna March)

San Francisco Bay Press $14.99 Meg Tuite’s “Domestic Apparition” is sublime. In this mosaic of tightly intertwined chapters that seamlessly join to form the novel, we meet Michelle, our narrator, whom we will not just come to root for, but … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Susan Rukeyser

Susan Rukeyser’s work, “Hiccup”, appears in the London Calling Special Issue. We especially love her answer in regards to the question, “How do you cure hiccups?” 1. What has the sea brought you?   The Irish Sea once brought me … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Suzanne Scanlon

Suzane Scanlon’s piece, “From Promising Young Women: Heather (#19)”, appears in the July issue. We asked her where the piece came from and she told us. 1. What kind of -some are you? It depends on the day. Awesome, irksome, … Continue reading →

Luminarium by Alex Shakar (A Review by Randy Brzoska)

SoHo Press $16/432 pages It seems fitting that Alex Shakar would open his novel, Luminarium, with an invitation.  Not your garden variety party invitation, mind you.  Something a bit more oblique, less straightforward.  But an invitation nonetheless. Picture yourself stepping … Continue reading →

the unfirm line – Red Hot Chili Peppers

“In the end and then, all will be forgiven when surrender rises high and I gave what I came to give.” Red Hot Chili Peppers, Tear. After a rough few weeks, it is reassuring to be reminded that “in the … Continue reading →

Gallimaufry: Thank You For Using LinkedIn!

Thank you for using LinkedIn. Everyone here at LinkedIn truly appreciates your ongoing support, and we hope our site has provided you the tools you need to succeed in business. With that said, we would like to take a moment … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: MG Martin

MG Martin’s, “6,000 Miles Apart, Which Is More In Kilometers” appears in the online July issue. It is amazing. Here, he answers these wonderful questions about various things. 1. What are you living on the side of?             First, I … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Amanda Montei

Amanda Montei’s eleven poems appear in our July issue. She answers our questions here. 1. What else makes my butt look better? Spanks and pilates, of course. 2. Why CVS and now Walgreen’s? Actually, I prefer Rite Aid because of … Continue reading →

Jeanette by Joe Simpson Walker (A Review by Martin Macaulay)

Chomu Press $17/408 pages ‘Jeanette, is something the matter?’ In Joe Simpson Walker’s novel, people have a habit of asking Jeanette Hesketh ‘What’s the matter?’ Her parents, her teacher, her neighbours, her is-he-isn’t-he boyfriend – they all want to get … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Joanna Pearson

Joanna Pearson’s “Origins of Winter” appears in the July issue.  Here, we ask her some forward questions. 1. Why are poets so fascinated by the seasons?   Possible obsession with any of the following: Pathetic fallacy? Greco-Roman mythology? Cycles in … Continue reading →

This Modern Writer: What Does This Have to Do With the Price of Eggs in China? By Lauren Schmeer

“I read your story as if the main character was a mutant baby, some sort of hybrid kid-dog monster.” I am quiet. I am prepared for this; I am getting workshopped. “And even after I got to the line that … Continue reading →

Moleskines

note: “Electric Parade” is now “Bullet Train to Tokyo” because “Electric Parade” no longer suits me and I’ve never set foot in Japan, much less one of its bullet trains. *** once upon a time, i was poor. in Prince … Continue reading →

Do You Know The Meth-od Man? It’s Three A.M.

A man nearly died on my driveway last night. He’d done a huge amount of some naracotic then wandered the trailer park before ending up at my house at three a.m.  The man fell against the front of my house then knocked on the window. … Continue reading →

MLP has a new Nephew

http://mudlusciouspress.com/nephew/

Ask the Author: Rachel Levy

Rachel Levy’s amazing piece “Becoming Deer” appears in the July Issue. She speaks with us here about cigarettes, inspiration and Darwinism. 1. What animal do you want to become? I want to become a deer. I value strength and size. … Continue reading →

World Tree by David Wojahn (A Review by Brian Fanelli)

University of Pittsburg Press 134 pages. $16 David Wojahn’s latest collection of poems, World Tree, is a book in which the dead come alive on the page. His poems are filled with voices of the past, including spirits from the … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Jack Nicholls

Jack Nicholl’s piece “Adrian Dumpleton” appears in the special London Calling Issue. He answers questions about keepie-ups, competition and various American and non things. 1. What could you grate on your abs? Nothing. However, I can zest a lemon using … Continue reading →

Gallimaufry: New Science Experiments You Can Do With Basic Household Items

Baking Soda Volcano This. Is. A classic. The kids will love this one so much, they’ll finally call you ‘Dad.’ (Hey, better late than never!) Start out by baking a dozen sugar cookies on a baking pan. When they’re finished, … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Ezra Fox

Ezra Fox’s “Get Well Rose” appears in the July issue. He talks with us about female authors, ice cream and taste buds. 1. How do you talk to yourself? Through my characters. I think people who don’t write fiction don’t … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Gary Percesepe

Gary Percesepe’s “Something” is included in the July issue. He speaks to you about stopping, cities, stalking and other somethings. 1. How did you know “Something” was complete when writing it? The music stopped. 2. What city has your favorite … Continue reading →

Re:Telling, An Anthology Edited by William Walsh (A Review by Sara Lippmann)

An Anthology of Borrowed Premises, Stolen Settings, Purloined Plots and Appropriated Characters Edited by William Walsh Ampersand Books, $17.95 This is a book that’s good fun. The tagline says it all: collected fictions that steal a page from, or lend … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Brian Laidlaw

Brian Laidlaw has two poems in the July issue. He answers questions regarding steampunk, style, and spills. 1. Where are your elegies for steampunk? Steampunk isn’t dead, but it used to be. I should have elegized it when I had … Continue reading →

Bowdlerized Books Presents: Excerpts From The Lorax, Abridged Version

We at Bowdlerized Books love literature. That much is certain and cannot be disputed. We live for the moment we read a great book and our minds start swirling as if suddenly activating parts of our brains that have atrophied. … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Hobie Anthony

Hobie Anthony offers three short fictions to the July issue and takes a moment to discuss roadtrip mixes, the influence of Portland and the fictional car he’d love to drive. 1. Why did you break “Three On The Road” up … Continue reading →

The Indefinite State of Imaginary Morals by Rae Bryant (A Review by Thomas Michael Duncan)

Patasola Press $14 Remember the last time you woke up after a one-night stand and chewed your own arm off so you could sneak out without waking the semi-stranger sleeping next to you? No? What do you mean, that’s never … Continue reading →

Little Known Author-created Causes of Hangovers

This is a guest post by Caleb J Ross as part of his Stranger Will Tour for Strange blog tour. He will be guest-posting beginning with the release of his novel Stranger Will in March 2011 to the release of … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Patricia Lockwood

Patricia Lockwood’s incredible poetry is featured in the July issue. She talks with us about canaries, mines, false alphabets and more. 1. What happens when a canary dies in the fact mine? A Tweety shirt shrinks in the wash. A … Continue reading →

Gallimaufry: Department Store Announcements You Don’t Hear Very Often

Attention shoppers: Life is hard, I know. There are many trials and tribulations, and some of your problems simply can’t be fixed. You want to hit an ‘undo’ button on some of the decisions you’ve made, but you can’t because … Continue reading →

death scene: denzel as malcolm x approaching the audubon

cue: Sam Cooke’s “A Change Is Gonna Come” play up to a loud, ear-splitting crescendo: the opening violins which slices every black American down his/her back. *** i was told–once–as a little boy, “denzel was despondent when he shot that … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Nikki Magennis

Nikki Magennis’s fiction appears in the London Calling issue. She talks with us the eye, the sparrow, words children need to be taught, and more. 1. Why should I keep my eye on the sparrow? You can try to forget … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Sarah Dalton

Sarah Dalton’s fiction takes up the critically important topic of Pierce Brosnan in the London Calling issue. Today, we get into Daniel Craig’s tears, faith in British celebrities, taking the piss out of someone and so on and so forth. … Continue reading →

The Mutation of Fortune by Erica Adams (A Review by David Atkinson)

The Green Lantern Press $20 The Mutation of Fortune is not an easy book to get a fix on.  The stories are too fluid to be easily grasped for quick summary.  The ground beneath the reader’s feet shifts too rapidly … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Helen Sedgwick

Helen Sedgwick’s fiction is included in the London Calling issue. We talk about her hunting name, what’s in the bag, the relationship between editing and writing and more. 1. How would you blacken Ireland’s eye? In my mind it’s fairly … Continue reading →

Nightmares of a Screamy Baby

My son, he’s 10 months old. Funny kid. Has a cute broad smile that he often displays alongside hysterical laughter. Since he doesn’t have any language I can’t ask him what he is laughing about. Talking to him is a … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Harry Giles

Two Poems from Harry Giles appear in the London Calling issue. He talks with us about where he would fly, theatrics and writing, the slam scene abroad and more. 1. If you could fly, where would you go? I’d use … Continue reading →

The Coffins of Little Hope by Timothy Schaffert (A Review by Dawn West)

Unbridled Books 272 pages, $24.95 Lies have a way of revealing truth. Motives. Fears. Obsessions. And aren’t writers the most fabulous liars? Great fiction is, in a sense, a series of fantastical lies spun into a gold-threaded web that somehow … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Gareth Durasow

Gareth Durasow’s instructional incendiary poem appears in London Calling. He talks with us about the mother of all bombs, what he’s waiting for, and grenade wedding crashing. 1. How would you make a bomb out of your mother? It’s a … Continue reading →

Gallimaufry: High School Courses Revisited

Creative Writing This is an introductory course that focuses on imaginative writing style, revision, being alone, ordering in, crying, finding a good psychologist, and cleaning the house. Writing-wise, we will focus on short stories, poetry and creative non-fiction as well … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Holly Dawson

Holly Dawson is featured in our most recent special issue. She talks with us about fixing bodies, doll repair, feral gnomes and other matters. 1. What things do you often lose in tunnels? I should be careful how I answer … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Dawn West

Dawn West’s epistolary fiction appears in London Calling. She talks with us about the language of lost, the charms of Chloe Sevigny and much more. 1. How often do you journal? I haven’t kept a journal since high school. Actually, … Continue reading →

Pittsburgh Noir (A Review by William D. Prystauk)

Akashic Books 237 Pages, $15.95 Editor: Kathleen George When it comes to anthologies of fiction, one usually finds one or two decent tales worthy of note while the rest is completely forgettable. Pittsburgh Noir is not one of those.  The … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Ronnie Stephens

The poetry of Ronnie K. Stephens appears in the London Calling special issue. We talk about period dress, slam mastering in the Ozarks, taking the floor and more. 1. Why did you choose to deviate from the patterns of couplets … Continue reading →

Critical Perspectives on Jay-Z and Kanye West’s ‘Otis’ From Seven Guys Named Otis

I’m really feeling this. These dudes is balling. “Luxury rap, the Hermes of verses.” That’s just how I’m living. They speaking my language. I mean, this is how I’m gonna be living. I guess this very moment I’m the-Hermes-of-sitting-on-my-ass-in-my-mother’s-basement. I’m … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Jarred McGinnis

You can read his work in the London Calling issue and today Jarred McGinnis discusses The Mighty Ducks, canal chases, and more. 1. Who would win in a hockey match: Trash Ducks or Mighty Ducks? Trash Ducks will be clogging … Continue reading →

Compendium by Kristina Marie Darling (A Review by Brian Fanelli)

Cow Heavy Books 55 pages, $10 Like a jigsaw puzzle, Kristina Marie Darling’s Compendium asks to be pieced together. It is a collection of lyric poems, vignettes, erasures, glossaries, footnotes, and histories that present only bits and pieces of a … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Hazel Foster

Hazel Foster’s Summer Sunday at the Fair is a real treat in the June issue.  She talks with us about circuses, how she watches television and the believability of that vampire guy as a male lead. 1. Why rebut Water for … Continue reading →

Gallimaufry: Standard & Poor’s Official Apology For Its $2 Trillion Dollar Mistake As Well As Some Of Its Other Minor Miscalculations

On August 6, after Standard & Poor’s downgraded the US credit rating to AA+, the US Treasury pointed out a $2 trillion error in Standard & Poor’s calculations. “A judgment flawed by a 2 trillion dollar error speaks for itself,” … Continue reading →

“mensah demary”

for A. down the rabbit hole… the name “mensah” is Igbo (some believe it is Twi) for “third born son.” this makes “mensah” a far more accurate name than “Thomas.” i retained my last name (real) to honor my father. … Continue reading →

Alexis Orgera’s how like foreign objects: A Review by J. A. Tyler

Alexis Orgera broke up with me. She did it in a book. The book was how like foreign objects. One minute we were dating and so intertwined and then I became a pit in her stomach and near the end … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: James Tadd Adcox

James Tadd Adcox makes another appearance in the June issue. He talks with us about breaking boners, bed talk, and the failures of monogamy. 1. Did you also know a girl that kept breaking boners? Apparently whales actually have a … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Mandy Haggith

Mandy Haggith’s poetry is featured in the London Calling issue. She talks with us about how she butters her biscuits, the color yellow, and rapefield cultivation. 1. Has Coldplay ruined the colour of yellow? Not at all. 2. How do … Continue reading →

Black Hole Blues By Patrick Wensink (A Review By P. Jonas Bekker)

Lazy Fascist Press $10.95 After reading Sex dungeon for sale, Patrick Wensink’s debut story collection that came out in Eraserhead Press’ New Bizarro Author Series I decided he could (and should) write a very good novel if he would just … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Alice Slater

Alice Slater’s witty fiction appears in our London Calling Special issue. She talks with us about her roller derby name (awesome), reliable narrators, and lots more. 1. How much do you trust the internet with food reviews? I rely on … Continue reading →

A Special Announcement From President Barack Hussein Obama

My fellow Americans, my colleagues and I in the Democratic Party recently made a debt deal with our friends across the aisle in the Republican Party. This deal averted a crisis—the debt ceiling was raised and our country avoided default—but … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Virginia Lee Borges

Virginia Lee Borges makes her literary debut in the June issue with a story that remains one of my personal favorites. She talks with us about what she leaves around the house, what she wants to pile, and her creation … Continue reading →

The Iguana Complex by Darby Larson (A Review By Joseph Michael Owens)

Mud Luscious Press Despite what you may have heard, Darby Larson is a lyricist. He might be the Eminem of prose fiction, but probably not. Perhaps he’s more like Sage Francis or one of the guys from Definitive Jux, but … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Cara McGuigan

Cara McGuigan is featured in our London Calling issue. She talks with us about the box beneath her floorboard, the dissolution of her heart, and altering EPCOT. 1. What would I find in your watch box beneath the floorboard? Running … Continue reading →

Gallimaufry: My First Days On Earth

Like you, I was born. Then I became a man. I still am a man. Just ask my wife. Never mind. Don’t ask my wife. Pretend I never even brought my wife up. Just take it from me: I am … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: David Holub

David Holub brings his unique humor to the May issue and he talks with us about unfriending, punctuation, and his fake laugh. 1. What is the Truth? The Truth is that thing that you cannot look at directly or you … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Andrew Pullan

Andrew Pullan’s poetry is featured in our London Calling issue. He talks with us about fighting metal, adolescent itches and winks as a seductive technique. 1. What job opportunities are there up north? Very limited – the only oppportunity seems … Continue reading →

What Doesn’t Kill You: An Anthology (A Review By Gale Martin)

Press 53 $17.95 Editors: Murray Dunlap & Kevin Morgan Watson When the premise of an anthology is compelling, reader expectations are high. Upon receiving a review copy of collected stories and narrative non-fiction called What Doesn’t Kill You published by … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Joshua Helms

We have three stories by Joshua Helms in the June issue. He talks with us about fire starting, fragility, and paternity. 1. What have you set on fire? When I was 13, I lit a tissue on fire with a … Continue reading →

tell me something good

they say athena is the greek goddess of love. i used to say this, before i learned the gods’ names and their accompanying powers, abilities hitched to human elements. they say athena is the goddess of love because, in my … Continue reading →

Ya Girl Kool Emcee White Chicky-V, yo Discusses Her Use of the N-Word

What up my niggers and niggerettes? My name Ya Girl Kool Emcee White Chicky-V, yo. Niggers be getting that twisted an’ shit. Only wan’ take the middle part an’ don’ be tryin’ to say the whole thing. If you say … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Caroline Crew

Caroline Crew has four poems in the June issue. She talks to us about where the weather touches her, seasoned hips, and assailing to the trees among other things. 1. Why is “Saussure, Sorry” screaming at me? I am hungover … Continue reading →

Huckster: Nine Ways To Keep Creativity Flowing

Advertising is all about creativity, no matter which department you’re in (unless you’re the office barista). So how do you cultivate creativity? With a garden trowel? A gun? With $32.50 in unmarked bills delivered to a shadowy man in a … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Lidia Yuknavitch

Lidia Yuknavitch shares a searing essay with PANK in the May issue. She talks with us about the origins of her essay, parody, and more. 1. What compelled you to write “On Being A Woman Writer?”. Being a woman writer.  … Continue reading →

I Know When To Keep Quiet By Dawn Leas (A Review By Amye Archer)

Finishing Line Press $12 I often lament that I have never lived anywhere else.  Sure, I’ve moved like a roulette wheel ticking around to different suburbs, but that center, the crumbling metropolis of Scranton, has always been within reach.   And … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Christopher Newgent

Christopher “ARMS” Newgent’s elegant fiction is part of the June issue. He talks with us about whiskey, burning, breaking up, and even his fiction. 1. What was the last thing you lit on fire? Some pages from the Association of … Continue reading →

Some European Notes, or Truth Unveiled By Time

From Yascha Mounk’s article “Rebellion Against Pluralism”: It is alarming that Breivik fed on ideas that are now fairly mainstream in Europe. Remarkably, he does not hail from the hard core of Scandinavia’s neo-Nazi movement. Even when he did post … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Alexis Pope

Alexis Pope’s excellent poetry appears in the June issue. She talks with us about bathing inr ose water, the heart as a decoration, and birth control. 1. Why do we bathe in rose water on Sunday? I guess because it’s … Continue reading →

Ben Tanzer’s My Father’s House: A review by J. A. Tyler

I’ve been thinking a lot recently about how much of my life slips into my fiction. If I look back on a previous manuscript I can see in it rhythms of songs I was listening to at the time, snippets … Continue reading →

Tigger Blood: A Letter from Rep. David Wu to his Colleagues in the House

Dear Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi and my Colleagues in the House, I’d first like to apologize for my behavior. I realize that it has become quite erratic. I will explain that, as well as the enclosed picture of me in … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Myfanwy Collins

Poinsettias, by Myfanway Collins, appears in the June issue. She shares some sad facts about poinsettias and much more. 1. What would you like to exhale? I would like to exhale all of my fear. I want it to spill … Continue reading →

I Don’t Respect Female Expression By Frank Hinton (A Review By Stanton Hancock)

Safety Third Enterprises 15 pgs, $3.00 In her chapbook “I Don’t Respect Female Expression,” Frank Hinton manages to include an astonishing amount of content within just fifteen pages.  Fittingly, considering the traditionally masculine name of “Frank” is being employed by … Continue reading →

the unfirm line – Ethel Rohan

“Every time I closed my eyes, I saw God pull mother through a black hole in the sky.” Ethel Rohan, Hard To Say When I was younger and closed my eyes, I would cry of the dark – the science … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Karen Skolfield

Karen Skolfield’s poetry appears in the June issue. She talks with us about the irony of a blackout in an engineering building, the power spikes of lesbians, and becoming smaller and faster. 1. How ironic is a blackout at the … Continue reading →

Huckster: Anatomy Of An Advertising Professional’s Brain

Many people think the brain of someone in advertising looks exactly like the brain of people in every other profession: grey, lumpy, lightening bolts down each side. But actually, our brains look quite different. Take the shape, for instance. An … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Becca Ansorge

Becca Ansorge writes letters in the May issue. She talks to us about writing letters on skin, matters of burning, how this piece was born and more. Whose skin would you write a letter on? The wrinkled palm of an … Continue reading →

what is exhausting is what i wanted…

the time is 10:32 PM est. i am hunched over my laptop, shoved into the corner of our apartment. the desk–my wife’s–is positioned next to an open window, where humid air blows in, where expensive cold blows out–along with the … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Thomas Kearnes

Thomas Kearnes has two stories in the June issue. He talks with us about being saved by a big dick, the trickiness of a meth high and getting down on a web cam. 1. If my big dick can’t save … Continue reading →

How to Keep Your Volkswagen Alive By Christopher Boucher (A Review By David Atkinson)

Melville House Press 208 pgs, $11.95 Having been born in the middle seventies to parents who owned a VW Beetle, I admit to being confused when I first picked up How to Keep Your Volkswagen Alive by Christopher Boucher.  I … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Bendi Barrett

Two poems by Bendi Barrett appear in the May issue. The poet talks with us about the process of creating these poems, wanting him open, and where the fallow ends. 1. How did you create “Diagram Of The Carnal Male” … Continue reading →

The Truth About Planking

It was late the other night and, if I remember correctly, the day had been unconscionably hot. The heat had given me leaden arms and legs. I lay face down on my couch blinking my dusty eyes and drifting between … Continue reading →

Sommer Browning’s Either Way I’m Celebrating: A Review by J. A. Tyler

Most reviews I write are intended to say what I think a book is attempting to do, and how well I believe the books does it. Only a fraction of the reviews I write are about telling people that they … Continue reading →

Ghostwriting, or PLACE ME LIKE A SEAL UPON YOUR HEART

“Understand me, when I write, right here, on these innumerable post cards, I annihilate not only what I am saying but also the unique addressee that I constitute, and therefore every possible addressee, and every destination. I kill you, I … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Jan Stinchcomb

Jan Stinchcomb’s Baboon is a story that really has stayed with me. I read it over and over again because it is layered and strange and endlessly compelling. She talks with us about the why of the baboon and so … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Keith Taylor

Keith Taylor’s poetry appears in the June issue. He talks with us about titles and their impact on poems, backpacking in Denmark. line lengths and more. 1. What impact does the title as the first line have on a poem? … Continue reading →

Huckster: Excerpts From An Advertising Professional’s Journal Regarding His Time At Ogilvy Transylvania

May 10 It’s very strange here at Ogilvy’s Transylvania office. Not strange in a bad way. Just strange. I mean, I love it here. It’s, like, the best place I’ve ever worked at, and I’m not just saying that because … Continue reading →

Short Bus By Brian Allen Carr (A Review By Sal Pane)

Texas A&M University Press $22.95 My first encounter with Brian Allen Carr was over the internet.  HTMLGIANT had just linked to this long diatribe I’d written about a semi-obscure video game from the 1990’s. I checked the comments section hourly, … Continue reading →

I Believe I’ll Write My Way Out of This Hole

You know how you almost always have someone who’s got your back? That person, since I was three years old, was my grandmother, granny; Mama Bear is what I called her. Because I didn’t have a mama  until I was ten, and then unfortunately, … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Mike Meginnis

Mike Meginnis’s technobiblical fiction appears in the May issue. He talks with us about all manner of things related to his story and beyond. 1. What is Robot Christ powered on? I hadn’t thought about it, but I’m tempted to … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Barry Basden

Barry Basden’s brief fiction appears in the May issue and he talks with us about Rebecca Black (who?), how he writes, and what he clutches when he sits alone. 1. How challenging is it for you to write and be … Continue reading →

Like Gambit Hurling Race Cards…

Author’s note: this was written in February, 2011–undoubtedly during a blizzard. Two weeks ago, I grabbed my red marker and wrote on my noticeboard, “opinionated writers.” Earlier, I perused Twitter and my RSS feeds, feeling inferior about my own work. … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Ken Poyner

Ken Poyner’s three poems are a fine addition to the June issue. He talks to us about dark sex, deadly teaching sins and so much more. 1. What makes someone a good piece of ass? The transition from selfish to … Continue reading →

Brandon Shimoda’s The Girl Without Arms: A Review by J. A. Tyler

The trouble in reviewing a book like Brandon Shimoda’s The Girl Without Arms is that no matter what the reviewer says, no matter what excerpts are culled, the text will remain very difficult to define without simply saying: go read … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Alex Pruteanu

Alex Pruteanu’s May Day is, fittingly, part of the May issue. He talks with us about interrogation, journalism, making fun of his last name and more. 1. How would you interrogate someone? Waterboarding is so Bush/Cheney era. The secret to … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Anthony Jones

The fiction of Anthony Jones appears in the May issue. He talks to us about writing as a woman, religious geometry, the duality of the soul and more. 1. How challenging is it as a man to write from a … Continue reading →

Giraffes in Hiding – The Mythical Memoirs of Carol Novack: A Review by Ethel Rohan

Carol Novak’s Giraffes in Hiding – The Mythical Memoirs of Carol Novack is a quirky and remarkable collection of forty-one poetic fictions, fusions, and prose poems. This exceptional collection makes for a challenging and absorbing read. To read this book … Continue reading →

Hector and the Search for Happiness By Francois Lelord (A Review By Rebecca Leece)

Gallic Books £6.99 Hector is a French psychiatrist who is dissatisfied because he’s not able to make people happy. He decides to look into matters by going on a trip around the world to observe what makes people happy—or unhappy. … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Carolyn Zaikowski

Carolyn Zaikowski’s work is featured in the May issue. She talks with us about how she falls, chasing water falls, what she used to have and more. 1. How do you go chasing waterfalls? There are a few ways I … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Melissa Chadburn

Melissa Chadburn’s unique fiction is included in the May issue. She talks with us about the composition of Christ’s body, mangled hearts, knowledge of priests, and more. 1.What do you wish Christ’s body was made of? Well hmmm… if it was … Continue reading →

Citizens or lovers: sixty-six notes around tennis

1. This video of a young Goran Ivanisevic confronting a chair umpire about how to correctly pronounce his name. And my tenderness for it. For the shifts in his face, between weary, wry bemusement and offended pride. For his distinctive … Continue reading →

An Open Letter to Stanley the Stinkbug, the only Stinkbug in America. Sorry for Flushing You Down the Toilet, but You Stink

Dear Stanley the Stinkbug, Minutes before sitting down to write this, my wife screamed like an unknown man was in the apartment, which could only mean one thing: you had somehow breached the defenses of my home and were dangling … Continue reading →

Cool Story, Bro

Humility is acceptable, right? It’s not so odd to stare at the ground–or my big-tongued Adidas sneakers, black or burgundy, depending on the mood–and take the compliments in stride, as in silence, instead of feeling full of myself? Am I … Continue reading →

Entrance to a colonial pageant in which we all begin to intricate By Johannes Göransson (A Review By Joseph Michael Owens)

Tarpaulin Sky Press 100 pgs.  $14 Beware beware I have begun a king A jacklighting king There is a talented bunch of contemporary writers doing some really cool things with experimental prose lately (I’d hate to call it experimental “-literature” … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Adam Peterson

Adam Peterson’s three stories are a fine part of the May issue. He talks with us about his best drink friend, generation skipping, and the influence of pop culture. 1. What beverage is your best friend? Coffee. Although that may … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Tyler Gobble

A poem from Tyler Gobble is featured in the May issue. He talks to us about grave dancing, the shame of relief, and the origins of his wonderful poem. 1. Whose grave would you dance on? What would you dance … Continue reading →

Huckster: Welcome To The 23rd Annual Agency Picnic Olympics!

Hello, everyone! Thank you for coming to the 23rd Annual Agency Picnic Olympics. Our agency has been doing this for more than 22 years now, and every year it gets better. So, without further ado, let’s go over the day’s … Continue reading →

Literature for True Hipsters (aka The Literary Web)

Earlier this year, I ranted on Twitter. For about an hour, I bemoaned the state of the online literary magazine or, to quote Roxane Gay’s recent tweet, “the literary web,” and wondered why it all seemed the same to me. … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Michelle Reale

Michelle Reale’s fiction appears in the May issue. She talks with us about her three stories, Duran Duran, and whose heart she wants in her throat. 1. How much of yourself is in “Three Stories”? How much of others? There … Continue reading →

Substitute “Baby’s First Words” in Case my Son’s Actual First Word Turns Out to be Profanity

Shift Funk Mister Funkster Funk that shift, you shift-for-brains Mister Funkster. Count What a funky count. Hiss Crock Mass Dan Dan Ick Got Dan Got Dan Ick Pits If that shifthead Mister Funkster keeps staring at my wife’s got Dan … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Mikko Harvey

Two poems by Mikko Harvey appear in the May issue. The author talks with us about commuters who don’t think, the city of his man boobs, and what has happened at the top of a staircase. 1. What are your … Continue reading →

Front Man By Brian Fanelli (A Review By Gretchen Primack)

Big Table Publishing Company $12 From the first listen—and I’m punning here, since this chapbook begins with a poem called “First Listen”—Brian Fanelli sets the reader up for music. Not the melodious, harmonious kind you might imagine when you hear … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Nancy Carol Moody

Nancy Carol Moody makes another appearance in our magazine and talks to us about writers and math, free television, and last suppers. 1. It makes nine mindless circuits around the tank. Am I right? Esattamente! Some have argued for a … Continue reading →

Hurricane Story By Jennifer Shaw (A Review By Amye Archer)

Chin Music Press, July 2011 118 pages.  $18 I, like most Americans, watched from the comfort of my oversized Lazy-Boy as Hurricane Katrina swept away New Orleans in August of 2005.  Don’t get me wrong, I recognized the tragedy of … Continue reading →

Huckster: Muse Varieties For Creatives In Advertising

Many creatives are reluctant to answer (truthfully) the question, “From where do you get your ideas?” Sure, they might provide an answer, but rarely to do they provide the truth: that they get their ideas from a muse. Every creative’s … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Katrina Denza

Katrina Denza’s In The Fall is a lovely story about Paris. She talks with us about the structure of her story, the why of Paris, and the imaginary language she wants to speak fluently. 1. What made you decide to … Continue reading →

Some Illegal Notes

I find myself tired and sick today; and sick and tired every day. I have theories about women and a certain kind of sensitivity. Women and a certain kind of sickness, especially stomach sickness. Women and what is and isn’t … Continue reading →

Literary Los Angeles: Children’s Theater, Family History, and the Hollywood Fringe Festival

It’s that time of year again – the Hollywood Fringe Festival, a ten-day live theater festival compromising more than 800 performances and events held in venues throughout Hollywood.  As someone with (as of four weeks ago) two children, I turned … Continue reading →

Bishop Bobby Bling Speaks: A Sermon

Let me hear the congregation say Amen. I can’t hear you; the congregation’s gotten shy all of a sudden? It don’t matter that you don’t know what I’m about to say. Just say Amen. If Jesus come down here and … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: André Babyn

André Babyn’s play, of sorts, is featured in the May issue. He talks to us about the fifth act, would there be one, inappropriate comments at a funeral, and where this work came from. 1. What would be the fifth … Continue reading →

So You Know It’s Me By Brian Oliu (A Review By Ian Denning)

Tiny Hardcore Press, $7 There’s a lot of delusion involved in trying to find someone on Craigslist Missed Connections. The writer deludes herself into thinking that the message will find its intended recipient. The reader deludes himself into thinking that … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Jules Archer

The searing fiction of Jules Archer is featured in the May issue. She talks with us about guerilla tactics at the drive in, edible body parts and much more. 1. What cockblocking guerrilla tactics would you use to stop a … Continue reading →

Lifestream

I think I’m getting old. Too old for Tumblr, maybe–or most social networks in general, but Tumblr’s on my mind at the moment. Almost a year ago, I opened my Tumblr account; my intent was to supplant my WordPress blog … Continue reading →

the unfirm line – Miracle Legion

“One day the stone will roll away, and soon you’ll see.” All For the Best, Miracle Legion. I am always a sucker for words that reference old Bible stories. As a bonus, also wrapped up in this piece is man … Continue reading →

Happy Birthday Lidia Yuknavitch

Yours is The Book generations of women will press to a beat beneath their left tit as they brave college classrooms the first time, or the next time, or the last time even; it’s with them between classes, between sentences, on … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Elizabeth J. Colen

Elizabeth J. Colen’s six brief fictions appears in the May issue. She explains a shot silk effect, imagines her soul trapped in an adolescent, and strategizes handling newsprint stains. 1. Imagine your soul trapped in the body of a 15-year-old … Continue reading →

Early Happy Father’s Day; or Unhappy Father’s Day; or No Fathers Day; or Dead Fathers Day; or Never Fathers Day; or just for the love of men who love day.

Huckster: Things (About The Advertising Industry And Those Who Work In It) I’ve Yet To Overhear At A Party

“I think it’s just a matter of time before someone in advertising wins the Nobel Peace Prize.” ……………… “Copywriter, huh? Is he single?” ……………… “Well, for starters, I feel like the deadlines could be tighter.” ……………… “It was either this, … Continue reading →

Somewhat Ineffective Jokes About Your Mother

Your mother’s so ugly that many people find her very, very unattractive. * Your mother’s feet have so many corns, that she should probably see a podiatrist. Perhaps the foot doctor can prescribe something to clear that up. * Your … Continue reading →

Go The Fuck to Sleep By Adam Mansbach (Review by Amye Archer)

Akashic Books 32 Pages, $14.95 My sister, Jennie, called me on the phone one day when my twin daughters were about eighteen months old.  It was a Tuesday and it was during nap time.  My heart sank when I realized … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Keith Nathan Brown

Keith Nathan Brown’s innovative Clock Time is featured in the April issue. He talks with us about time villains, where the present overlaps, and what he wants swallowing him. 1. Which is your favorite time themed villain, The Clock King, … Continue reading →

“Give It To God”

“Give it to God,” she said. I’ve written this story a million times before. I’d like to do it differently, this time. When I think of John, I never know where to start. In the beginning. *** We became friends … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Laura Adamczyk

In the April issue, Laura invites us to Please Come In. She talks with us about sharing toothbrushes, finger weapons, and how she reacts to betrayal. 1. What would it take for you to use someone else’s toothbrush? Pretty much … Continue reading →

Big Bright Sun By Nate Pritts (A Review By Brian Fanelli)

Blaze Vox [books] 100 pages, $16 Nate Pritts begins his fourth collection of poems, Big Bright Sun, with a quote from Ralph Waldo Emerson: “But for me the earth is new today, and the sun is raining light.” For Emerson … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Jenny Halper

Jenny Halper’s wonderful, wonderful fiction is one of our favorite parts of the April issue. She talks to us about her vanity, a letter she might write to her thirteen year old child, love and so much more. 1. What … Continue reading →

Dear Tracy Morgan

Dear Tracy Morgan, By now, everyone probably knows you stated during a recent stand-up routine in Nashville Tennesse you’d stab your son to death if he was gay. That was probably the worst of your homophobic tirade. I guess. You also said gays are pussies for whining so much about being bullied … Continue reading →

Notes on watching Asif Kapadia’s SENNA (2010).

I watched Asif Kapadia’s SENNA when it came out in my city in part because I saw the trailer on the blog of a Japanese male model I like, who has a very delicate and beautiful but sometimes irritatingly self-satisfied … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Kirsty Logan

Kirsty Logan’s gorgeous fiction graces the April issue. She talks about the etiquette of curtseying, the lines between the literate and the erotic and some matters of gender. 1. When else is it silly to curtsey? Basically never. The girl in … Continue reading →

Huckster: A Few Famous Songs Turned Into Advertising Jingles

Sung to the tune of “Wanna Be Starting Something,” by Michael Jackson I said you wanna be drinkin’ Starbucks You got to be drinkin’ Starbucks I said you wanna be drinkin’ Starbucks You got to be drinkin’ Starbucks You’re really … Continue reading →

Ask the Champ: Gregory Sherl

It’s rare that we get to interview a champion after surviving a brawl so we are proud that Gregory Sherl, Orlando’s Literary Death Match champion, took time out of his busy schedule to answer our humble questions. His poems in … Continue reading →

Transcript: Anthony Weiner’s Penis Answers Questions During His Press Conference

Monday, Representative Anthony Weiner called a press conference to admit to sending racy pictures to women over the internet. While Weiner answered questions, his penis was below, likewise, responding to questions. Here we present the previously inaudible answers of Rep. … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Ross White

Two poems from Ross White appear in the April issue. He gives advice of the expert kind about his poetry career, describes the kind of nut he is, and his preferred bodyguard. 1. What would be expert advice for your … Continue reading →

The Bee-Loud Glade By Steve Himmer (A Review By Dawn West)

Atticus Books, 2011 224 pages,  $14.95 Like many ‘80s babies raised in or around mid-sized Midwest cities, my interaction with nature was largely confined to backyards, bike trails, cornfields, and the inevitable pumpkin patch. I’ve spent a healthy amount of … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Tracy Gonzalez

Tracy Gonzalez offers some insight into the trouble with giving a man a boner in the April issue. She talks with us about how to give a man a boner with ordinary household objects, and other boner-related matters. 1. How … Continue reading →

The Butterfly Cabinet by Bernie McGill: A Review by Ethel Rohan

I’m the girl who faithfully raced home from school to watch BBC’s historical drama, Upstairs Downstairs; the teen who reread Wuthering Heights obsessively; and the young adult who attempted to write a novel set in a mansion in nineteenth century … Continue reading →

Pictorial: Hard-Bound Drug

Today marks Day 5 of my summer cold; when I’m sick, my desire to write wanes–if anything, I write in my head without putting pen to pad [or finger to keyboard]. Being sick, however, can’t stop the movement*. On my … Continue reading →

Hardwired

The day is warm and windy in Republican country. I’m surrounded by churches and liquor stores, desert hugged by mountains. What does a person’s sexual preference have to do with his or her professional ability, his or her professional integrity? … Continue reading →

the unfirm line – Spiritualized

“Oh babe, I am going nowhere. Nowhere’s where I want to be.” Spiritualized, ‘Don’t Just Do Something’ the unfirm line quiz Instructions: Read the above line then listen to the below song. Question 1: Is he going nowhere as in … Continue reading →

Hairy English

“A semiotician as subtle as Roland Barthes was disappointed in later years that his interviews needed to be cleaned up of hesitations, raspings, small coughs. These sub-verbal or intra-verbal materials claim a locality connected not just to breathing, but rather … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Daniel Pinkerton

You will enjoy Daniel Pinkerton’s poetry in the April issue. He talks with us about the imagery in his work, the correlation between nudity and beauty, the startling nature of Hammer Pants and more. 1. I laughed out loud at … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Chelsea Laine Wells

Chelsea Laine Wells’s difficult and haunting The Breathing Dead appears in the April issue. She talks to us about writing unsettling stories, her uncontrollable urges, and canned pasta. 1. What uncontrollable urges do you have? How dangerous are they? Most … Continue reading →

Huckster: Movie Teaser Excerpts For Films About Advertising

If you see only one movie this summer, make it one of these…and then see the other four! And remember, when you’re reading these teasers, channel the voice of Don LaFontaine! …………………….. The Job In a world…where one man will … Continue reading →

Touching Kiefer Sutherland (1)

In 1989, I broke up with my first boyfriend. I touched Kiefer Sutherland. And I won the title of Miss Coors Extra Gold. My first boyfriend was older than me. He drove a Corvette, owned a house, owned a business. … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Carly Taylor

Three lovely poems by Carly Taylor grace the April issue. She talks with us about compatibility, compartments and catharsis. 1. What stains can a wedding dress not survive? The first thing that comes to mind is wine or anything in … Continue reading →

Norman Lock’s Grim Tales: A Review by PJ Bekker

I hope you’re reading this sitting down, because I am about to dispel a widespread myth about literary criticism: there is no such thing as objectivity. Every reviewer has his or her ideas and preconceptions about what literature should and … Continue reading →

Ol’ Clementine Explains How he and a Team of Navy SEALs Killed Osama bin Laden

NOTE: This is the third and final post in the series, THE MERKING OF OBL (though it may be back as an occasional feature). Read Part 1 here and Part 2 here. Eds. note: At 236-years-old, Ol’ Clementine is the oldest man … Continue reading →

Pictorial: Six Tattoos

There’s nothing particularly attractive about Ohio–its northeast quadrant, specifically–beyond its small town charm. One road truncates ten towns and only the changes in their Welcome To signage demarcates their differences. Glass storefronts adorn the idyllic Main Street of politicians’ lore, … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Nicole Monaghan

Nicole Monoghan’s fiction in the April issue is a heartbreaking cautionary tale. She talks with us about the best libations for fornication, the Kinsey scale, the myth of monogamy and more. 1. What geometric shape should a relationship never resemble? … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Pedro Ponce

Pedro Ponce’s The Church of Best Guesses appears in the April issue. He discusses Baptism, the haunting of pi, the position he would hold in the Church of Best Guesses and more. 1. How is one baptized in the Church … Continue reading →

Huckster: The Opening Of A Job (As Told In The Style Of A Raymond Carver Story Edited By Gordon Lish)

L.T and I go out for a drink at this café that serves cold sandwiches and alcohol. This is after I opened a new job back at the agency. We don’t always drink at lunch. Sometimes we drink other times … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Sterling McKennedy

Sterling McKennedy’s imaginative What We Had to Do is, I confess, a favorite. He talks with us about celestial bodies, what he might build on the moon, and more. 1. What celestial body would you pick apart? Oh, I’ll pick … Continue reading →

xTx’s He Is Talking to the Fat Lady: A Review By Lauren Schmeer

Reading xTx’s newest chapbook He Is Talking to the Fat Lady gives me the feeling of being laughed at while I’m huddled over in pain, and I appreciate it more with every read. There’s an empowered anger in each piece, … Continue reading →

Pictorial: Lisa Nicole Carson

Her Wiki page is paltry, a bare-bones rundown of an eleven year acting career–mere vital statics. Born July 12, 1969 in Brooklyn, New York. Ethnicity: African-American Occupation: Actress Years active: 1991 – 2002 There are brief notes on her acting … Continue reading →

An Interview With Miami-Dade Mayoral Candidate Luther “Uncle Luke” Campbell

Luther “Uncle Luke” Campbell, first as leader of  the rap group, 2 Live Crew and then as a solo artist, has recorded some of the raunchiest party songs of all time. Campbell masterminded such hits as, “Me So Horny” and “Head, Head … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Jaime Fountaine

Jaime Fountaine’s amazing Len and Ernie appears in the April issue. She gets down with us, talking about singing for supper, long lost pals, and the best things that aren’t so easy. 1. Are halves still important to you? Halves … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Adam Day

Adam Day’s two poems are part of the April issue. He talks with us about how he shifts, infidelities and food, and how he comes up with his amazing lines. 1. What do you shift like? Like Etheridge Knight or … Continue reading →

Parcel #1: A Review by Ally Nicholl

The first thing you’ll notice about Parcel is that it looks and feels gorgeous. The creators have clearly put a lot of effort into making it an enjoyable reading experience, with artwork by Jaclyn Mednicov and stylish design work by … Continue reading →

Joshua Marie Wilkinson’s Selenography: A review by J. A. Tyler

The moon is out tonight and it is big on the horizon and the face, the man-in-the-moon face, is clearly visible, looking downward in a gesture that seems either pitying or happy from afar. The moon’s surface is an odd … Continue reading →

Three (About the Body) Rough

When I was three, my mother left my father and me. When I was five, my father told me he was driving to Denver to pick up my brother. I didn’t know I had a brother. I knew I didn’t have a … Continue reading →

On dubbing

Yoko Tawada, “The Art of Being Non-Synchronous”: In Japan, poetry readings are rare. I found it just as surprising that on German television the samurais in a Kurosawa movie spoke German fluently, as did the figures in anime films. Even … Continue reading →

Thoughts On The Rapture

Somewhere on my hard drive lies a column–most likely under a folder labeled “PANK”–that I intended to post this week. I decided to save it for next week. Or maybe not. Depends on where I go with this new, sudden … Continue reading →

the unfirm line – Gnarls Barkley

“Come on now, who do you think you are? Bless your soul. You really think you’re in control?” – ‘Crazy, Gnarls Barkley Reflection is a soul-pounding process. The goal to never make the same mistake twice, while hoping your loved … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: David Cotrone

David Cotrone’s Porch appears in the April issue and he talks with us about building nightmares, the fire on the roof, movies featuring ruined houses and much more. 1. How would you build a nightmare? From the ground up. From … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Faith Gardner

Faith Gardner’s fiction is featured in the April issue and she talks with us about what she wears in her head, the development of this story and how music influences her writing. 1. What do you wear, ride, and snort in … Continue reading →

Huckster: Yankee Candle Scents For Advertising Professionals

Polished Turd Definitely doesn’t smell like Cannes. Production Meeting Notes of copper (blood) and onions (body odor) and sugar (to pour into the wounds). Careful! Some wicks are fuses! Office Coffee Is something burning? Yes. Yes, something is burning. Server’s … Continue reading →

Dear Donny Thane

  Last night I sat under a fan staring at the TV wondering if this might be the night I slept longer than four hours, then over the sound of the fan and TV I heard my son crying down the hall in … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Laura LeHew

Laura LeHew shares her imaginative poetry with us once again in the April issue. She talks with us about new math, the airline industry and airplane peril movies. 1. How did you find “New Math”? 45 minutes on hold with … Continue reading →

Sarah Rose Etter’s Tongue Party: A Review by Dawn West

There is a particular scene in HBO’s Six Feet Under when Claire Fisher is in art class and her professor, Olivier, is raving about how sensual sensation is the most reliable gauge for evaluating a work of art; he insists … Continue reading →

The Merking of OBL Part 2: Barack Obama Calls George W. Bush

NOTE: This is the second post in the series, THE MERKING OF OBL, which will explore the death of Osama bin Laden. Read Part 1 here. Check back later this week for part 3 and maybe 4, I haven’t decided … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Marie-Elizabeth Mali

Marie-Elizabeth Mali offers us a glimpse into five years of marriage in the March issue and she talks to us about being married to a poet, perfect moments, and what to avoid in marriage vows. 1. What are the benefits … Continue reading →

The Merking of OBL Pt. 1: An Interview With Fred, Osama bin Laden’s 72nd Virgin

NOTE: This is the first post in the series THE MERKING OF OBL, which will explore the death of Osama bin Laden. Check back later this week for parts 2, 3 and maybe 4, I haven’t decided yet, as well … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Rose Hunter

A gorgeous, poem in two parts, by Rose Hunter, appears in the April issue. She talks with us about living in Mexico, bottle labels, hunting, and more. 1. How often do you read the labels of liquor bottles and cigarette … Continue reading →

How To Ask For It: An Essay by Emma Ozeren

I grew up in the West Country, which is not a country; it’s the rural south-west of England, a stocky little peninsula pointing out to the Celtic Sea and the Atlantic beyond. My family have been farming there for a … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Michelle Cheever

1. How is a man’s wreckage attractive? A man’s wreckage is attractive because “broken” is a beautiful word. The girl in the story knew she couldn’t save him by sleeping with him, if fact it probably made him feel all … Continue reading →

The Joy of Binge Drinking: An Essay by Jacqui Hazell

We like a drink, us Brits. We’re renowned for it. Venture into any town or city centre, anywhere in the UK, on a Friday or Saturday night and what will you see? Depending on your point of view, it’ll be … Continue reading →

MÃœNCHNER FREIHEIT 04262011

Dear —, I take this video* outside the Münchner Freiheit metro station in the Schwabing area of Munich. Later I have dinner with strangers who also happen to be friends. Everyone speaks in German, which I understand fairly well, but … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Christina Kapp

Christina Kapp’s Inheritance is included in the March issue. She talks with us about her buttons, drinking herself to death, rescue, and more. 1. What do your buttons look like? Well, my most often used buttons are white and they … Continue reading →

Huckster: Deciding To Get Into Advertising: Mini-Stories

Jason’s Story I still remember the day I decided to get into advertising. It was a cold day. Extremely cold. Not outside, but inside the walk-in freezer, the one my captor locked me in. You know, same old story. Anyway, … Continue reading →

Writer-Spouses

So much to say in a marriage, so much unsaid. Joyce Carol Oates *** Only a foolhardy youth with something to prove acknowledges death, then proceeds to chase it. Some call it bravery; the old men in flannel shirts, their … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Amber Noelle Sparks

Amber Sparks was a finalist in our 2010 contest and she talks with us about deathbed towns, the metal she would like to be made of, and how the heart can be bigger than the body it is beating in. … Continue reading →

Fragmentation + Other Stories: A Review by Rebecca Leece

Anthologies. What’s to be done about them? Millions exist, and undoubtedly millions more are in the making this very instant. Say, for example, you are fascinated by stories about dead babies. You require a fresh dead baby story to read while you … Continue reading →

Crabs

Today is Tuesday and I transmit from a trailer in a trailer park on the southeast of town. The sun shines. The wind has tapered down. Weather’s about to turn for the warmer. I love warm. And my trailer is awesome. Did I mention … Continue reading →

Dublin Calling: An Essay by Erin Stalcup

When I arrived in Ireland I had a hard time understanding the accents. I didn’t know what “T’lads and m’self ergoin’ twa disco t’ave some craic—ye must get paralytic wit’ us!” meant. I did a lot of what lads in … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Tim Kahl

Today, by Tim Kahl, appears in the March issue. He talks with us about an all squirrel version of a popular movie, how a star loses its innocence and how his shadow slinks. 1. How would you make an all … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Frankie Romano

Frankie Romano’s Oscar the Normal is a great part of the February issue. She talks to us about what she would live without, breaking news about her imaginary missing arm, growing up, and how poetry slams have helped her voice. … Continue reading →

Huckster: The Catholic Church—Advertising Medium Of The Future

Currently, there’s a huge medium that’s being ignored by advertisers, and that medium is the Catholic Church. But this will change in the future—specifically, it will change on Maypril 45, 2123 AD. I learned this from a friend of mine … Continue reading →

Birther Control or Ol’ Clementine Got Some Questions About The President’s Birth Certificate

Eds. note: At 236-years-old, Ol’ Clementine is the oldest man in the world. He worked as a slave in most of the Confederate states and has continued the profession long after Emancipation. Occasionally, he shares his unique perspective on the … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Kristina Born

Kritina Born’s The Village Called Hurty was a finalist in our most recent writing contest. She talks with us about her hurty place, the magic she wants and her favorite werewolf. 1. Where is your hurty place? I bruise like … Continue reading →

Spilt Milk Issue 1 (blue-eyed boy bait) – A Review by Ally Nicholl

Spilt Milk describe themselves as “collectors & distributors of word joy”, and their first magazine ‘blue-eyed boy bait’ is a handsome collection of short stories, flash fiction and poetry which aims to do just that. Thirty different writers have contributed … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Hilary King

Hilary King evokes William Carlos Williams in the February issue. She talks with us about how that poet might react, theories about the original and its imitations, and interoffice romance. 1. How would William Carlos Williams react after reading your … Continue reading →

Short Story Markets in the UK and the US, by Jarred McGinnis

Every morning from the age of five until I was eighteen, they made me pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America; so I’m duty bound to think, like rock and roll and spray cheese in a … Continue reading →

14

My son’s first girlfriend was Alyssa Milano. He was three. She was twenty-seven. Alyssa was on the cover of Cosmopolitan Magazine that year and my son cut her out with his child-safe scissors then stuck her to the refrigerator with a couple of … Continue reading →

On Writing Memoir (Or The Lying Game)

I have a friend on Twitter. Well, I have 104 friends on Twitter as of today–a nice number given my account lockdown–but anyway, I have a friend who, last year, sent me some direct messages. I publicly vented my frustrations … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Eliza Tudor

Eliza Tudor’s wonderful Shells is featured in the March issue. She talks with us about what can break her easily, the problem of love, medical conditions and slow dances. 1. How is love a problem worse than cars? Trust me … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Eric Nguyen

Enjoy Eric Nguyen’s “We Are Here” in the February 2011 issue of PANK. He talks with us about why we are here, Anne Rice’s fighting style and spacecrafts as time capsules. 1. What is Anne Rice’s fighting style? Capoeira. 2. … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Megan Williams

Two poems by Megan Williams appear in the March issue. She talks with us about the kind of cathedral woman she is, which comes first, the poem or the title, and the lines that impact her most. 1. What kind … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Richard Thomas

Richard Thomas allows us to choose our own adventure, sort of, with Splintered in the March issue. He talks with us about the structure of that story, awkward breakups and breakup mixes. 1. How did you figure out that “Choose … Continue reading →

Becoming British: An Essay by Sara Henkin

After nearly five years in London, one wedding, three different types of visas, and a pact that my husband and I would not give in and pay an immigration lawyer, I found myself registering to take the United Kingdom’s citizenship … Continue reading →

Moses and God Compose the 10 Commandments

We’ve reached the holiest time of the year, where Jews celebrate their escape from bondage in Egypt and Christians celebrate the torture and brutal murder of Jesus Christ. This holy moment for the Jews culminated in Moses the Law Giver, … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Sandra Simonds

Sandra Simonds’s Sketch of Early Life does a fine job of capturing early motherhood. She talks with us about the gifts left by the fetus hairy, nautical transportation, and how she might answer the questions, “Is there a doctor in … Continue reading →

Huckster: First Lines Of Classic Novels, Written As If Their Authors Had Worked In Advertising

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. It was the age of opening a job, it was the age of closing the job, followed by reopening the job, but with a tighter deadline. It was … Continue reading →

Letter to Shin Sang-ok

Dear Shin Sang-ok, I keep thinking about you. When I was at university, I wrote a short story—-which was not a short story because it ended up being fifty pages, one of the first indications of my future failure as … Continue reading →

Brendan Connell’s The Life of Polycrates & Other Stories for Antiquated Children: A Review by JL Williams

I’m loath to summarise each story in this fascinating and sensual collection as at least one other has already done it very well, and because they’re just so good you ought to read them yourself. If you do, prepare to indulge, to savour, … Continue reading →

Long Live the Queen’s Head Pub: An Essay by Danica Green

Sport is a large part of living in Britain, and everyone is expected to stand up and support their country when the time comes. Football belongs to the English, rugby to the Welsh, and Scotland has such unclassifiable sports as … Continue reading →

Novel Zombie

I’d like to tell you about my novel. The dead one. The one which stirs in its grave. gaussian blur It started in 2002. I lived in Prince George’s County, Maryland–about ten miles from the DC border–and I had a … Continue reading →

the unfirm line – M. Kitchell

“The images produced by dead men are the greatest mystery of my life.” M. Kitchell, ‘the text of death’ There are two dead men that mean the world to me. They produced words and stories that stabbed directly, not forceful … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: James O’Brien

James O’Brien’s Travelers is included in the March issue.  He talks with us about his preferred (or not) mode of travel, atrocious acts, nameless characters and more. 1. How do you prefer to travel long distances? I don’t. If I … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Joseph Michael Owens

Contemptibly, A Hair, in our March issue, is guaranteed to make you laugh. The author, Joseph Michael Owens, talks with us about free coffee at work, how he takes his coffee and much more. 1. What is your theory on the … Continue reading →

Huckster: The Progression Of Job Titles In Various Agency Departments

Account Services Department Account Coordinator Account Executive Assistant to the Barista Barista Head Barista Account Supervisor Director of Account Services (Mystery Title, Determined By The Wheel Of Thou Fair Moniker) Assistant to the Barista …………………… …………………… Public Relations Department Public … Continue reading →

In Search of the Perfect Ending

About ten miles from my job, there’s a park where I like to visit when, upon lunch time, I have nowhere else to go. My job, a manufacturing plant, has a cafeteria struck dead by austerity: white rectangular tables with … Continue reading →

Fractured West #2: A Review by Tania Hershman

It took me far longer to read this magazine of flash fiction than it usually does to read most novels, and that is testament to the power and intensity of an excellent piece of flash fiction. I carried it around … Continue reading →

Ol’ Clementine Remembers the War of Yankee Aggression

Eds. note: On the 150th anniversary of The Civil War, that chapter in the country’s history remains a controversial one. To gain perspective, we turn to the world’s oldest man, former Alabama slave, Ol’ Clementine. At 236 years old, he … Continue reading →

Light

Jeff and I used to go to the gay clubs in Denver. I was a model then; Jeff was a model too. That was how we met. Anyway, we recognized each other right away. At clubs, we were brother and sister. Jeff was … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Joseph A.W. Quintela

Joseph A.W. Quintela’s poem I Am appears in the February issue and he does a lot of answering our questions with questions in today’s interview. 1. What implement of destruction are you really? Why is an axe thought to be … Continue reading →

Literary Scenes in Britain, Nashville and Amsterdam: An Essay by Avery Oslo

BritPANK is coming! It’s like Christmas in July, but instead of milk and cookies, Santa’s sipping Irn Bru and eating…toad-in-the-hole? Laver bread? Champ? This special issue is necessary, like tea or like air because modern British literature is one of … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Susan Slaviero

Susan Slaviero’s poetry appears in the February issue. She talks with us about hiding the body, poetry brothels and the cast of the sequel to her life. 1. Where did you hide the body? The body is hidden in a … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Libby Cudmore

Libby Cudmore finds a Personal Jesus in the March issue. She talks with us about continental breakfasts, the structure of her body and what Jesus listens to while he watches. 1. What would be served at the Continental breakfast at … Continue reading →

Huckster: How To Inverview For A Job In Advertising

Looking for a job in advertising? Plenty of people are, that’s for sure. Here’s a little trick: open up any phone book and, chances are, someone in that book is looking for a job in advertising. Just kidding. There’s no … Continue reading →

Open Letter to James Franco so if you are not Jimmy Franco Please Stop Reading. Thanks.

Dear Jimmy, Forgive me for being so informal. My initial draft began, “Dear Mr. Franco,” but after you read this, we’re going to become good buddies and nothing as formal as “Mr. Franco” will do. You’ll call me on my … Continue reading →

Lidia Yuknavitch’s The Chronology of Water: A Review by Dawn West

I am not what people mean when they say good woman. By people, I mean the good Christian kind. Sarah Palin calls them real Americans. I have lied (especially to hide) and cheated (twice). I smoke and swear and drink. I’m not … Continue reading →

Two

I saw the film, “Showgirls,” with a friend in 1995. We were alone in the theater. I loved the movie from the get go, my instant-fierce love. The film received terrible reviews though; everyone said how bad Elizabeth Berkley was as Nomi Malone. I’ve seen … Continue reading →

the unfirm line – Morrissey

“And all those lies, written lies, twisted lies well, they weren’t lies, they weren’t lies, they weren’t lies I never said. I never said.” Morrissey, Speedway I’ve never confessed to a priest. Tight-lipped, tight-lipped and evasive. There are no horrible … Continue reading →

On Audrey Hepburn, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Tura Satana, Gregory Peck, racist cookies, and not being an American writer.

My father used to say that I was an American made of Filipino raw materials, so for a long time I’ve thought of my body as composite and cybernetic (cybernetic because my American part is definitely electronic—which is to say, … Continue reading →

A Short, Springtime Invocation Dedicated To Writers + Snooki

Living in NJ means I have to deflect vitriol and chides deriving from the thing called Jersey Shore. As if I gave the thumbs up on that show, as if Jersey Shore applies to the entire state; funny, I don’t … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Erik Hanson

Erik Hanson’s Vision Quest is a favorite from the February issue. He talks with us about sad stories that begin in bars, Scotch for sipping, and staring into the stars among other matters. 1. What have you found in the … Continue reading →

DYN-O-MITE!: The Revolutionary Origins of an Explosive Catchphrase

Long thought to be a sitcom catchphrase like any other—DYN-O-MITE!—the excited refrain of James Evans, Jr., the oldest son on the Norman Lear produced family sitcom, Good Times, is perhaps the most interesting and subversive in television history. The refrain … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Lania Knight

Lania Knight’s moving and poetic essay appears in the February issue. She talks with us about dancing playlists, the potential of passionate affairs, and the pelts of dream animals. 1. What is on your dance party playlist? I’ve got eclectic … Continue reading →

Huckster: First-Draft Taglines

Chances are, if you don’t work in the magical world of advertising, then you’re probably not aware of what company taglines originally looked like before they evolved into their present state. For instance, did you know that Volkswagon’s “Drivers Wanted” … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Adam Moorad

Adam Moorad makes another appearance in PANK with his story Wine of Youth. He talks with us about skin oracles, the actual taste of the wine of youth and more. 1. What does the wine of youth taste like? What … Continue reading →

One

My mother died March 20, 2011. Her name was Lydia Kathleen. She married my father when she was seventeen. At eighteen, Lydia Kathleen gave birth to me. My father tells me about the snowstorm in Durango that night. They were scared … Continue reading →

Clare Fisher’s The Hole in the Wall: A Review by Dan Holloway

Clare Fisher’s The Hole in the Wall is a beautifully produced, exquisitely edited novella, just as I’ve come to expect from the fantastic Philistine Press. It’s daring, and so nearly brilliant. For such a short book The Hole in the … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Joseph Cassara

Joseph Cassara’s imaginative fiction appeared in the February issue and was also featured on the American Short Fiction blog. He talks with us about the neuroses of his childhood, singing as the ship goes down and more. 1. How would … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Len Kuntz

The prolific Len Kuntz made his PANK debut in the February issue. He took a stream of consciousness approach to our conversation and then magic happened. 1. How can one tell the level of toothache through a kiss? If the kiss flutters … Continue reading →

Huckster: My First Date

Everyone remembers their first date. I certainly remember mine. I was 22 and I had just been promoted from junior copywriter to copywriter. In fact, I remember my first date like it was yesterday. Her name was Judy or Joan … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Amy Butcher

Amy Butcher’s Taking Form appears in the February issue. She talks with us about the coolest name, working the pole and Mennonite breakfasts. 1. You have one of the coolest names of all time. However, to protect your cool name, … Continue reading →

Slave, Please

I must have read The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn a long time ago, back when I was a teenager or something like that. Never finished it. Figured there wasn’t much to it. A bunch of ignorant White folks saying ‘nigger’ … Continue reading →

Fluffer

The first erotic story I ever wrote published was in 1995. I called it “Private Investigation” and had Fox Mulder and Dana Scully in mind when I wrote it. They fucked on a mattress at a crime scene. Playgirl Magazine published it. … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Lydia Unsworth

Lydia Unsworth’s imaginative fiction appeared in the December issue. She talks with us about watery music, the specialness of the sea, and what she was born to kill. 1. Is the sea nothing special to you? It’s getting there.  I’m … Continue reading →

By Invitation Only: A Review by Kenny Mooney

By Invitation Only, a collection of short stories from Unbound Press and Spilling Ink Review, ironically enough, came into my life uninvited. I won it in a competition I was only vaguely aware I had even entered – a promotional … Continue reading →

An Interview with Ocean Vuong By Amanda Mathews

As a follow-up to Krystelle Bamford’s review of Ocean Vuong’s Burnings, Amanda Mathews presents an interview: Q: In the first section of your book Burnings, the majority of the poems center around Vietnam along with maternal relationships with both your mother … Continue reading →

Blog Different

This past week, I wrote a post on my personal blog and snatched it down shortly after pressing “Publish.” As I typed out the gory details involving my depression diagnosis, it never occurred to me that I was sharing more … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Brendan Constantine

Brendan Constantine’s Noct appears in the February issue and he talks with us about white space, counting, WTF, and more. 1. How did you form the white space in “Noct”? I’d been writing about speechlessness. Hardly an original notion, I … Continue reading →

First Person Memoirs For People Who Don’t Exist

I write first person memoirs for people who don’t exist. I just thought this to myself and it sounded cool and authoritative (in the author sense of the word). It may be accurate, since they’re as bewildered and mistaken about … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Shanti Perez

Shanti Perez’s Krst, The Little Spy, appears in the December 2010 issue. She talks with us about barn sneaking, researching for her writing, and the guilty pleasures of watching. 1. What would you sneak into a barn? This is the … Continue reading →

A Life Transparent by Todd Keisling – A Review by Ally Nicholl

Donovan Candle has a problem: a telesales rep for nine years, the mundanity of his existence has brought him to the attention of the Gatekeeper of the Grey, a sinister overlord named Aleister Dullington who feeds on boredom and uses … Continue reading →

Huckster: Do You Have A Urinary Tract Infection Or Are You Just Doing Your Timesheets?

Let’s face it: there’s only one thing worse than having “that feeling” and that, of course, is not knowing exactly what the feeling means (besides excruciating pain! Help!). Many doctors rush to the diagnosis of urinary tract infection (UTI), but … Continue reading →

Breeding and Writing: I don’t know what to call this

I don’t know where the time goes. I’ve been desperately grasping the holes where it used to be, clawing to save bits of burnt straw. Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Sarah Kokernot

Sarah Kokernot’s The Russians Have Come appears in the February issue. She talks to us about laughing at orphans, collecting things, and how much of her life is in stories. 1. What is the worst thing you have ever laughed … Continue reading →

A Sample of Critical Reactions to Martin Lawrence’s: Big Mommas: Like Father, Like Son

Eds. Note: In 2000, Martin Lawrence starred in the seminal black-man-in-a-fat-suit-portraying-a-black-woman comedy, Big Momma’s House. This was an exciting moment for cinema. Lawrence, long thought to be the clown, turned in a sensitive and nuanced performance as a man who, … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Nate Pritts

Prolific poet and editor Nate Pritts has a fine series of poems in the February issue. He speaks with us about the construction of poetry, where words crash, and what he wants to hold hands with. 1. What’s with poetry’s … Continue reading →

Bragi Ólafsson’s The Ambassador (translated by Lytton Smith): A Review by Rebecca Leece

It was January of 2011 when—working my way through the lung-high drifts of snow—I decided to focus on reading international writers. “No, wait!” I cried out, raising a mitten-clad hand, just in time to catch the arm of another Brooklynite … Continue reading →

the unfirm line – Mel Bosworth

“The spell is over us all, the spell is over us all, relentless.” Mel Bosworth, Grease Stains, Kismet, and Maternal Wisdom Sometimes I stress over the big decisions: job choices, moving from state to state, parental choices. However, I am … Continue reading →

Cattle Call

Have you ever been to a cattle call? It’s like entering a writing contest. But I should explain a cattle call first. When I was a model I used to go to these things the industry referred to as a “cattle call,” … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Leslie McGrath

Leslie McGrath’s nuanced poem, Parallax, appears in the February issue. The poet talks with us about pocket Museums, poems as love stories, commonality or rarity, and more. 1. What is in your pocket Louvre? I went to a reading at … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Chloe Caldwell

Chloe Caldwell’s visceral Hunger appears in the February issue. She talks with us about the best scotch pairings with coke, pinatas, and orgies in her mouth. 1. What scotch do you recommend in McDonald’s Coca-Cola? Johnnie Walker Red Label holds … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Rachel Brown

Rachel Brown’s four poems are featured in the February issue. She talks with us about her first time (publishing, pervs), math, zipping things and more. 1. Based on your bio, I understand this is your first publication. What was your … Continue reading →

Huckster: The Worst Kind Of Client

It’s common for someone working in advertising to complain about a client every now and then. It’s only human nature as well as science (chemistry). There are the clients who want to play art director, or the ones who like … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Deanna Larsen

Deanna Larsen’s elegant Buenos Aires in Three Short Lessons is part of the February issue. She talks with us about what she wishes her calves would cut, matters of bones and being afraid of her own body. 1. What or … Continue reading →

Doing Dishes

I dreamed once a person took a shit in the middle of a room and then left it there, and I just stood looking at it like, I’m supposed to clean this up? I used to live in this apartment complex where a guy … Continue reading →

Disintegrating Novels

I’m glancing at my noticeboard, at the numerous tasks I need to complete: four stories (three fiction, one personal essay) in various revision stages, three works in progress and my column. The noticeboard excludes other lesser duties: update my Tumblr … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Claudine Moreau

Claudine Moreau’s No Witnesses is a fine addition to the February issue. She talks with us about achieving hidden motives, literature as her religion (sort of), the research she puts into her writing, and more. 1. How would you pimp … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Andrew Kozma

Two poems by Andrew Kozma appear in the February issue and he discusses the matter of epigraphs, what he is willing to mine and what he has cut to save something. 1. What epigraph best describes or introduces you? I’ll … Continue reading →

Literary Los Angeles: Los Angeles Alleys

It’s been far too long since I wrote a post for Literary Los Angeles, but now I am in the process of writing several very long ones at once, including a whole series on Los Angeles history and how it’s … Continue reading →

Ocean Vuong’s Burnings: A Review by Krystelle Bamford

It’s a strange feeling to miss a place sporadically.  I lived in New York for a few years before moving to Scotland, and when I think about the city it’s a glancing, regretful attachment.  A really beautiful and thoughtless boyfriend who you’re … Continue reading →

Not Vegas

So it’s Thursday everyone and I realized at 5:49 this morning I hadn’t written my column this week. Wow. Time flies. It’s Friday, 7:11 a.m., and I’ve still not finished my column. Slacker. Actually, I’ve got stuff happening and probably could have skipped this week, but … Continue reading →

the unfirm line – Edward Abbey

“A swirl of little pale birds, like confetti, like a net of lace, exfoliated from the sky and draped themselves upon an Aleppo pine … the world continued, bland and blase, while catastrophe opened beneath the one who cared.” Edward … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Peter Schwartz

Peter Schwartz’s masterful poetry is part of the January issue and he talks to us about a number of things including the 12th thing his pain has, the influence of art on poetry and more. 1. If your pain has … Continue reading →

Huckster: Myth Bustin’

Why am I here? Why are you here? Why are any of us here? Why is this cat here, sitting on the barstool next to me? Why is there a living goldfish wriggling inside the cat’s mouth? Where did that … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Katy Resch

Katy Resch’s The Fawn Skull is one of my favorites I’ve had the opportunity to publish. In this excellent story, in the January issue, she captures the life and mind and heart of an adolescent girl so beautifully in this … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Laurence Pritchard

Laurence Pritchard’s engaging “Fucking Mermaids” is one of our favorites in the January issue. He talks with us about the logistics of sex with mermaids, minotaurs, and other mythical beasts. 1. Would fucking a mermaid be like that pool sex … Continue reading →

They All Have Shaft Afros

At once, I see why I used to love—and now hate—the Law & Order series. When I was down with the show, I stuck with the original version. Every so often, I’d watch SVU, but I could only handle sex … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: James Valvis

Poetry from James Valvis appears in the January issue. He writes us a poem, talks about breaking and entering into poetry and more. 1. Describe how you break into other people’s poems and steal from them to create new poems. … Continue reading →

A Kite in Wind: Julia Cohen’s Triggermoon Triggermoon (a review)

Imagine this perfectly windy day. There is a kite, the most perfect kite. And we are on a perfect grassy slope, looking down a clean run, a lack of trees as a runway. We want to burst, kite string in … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Bess Winter

Bess Winter’s Men With Own Tuxedos is included in the January issue and she talks with us about the ritual of the tuxedo, Craigslist and the origins of her story. 1. Why must men in tuxedos be sad? We cannot … Continue reading →

Tenderoni by Kathy Fish: A Review by Ethel Rohan

The story collection, Tenderoni, by Kathy Fish is forthcoming soon from Cow Heavy Books. I had the great honor and pleasure of reading an advance copy. I admit on first learning the story collection’s title, Tenderoni, I felt somewhat ambivalent. … Continue reading →

Huckster: An Average Day For Someone Who Works In Advertising

—Wake up. Wonder why you have “If You’re Happy And You Know It, Clap Your Hands” song stuck in head. —Go to bathroom (number one). —Head to office. Realize you forgot your laptop. —Go back home, try to remember what … Continue reading →

There Is More To Life Than Writing

I have no business posting this. “ A life, Jimmy, you know what that is? It’s the shit that happens while you’re waiting for moments that never come.” -Quote from The Wire *** I am of two minds, of two … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Janice Harrington

We are lucky to have four poems by Janice Harrington in the January issue and she talks with us about grafting things to her body, the medical procedure that makes her most uncomfortable, writing science and medicine for children and … Continue reading →

Barry Graham’s Nothing or Next to Nothing: A Review by Martin Macaulay

I’ll always remember seeing Barry Graham (now Dogo Barry Graham) on TV about 20 years ago. It was a regional show called Scottish Books which ran in a past-bedtime slot. Each week a different panel discussed the latest releases, but … Continue reading →

Poison

When I leave work traveling north on Highway 50 over the bridge I see the same billboard each day. “Heaven or Hell: Where Are You Going?”  It’s a ridicules question. Hell is eighth grade. Or if you’re a writer, it’s having no time to write.   … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Micah Dean Hicks

Micah Dean Hicks’s remarkable “A Famine of Music” appears in the January issue and he talks with us about matters of great importance including inventing body parts, the danger of music in a dark alley and more. 1. What body … Continue reading →

the unfirm line – The Dears

“Galactic tides will end our lives - Taking us down in the moonlight” The Dears – Galactic Tides There are some masses, immense and greedy. I try to stay away from them, stay away from their gravitational field. Otherwise, the closer … Continue reading →

Breeding and Writing: Does your choice of profession outweigh your rights?

I’ll make this brief. I read two news stories today that piss me off as a professional, as a parent, and as a human being. Because you know what? I am all of those things at the same time. Story … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Lincoln Michel

Two of Lincoln Michel’s fictions appear in the January issue. He talks with us about the Wu-Tang sword, face slapping as a motivational tool, what he would hunt and more. 1. What rank would you like to have in the … Continue reading →

Huckster: The Legend Of My Grandfather, An Ad Man

Before he died, my grandfather once told me that everyone is supposed to stick to one thing in life. One thing. That, he said, was the secret of life. He was in advertising, my grandfather, but you’d never know it. … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Sam Cohen

Sam Cohen “goes there” with her fantastic story, Sustenance, in the January issue. She talks with us about the difficult choices inherent to cannibalism, how to sever a limb, and her tattoo wishlist among other things. 1. Whose voice would … Continue reading →

A Review of Brevity, Winter 2011

I don’t know about you, PANKsters, but I am in that middle section. I’d like to pretend I’m far too busy and important to read things that are longer than 1,000 words, but as it’s midday and I’m still in … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: I. Fontana

I. Fontana’s Lamentations of Babylon appears in the January issue and the author talks with us about harems, unemployment, elaborate storytelling and more. 1. In one paragraph, categorize the first decade of the 21st century. Whether you’re in Estonia, Latvia, … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Jen Besemer

Jen Bessemer’s imaginative work appears in the January issue and she talks with us about literary movements, hidden dangers and performance enhancement. 1. What hidden dangers are you fed up with? I’m fed up with the hidden dangers of contemporary … Continue reading →

Impeded

Today is Sunday and I transmit from a cottage in Republican country after having suffered the worst of a terrible bout of flu. It’s early afternoon and already I’ve worn myself out doing laundry and a few other minor chores. I may not finish this … Continue reading →

Breeding and Writing: Big-bottomed girls and other playthings

When I was a kid, I was weird and lonely. My friends were my pets and my toys, in that order. Looking at my kids’ toys now, though, I think something big has changed. Girls’ toys, in general, are role-playing … Continue reading →

Forbes & Jaded Ibis Press

Jaded Ibis Press, publisher extraordinaire & home to slick now & coming books by Lily Hoang, David Hoenigman, John Dermot Woods/J.A. Tyler, Janice Lee, Anna Joy Springer, Christopher Grimes, & Davis Schneiderman posted this in-depth interview today via Forbes.com. Chalk one up for team … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Lacey Martinez

Lacey Martinez’s Birth Defect is an imaginative, sort of disturbing but engaging story in the December issue. She talks with us about the letter Z, bilingualism, our biggest fears and more. 1. What exactly is ‘Z’? According to the latest … Continue reading →

Huckster: Transcript Of An Ad Agency New-Business Pitch, Part 1: Introducing The Team

Hello, and thank you for letting us pitch your business. Half of the thinking you’re about to hear today will decidedly prove that we are the right advertising agency for you, and the other half will simply blow. Your. Mind. … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Suzanne Rindell

Suzanne Rindell’s elegant writing is part of the December issue and she talks to us about being pretty in fiction, hated day jobs and how much of herself she puts in her writing. 1. Why must most everyone be pretty … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Aubrey Hirsch

At AWP 2011, I met Aubrey Hirsch, author of the story “Hydrogen Event In A Bubble Chamber” published in the May 2010 issue. Aubrey informed me over drinks that I did not interview her for that issue and after some … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Alec Bryan

Alec Bryan’s contribution to the January issue is quite epic, and he talks about selling himself, catching tears, and rattling questions among other matters. 1. When selling yourself, what is your slogan? I am more than a piece of man … Continue reading →

Sex Scene: An Anthology, a Review by Ally Nicholl

Thirteen writers, each with different backgrounds and experiences, are given the simple brief : write a sex scene. This forms the intriguing premise of Sex Scene: An Anthology, edited by Robert James Russell, and the results are fascinating. It gets … Continue reading →

Electric Parade: Patti Smith & Me

I’m a quarter through Patti Smith’s memoir, Just Kids. I don’t have anything to say about the book itself, other than I can’t wait to finish it. That aside, I was shocked to learn that Smith lived in my section … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Ande Davis

Ande Davis does beautiful things with language in his story Mechanics. He talks with us about ninja turtles, Mary’s father, dating the limbless and more. 1. What action figure would you wish to hug people like? A ninja turtle, probably … Continue reading →

Higher

I’d like to write another story for Best Women’s Erotica; I’d like to publish that story in another edition of Best Women’s Erotica. Over the years, editors for the annual erotica collection have rejected my work once, shortlisted my work … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Shannon Peil

Shannon Peil’s Sam appears in the December issue and he talks with us about balance, voice, names that should be banned and other matters. 1. What is your middle name? What would you like your middle name to be? My … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Karen Munro

Karen Munro’s hilarious Agenda which any one in academia can relate to, is included in our December issue. She talks with us about her work, cybernetic implants, and the strangeness of the Northwest. 1. How did you go about creating … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Sherry O’Keefe

Sherry O’Keefe’s poetry in the December issue is about what is not what it is about. She talks with us about Karl, dauntless tasks, and much more. Who is Karl? Every canoe I’ve ever paddled, I’ve tipped out of. Karl … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Annam Manthiram

Annam Manthiram’s Superheroes is part of the December issue and she talks with us about a soundtrack for escaping an exploding building, lame superpowers, and Indian superheroes. 1. What is the lamest superpower ever? Serrano chili pepper claws. If you’re … Continue reading →

Mary Carroll-Hacket’s The Real Politics of Lipstick: A Review by Amy Whipple

At night, I read these memories like the finger-worn pages of my favorite childhood Mother Goose book.   These memories are barefoot and covered in the first good sweat of late spring.   Southern front porches and long green lawns. … Continue reading →

In Response to Kirsty Logan’s “Youth Is All” Who Wrote In Response to Amber Sparks’ “Writing Under the Influence of Anxiety.”

Today is Monday. I transmit from a cottage in Republican country. I’m tired because I worked all day and now listen to a  soft rock mix on I-Tunes because I’m forty-four but sometimes forget and have to ask my son, “How old am I?” If … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Daniela Olszewska

Daniela Olszewska’s three poems will grab your attention in the December issue. She talks with us about the imagery in her poetry, obsessions with themes and fights with toxic rodents. 1. What kind of influence would you like on gerbils? … Continue reading →

This Modern Writer: Youth Is All

Like many writers, I was deeply affected by Amber Sparks’ recent post at Big Other. It made me realise that I am anxious, seriously fucking anxious, and I was so scared to admit it that I didn’t even realise that … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Raina Lauren Fields

Raina Fields’s killer poetry is a key part of the December issue and she talks with us about cheap beer, hotel sex, and who we belong to. 1. What is your favorite cheap beer? The Champagne of Beers. Or PBR. … Continue reading →

Last Words: Philippe Parreno & Douglas Gordon, ZIDANE: A 21ST CENTURY PORTRAIT

This week’s Last Words feature comes from Philippe Parreno and Douglas Gordan’s Zidane: A 21st Century Portrait. This will be the last Last Words post for a while (possibly permanently if I retire the feature and move on to something … Continue reading →

Breeding and Writing: The problem of first loves

The first time you love, you’re invincible. The outside world falls away. Your pairing and your faith are all that matter. But you lose something serious when it’s over; you lose the lack of sight. Continue reading →

Huckster: Five Commonly Known Sexual Pleasures For Advertising Professionals

To be sure, everyone’s extremely familiar with kama sutra—the ancient Hindu text on erotic pleasures. Everyone except advertising professionals, that is. You see, these professionals have their own book catered specifically for them. Here are just some of the 1,245 … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Joe Kapitan

Joe Kapitan offers us a theology, of sorts, in the December issue and talks with us about invitations to war, requests for money, and research and writing. 1. What would you do better with if it was removed? This mole … Continue reading →

Emma Straub’s Other People We Married: A Review by Sara Lippmann

We all have our things we never tire of, things that burrow inside us and stay, things we can’t get enough of and continue to revisit, such is the nature of their hold. Dark chocolate. Urban Cowboy. “A Perfect Day … Continue reading →

Used Furniture Review: grrrrooooowthhhh

I have loved watching the Used Furniture Review grow over the past months. Have you been reading there? You should be / have been / need to. For instance Kim Chinquee. For instance Brandi Wells. For instance Amber Sparks. For … Continue reading →

When Not To Write A Memoir (Or Letting The Pain Go)

* What to make of Health.com’s recent assertion that writers and artists are fourth most likely to be depressed? Beyond the typical ephemera found on Twitter (their depressed cuz they suck! LOL FTW! getarealjob), there isn’t new ground to tread … Continue reading →

The Feel and Felt of Matt Mauch’s Poetry Collection, Prayer Book

Matt Muach’s poetry collection, Prayer Book might threaten to cross the line of decency—even enter realms of blasphemy—if it weren’t for the poems’ sincerity. It is a book of tangents and fragments arranged into the form of prayers. The poems … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Hannah Miet

Hannah Miet’s rather perfect poem is part of the December issue. She talks with us about mourning sex, new sexual positions and the Whole Foods salad bar. 1. When you decide to get married, what kind of intervention would it … Continue reading →

Castles

Today the sun shines upon our cottage, the air outside is warming, and I canceled our cable television subscription.  My son’s idea. ”Mom, why don’t we cancel cable?” Sure, yeah. Done. It’s all crap anyway. Television, gads, it’s Crack. The only thing I still love about cable television is True Blood, and … Continue reading →

Last Words: Tsai Ming-liang, VIVE L’AMOUR

This week’s Last Words feature comes from Tsai Ming Liang’s Vive L’Amour. Lately I’ve had trouble putting things into words.

Breeding and Writing: The people I can’t be

I don’t have creative energy and love at the same time. They seem to be mutually exclusive. Either it’s dishes or dharma; laundry or literature. I can’t seem to (pardon the pun) marry the two women I intend to be. Continue reading →

Potty Mouth

Strangers in public restrooms lend to memorable moments, which sometimes inspire my writing. While relieving myself at a supermarket urinal today, a gentleman’s phone conversation echoed from a stall: Did you return that movie I left on the table? Damnit! … Continue reading →

Huckster: What It Takes

If you’re like me, you’re probably asking yourself right now, What does it take to get into advertising? Certainly, some qualifications depend on what department you want to work in, but there are some general traits that are not department-specific, … Continue reading →

HUM WHO HICCUP ////// Chris Mason

If you don’t know Narrow House, you should. If you don’t know which Narrow House, Chris Mason’s forthcoming HUM WHO HICCUP. If you don’t know Chris Mason, let’s learn to. If you haven’t read HUM WHO HICCUP, let me say: … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Jeffrey Carl Jefferis

Cool Steve, by Jeffrey Carl Jefferis, appears in the December issue, and he talks with us about the intersections between Steve and coolness, gang names and more. 1. I’ve never met a cool person named Steve. Is this because I … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Nate Innomi

Nate Innomi’s infectious story appears in the December issue and he talks with us about inventing disease, eye fucking and value meals. 1. What disease would you like to invent? How would one get infected with it? Critical thought. I … Continue reading →

Ryan Stone’s Best Road Yet: A Review by Martin Macaulay

Ryan Stone‘s Best Road Yet is a collection of twelve stories set in the fictional Midwest town of Wynott. In it we meet a number of residents, some of them on more than one occasion, and Wynott is the thread … Continue reading →

Literary Los Angeles: Building a Future City

After living in six cities on three continents, I have chosen to raise my children in the same place where I grew up (walking distance, in fact, from my old high school). Where once this was the default choice of … Continue reading →

Last Words: Apichatpong Weerasethakul, SYNDROMES AND A CENTURY

This week’s Last Words feature comes, in keeping with this month’s cinema theme, from Apichatpong Weerasethakul’s Syndromes and a Century. It’s in honor of the fact that Weerasethakul’s latest film, Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives, for which he … Continue reading →

Breeding and Writing: The words that fuck us up

Thinking back on my own formative years, there are words I thought I knew and have found out later that I completely don’t. Continue reading →

Huckster: Monologue Of An Ad Job (Read In The Voice Of Morgan Freeman From Shawshank Redemption)

There’s a job like me in every ad agency in America, I guess. I’m the project that can give it to you. Stress-induced hives, grey hairs, a bastard child conceived while working late into the night with someone of the … Continue reading →

The Wild & Wonderful Whites of West Virginia

D. Ray White was a revered mountain dancer from Appalachia who, while being filmed for the documentary The Talking Feet, was murdered in a shootout in 1985. His son Jesco filled his tap shoes and has danced his way to … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Noah Falck

Noah Falck’s Cincinatti, appears in the December issue. He talks with us about the shape of a poem, whether teaching encourages drinking, and TV as a soundtrack for sex. 1. Does being an elementary school teacher encourage the drinking of … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Kristina Marie Darling

Kristina Marie Darling brings more of her stunning prose poetry to the December issue. She talks with us about stolen lockets, her translator of choice and what she would name her black metal band. 1. What locket would you like … Continue reading →

Raymond Luczak’s Mute: A Review by Robyn Oxborrow

Books from the deaf GLBT community are hard to come by, but Raymond Luczak has been trying to change that for over decade with the publications of Eyes of Desire:A Deaf Gay & Lesbian Reader (1993) and Eyes of Desire … Continue reading →

Sidebrow’s Collaborative CITY: A Review by J. A. Tyler

Sidebrow Books is going to (if they haven’t already) become a seething force in the mouth of indie lit. Take a slim volume like City, this unassuming book written in collage, covered thick in words, & it is apparent that … Continue reading →

Quake

My Kiddo was  sick today. At seven a.m. this morning he said, “Mama, will you stay home with me?”   I called my  boss and  left a message then lied down with my son on his bed and rubbed his … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Ben Segal

Ben Segal’s work is featured in the November issue and he talks with us today about decorating in the past tense, time and writing, and science fiction pornography. 1. What would the decor of a room in past tense look … Continue reading →

Choice of Words: A Note on Gabrielle Giffords & The Tragedy in Arizona

I was in the middle of writing a column for PANK—or rather, the beginning. The idea came to me last night; I planned to use the cloistered downtime of a Saturday snowstorm to get the writing done. I went as … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Rae Bryant

Rae Bryant’s fiction opens our December issue and she talks with us about her writing, that which she would rule and more. 1. What would you like to be the empress of? I am already empress of the coffee pot … Continue reading →

Last Words: Wong Kar-wai, HAPPY TOGETHER

This week’s Last Words (Last Shots? Last Frames?) comes from Wong Kar-wai’s Happy Together, one of my favorite films of all time (“of all time!”). I knew that next week I wanted to feature the end of another film, and … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Vallie Lynn Watson

Vallie Lynn Watson, One Tree Hill afficianado, has a small fiction in the November issue and she talks with us about trails left behind, obsessions, and how she puts herself in her writing. 1. What have you left a trail … Continue reading →

Huckster: The Unbelievable History Of The Advertising Industry

You’re probably wondering how the advertising industry got started—or, to put it another way, how the industry of advertising began. It’s only natural for you to wonder such a thing. But the fact is, if I told you, you wouldn’t … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: J.A. Tyler

JA Tyelr’s The Rhinoceros was a runner up in our 2009 1,001 Awesome Words contest and today he talks to us about the deal he made with the devil, nicknames for his body and  who he’d like to gore. 1. … Continue reading →

Remembering Biddy

My mom slept until noon today, and—considering how unusual that is—I got worried. She was still. I thought she had taken the wrong cocktail of pills and would never wake. She was breathing. My best friend’s mother died last week, … Continue reading →

Born Again

Everyone has talent. What is rare is the courage to follow the talent to the dark place where it leads. Erica Jong Since beginning my column here for PANK Magazine,  I’ve received several messages on Facebook as well as several … Continue reading →

Another Bullshit Night…

When asked to offer his opinion on memoirs, Thomas DeMary, author of zero books, offered the following response. *Note: we shouldn’t have asked him. Over the New Year’s holiday, I started reading Nick Flynn’s memoir Another Bullshit Night In Suck … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Salvatore Pane

Salvatore Pane’s lovely story appears in the November issue. He talks with us about the influence of science on his writing, bad Internet handles, living in a BioDome, and more. 1. How much fanfare would you like to be greeted … Continue reading →

David M. Peak’s The Rocket’s Red Glare: A Review by Thomas DeMary

Nearly 350 million quarters are minted each month. In the second after a coin is pressed, an entire civilization of germs can rise and file, leaving behind only their tale of survival. The Rocket’s Red Glare is one of these … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Feng Sun Chen

Feng Sun Chen’s unique writing appears in the November issue and she talks with us about cleaning prose windows, surviving the holidays, and much more. 1. How do you avoid self-destruction? I’m too lazy to be very self destructive. And … Continue reading →

This Modern Writer: Kinderwhoring

Every now and then I find that some teen girl has posted one of my poems or stories on her blog. I get all excited and talk about it on my Twitter and Facebook, and send her a comment or … Continue reading →

Breeding and Writing: Suck it up and change anyway

We’re rearranging my kid’s room in the aftermath of that which is Christmas. Among the haul, he got a play kitchen, a talking truck as big as he is, a train set with eight feet of track, and half a … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Marcus Wicker

Marcus Wicker’s poetry appears both in the November issue of PANK and PANK 5. He talks with us about guilt, the last piece advice he received from a duck, his favorite season and more. 1. What was the last piece … Continue reading →

First Words/Last Words: Hiromi Goto, “Stinky Girl”

This week’s First Words/Last Words feature comes as a total accident. I was researching the poet Hiromi Ito, and came across the Japanese-Canadian writer Hiromi Goto, whose work strangely enough has a lot of crossover with Ito’s, and with my … Continue reading →

Huckster: Regarding The Advertising Agency Media Department, Did You Know?

1,024 is the average number of words per minute a media buyer can speak? Ron Jeremy was a media buyer before he was an accountant? (This is a different Ron Jeremy.) Media buyers are born with three kidneys? After a … Continue reading →

Still Alive

When I was three, my mother abandoned me. She  gave me up to become  a stripper at the Clown’s Den in Denver, and then she became a hooker.  When I was five, she  went to prison for solicitation.   That … Continue reading →

Joseph Riippi’s The Orange Suitcase: A Review by P. Jonas Bekker

Do Something! Do Something! Do Something!, Joseph Riippi‘s debut novel, received some harsh criticism (here, for example). Part of that was due to the fact that, due to its fragmented nature, it apparently lacked character definition and conflict. Another part … Continue reading →

Last Words: Jalal Toufic, THE WITHDRAWAL OF TRADITION PAST A SURPASSING DISASTER and GRAZIELLA

This week’s Last Words comes a couple days earlier and is a holiday double feature! Here are two endings from Jalal Toufic; one from The Withdrawal of Tradition Past a Surpassing Disaster, the other from Graziella, both of which are … Continue reading →

The Perfect Writing Chair

One of the joys of being a writer is buying things to make us better writers. For some this involves treating themselves to a latte, an iPad, or—in my current case—a writing chair. The couch and bed have trumped my … Continue reading →

E-Books: A Vignette

* A Little Joke (Voila) To paraphrase news anchor Kent Brockman, “I for one welcome our new e-book overlords.” ** The Aesthetic While I love the feel, the smell, the heft of a physical book, I just want the story—a … Continue reading →

Darlin’ Neal’s Rattlesnakes & the Moon: A Review by Robyn Oxborrow

Great stories can make us see our lives in a new way, pulling us in, taking the time to make us feel welcome so we step alongside the main character. In Rattlesnakes & the Moon, Darlin’ Neal creates this atmosphere … Continue reading →

Brittany Murphy, an Elegy in X

Amber Tamblyn wrote she died like a spider in the shower. Where does a soul go? Up the wall on eight legs, down the drain? My son asked me a long time ago  not to kill spiders, so I scoop … Continue reading →

Last Words: Yoneda Kou, TADAYOEDO SHIZUMAZU, SAREDO NAKI MO SEZU

This week’s Last Words feature comes from a yaoi manga by Japanese manga artist, or mangaka, Yoneda Kou. The full manga (it’s a one-shot) can be read for free online here, scanlated (scanned + translated) by the fan group DP … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Jess Upshaw Glass

Jess’s imaginative The Baby in the Bedroom appears in the November issue. She talks with us about babies in peril, nursing wounds, being the butt of a bar joke and more. 1. Why must the baby always be in peril … Continue reading →

Huckster: Two-Page, Annotated Introduction In The Creative Department Employee Manual

PAGE 1 Hello and welcome, new employee in the creative department! Congratulations on getting the new job. Whether you’re an art director, copywriter, designer—whatever—your time here will be quite fruitful.1 Consider this an executive summary of the 1,235-page manual you’re … Continue reading →

Dirty Laundry

Washing bedding is stupid when you’re tired because stretching a fitted sheet over a mattress takes effort. I considered sleeping on an unmade bed, but I’m not thirteen. I waited for my sheets to dry like an adult, ate blue … Continue reading →

Ask the Authors: Molly Gaudry and Lily Hoang

Molly Gaudry and Lily Hoang’s collaborative hybrid piece, The Fan Dancers, appears in the November issue. They talk with us about their collaboration, dancing with objects, and who’d they’d like to change into. 1. Describe your collaborative process for “The … Continue reading →

Review: Room by Emma Donoghue

I am in love with Emma Donoghue. Not in a naked babymaking sort of way (well, maybe a little), in the sort of way that I want to be like her when I grow up. I first read her when … Continue reading →

The MFA: A Parade of Paper Tigers

I have no vested interest in the MFA degree’s legitimacy as seen through the eyes of proponents and opponents alike. I’m a 29-year-old man still looking to complete his Bachelor’s degree; fretting over the MFA is a little hasty. But … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: B.G. Will

There is Room for Two in B.G. Will’s story in the October issue. He talks with us about his take on sexting, fueling a dadbot, and figuring out his dreams among other things. 1. What is your take on sexting? … Continue reading →

5 Reasons You Should Buy Fractured West

#1. It’s crammed full of eerie, sexy, sweet, bizarre, and truthful short-short stories. #2. It’s written by twenty-two of the most shamefully talented writers around today—you wouldn’t want to be the last person to be aware of the next wave … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Rickey Laurentiis

Rickey Laurentiis’s poem Mood Indigo appears in the October issue and today, the poet talks with us about life in the Big Easy, the best New Orleans cocktail, danger in love and home and more. 1. What is the  significance … Continue reading →

Last Words: Heriberto Yépez, “Re-reading Maria Sabina”

This week’s Last Words feature comes from an article written by Heriberto Yépez, about the indigenous Mexican poet and curandera Maria Sabina. You can find the full article here, and another Yépez article that explains Maria Sabina in more depth … Continue reading →

Wilderness

Yesterday I felt like I edged ever near a nervous breakdown. I had one of those in college, you know, a near-nervous-breakdown and began seeing a shrink and took meds, the whole thing. My primary fear, always, is I’ll become … Continue reading →

Breeding and Writing: Mourning for a stranger

I can’t think of a parenting slant to this, but here are the words I want to say today. I just heard that Cami Park died. I didn’t know her. We never crossed paths even once. Apparently, she was a … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Christy Crutchfield

Christy Crutchfield’s three fictions are included in the November issue. She talks to us about how she likes her explosions, ideal tattoo real estate, sideshow attractions and more. 1. What was the significance of calling out the fireworks as “legal” … Continue reading →

Huckster: Hello And Welcome To The Agency, New Account Executive

Oh, hi! I didn’t see you there. Just kidding. How could I miss you—you’re in our lobby, for Christ’s sake. Welcome to our ad agency, new account executive. Let me give you the dime tour one more time. Then I’ll … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Sarah Rose Etter

Sarah Rose Etter’s The Tongue Party is at once discomfiting and entrancing. She talks with us about hosting a tongue party of her own, naming a boat, the torture of children and other pleasant topics. 1. Would you ever hold … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Robert Warwick

Robert Warwick’s fiction is included in the October issue and he has a few things to tell us in today’s interview about things he has drowned in, the parts of himself in his writing and more. 1. Why can’t the … Continue reading →

Jo Cannon’s Insignificant Gestures: A Review by Sara Lippmann

No matter who we are or what we look like or where we’ve been or why  we’re here, if we have a human heart it’s going to break—if it’s not already broken. Anguish permeates the twenty-five stories in PANK contributor … Continue reading →

Bending of Spines: A Consideration on “Truth” In Literature

Over the weekend, I purchased a copy of Granta, the splendid UK literary magazine. I was elated to see a copy lying there on its back, next to Tin House and The Paris Review, though I wondered how it got … Continue reading →

Childhood Tastes Like a 9-Volt Battery

I used a found Collective Soul CD to scrape dried cat vomit off my dresser. When’s the last time you bought a CD? I don’t miss them. There isn’t much romance to them. They don’t crackle and warm like vinyl. … Continue reading →

Ask The Publisher: Matt DeBenedictis

Matt DeBenedictis is the mad genius behind Safety Third Enterprises, publisher of such fine chapbooks at The Serial Rapist Sitting Behind You is a Robot and He Is Talking To The Fat Lady. He’s also a tremendously talented writer and … Continue reading →

Ask the Translator: Lawrence Schimel

Lawrence Schimel translated the lovely work of Sofia Rhei in the October issue. He talks with us about why he translated Cinderella, fictional languages he’d like to speak, and who’d play him in the movie. 1. What compelled you to … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Elaine Castillo

Elaine Castillo is one of our favorite writers and in the October issue she tells a story in a series of Figures. Today, she talks with us about dangerous drinking water, things she’d like to be dipped in, Greek mythology … Continue reading →

Last Words: Park Chan-wook, SYMPATHY FOR LADY VENGEANCE

This Friday’s Last Words feature is a last scene, one of my favorite last scenes in film. (This is an understatement; better to say, one of the scenes that crushes me the most, in the places that need to be … Continue reading →

Breeding and Writing: The only two things I want

Anytime I see this question in one of those legacy journals  at the bookstore or philosophical posts on a “mommy forum” (gag), I have the same answer. What do you want for your children? Personally, I want them to be: … Continue reading →

Not the Slab; A Microscope

“If I had to give young writers advice, I would say  don’t listen to writers talk about writing or themselves.” Lillian Hellman Whoops. I transmit from a cottage in Republican country. Today is Thursday.  Outside the cold could sink deeper … Continue reading →

The Inner Sanctum Of A Traditional Advertising Agency

There are many departments within an advertising agency, and each has its annoying (yet adorable!) habits. Here is a brief overview of the departments for a traditional agency structure. I should be clear that every agency is different and, these … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Matthew Burnside

Matthew Burnside’s partially elided text appears in the November issue and he talks with us about fox face girls, the format of his work in the November issue, the bleeding of brave birds, and more. 1. Would you make out … Continue reading →

We Need to Talk about Beside the Sea: by Dan Holloway

Sometimes, without you even noticing it, a book will wander out of the media’s review pages and plant its bum firmly on the features seat. It’s impossible to unravel the vagaries of the process by which some cheeky little volumes … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Andrew Tibbetts

The fiction of Andrew Tibbetts is included in our Queer Issue and he talks with us about perfect gifts, sassy black women on TV, his catch sitcom phrase and more. 1. How would a homosexual make the perfect Christmas gift … Continue reading →

Fuck Writing Maxims

Thanksgiving Eve. It is almost midnight and, rather than sleeping, I’m working on the iPad, attempting to snap out of my writer’s block. Call it Honeymoon Hangover; upon my return from London a few weeks ago, ramping up again has … Continue reading →

“There is No Safe Haven Like Being at Mother’s Breast”

Call it a self-fulfilling prophecy: One month into writing POP ULCER, I have been diagnosed with my first stomach ulcer. Thanks to TUMS and Prevacid, my stomach feels a little less like a voodoo doll. I  have no appetite. If … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Mel Bosworth

Mel Bosworth writes of many things and in the November issue, he tells the tale Jonah is Clean. He’s also a big big Lakers fan. He’s the guy in the stands painted in glorious shades of purple and yellow pounding … Continue reading →

Yes, an MLP Cyber Monday Deal

Any 2 Mud Luscious Press titles, current or  forthcoming, for $20, free shipping. Today only. Get you some.

Last Words: Tisa Bryant, UNEXPLAINED PRESENCE

This Thanksgiving Friday’s Last Words feature comes, appropriately I think, from Tisa Bryant’s Unexplained Presence. From the back cover: “By remixing stories from novels and films to zoom in on the black presences within them, Tisa Bryant ruminates on the … Continue reading →

Breeding and Writing: Holiday horror stories

So, yep. It’s Thanksgiving. That’s the current elephant in the room, right? I’ll go with it. Happy Turkey Day, youse guys! It’s time for big parades and football games and warm fuzzies and appreciation and tryptophan and pie, extra whipped … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Christopher Phelps

Christopher Phelps brings his unique style to the October issue and talks to us about the formations of an ouroboros, his background and its influence on his writing, recent purchases from snakes and more. 1. What  inanimate objects  would you … Continue reading →

Timothy Willis Sanders’s Orange Juice: A Review by Matt Cook

Timothy Willis Sanders’s Orange Juice is the second release from Awesome Machine, a sideline of the well-established Publishing Genius, and the remit for the little brother press is specific. Through short runs (125) of interesting projects, without all the hassle … Continue reading →

Apologia for Jaden and Willow Smith, Part 1: Emotional review of one scene in THE KARATE KID (2010)

In THE KARATE KID, Jackie Chan is a broken man because he killed his wife and son in a car accident while he and his wife were arguing (though I don’t think Jackie Chan says explicitly that they are his … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Mike Buffalo

Mike Buffalo, man of mystery, appears in the October issue and talks to us about down low neo-Nazis, Dennis Cooper, and what he eats when he feels sad. 1. What kind of mask would you wear to abduct someone? Like … Continue reading →

Huckster: Mad Men, Pagan Deities & Journalism—Answers To Common Questions About Advertising

Below, I’ve answered some common questions about advertising. Hopefully this will shed some light on an industry renowned for its darkness. Dear Huckster: Is the television show Mad Men respresentative of the current advertising world? – GoingMad, Auburn, Alabama Dear … Continue reading →

PANK giveaway: Andrew Borgstrom’s EXPLANATIONS

In honor of the release  of Andrew Borgstrom’s Cupboard Pamphlet Series volume EXPLANATIONS, I want to give out 5 signed copies to the first people to comment here. Go ahead. No strings attached. Just say you want one & it … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: M. Kitchell

M. Kitchell’s innovative Loop appears in the October issue. He talks with us about narrative structures, things he has wanted but couldn’t love, pornography from the past and more. 1. How does the choppy sentence construction contribute or enhance the … Continue reading →

Androgene

When I was a boy, I used to wear my grandfather’s t-shirts as dresses. My family called them togas. My grandfather once caught me stuffing with shoulder pads— his 5-year-old grandson on a step stool, makeshift breasts reflected in the … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Paul Lomax

Paul Lomax’s work is included in the October issue. He talks about the importance (or not) of white space, his screensaver, and the sin he loves best. 1. How importance is white space to you when creating a stanza? About … Continue reading →

Last Words: Alain Mabanckou, BROKEN GLASS

This Friday’s Last Words feature comes from Broken Glass by Alain Mabanckou, one of the few writers able to pull off the Writer-As-Protagonist conceit with sly, irreverent, acidic aplomb. I’m not a particularly gifted reviewer, so I direct you to … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Holly Jensen

Enjoy a fine story by Holly Jensen in the October issue then listen in as we talk about her favorite word, the lies breeders tell, beers to get bleary on and more. 1. What is your favorite word? My fancypants … Continue reading →

Review: I Am Here and You Are Gone by Shome Dasgupta

Even if I haven’t submitted to a contest, and most times I haven’t, my inner-reader and inner-editor are always hyper-critical of any book labeled as a “winner”. So while I am familiar with Shome Dasgupta’s writing through various online and … Continue reading →

A FAILED ESSAY ON GRIEF, SICKNESS, ANTI-WRITING/ANTE-WRITING, WOUNDS, CIXOUS, PHILOCTETES, DÉBROUILLARDES, AUNG SAN SUU KYI, ON KAWARA, KANYE WEST, JUSTIN TIMBERLAKE, BARTHES’ MOURNING DIARY AND QUEER GHOSTS IN CONTEMPORARY R&B; IN THE FORM OF AN INTERRUPTED LETTER TO A DEAD PARENT.

Yes, I would sometimes like to write postcards like the above telegram to people. Especially since I now live so far from everyone I know. Postcards which say only, just as On Kawara’s telegrams do: I AM STILL ALIVE or … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Ben Engel

Ben Engel’s “In the Forest” is included in the October issue. He talks with us about mythical places, small things hidden, the deception of queer fiction and much more. You want to read this interview. 1. What mythical wooded planet … Continue reading →

We Can Be Happy Underground: A Review of D.R. Haney’s Subversia by Matt Cook

When a book has a cover this arresting, features writing by a punk-author originally published on The Nervous Breakdown, and has an opening chapter entitled “I was a child porn model”, you might anticipate an abrasive experience filled with memory-scorching … Continue reading →

Huckster: A Frank Introduction To The Ad Agency Production Meeting

When someone asks me what I do for a living, I tell him or her I’m a writer at an advertising agency. I could say that I’m a copywriter at an advertising agency, but there have been too many instances … Continue reading →

Kids Say the Darndest Things & We Should Exploit Them After We Correct Them

My aunt looks like Justin Bieber.  When I grow up I wanna be skinny. Not fat like my mom. I have two really small toes like midgets do. ‡ These gems sparkle from the mouths of third grade students I’ve … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Dennis Mahagin

Dennis Mahagin’s charming and irreverent work appears in the October issue and he talks to us about the why of dwarves, his favorite TV theme song, Kissimmee, FL, and more. 1. Why the seven dwarves? As “soldiers of metaphor” I … Continue reading →

Last Words: Manuel Ramos Otero, “The Exemplary Life of the Slave and the Master”

Last Words is a feature about the last words of a given work: story, novel, poem, essay, instruction manual. I find we often favor excerpting the beginning of a piece of writing; Great First Sentences, etc. Why not excerpt the … Continue reading →

Breeding and Writing: Psycho families are just more fun

Thanksgiving’s closing in quickly. Enter the holiday season, with all the familial insanity it always brings. I used to wish I had a normal family. You know, as a kid. Back when I thought there was such a thing. Cookies … Continue reading →

Review: Play It As It Lays by Joan Didion

Want to write flash fiction? Want to write it better, cleaner, harder, stronger? Read this novel. It’s only 200 pages and the font is really big; you have time. Play It As It Lays chronicles the downward drift of resting … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Robert McDonald

Robert McDonald’s moving poem for Dorothy Allison is featured in the October issue. He talks to us about her influence, the stories that weigh him down, and the things he carries. 1. How has Dorothy Allison influenced you? I had … Continue reading →

Literary Los Angeles: The Big One

Like every hapless child that went to school in Los Angeles in the 1980s, I was terrified of The Big One.   The Big One, the big earthquake, the nine-point-something San Andreas Fault killer that was—that is—quietly sleeping beneath our … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Crystal Boson

Crystal Boson’s brings her unique voice to the October issue and talks to us about her prayers, sacrifice, Texans and their marinades, and more. 1. What do you pray about? Does it help? I mostly pray for the normal things: … Continue reading →

The Maze of Diane Lockward’s Temptation by Water

Diane Lockward’s collection of poems, Temptation by Water, takes readers on a journey through a maze of sorrows and delights. Just as life doubles back on itself, giving the joy of french fries with the regret of trans fats, Lockward … Continue reading →

A FAILED ESSAY ON READING WHILE MOVING, MANGUEL’S A READING DIARY, BOLAÑO’S NAZI LITERATURE IN THE AMERICAS, MARGINALIA, SEI SHONAGON, AND HOW TO BE A BROWN GIRL AS A TEDIOUS PASTICHE.

* All the features and habits of moving, all of which I now know too well. In the past eight years, I have lived in eight different cities. * Madness of packing—though I am an exemplary packer, the best packer … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Maureen Seaton

Maureen Seaton has both a poem and an essay in the October issue. She talks with us about being tri, what she’d like to fly and blast radii. 1. What do you think it would be like to be “tri”? … Continue reading →

I’ve Always Wanted To Be a Housewife

Earlier  I thought about raw fast food chicken soaked in ammonia, so I ordered a double cheeseburger and fries. If you get McDonald’s, take the long way home. We think we’re invisible to others when we drive. Blast that Katy … Continue reading →

This Modern Writer: Post-Orgasmic Chill

I’ve been lucky lately. Like, super-lucky. In a three-week span I: #1. Got a story accepted by BBC Radio 4 (due to be broadcast in January); #2. Landed a paid internship at Creative Scotland; #3. Won third place in the … Continue reading →

Mel Bosworth’s Grease Stains, Kismet, and Maternal Wisdom: A Review by Martin Macaulay

Have you ever read a real-life story of love? Not one of those decorated love stories, wrapped in adjectives too flowery to connect to any kind of reality, but a love story that grabs you by the hand and drags … Continue reading →

Breeding and Writing: Be awesome or die

What’s more important: being perfect or being kind?  Should you encourage writers even though they suck? This issue has been on my mind today after reading Carolyn Kellogg’s rebuttal article up at the LA Times site today called “12 reasons … Continue reading →

the unfirm line – MGMT

“It’s a heavy time but your,  your rhythm makes it light and explode like a violent star keeps threatening the night.” MGMT, Flash Delirium I am more influenced by music than literature, especially musicians that can write without mimic, without … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Michelle Valois

Michelle Valois’s fine work is part of our September issue and she talks with us about teaching humanity, revolutions and much more. 1. What bodies have you buried in your growth as a person? Only the celestial bodies of old … Continue reading →

Divinia is Divina by Jack Wiler

Jack Wiler’s collection of poetry “Divina is Divina” got me—I mean got my heart and made me cry good hot tears. Poems like “We Monsters,” “My Friend Asked Me to Write About Losing Things,” “Divina Is Divina,” “The Man with … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Valerie Suffron

Valerie Suffron’s imaginative work appears in the September issue. She talks with us about the desire for perfection, being thrown off a bridge and the intersection between desire and illness. 1. What do you desire the most? Perfection. I’ve reflected … Continue reading →

Breeding and Writing: Mortal fear combat tactics

Yeah, it’s hard as hell. And yeah, it’s raw to write them. But we all have nightmares. It’s sharing them that releases the fear into the ether and strips its power over us, and of course, if we do it right, the fears belonging to our readers, too. Continue reading →

the unfirm line – Ben Tanzer

“It is also clear to me that age brings fear, and there is no doubt that everything scares me more than it used to.” Ben Tanzer, 99 Problems Never been a scaredy cat, never been worried about what went bump … Continue reading →

Adam Ford’s Heroes and Civilians: A Review by Thomas DeMary

Novelty is relative. The newness of style, of language, in literature is wholly dependent on the reader’s exposure, limited or otherwise, to various texts. “If I haven’t seen it, it’s new to me,” so goes the mantra. While flash fiction … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Isabell Serafin

Isabell Serafin’s lush writing graces the September issue. She talks with us about what she’s been up to, where she is in the world, and things stuffed with savory meat. What have you been doing since you found out your … Continue reading →

Airplane Mode

Third (and final) installment of a micro-series. Parts one and two. Meanwhile, Electric Parade is on a two-week hiatus due to the author getting married. Gone ’til November… * “Lately, I’ll sit down with a blank pad and feel like … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Tara Laskowski

Tara Laskowski’s remarkable story with a very long title appears in the September issue. She talks with us about naming children after rock stars, the junk she studies and much more. 1. What musician would you name a child after? … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Kristina Knappett

Kristina Knappett rants in the September issue and talks with us about unitards, the influence of high school on her writing, and the allure of Degrassi. 1. Could a unitard also be a mentally handicapped unicorn, one who breaks dreams … Continue reading →

Breeding and Writing: A peek into new territory

Talking with folks who have successfully charted in YA waters, I realized quickly that none of my hard-wrought publication credits matter. I mean, sure, I can say that I’ve sold tons of work to someone who isn’t my mother and doesn’t have to like me. There’s that, and that helps. But in juvenile book circles? I have no pull. I know no one well. Nobody owes me favors, has read my work, or remembers meeting me at a workshop. They don’t. They haven’t. They wouldn’t. I’m a novice all over again. Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Robin Lee Mozer

Robin Lee Mozer’s intense and moving work appears in the September issue. She talks with us about talking to the past, her stylistic choices, and the absences that scare her. What would your 23-year-old self tell your 16-year-old self? What … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Sunshine LeMontree

Sunshine LeMontree’s fiction appears in the September issue and she talks with us about the veracity of her name, dancing, the use of fact in fiction and much more. 1. Are you operating under a nom de plume? If not, … Continue reading →

Ben Spivey’s Flowing in the Gossamer Fold: A Review by Melissa Chichester

“The walls felt colder, and I sat shoulder to shoulder with the world.” Get ready, because  it’s a tight squeeze. While reading Ben Spivey’s Flowing in the Gossamer Fold, be prepared to enter the vortex that is Malcolm Blackburn. Wait, … Continue reading →

Touch-Down In London-Town: Morning Sickness

Part two of a three part micro-series. Part one is here. II. Nausea hit me mid-morning. In the middle of a team meeting at work, giving the rundown on the day’s priorities, I place a hand on the wall and … Continue reading →

J. A. Tyler interviews J. A. Tyler: A Re-Review of Stephanie Barber’s Re-Release of These Here Separated to See How They Standing Alone Or the Soundtracks of Six Films

JAT: When did your original review of Stephanie Barber’s These Here Separated— appear in Mud Luscious? JAT: Issue six. It went online January 2009. JAT: And this was part of your full-press review of Publishing Genius Press right? JAT: Right. … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Burnt Filament

Burnt Filament’s amazing poem appears in the September issue and he chats with us about the smell of whiskey, faking orgasms, and phone numbers on dirty bathroom walls. 1. What whiskey would you like to smell like? Maker’s Mark. One … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Tania Hershman

Tania Hershman was a finalist in our first 1,001 Words contest. Today she talks with us about brave questions, running away, and other such concerns. 1. What is the bravest question you’ve asked? “Will you marry me?” (Not revealing to … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: James Merenda

James Merenda’s poetry is featured in the September issue and he talks with us about proper sex research, corrective footwear, and the poetry of playwriting. 1. What are the benefits of marrying a hater instead of a lover? It makes … Continue reading →

Literary Los Angeles: Interview with Aimee Bender

Aimee Bender is one of our city’s best-loved writers, a teacher of creative writing at USC and UCLA, and a fellow L.A. native.   Her most recent novel, The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake, is set in the center of … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Travis Hessman

Travis Hessman makes another appearance in PANK with another uniquely formed story. He talks with us about meta commentary, pick up lines he won’t use, and thin walls. 1. What would be your meta commentary on the impending nature of … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Megan Falley

Spoken word poet Megan Falley’s amazing poetry appears in the September issue and is forthcoming in PANK 5. She talks with us about Jello, wearing injuries, and much more. 1. What is your favorite Jello mold? I actually loathe Jell-o. … Continue reading →

Mary Hamilton’s We Know What We Are: A Review by Martin Macaulay

Mary Hamilton’s ‘We Know What We Are‘  is a collection of thirteen short-short stories, beautifully crafted and condensed into microcosms of  life, love, death and dream. Some of the places this writer takes you, you’ll already know; some you won’t. … Continue reading →

The Day Job – A Writer’s Malady

I step outside and drag a blade of cold air into my lungs.   5:35 AM.   In two hours, I’ll sit at my desk, wait for my laptop to boot up and stare at the pictures, the papers, the … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Jenny Bitner

Jenny Bitner’s imaginative Is This Part of the Love Ritual? appears in the September issue. She takes on our questions today with similar flair. 1. How do you think an alien would abduct you? That’s the strange part, aliens can … Continue reading →

Ben Brooks’s An Island of Fifty: A Review by Thomas DeMary

There’s a scene in Spike Lee’s film Mo Betta Blues in which the two main characters, jazz musicians in a quartet, quarrel over the juxtaposition of artistry and pleasing the fans: one wants to do his thing, the other wants … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Phil Estes

Phil Estes’s poetry appears in the September issue. He talks with us about the benefits of a PhD in creative writing, loneliness and aloneness and more. 1. What does one do with a doctorate in Creative Writing? Emergency surgery in … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: P. Scott Cunningham

Read P. Scott’s poetry in the September issue and then listen in as we talk about sleeping with tiny lesbians, searching for the good in Miami and the Florida lit scene. 1. What would a poem about not concentrating for … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Bonnie ZoBell

Bonnie ZoBell has a name you just want to say over and over. Her fine writing appears in the August issue and she talks with us about her favorite borough, the things she has run from and abandonment issues. Would … Continue reading →

Touch Down In London-Town*: A Honeymoon In Three Parts

*Title borrowed from Estelle featuring Kanye West “American Boy” I. While I continue work on the best writer apps for the iPhone review (dammit, I said it’s coming), I figured it’ll be a good time to start a micro-series. If … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Lisa Aldin

A fantastic story from Lisa Aldin opens the September issue and today she talks with us about love, birth control, and other disasters. 1. What kind of natural disaster does a monogamous girl cause? A celibate girl? I imagine a … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Katie Jean Shinkle

Katie Jean Shinkle appears in the August issue and talks with us about the shape of the heart, monogamy, and leaving someone. 1. What geometrical shape is your heart in? A deep freezer or a decapitated doll’s head or a … Continue reading →

Breeding and Writing: Who are you writing for?

When you create art, it’s moving toward someone. And it’s an uber-specific individual. Who will remember you? Continue reading →

Monkeybicycle 7: A Review by Matt Cook

From the moment it appeared in my inbox, Monkeybicycle #7 felt big. Weighing in at a beefy 200 pages of high-concept, unpredictable writing, it’s as long as a screenplay and delivers a distinctly cinematic feel. Like a multiplex owned and … Continue reading →

Eric Beeny’s Snowing Fireflies: A Review by Renee Emerson

Reading Eric Beeny’s  Snowing Fireflies is like entering a dream about childhood. Even the look of the chapbook is playful””meandering font, drawings of little fireflies here and there, a picnic basket on the cover. The stories are whimsical, imaginative, but … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Beth Thomas

We first heard Beth Thomas’s “Head,” which appears in the August issue, at the PANK reading at AWP. We both fell in love with the story and were thrilled when Beth sent it our way. Today she talks with us … Continue reading →

Electric Parade: Note From The Author

Sunday morning and it’s a kinda-gray day. The wife to be is working overtime, Rover’s asleep in the bed and the incense smoke wafts from the bookcase. From the iMac, Kayne’s Devil In A New Dress thumps and sets the … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Robert Alan Wendeborn

Robert Alan Wendeborn appears in PANK for the second time in the August issue. He talks with us about the worst poem he has ever written, his future and the stresses of poetry. 1. Where do you like your future … Continue reading →

the unfirm line – LCD Soundsystem

“I can change if it helps you fall in love.” LCD Soundsystem, “I Can Change” Tonight I went to help.com to see the first answer to this question: “How much of yourself should you have to change for the one … Continue reading →

Ben Mirov’s Ghost Machine: A Review by Iris Cushing

Are Ben Mirov’s poems haunted? Perhaps not so much as they are preoccupied—inhabited by something that was there before anyone arrived, including, perhaps, the poet himself. Ghost Machine guides us through the narrator’s material occupations: food, friends, money, sex. The … Continue reading →

Parable of the iPhone

I’m crouched over a blue plastic bin of spare parts: PVC elbows, steel nuts and bolts, and a large green and white pump made in Japan, meant for usage on a project about ten years ago. I’m doing my part … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Melissa Goodrich

Melissa Goodrich has one of the most popular stories in the August issue and she talks with us about inadequate nipple stimulation, isolation, looking up the sky’s skirt and more. 1. “When he starts sucking on my nipples, all I … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Lindsay Merbaum

Today we talk with Lindsay Merbaum whose beautiful Opaline graces the August issue. She talks with us about life in Ecuadar, the lack of beauty among nuns, being the new girl, and more. 1. Why can’t there be any hot … Continue reading →

Literary Los Angeles: The Four-Season Climate, Comforting Boundaries, and Literary Lies

It’s surprising, considering that fall is my favorite season, how unhappy it makes me.   Autumn surrounds me with all my favorite things—pumpkin pie, woolen garments, cranberry sauce, turning leaves—but it also drives me to check and recheck the weather … Continue reading →

the unfirm line – Mike Young

“What I do know is the trick of all things wonderful. It’s that you can’t thank them.” Mike Young, We Are All Good If They Try Hard Enough I wish I could thank for all things wonderful. I wish I … Continue reading →

Harriet Brown’s Brave Girl Eating: A Review by Amy Whipple

“I found something better than cutting,” my friend Anne announces over Instant Messenger. In the black-hole moment between when I ask What? and the ping of her response, I consider smoking, drinking, drugs. The big ones. She is sixteen. I … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Matt Lapata

Matt Lapata’s dense and dark Absalomammon haunts the August issue and he talks with us about weaponcrafting, creating his own religion and more. 1. What edged weapon would you want to grow out of your arm? A chainsaw with teeth … Continue reading →

The Death of Publishing Part M: This Time, It’s Electric!

Caption: They shot Publishing on the Causeway The publishing industry is dying—so I’ve heard. The new era is here—I think. E-books, E-readers and E-distribution: it all spells “freedom” for the writer or, perhaps, the unlocking of those pesky gates separating … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Brett Elizabeth Jenkins

Brett Elizabeth Jenkins is one of the fine poets featured in the August issue and she talks with us about wedding songs, divorce soundtracks, and finding the dead. 1. Who would you like to find dead? Where would you like … Continue reading →

Literary Los Angeles: Superclogger

I’m a little late to post this (I’ve been meaning to blog about it since June, how time flies!) but I couldn’t let Literary Los Angeles go without mentioning “Superclogger,” artist Joel Kyack’s mobile puppet show. Kyack and his fellow … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Luke Goebel

There are two Luke’s in the August issue. This is one of their stories. [Insert Law & Order sound] He talks with us about charms, choosing to cleanse and so much more. 1. Why would anyone want to drink a … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Luke Geddes

Invasion, by Luke Geddes appears in the August issue and he talks with us about doing the watusi, plural archetypes and other such matters. 1. What music would you prevent your children from listening to? I put headphones blasting the … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: John Fischer

John Fischer’s wondrous writing appears in the August issue and today he talks with us about the wonders of Velcro, Orlando beyond the tourism, and the voice of dust. 1. What kind of Velcro shoes would you rock? New Balance … Continue reading →

Elegy For Google Wave

When I started Electric Parade, one of my first installments was on Google Wave, the now defunct social collaborative tool. Like Wave, my installment floundered, never quite took the shape I envisioned; eventually, I killed it off in favor of … Continue reading →

The Serial Rapist Sitting Behind You is a Robot: A Review

I do not want to read The Serial Rapist Sitting Behind You is a Robot. The stories are uncomfortable and violent and the people in them are vicious and abrupt. I would not want to be stuck in a lift … Continue reading →

I Can Has Author Friends?: How the Internet Alters the Reader/Writer Dynamic

During my youth, I was a total comic book addict. I read four issues of Spider-Man every month along with healthy doses of the X-Men and the Dark Horse Star Wars series. But in 1994, when I was just beginning … Continue reading →

Ask the Photographer: Gena Mohwish

Gena Mohwish is the first photographer we’ve published in PANK online and she talks with us today about photography, pixels versus film, and more. 1. Where do you enjoy playing hide-and-seek the most? in the past. 2. How did you … Continue reading →

Vanishing and Other Stories by Deborah Willis: A Review By Salvatore Pane

Deborah Willis’s debut short story collection Vanishing displays an impressive range of talents and voices. These fourteen long stories feel texturally distinct from one another, and the book never falls into that trap that some short story collections do where … Continue reading →

the unfirm line – Counting Crows

“It’s been so long since I’ve seen the ocean. Guess I should.” The Counting Crows, ‘A Long December’ For the last 20 years of my life, I have lived very close to the ocean. Within the next 30 days, I … Continue reading →

Vignette on Frazen, Lit Fiction & The Twitterverse

The literary hype machine descends upon the masses. Its message””Frazen is here! Rejoice, you troglodytes!””is splayed across the web like a flickering neon sign. I didn”â„¢t know Jonathan Frazen was upon us once again. I haven”â„¢t even read The Corrections … Continue reading →

Literary Los Angeles: The Unusual Suspects

I first met Amy Ellenburger when I was writing about arts funding and Chalk Repertory Theatre, the theater company of which Ellenburger is a founding member.   (I later blogged about Chalk Repertory and their resident playwright Ruth McKee here … Continue reading →

Word Play: A Photo Book Review of Marjorie Tesser’s The Important Thing Is…Card Game

Winner of the 2009 Firewheel Chapbook Award, Marjorie Tesser’s chapbook The Important Thing Is– is poetry designed to be played as a game. The book is presented in a box with game cards and instructions that give only one rule””break … Continue reading →

What Do You Want Your Writing To Be Like?

One of the best readings I saw at AWP 2010 was the Black Warrior Review/Blue Hour Press event. I spent much of the conference in a drunken haze, and to be brutally honest, I don’t really remember a ton of … Continue reading →

Museum Appetite 7: Video Installations and Reality Television

I have visited San Francisco three times since moving to Los Angeles; the first two trips were lost time in terms of museum-hopping, but last weekend I spent one day absolutely alone in a semi-familiar city.   Naturally, I sought … Continue reading →

What I Love About YOU

Nuala Ni­ Chonchoir’s debut novel, You, is set in 1980 Dublin against the charged backdrop of the River Liffey. The novel tells the turbulent story of a ten-year-old girl and her broken family. Narrated through the child’s point of view … Continue reading →

Fractured West #1: A Review by Claire King

Reading the first issue of this new literary magazine is like crashing a party. You walk into the room, you recognise a couple of faces but not many. It’s exciting in there, sexy and uncertain. Look around you: there are … Continue reading →

the unfirm line – J.D. Salinger

“It’s partly true too, but it isn’t all true. People always think something’s all true.” J.D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye This line has haunted me in a fatherly way. In today’s society of polars, how do I teach … Continue reading →

When Your Writing Space…Part II (aka Mac Love)

-Photo by Peter Yang, taken for Rolling Stone Magazine “Just when I thought I was out”¦they pull me back in.”* “They,” in this case, refers to the objects that make up my writing space. If you’ll recall, I adjusted my … Continue reading →

Vinyl Poetry is New & Good

Gregory Sherl and K.M.A. Sullivan are spearheading VINYL POETRY, a new online venue. Though submissions are by solicitation only at this point, they are open to suggestions. Check out their first issue with work by Sasha Fletcher, Matt Hart, Bob … Continue reading →

Jay Varner’s Nothing Left To Burn: A Review by Salvatore Pane

A coming-of-age memoir in the tradition of Tobias Wolff’s  This Boy’s Life and Gary Fincke’s The Canals of Mars, Jay Varner’s debut book Nothing Left to Burn tells a generational story in tiny McVeytown, a rundown blip on the map … Continue reading →

the unfirm line – “Your Wife is Hot”

“Your Wife is Hot” a single billboard message on CA 78 west (Oceanside). At first, I was taken aback, but then as I continued to drive, I started to smile about it. The sign was right. My wife is hot. … Continue reading →

Top Writer Apps for The iPad

I’ve covered my thoughts on the iPad, and its usefulness to writers, in previous installments. I won’t rehash old points, but only state that the iPad still has some gaps in its design, and rightfully so, given its a first-generation … Continue reading →

Haunted: A Review of Maureen Alsop’s Apparition Wren

I met Maureen Alsop before meeting her poetry. We were ghost hunting together in the hills of the Antelope Valley. To clarify, we are not normally ghost hunters, but poets. We were actually in search of poetry—attempting to soften a … Continue reading →

Review: Becoming a Writer by Dorothea Brande

When I first started taking my writing seriously — though I don’t know how successful that was, because I still write stupid shit about zombie rockstars and butch girls in bars… Okay, when I started actually finishing stories instead of … Continue reading →

Underrated

By now, I’m sure most of you have read Anis Shivani’s attack on what he calls the fifteen most overrated writers in America. Many writers have already spoken out about how useless such a list is. But I’m not posting … Continue reading →

Literary Los Angeles: The New Normal

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about this Slate article, in which writer Tom Vanderbilt argues that in the movies not owning a car is shorthand for being a loser, a criminal, or a freak. Growing up in L.A., public … Continue reading →

Breeding and Writing: Bowling your heart out

Since it was a typical Saturday morning in our small town (read: nothing much else going on here), there were a few families bowling together. As I watched them, I saw a pattern.
Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Jen Gann

Jen Gann’s Tiger Town is part of the July issue and today there’s more tiger talk than you thought was possible. 1. If a dead tiger washed up on the beach, would you wear its pelt? Maybe if someone dried … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Kyle Minor

Kyle Minor is one of PANK’s favorite writers. He makes an appearance in the July issue and takes our questions head on in ways that make us want to shout, “Kyle Minor, you are a king among men!” 1. What … Continue reading →

Best Writer Apps for Android

The computer & mobile platform flame wars entertain me. Apple vs. Google vs. Microsoft vs. Research in Motion (aka RIM aka Blackberry): each ecosystem has its positives and negatives. I still own a PC, though I use it more as … Continue reading →

Pindeldyboz is over / Mud Luscious Press takes on print archives

For those of you who haven’t heard, the final online issue of Pindeldyboz is up with notes from a few generations of editors as well as some final editorial picks, an online ‘best of’ to cap off this fine journal’s … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Chris Erickson

An excerpt from Chris Erickson’s Henrytown appears in the July issue and today he asserts some of our questions are loaded (indeed they are), talks about the taste of laser beams, and more. 1. What do you think a laser … Continue reading →

Literary Los Angeles: Jonathan Gold and Culinary Citizenship

I was driving alone up Western Avenue in Los Angeles late at night.   I had been back from China for only a few weeks.   I was zoning out, letting my eyes slip into and out of focus across … Continue reading →

Breeding and Writing: Murder by default

As a parent, I can’t bow out. I can’t decline. It never matters whether I want to. It’s non-optional and there’s no point in arguing. I clean. I wipe. I wake. I comb, I dress, I make lunches, I sign notes and make appointments.

I’m also a writer, but that identity usually gets brushed off. I’m just too occupied.

That’s not right. I was a writer first. Continue reading →

the unfirm line – Pablo Picasso

“I paint objects as I think them, not as I see them.” -Pablo Picasso. I saw this (Ma Jolie – Pablo Picasso) at the Indianapolis Museum of Art this week. I read the quote. I like things that are thinking, … Continue reading →

When Your Writing Space Keeps You From Writing…

My writing space needed a change. The glass tops of my L-shaped desk were covered in dust and cigarette ash. The monitor and laptop appeared out of place. Not to mention the bevy of wires: USB cords, an auxiliary cable … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Kate Wyer

Only in Motion by Kate Wyer appears in the June issue and talks with us about willing herself into a collision, good shades of lipstick and other important matters. 1. How do you will yourself into a collision? I was … Continue reading →

This Modern Writer: Training to be a Writer by Digging Holes in Scranton, Pennsylvania by Salvatore Pane

From ages six through 13, I spent most summer days at my father’s garage in Scranton, Pennsylvania. He purchased the place from his family in the late 80s, and there wasn’t much to do at C. Pane Body Shop for … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Sara Crowley

Sara Crowley’s visceral In July conveniently appears in the July issue. She talks with us about wombs as weapons, growing up and period sex. 1. If your womb was a firearm, what would it be and why would we want … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Stace Budzko

Stace Budzko’s Beautiful Retards is a fine inclusion in the July issue. Stace talks with us about safety equipment, swimming style, and language choices. 1. Do you use the word “retard” when describing mentally handicapped people in real life? Man, … Continue reading →

Literary Los Angeles: Working from Home

I recently read a statistic (from a source I have since misplaced and so can’t cite here) stating that Los Angeles has the highest percentage of freelance, temporary, and contract workers of any city in the country.   While this … Continue reading →

Breeding and Writing: Awesomely disturbing kids’ books

There are lots of publishers out there with some nauseating stuff, but we’re not talking about Elmo or (god forbid) Spongebob paperbacks and coloring books.

So sick of those. Ugh.

Anyhow, not them.

No, what we’re discussing today, boys and girls, are some supremely messed up, real-life books for kids. These books exist. They are not photoshopped gags–I checked. Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Rachel Adams

Rachel Adams writes of Sex and the American Rabbit in the July issue and talks with us about mythical voyeuristic beasts, Hemingway’s safeword and other curiosities. 1. What mythical beasts would you watch have sex? Unicorns. The loudest prudes always … Continue reading →

the unfirm line – Peter Schwartz

“Tell me there will be beaches in my future.” Peter Schwartz, “Tell Me” There are so many ideas that come to mind with this line. Some linear, some not so much. – my wife and I will have out beach … Continue reading →

Electric Parade: The iPad and i (three months later…)

It’s been three months since I bought the iPad. For me, that’s plenty of time to fit a new gadget into my life or, rather, realize it’s taking up space, like so many USB cords and cheap earbuds and travel … Continue reading →

Rob Sherman’s Valve Works: A Review by Dan Holloway

I read a tweet a few weeks ago that “most people who claim to be at the cutting edge have no idea where the cutting edge even is”, so it’s always interesting to check out things that claim to be … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: xTx

xTx’s poetry is a real standout in the June issue and she talks with us about vowels, noms de plume, and becoming fluent in her. What would be my nom de plume that I should hide behind? What would the … Continue reading →

Breeding and Writing: Giving away your baby

We know our writing better than anyone else ever could.

We were there the day it came into being, and we know the thousand other ways the ending could have gone, the phrase we didn’t pick but almost did, the names and where they came from, why they mattered. We want to qualify our decisions, so the editor will see things our way and make them the way we would.

It takes an editor two seconds to delete a line you made with your blood. Continue reading →

Like Winning at Roulette : A Review of Jessalyn Wakefield’s Unsleep’s Village by J. A. Tyler

I went on cruise and in the stateroom there was a closed-circuit feature about how to bet on roulette and how, if you place those bets just right, you can win big. My wife and I watched the video. We … Continue reading →

Museum Appetite 6: Getting To Know You

Last weekend, I visited the Museum of Jurassic Technology again.   I live only a few miles from the museum, and I absolutely love it, so I usually end up visiting once a month.   My first visit lasted three … Continue reading →

the unfirm line – The Dears

Most people are saying you’re wrong,  I know you’re on to something. I think the world of you. The Dears, Meltdown in A Major There is a piano solo intro that I try on my piano. It sounds similar but … Continue reading →

Electric Parade: Ghosts In The Machine

It”â„¢s Christmas Eve. My family’s generations are delineated by the spaces we fill inside my aunt’s home: teenagers whisper in the back room, the young adults chuckle on the sofa set in the living room, the elders drag forks over … Continue reading →

Matt Bell’s How They Were Found: A Review by Troy Urquhart

No matter what I write here, I cannot tell you how great this book is. In fact, I’m not even sure I know how to write a review that will  do it justice. So let’s just agree on this point … Continue reading →

Dawn Potter the Frank Zappa of Poetry: A Review of How The Crimes Happen

               

Ask the Author: Joseph Riippi

Joseph Riippi writes about various somethings in the June issue and talks with us about this sequence of work, writing soundtracks, forthcoming projects and a DVD bonus extra. 1. What would the first sentences of “Something About Thundercats” look like? … Continue reading →

Literary Los Angeles: Choosing L.A.

I’ve spent a lot of time this week thinking about that article from New York Magazine.   This one, if you haven’t read it, but it’s likely you have.   It’s called “All Joy and No Fun: Why parents hate … Continue reading →

Breeding and Writing: Mother-friendly places to submit

Parenthood takes a lot out of you. (Today, for example, it took most of my time today, so I’m just now writing this.)

Between cooking, feeding, the subsequent and never-ending cleaning, bathing, reading, Band-Aiding, diapering–and oh yeah, squeezing the suckers out in the first place–there’s not a lot left at the end of the evening for mom and dad, of energy, nookie, or anything else.

It’s rather all-consuming.

But in that consumption, those of us who were writers before engaging our wombs in the “on” position have found whole new worlds of emotional and personal pleasure and baggage (yes, both) to be blessed and/or plagued with.

Add to that, motherhood can be rather isolating. Very few moms ever say what they really feel, because quite a lot of it is frightening, truth be known. Commiseration is a beautiful thing; thus the major-dollar, let’s-parent-together, hive mind sites like BabyCenter and CafeMom.

It makes more than a little sense, then, that mama-magazines would pop up to publish the diatribes of those who feel a little more literary.

Here are some of those, for anyone inclined, and what they want: Continue reading →

Ask the Author: David Frederick Thomas

David Frederick Thomas’s story with an exceptionally long title is one of our favorites from the June issue. Today, he talks with us about the new hugging, special utensils, and living in two different places. 1. What else is the … Continue reading →

the unfirm line – T.S. Eliot

“I will show you fear in a handful of dust.” T.S. Eliot, The Waste Land One of the hardest books I have ever read illustrated testimonies of men, women and children during the dust bowl. Horribly sad, dust pneumonia. I’ll … Continue reading →

Electric Parade: Painful Writing (Or Never Learning How To Hold A Pencil)

In first grade, my teacher, disgusted with my penmanship, watched as I held a pencil to jot down—something: a math problem or the year Abraham Lincoln “freed” the slaves. No one taught me how to hold a pencil. It’s one … Continue reading →

Jason Floyd Williams’ Inheritance Tax: A Review by Adam Palumbo

Last week, my grandfather’s health deteriorated rapidly while traveling to my cousin’s wedding in Houston, Texas. He is 82. He has led a full and adventurous life, serving in both the Second World and Korean wars. He raised five children … Continue reading →

Museum Appetite 5: Going Inside

Every time I’ve visited the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), I’ve wandered through the first floor of the Broad Contemporary Art Museum like a weird moth to a weird flame.   The flame, in this case, is two … Continue reading →

This Modern Writer: The Backup Plan

At the rate I fail at relationships, I’m thinking I may not have children.  Yes, I am 31, which makes me technically young.  However, the older I get, the quality of my sperm degrades, unlike wine and cheese.  Also, I’m … Continue reading →

This Modern Writer: Genre

I’ve never done a how-to-write blog post before. This is because a)         PANKsters know how to write already; and b)         I’m not entirely sure how to write. But I realised that I … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Traci O’Connor

Traci O’Connor has two short fictions in the June issue and talks with us about cicadas, trespasses, and her contributions to the June issue. How would you classify your contributions to this issue? Are they fiction? Poetry? Does the classification … Continue reading →

Literary Los Angeles: 826LA

This week’s edition of Literary Los Angeles is also a shameless plug for one of L.A.’s most versatile, energetic, creative, and necessary literary non-profits, 826LA. 826LA is the Southern California outlet of 826 National, an organization dedicated to helping students … Continue reading →

Breeding and Writing: Sally Mann and the ethics of being a parent artist

Many accused photographer Sally Mann of either choosing her craft to the exclusion of her kids or her kids over her artistic credibility.

Tough place to be.

Mann’s most controversial work was Immediate Family, a book comprised of pictures of her kids in the twilight of their childhoods as each teetered between innocence and adolescence.

The alarming bit? Many of the photos are nude shots. Yes, they are all breathtaking, arresting pictures. Does that make it right to publish them?

As artists, shouldn’t we document life as it really happens? Are all things to be filtered for political correctness? Does that change when we become someone’s parent, or are our lives still our own? Continue reading →

Review: The Fox’s Window and Other Stories by Naoko Awa

Each one of the stories in The Fox’s Window takes your hand and leads you out of the safety of your home, to the deepest, darkest part of the woods or right down to the bottom of the sea or … Continue reading →

Museum Appetite 4: Doctor Who

In a recent episode of Doctor Who, the Doctor and his companion Amy Pond visited a museum.   For on the un-geeky, Doctor Who is a British, time-travel sci-fi series in which a man called the Doctor travels through space … Continue reading →

the unfirm line – MGMT

“I’ve got someone to make reports that tell me how my money’s spent.  To book my stays and draw my blinds  so I can’t tell what’s really there.” MGMT, “Congratulations” Purchased and purposeful self delusion. Sad, I guess there are … Continue reading →

Electric Parade: Blackberry Is King For Writers (Crap For Everyone Else)

I purchased my first smartphone in early 2009: a Blackberry Curve. At the time, it was the best phone Verizon offered, which only heightened my hate for AT&T for obvious reasons. That said, I needed a phone to make my … Continue reading →

Craig Sernotti’s Forked Tongue: A Review by Dan Holloway

Craig Sernotti’s Forked Tongue (Blue Room Publishing) is a strange mix of the lyrical and the minimal, and reading it has made me think long and hard about what a collection of poetry is. Which is a good thing. And … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: RD Parker

RD Parker’s innovative poetry graces the June issue and he talks with us about abstractions, madames and public transportation. 1. What if a motorcycle shop was next to the graveyard? How would you react then? I probably wouldn’t. Graveyards are … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Alexandra Isacson

Alexandra Isacson’s gorgeous She Loved Things With Wings appears in the June issue and on the last day of the long weekend, she talks with us about wings, loving thyself, and her wort text message faux pas. 1. Where’s the … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Teresa Milbrodt

Teresa Milbrodt’s Mr. Chicken appears in the June issue. She talks with us about guilty pleasures, dating a woman with a beard and more. 1. Would you date a woman with a beard? Funny you should ask. We met about … Continue reading →

Shane Jones’ Light Boxes: A Review By Salvatore Pane

It’s easy to see why Spike Jonze bought the film rights to Shane Jones‘  debut novel  Light Boxes. Jones is an image junkie and delivers  one imaginative set piece after another in this meta-fantasy about a town suffering through a … Continue reading →

Literary Los Angeles: Doing Theater in a Film Town

L.A.’s Chalk Repertory Theatre has been one of my go-to choices for theater in Los Angeles ever since I saw their remarkable performance of “Three Sisters” last year.   After watching the original play “Full Disclosure” last month (starring founding … Continue reading →

Breeding and Writing: Why nobody cares about your relevant crap

When you’re thirty, those younger than you don’t care because you’re not young. Those older than you don’t care because you’re not old. Those you are thirty with are your closest allies, your commiserators, your siblings through life.

The cruel reality of it is that when you’re seventy, then eighty, then ninety, there will be increasingly fewer of them left. The generational conspirators will die off and leave you in a swelling world of new children and younger-than-you adults who make no sense and don’t remember anything you do.

How do you write to and for a world of readers who are not you, haven’t lived your life, and eventually will find you totally outdated? How do you matter when it’s all so impermanent? Continue reading →

Ask the Author: James Tadd Adcox

Tadd Adcox makes his second appearance in PANK with Diseases, Disorders and Breaks. He talks with us about macking, who he would like to bury and so much more. There are footnotes, even. 1. Is your way of macking it … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Gabe Durham

Enjoy five proses from Gabe Durham in the June issue and then he talks with us about adult diapers, the shame of the body, and the change in you, me, and all of us. 1. What would you like to … Continue reading →

the unfirm line – Aaron Burch

“But if you get this far. If you get it.” Aaron Burch, How To Take Yourself Apart, How To Make Yourself Anew I love optimism as it relates to distance and the next step. Hope tied to momentum and time. … Continue reading →

Electric Parade: Typewriting

The colossus sits atop one of my bookshelves. A black, cast iron automaton rules over the elegant, aluminum unibody tools at my desk. Touch screens. Curved angles. Polished bezel and battery packs. The colossus is powered by human endeavor; its … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Victoria Lynne McCoy

You can read a poem from Victoria Lynne McCoy in the June issue and read on here for more on context in poetry, marriage proposals, and what it would be like on the day it were legal to rape your … Continue reading →

Janice Dickinson’s No Lifeguard on Duty: A Review

Before we begin, let me confirm that yes I do mean that Janice Dickinson, yes she does have a book, and yes I have read it. And I think that you should read it too. Lest you think that No … Continue reading →

Sasha Fletcher’s When All our Days Are Numbered Marching Bands Will Fill the Streets & We Will Not Hear Them Because We Will Be Upstairs in the Clouds: A Review By Troy Urquhart

In the second chapter of Walden, the nineteenth-century naturalist and philosopher Henry David Thoreau asserted that the ultimate creative act is, fundamentally, an act of self-creation, an act in which the artist shapes not objects in the world, but his … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Emily Howorth

Emily Howorth’s whimsical Look Away, Dixieland is part of the June issue. She talks with us about letting Scarlett O’Hara burn, fact versus fiction, party mixes and more. 1. Would you have let Scarlett O’Hara burn? Why or why not? … Continue reading →

the unfirm line – The Smiths

“I once had a child, and it saved my life.” The Smiths, The Hand that Rocks the Cradle. (To celebrate the Orange Alert Smith-i-sode, as well as a general shout out for Fathers Day.) We are lucky to be a … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Kaitlin Dyer

Listen to or read three of Kaitlin Dyer’s poems in the June issue, then rush back here to read about the consequences of rust, organ donation, and making the moves on the denizens of Oz. 1. How would you donate … Continue reading →

Breeding and Writing: Teaching your baby to swear

I’ve written some dark shit. I’d hope I’m not as fundamentally deranged as every character I can imagine. But obviously I’m still the person who thought that stuff in the first place then, aren’t I? And I could have (theoretically) chosen not to write those more troubling thoughts down for preservation. Right?

Who’s at fault?

The twisted author? The ignorant masses? The collective unconsciousness, the hive mind, the overextended self-help book section, the all day CNN reports of raped children and looted buildings? What makes dark things happen in a story, and are they real if they do?

Does fiction have a moral obligation to be responsible?

Or does it save us from everyday obligation and free our minds?
Continue reading →

Museum Appetite 3: Context

Many specific museum exhibits have stayed with me, for either emotional reasons not relating to the art, emotional reasons relating to the art, or on the basis of the art itself.   The last exhibit I really loved was called … Continue reading →

Dan Holloway’s Songs From The Other Side of the Wall: A Review By Amy Whipple

While the big publishing houses continue to fret about the future of the book, Dan Holloway just keeps on going. Founder of the Year Zero¸ Writers collective, Holloway preaches free e-books and otherwise self-published items. Much of what he and … Continue reading →

Electric Parade: Weapons of Choice by Thomas Demary

Each morning, before leaving for work, I grab my tools, all stuffed in a backpack, and head out the door, intending to write during my hour-long lunch break. The contents of my bag: iPad, Nikon camera, three USB cables, three … Continue reading →

Boundaries before Borders: A Review of Alba Cruz-Hacker’s No Honey For Wild Beasts

Alba Cruz-Hacker’s collection, No Honey for Wild Beasts, is a book about finding the courage to say no. These poems dress feminist theory with the music of confessional poetry, singing important messages to a new generation of readers. Cruz-Hacker, like … Continue reading →

Literary Los Angeles: Machine Project

“Sound Synthesis Workshop;” “Intermediate Welding for Aesthetes;” “Paleolithic Bone Tools Workshop.”   Those are a few of the lectures you could have (should have) attended in the last two months at Machine Project, a non-profit arts and sciences organization that … Continue reading →

Breeding and Writing: The Uterus Monologues

Why does having a vagina mean I have to love my work less?

It’s more passive aggressive than it was in olden days, to be sure. We’ve come a long way. But that mostly-unspoken bitterness is still there: I thought you were a mother.
Continue reading →

Tom Bissell’s Extra Lives: Why Video Games Matter — A Review By Salvatore Pane

In 1989, my parents bought me a Nintendo Entertainment System for Christmas. I was four years old and this was, unequivocally, the happiest moment of my entire life. This is not an uncommon story; the NES sold more than 61 … Continue reading →

Museum Appetite 2: The Mixed-Up Files

Six weeks ago, I spent the night in UCLA’s Hammer Museum during an event called the Dream-In, curated in conjunction with the Machine Project and artSpa. The Dream-In was an investigation of dreams and dreaming, held in conjunction with the … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Elizabeth Hildreth

Elizabeth Hildreth offers one of her English to English translations in the May issues and gives us some answers to our burning questions. 1. What is the sound of your voice in geological terms? Blowout 2. What kind of prosthetic … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: D.E. Steward

D.E. Steward’s place-based writing appears in the May issue and he talks with us about the sink as a toilet, smuggling and the language of the future. 1. What are the hygienic benefits of pissing in the sink? No stink … Continue reading →

Literary Los Angeles: The After-Movie Q&A

One of my favorite Los Angeles institutions is the after-movie Q&A.   Of course, question-and-answer periods following new releases and small screenings are not exclusive to Los Angeles but I’d hazard that in no other city do they feature so … Continue reading →

Breeding and Writing: The fast-food joint at the end of the universe

What happens if the foil-wearing pyramid people are right, and something drastic happens in 2012, leaving all of our technology obliterated? Who would we be?

Say we all survive and start over. Could you help your kid with a science project without Google? Stand reading a single newspaper once a day, or worse, once a week? Could you permanently remember how your favorite songs go, even without being able to listen to your iPod for the rest of your life? Continue reading →

Julie Enszer’s Handmade Love: A Review and Interview By Dan Holloway

A Review: Julie Enszer‘s poetry, riddled with the juxtapositions and contradictions facing feminists and LGBTQ activists today, reads like  the author is throwing questions against the side of her skull to break them open. Her collection Handmade Love isn’t a … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Jennifer Spiegel

Jennifer Spiegel’s Glasnost is featured in the May issue and she talks about her work, Russia, and the presumptions of perception. 1. What was your intent in “Glasnost” in showing everyone’s present and future? This is the serious question. Are … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Catherine Zobal Dent

Catherine Zobal Dent’s innovative Flesh appears in the May issue and today, she talks with us about the shared characteristics between Jesus and mass murderers, her work in PANK, and how she would cut her own hair, among other things. … Continue reading →

the unfirm line – Charles Bukowski

“Writing was strange. I needed to write. It was a disease, a drug, a heavy compulsion, yet I  didn’t like to think of myself as a writer.” Charles Bukowski, Hollywood. I think I can count the number of times I … Continue reading →

A Visual Review of Ann Carson’s Nox

Dan Gutstein’s Non/Fiction: A Review By Amy Whipple

Before we start, you should   to know that I can get rather Glenn Beck-ish about genre. Start talking about rounding corners in a memoir, and I’ll get all kinds of slippery-slope on you (complete with finger jabs in the … Continue reading →

Museum Appetite

I lived in Los Angeles for nearly a year before I visited the Museum of Jurassic Technology.   I went on a whim with two friends, and none of us had visited the museum before.   We could not have … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Nancy Carol Moody

The May issue marks Nancy Carol Moody’s second appearance in PANK. She talks with us about her mythical beast swagger, Captain Obvious’s appearance and more. 1. What would Captain Obvious look like? What would be his superpowers? Captain Obvious is … Continue reading →

Literary Los Angeles: You Are Welcome

I was at a book party this week.   I didn’t know anyone well, but I recognized some names and faces, including the face of one man who looked so familiar I spent much of the evening wondering whether he … Continue reading →

the unfirm line – Pet Shop Boys

“When I look back upon my life, it’s always with a sense of shame. I’ve always been the one to blame.” Pet Shop Boys, It’s a Sin Sometimes a phrase will turn on me as the years pass. When I … Continue reading →

Breeding and Writing: Why you aren’t ready to be a writer

I don’t want her to die yet. I want another Christmas. I want family pictures, and her attendance at my son’s graduation in seventeen years, and her hair to have the chance to turn grey. I need it all to stop for a minute and let me catch up, let me breathe.

We don’t get that chance in the writing world, either.
Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Mabel Yu

Mabel Yu’s writing will be featured both in PANK 5 as well as in the May issue of PANK. She talks about the executioner’s song, the embarrassing things that can happen in groups and more. 1. What song would you … Continue reading →

Patrick Wensink’s Sex Dungeon For Sale: A Review by P. Jonas Bekker

Patrick Wensink’s story collection Sex Dungeon for Sale came out last year from Eraserhead Press‘s New Bizarro Author Series, or NBAS. The philosophy of the NBAS is interesting. Normally, the editor’s foreword states, Eraserhead would only have room for one … Continue reading →

Guilty Pleasures: A Review of Chris Priestley’s Tales of Terror

Everyone has a guilty book pleasure. Maybe yours is Harlequin romances about Greek tycoons and Regency fops making all the bosoms quiver. Maybe it’s chick-lit books with pink glittery covers or doorstop fantasy series about psychic dragons. Maybe it’s Jeffrey … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Adam Tessier

Three poems by Adam Tessier appear in the May issue. He talks about barista history, recent beverages he has prepared, and strange things he’s run in to. What would being a barista historian entail? Oddly enough this question seems utterly … Continue reading →

Gary Fincke’s The Canals of Mars: A Review By Salvatore Pane

To call Gary Fincke prolific would be an understatement. He is the author of sixteen books of fiction, poetry and nonfiction (one of which won the 2003 Flannery O’ Connor Award). His latest, the memoir The Canals of Mars (published … Continue reading →

The Difference Between Lay and Lie

It seems to me that when people have conquered the two/too/to fiasco, or the there/their/they’re conundrum, they give up, convinced of their mastery of the English language. And I know I’m probably going to sound  kind of like an  asshole … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Kathleen Heil

You can read or listen to three of Kathleen Heil’s poems in the May issue and she talks to us about the sound of a hug, megalomania and much more. 1. What does a hug sound like? A hug sounds … Continue reading →

Breeding and Writing: Grandpa knows what you’re doing in there

If you’re comfortable with something you’ve written, it probably sucks.

Yet no one can make us as uncomfortable as our families. That’s what they’re for. Watch any Thanksgiving episode of any sitcom. It happens.

That’s the real question I’m asking. As a parent, as a sibling, as the adult child of someone else who will likely be hurt by your actions—how do you marry the two worlds? Continue reading →

the unfirm line – Blake Butler

“If I’d listened, in those soft days, I would have taken other pictures to show my children (the children I’ll never have). I’d flip through the photo album backwards and watch my father’s head grow full again – and me … Continue reading →

CSI Svalbard Episode 3: A Review By Mark Welker

You might think that by the third episode, the pool of 2,000-odd inhabitants of the Svalbard islands might be running a bit short on murder suspects. And judging by the opening scene of this episode, “ËœDoomsday Vault’, you mightn’t be … Continue reading →

Celebrating Sport: A Review of Stymie Magazine by Mike Revell

Reading Stymie, it occurred to me that you do not often find sport and literature in the same place. Not this kind of literature, anyway: not fiction or poetry. Disregard, for a moment, that childhood staple of soccer stories looking … Continue reading →

the unfirm line – Morrissey

“Come back, come back to Camden, and I’ll be good.” Morrissey – “Come Back to Camden” ‘Being good’ was always such a childly endeavor. Christmas depended on it.  So to hear a grown man singing that he will be good … Continue reading →

Matthew Simmon’s A Jello Horse: A Review and Interview By Salvatore Pane

A Review I came home from AWP with a lot of books, but the one I like best is definitely A Jello Horse by Matthew Simmons. Distributed by Publishing Genius, A Jello Horse is a novella about a young man … Continue reading →

Review: Howards End Is On The Landing by Susan Hill

I love books about books. I mean, I really fucking love them. Book-books are my chosen topic of non-fiction writing, and there just aren’t enough of them. I go on Amazon specifically to look at Listmania lists titled ‘books about … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Jonathan Papas

Three of Jonathan Papas’s poems appear in the April issue and today we talk video games, the decline (or not) of ska, and mixtapes. 1. Who did you use the most in Street Fighter II? Blanka, without a doubt. I … Continue reading →

the unfirm line – Brett Fogarty

“A steamroller of a forget-me-not (they say don’t forget don’t forget but I do a little every day and I am sorry).” –     Brett Fogarty in Nicole Elizabeth’s “the 12 am project.” Memory issues are crushing, repainting the … Continue reading →

Gutter #2: A Review by Euan McClymont

Gutter is a brave and important venture. It focuses on contemporary Scottish writing but not in any limiting sense of those born in the country; rather in the healthy sense of all and any writers currently based in Scotland.  The … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Desmond Kon Zhicheng-Mingdao

Desmond Kon Zhicheng-Mingdao has work in the April issue and forthcoming in PANK 5. He talks with us about construction materials for a poem, hotstepping and brands to avoid. 1. What would you make a poem out of? Memory, fantasy, … Continue reading →

the unfirm line – Vonnegut

“What kind of a man would turn his daughter into an outboard motor?” –  Rabo Karabekian, Vonnegut’s Breakfast of Champions I have a daughter and have never thought of her as an outboard motor, or any other sort of internal … Continue reading →

Review: Michele Leggott’s Milk & Honey

Most people I know don’t read poetry. My girlfriend, my mother, my workmates: they say they don’t ‘get’ poetry. They say it excludes them, it doesn’t mean anything to them. Even some of my writer friends are leery of poetry; … Continue reading →

the unfirm line – Radiohead

“What would I do? What would I do, if I did not have you?” “”Radiohead, I Might Be Wrong I recently read in a comment/review of Sally Weigel’s, To Young To Fall Asleep that Radiohead only made depressing music. I … Continue reading →

A Reader’s Rapture: A Review of Maurya Simon’s The Raindrop’s Gospel, by Nicelle Davis

Highly adorned Christian churches are always good for renewing my guilt over sex. As scripture is read, my attention is stolen by depictions of half-clothed deities. The arrow protruding from St. Sebastian’s groin makes me blush; Jesus at the crucifixion … Continue reading →

Review: We’re Getting On by James Kaelan

Flatmancrooked is gaining quite the reputation for innovative book marketing. Last year they launched Emma Straub’s novella, Fly-Over State, by asking people to buy a “share” in the project, which includes a signed first-edition copy of the novella. This year … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Leah Bailly

Leah Bailly’s Stampede Queen is featured in the April issue and today she talks with us about capers, Calgary exports and much more. 1. What caper would you pull off in an attempt to get a lot of money? I’d … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Nik De Dominic

Nik De Dominic’s “On” poems join other fine work in the April issue and today, he talks with us about meta commentary, scandal and the New Orleans influence. 1. How long did you wait in your relationship to write love … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Julie Babcock

Julie Babcock’s poetry graces the April issue of PANK and she talks with us about grandmothers, Carmen Sandiego during her golden years and the mother of all songs. 1. What would the dodo advise a grandmother? Would it be about … Continue reading →

An Ampersand Megareview by Megan Scarborough

Ryan J. Davidson’s poetry collection Under What Stars focuses on themes of travel, soul-searching, and loneliness — something of a holy trinity.   The collection centers around the places Davidson has lived in and traveled to throughout Asia, Europe and … Continue reading →

Nicolle Elizabeth’s Threadbare Von Barren: A Review by Salvatore Pane

Nicolle Elizabeth’s chapbook, Threadbare Von Barren, is a slim volume comprised of 32 pieces of flash fiction. The individual stories read more like prose poetry and test the minimalist boundaries of the flash genre. Take for instance, the fourth in … Continue reading →

Review: Lock Up Your Daughters #4

If you are a superhot, supercool Glaswegian dyke, you will already be familiar with Lock Up Your Daughters. I am, however, aware that queer Scottish twentysomethings make up a very tiny percentage of PANK readers, so I will be more … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Dan Piepenbring

Dan Piepenbring appears in our March issue and today talks to us about dreams of defenestration, the papacy and the dangers of dodging. 1. Could you ever love a woman whose vagina fell out of her now and again? Oh, … Continue reading →

CSI: Svalbard Episode 2 — A Review By Andrea Mullaney

It’s always tough to judge a new show on the basis of its first episode, even the latest in such an established franchise as the CSI shows, because the set-up and the players have to be introduced in the course … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Karissa Morton

Two of Karissa Morton’s fascinating poems appear in the March issue and she talks with us about fraternity, uses for useless organs and the hide and seek habits of inanimate objects. 1. What are the perks of being the president … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Diane Lockward

Diane Lockward’s poetry is featured in the March issue and she talks with us about deeds of darkness, unitards and the sound of poetry. 1. What defines a “deed of darkness” for you? Is it something as small as killing … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Nick Kocz

Nick Kocz’s Dining by Candlelight is part of our March literary feast. He talks with us about crippling addictions, weird things we put in our mouths and seduction soundtracks. What have you been addicted to that could have crippled you … Continue reading →

Review: Angela Readman’s Strip

The poems in Strip (Salt Publishing, 2007) are the glittering twists of burlesque, then the smeared lipstick and fading smiles of the dressing room. They dazzle us with performance then drag us backstage; they are the untouchable neon of the … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Brad Green

In the March issue, Brad Green writes about the microcosm of office life and today talks with us about the hipster goth, free time (or the lack thereof, and even a bit about his writing. When are you using the … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Nath Jones

Nath Jones explains How Mommy Ate Her Soul in the March issue and talks with us about the perfect soul recipe, working the graveyard shift, and the courage to send her work into the world. 1. How would you go … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Amorak Huey

Amorak Huey four poems in the March issue cover a lot of ground as does our conversation about obituaries, Little Red Riding Hood and kissing in a small town. 1. How would one write a poem about black metal? For … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Christopher Heavener

Christopher Heavener’s Omens portends great things in the March issue. He talks with us today about modern letters in Central Florida, the rituals he’s a slave to and the strange things we ask of our lovers. 1. Do you believe … Continue reading →

Review: Susan Hill’s The Mist in the Mirror

The whole time I was reading Susan Hill’s novel The Mist in the Mirror I wanted to go back and read the whole thing again. At the end of every paragraph — at the end of every sentence — I … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Daniel Gutstein

Daniel Gutstein brings his quirky humor to the March issue and talks with us about kicking a mockingbird’s ass, time saving devices and the heroics of a Beef Pineapple Robot. 1. Instructor Gutstein, what techniques would you use to kick … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Jessica Hagemann

Jessica Hagemann’s MySpace: Begin was a finalist in our 1,001 Awesome Words Contest and today talks about shapes, social networking and cartoon characters. 1. What is the power structure like in your life? Is it a hexagonal or a dodecahedron? … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Mary Hamilton

Mary Hamilton’s We Know What We Are is forthcoming from Rose Metal Press this summer. In the meantime, her work appears in the March issue. Today she talks with us about optometry, GaGa glasses, and first lines. 1. What is … Continue reading →

Justin Taylor’s Everything Here Is the Best Thing Ever: A Review by Salvatore Pane

A lot has already been written about Justin Taylor’s impressive Everything Here Is the Best Thing Ever, a debut short story collection by an HTML Giant contributor about hip, young people doing hip, young things. Whether or not you believe … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Joseph Goosey

Joseph Goosey makes another appearance in the March issue of PANK and talks with us about literary threesome, the writing life if Jacksonville, and dental work. 1. What authors would you get into a threesome with? What would happen? Oh … Continue reading →

This Modern Writer: An Open Letter To First Time Authors On A Small Press

Dear Fellow First Time Authors On A Small Press, Like you, I have a day job that supports my writing habit.  Like some of you, I also have a spouse who would taser you at the thought of you being … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Ori Fienberg

Check out Ori’s Fienberg’s four poems in the February issue of PANK and catch up with him as we talk about where poems go to die, beating up nature, and living in a world without typos. 1. What happens when … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Brian Allen Carr

1. Brian, are you ok? Are you ok? Are you ok, Brian? You have no idea how long I’ve waited for someone to ask me that question. I’ve checked my fingers. They are all here. It could be worse. Though … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Alan Stewart Carl

Alan Stewart Carl’s Cast Out is featured in the February issue. He talks with us about the apocalypse, a mixtape for the end of the world and what he does when he steps away from his writing. 1. This section … Continue reading →

Jeanann Verlee’s Racing Hummingbirds: A Review by Megan Scarborough

Racing Hummingbirds ought to come with a warning: Choking Hazard. I read some of it while eating my dinner: I don’t suggest this. The collection is raucously confessional, full of blood and guts, sex and booze. It’s poetry with its … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Maya Jewell Zeller

Three poems from Maya Jewell Zeller grace the February issue and she talks with us about robotic poetry, natural writing talent and what her world might look like if all the water left it. 1. Have you ever considered writing … Continue reading →

This Modern Writer: Things I Do That I Think Are Writerly And Therefore An Acceptable Use of Time, But Are Really Just Procrastination

Play Bejewelled while listening to podcasts about writing. Make lists: To Do lists, lists of stories to finish, lists of things I want to write essays about, lists of books I want to review, lists of words that inspire me, … Continue reading →

Ask The Author: Kimberly Lojewski

Kimberly Lojewski brings us in the February issue of PANK “An Arctic Mirage Sounds A Lot Like Rusty Crickets“.  She talks with us today about narwhals, sacrifice, and  pageantry  in warm places. 1. Would a lot of rusty crickets sound … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Christopher Ryan

In the February issue, Christopher reveals a Work History, then talks with me about the strange things we do for money, the tattoo that means the most and the exact location of the devil. 1. What is the strangest thing … Continue reading →

Review: Shanghai Baby

There are many reasons to mock Wei Hui’s 1993 novel Shanghai Baby — the irritatingly self-obsessed and clearly autobiographical protagonist, the clumsy translation, the unsexy sex scenes. But the most eye-rollingly awful thing about the book is that it exists … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Amber Sparks

Read or listen to Amber Sparks’s Storage Space in the February issue and then enjoy our conversation where she and I talk about women’s bodies, hypochondria and solving the politician problem. 1. This fragment is probably one of the most … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Corey Mesler

Not only is Corey Mesler in the February issue with two poems, he also talks with J. Bradley about juggling, the movie of the book, and also critiques Garrison Keillor, a wee bit. 1. I noticed a tremendous lack of … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Erik Smetana

Catch up with Headlines by Erik Smetana in the February issue then enjoy our conversation about robots guarding St. Louis, fictional reporters and how everything is better when set to music. 1. “Headlines” reminds me of the Dadaist cut-up method … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Eric Burke

Eric Burke’s shares two poems in the February issue and tells J. Bradley about his beard, the Ramones and the work of his day job. 1. If you sheared your beard, would you lose all of your mad writing skills … Continue reading →

Review: CSI Svalbard

Everything I have pointed my eyes towards in the past few weeks has gone through a mental filter named Can I Review This? I rejected my library borrowings — a non-fiction book on Bluestockings and a doorstop horror novel — … Continue reading →

Shane Jones’s A Cake Appeared: A Review by Troy Urquhart

The experience of reading Shane Jones’s new collection A Cake Appeared (Scrambler Books) is very much like the experience of peering into one of Salvador Dali’s paintings — ‘The Hallucinogenic Toreador’, perhaps, or ‘The Discovery of American by Christopher Columbus’. … Continue reading →

My First Day on Fictionaut

Like a mouth-breathing, crotch-rubbing, bulge-eyed stalker, I have long admired Fictionaut from afar. But I’ve always felt that it’s slightly out of my grasp. Fictionaut is for proper writers; ones with pro sales and chapbooks and story collections and maybe … Continue reading →

It’s My Two Cents: Cambridge, Huff, Daum, Dando, Coke, Beck, Aldo, Howle

Greetings from a bakery/cafe in Cambridge, MA called Carberry’s, where I paid 4.95USD for an hour’s worth of internet access. Don’t say I never did anything for you, readers…The mp3 CD I dug out of my glove compartment kept me … Continue reading →

Meanwhile Reads

I like to read. I need to read. But I’ve got shit to do. I deal with this by multitasking, maybe because I’m female or maybe because I have a short attention span. Accordingly, I would like to present to … Continue reading →

Review: FRiGG #27

There are a few reasons why I love the Law & Order-themed issue of FRiGG so much. Let’s examine the evidence (note: I promise that will be the only pun in this review). 1. Law & Order Is Good For … Continue reading →

This Modern Writer: The Teeth of My Ambition

I always thought I was an unambitious person. I didn’t care about building a career or making lots of money or having a big house or my own office. I didn’t care about impressing anyone or causing jealousy or getting … Continue reading →

It’s My Two Cents: Baby, Back, Krugman, Indiana, McElwee, Beller, Bronson

Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Beer Supply, L.A.’s premier 70s soft-rock tribute band. Take a look at that set list from their first gig. Ambrosia. Poco. Player…Speaking of “Baby Come Back,” Player’s 1977 #1 hit, as I brainstormed with … Continue reading →

Review: Popshot #1

When contemplating a poetry and illustration magazine, it must be easy to get into a chicken-and-egg scenario. Should the illustrations be inspired by the poetry, or vice versa? Jacob Denno went with the former for his magazine, asking artists to … Continue reading →

It’s My Two Cents: Mayer, Naropa, Huth, Pritts, Oral, Three Things That Piss Me Off About The Rumpus

If Jane Mayer could look more smug when she is not talking in her recent television appearances, she would explode in a flameball of contemptuousness.   Super reporter, though…I don’t know what Google Buzz is, but evidently it’s a hit… … Continue reading →

Review: Inconceivable Wilson – JA Tyler

JA Tyler has discovered the secret of time travel. There is no other explanation for being able to run mud luscious magazine and ml press, produce several chapbooks and novellas, contribute to Rumble, The Chapbook Review, and Lies With Occasional … Continue reading →

It’s My Two Cents: Reznor, Lennon, Ving, Mordor, Burt, Wakoski, DiNovis, Banks

Was it a former coach of the New Jersey Nets who said, “Don’t be the lion who stares at the legs of the chair? I think it was…I’m not sure if this guy is for real, but he sure knows … Continue reading →

It’s My Two Cents: Yule, Iris, Long, Blogger, Cooper, Hitler, Vocoder

If you get the name of the person singing wrong in a song–Doug Yule, say, instead of Lou Reed–you do not get to write a poem about that song…An ex-friend just wrote a hate email to me, after I used … Continue reading →

It’s My Two Cents: And We’re Back

And we’re back.   Sorry folks, sometimes a columnist needs to have a nervous breakdown or three before three-dotting his way back to sanity. Onward. Some predictions sprinkled in…Am I the only person who love that the same image of … Continue reading →

It’s My Two Cents: Dunham, Jillette, Litbloggers, King, Sabotage, Shortz

It’s Christmas, which means people might be reading this or might not. Or perhaps you’re Jewish, Asian, African, or my favorite, Depressed..I love this quote by Carroll Dunham: “In the contemporary context, there appears to be a divergence between “sincere” … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: John Haggerty

John Haggerty spins a delightful yarn about The Incredible Teeth of Bobby Mcgraw in the December issue. He offers us a brief tutorial on California geography, an update on the state of his teeth and more in today’s interview with … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Janet Freeman

In the December issue, Janet covers Gabriel Garcia Marquez and in today’s interview she reveals that marriage is the worst injury she has ever committed unto herself, among other lovely tidbits. Have you ever been to Taos, New Mexico? What … Continue reading →

It’s My Two Cents: Telfer, Hickey, The Laughers, Colins, Claire, Nash, Afros

Greetings from Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport, while I wait for my flight to Albany International Airport.   The latter is international, we think, because of a flight to Toronto once a month.   But Chicago? The wind is cold, the … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Sheldon Lee Compton

Sheldon Lee Compton writes about drugs, sex and rock and roll in the December issue, then answers questions in today’s interview about drugs, sex and rock and roll. What do you find sexy? Other than the basics, I’d say a … Continue reading →

It’s My Two Cents: Mathews, Cupcakes, Shukert, Nuno, Vito, Chet

I’m back after a week-long bender of book tour and absentee blogging…Thank you for your patience, oh readers and Panksters…Onward to two-centsing… Coat racks are bullshit…Did you know that the Thoreau family–the Henry-David-Thoreau Thoreaus, the go out into the woods … Continue reading →

PANKcast!

1. Kudos to the publishing industry, where memoirs are written by people with genuinely awesome stories to tell and not Miss USA contestants whining about their cup size! 2. I would go to Boston just to hit up these bookstores. … Continue reading →

It’s My Two Cents: Turner Overdrive, The Regulars, Nader, Runaways, Arnold, Flatulists

Here’s modern poetry in a nutshell: paintings, animals, mythology…Every word can end either with the suffix “-esque” or the suffix “Turner Overdrive”–.But nothing shall ever be “Turner Overdrive-esque”… Written while tipsy…Heck, we all have pets; heck, if we went to … Continue reading →

It’s My Two Cents: Friendster, Frisell, Jordan, Arcangel, et Cetera

Humping a statue can be a dignified form of political protest–I logged onto my Friendster page for the first time in, like, two years–Sometimes I miss living in Camden, NJ, but not going to school there–I can’t wait to see … Continue reading →

It’s My Two Cents: Seth, Ben, Rocksteady, LL, Barbicide

Enough of this picking on memoirs already. Many of them are in fact journalism collections or nonfiction road trips. What’s the matter with that? Why the false fiction-nonfiction dichotomy?…Speaking of memoirs, I love me some Ben Yagoda, but his new … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Steve Gibbon

In his story, Black Stag, Steve Gibbon tells us of the large gentleman Daniel Barker and in today’s interview, he brings news of Maine, strange interactions with other people and bad writing advice. 1)  Is literature  about work peculiarly American? … Continue reading →

It’s My Two Cents: Prog, Abdul, HTMLG, Elaine’s, Fence

I gave up on objecting sentences with “however” after reading the Language Log. Not that I feel good about it…I guess someday I will have to sit down and actually listen to the Zombies box set, rather than saying I … Continue reading →

Degrees of Separation

Let us begin with  ABJECTIVE and  Juliet Cook’s “Paper Dolls.” Cook is also featured in DIAGRAM 9.5. In  DIAGRAM 9.5, we also find Ryan Teitman’s “Ode, Elegy, Aubade, Psalm.”   Ryan is also in Hayden’s Ferry Review. Hayden’s Ferry houses … Continue reading →

Ask the Author: Jimmy Chen

Today, Jimmy Chen, who gives us Of Mimesis in the October issue, talks about strange eateries, robots and cliches about women, crime and war. 1) What is the strangest place  you’ve ever eaten in San Francisco? I’ll spare you a … Continue reading →

PANKcast!

1. The Seattle Times pours out its best writers. 2. Mmmm… Texas Book Festival is looking spicy! 3. Vampires, hit men, and God – Anne Rice will creep you out. 4. The Washington Post loves “The Man in the Wooden … Continue reading →

Ashley’s Dozen

A Cappella Zoo: A review of C.E. Chaffin’s big top, faith, and awesome words found in his collection Unexpected light. The Ampersand Review:   Another Poem about China, a thought provoking piece by J. Bradley, is featured in Volume 3. … Continue reading →

PANKcast!

1. Norma Fox Mazer, an older person who actually understood the ups and down of young adults, passed away. Damn. 2. Plotless, yet laced with something very tasty. 3. Her husband fell in love with a gay man, and she … Continue reading →

PANKcast

1. Books are quite literally a form of art to Steve Wolfe, whether or not he’s read them. 2. Third Place Books gives their say on current best sellers. 3. A Michigander! A local press! Nominated for the National Book … Continue reading →

From Ashley’s Desk: Yooper Dozen

In true randomness fashion this week’s blog is dedicated to the favorites of someone… Zahir, a journal of speculative fiction is going electronic!   Starting with it’s January 2010 the only way to read this literary goodness will be via … Continue reading →

PANKcast!

1. 2009′s Great Michigan Read is from Vietnam! 2. “Never-Ending Birds” from the editor of The Kenyon Review. 3. Dave Eggers gets wild! 4. Need a laugh? Check out The New Yorker’s run-down of the publishing industry. 5. Unplug yourself … Continue reading →

From Ashley’s Desk to Yours

So this week I decided it would be fun to stalk a certain Associate Editor’s Facebook page. Here’s what I mined. Numero uno, Knee-Jerk, an interesting interview with David Shields, What is your most desired result of Reality Hunger? Intrigued? … Continue reading →

PANKcast

1. The New York Times shines light on the hidden life of deer. 2. Ah, the Midwest: fishing, pinochle, and the death of farming. The Seattle Times reviews the poetry of Ted Kooser. 3. Michael Moore has done it again … Continue reading →

From Ashley’s desk to yours…

1. A Public Space poetry editor Brett Fletcher Lauer is one of the judges for Bright Lights, Big Verse. Write your own New York poem and see your name in lights in Times Square.   How cool is that?! 2. … Continue reading →

PANKcast – books and blather

1. The New York Times is ready for Halloween with “Her Fearful Symmetry.” 2. Detroit Free Press reviews “Surrogate.” 3. Washington Post promotes the National Book Festival with a list of authors attending, including John Irving! 4. Shakespeare is back … Continue reading →

Majors, books, and blather…

1. The New York Times on Atwood’s SecretBurgers in The Year of the Flood. 2. The Seattle Times gives a four-star review to Bright Star. 3. Dumberer? Jeff Daniels’ new comedy, “Escanaba,” reviewed by the Detroit Free Press. 4. The … Continue reading →

Coded Language

This is Saul Williams – Coded Language. Awesome.  Enjoy!

Art by Shannon Willis

Art by Shannon Willis Check out Shannon’s beautiful multi-layer, mixed-media art at: http://artbyshannonwillis.com/ “Choose Your Destiny” is beautiful.

Art is Rebellion

“Bring out your [art]!” Send in your art! We would love to consider it. http://www.hu.mtu.edu/SMS

Reverse Graffiti Art (Clean Art)

                        Check out Paul “Moose” Curtis and his reverse graffiti art  using high pressure water to create green landscapes in the urban environment at  www.reversegraffitiproject.com

Perhaps the Last Open Forum Left

All forms of published written expression pass through a filter that censors the content to conform to society’s established norms. Bathroom graffiti may be one of the last open forums left providing a backdrop for anonymous articulation and discussion of … Continue reading →

Daydreaming…

Just floating along, taking my sweet time

Spoken Word

This is Oscar Brown – This Beach. Awesome.  Enjoy!

Spider

 ”Spider”,  for your amusement:

Get a PANK Subscription!

PANK does subscriptions! We offer a variety of subscription options: 1-year : 10 bones 2-year: 15 clams 3-year:   a twenty spot Lifetime: your soul…or $250 Interested in receiving new contemporary art and literature from emerging literary icons with our … Continue reading →

Debate Junkie

This year I’ve been glued to C-Span when it comes to debates.   C-Span offers a split-screen view of the candidates during the entire debate, which allows the viewer to see the emotional reaction of the candidate who isn’t speaking. … Continue reading →

Amoeba

Hah, I see a pattern forming.   My blogging abilities seem to be limited to trying to share my likings with others, but so be it.   That being said, I love Amoeba.   Amoeba is a music store with … Continue reading →

Michel Gondry

The Lego comment made me think about the White Stripes music video for “Fell in Love with a Girl.”   The video is directed by Michel Gondry, who happens to be a pretty awesome artist.   If you’ve never seen … Continue reading →

Institutionalized “Man”

I was in an avid debate about contemporary language and more specifically the role of vulgar slang and expletives. I was arguing fervently for more freedom in the use of these profane terms in broadcasting, print, and speech.   A … Continue reading →

Pank’s Romantic

I have a dirty little secret. It’s raunchy. It’s delicious and I love every single minute of it.       I’m a reader… ok so that fact isn’t necessarily a secret. PANK is a literary magazine… which involves a … Continue reading →

Web 2.0 grief debate

What has the web become? Early on the web was used as a vehicle for transmission of information from one source to another not unlike transmission based modes of instruction like the lecture. But now it has become something much … Continue reading →

KCRW

KCRW is an amazing radio station that broadcasts a beautiful array of music, news, and artistic talks.   There are many different programs to choose from, and if you’re ever looking for something to read, check out Bookworm hosted by … Continue reading →

K-Day

Hooray for a new year and new look for Pank. Thanks to Roxane our new website is up and running, and it looks great! Also, to celebrate the beginning of a new school year, Pank will be at K-Day. You … Continue reading →