"Nora and the Black Man," by Nona Caspers

Relying on the insulation of a rural Minnesota town, a teenager’s perception of her parents’ fears is at odds with her curious mind that longs to understand complexity and connections rather than the separateness and rigid boundaries of their lives.  The story so well presents this tension that we read the following line with both humor and profound insight:  “Before Nora was born her father had a crush on Dianna Ross.”  The midwest in this story recalls the sensitivity of a writer like Eudora Welty but Capers firmly plants her story in the farming midwest.  Read it here in Cimarron Review.

"Seeing is Believing," by Doris Betts

What I like most about short stories is the ability more so than in novel, to lift the story beyond reality, to go beyond the grounded details of life and find a surprise, a mystery, within.  Doris Betts is one of those writers.  Here’s a story that really makes me believe in the character’s ability to recall faces in detail based only on hearing their voices.  It’s plausible, at least in this story.  The title is perfect and the ending illuminates the raison d’etre for the story, echoing a Latin phrase mentioned in the story, ‘to be rather than be seen’.  Read it here in Carolina Quarterly.

"Keynote," by J. David Bell

This is a story about impending retirement.  But more moving is the way Bell portrays the mind’s ability to shift perceptions.  During this sensitive time when the elder faculty member is asked to give a keynote, he reflects on his contributions, his later years, and the rising younger stars in the department.  Shifting paradigms, once this academic’s prize possession ironically presents a felt threat.  Or does it?  In this story the main character experiences something much more than regrets or threats from the next generation of faculty.  For a moving story told with depth of internal thought, read it here in Summerset Review.

"The Speed of Sound," by Elizabeth Gonzalez

Few people mention star gazing these days. Most of us live in urban areas where the ambient light robs us of an otherwise magical moment pondering the omniscient patterns that change with the Earth’s rotation.  This story turns our gaze toward the meaning of those lights of incomprehensible distance. The tendency toward vertigo is delivered with an intriguing line: “on a clear night, the sky seemed so vast and so close overhead it was disorienting, as if you could fall up.”  The physics of sound and light are unlike everyday life that “tumbled along ... and traveled only one path, and petered out.”  This story has a wonderful shape that converges the mysteries and realities of physics and the feeling of loss. Read it here in Hunger Mountain.

"Chaesa," by John Patrick Bishop

On the one year anniversary of her father’s death, a twelve year old girl and her family stay in the Communist occupied city of Seoul.  The details are intriguing and the story achieves the tone of a folk tale when the food prepared by her mother seems to expand to fill the needs of a village. The language is responsible for this air of mystery and the sense of urgency to flee.  But in truth the story reads as if it is part of a novel, there are so many connections and questions too large for a short story, in addition to the omniscient voice.  Nevertheless this is an intriguing story, here at Kenyon Review Online.

"Tractor Incident," by Eric Ramseier

Sometimes we dread life’s demands. Wishing away events that challenge our daily routines can consume a lot of time and thought. That’s how we find this character when a dust cloud envelops him and his truck after slamming the brakes.  He wished it were a cloud of locusts consuming “whatever occupied the ground”  instead of surrounding him.  But what he cannot escape is witnessing is an over-turned tractor and underneath it an injured boy. The strength of the story is the close point of view and associative leaps.  After placing the boy in the back of his pickup, he wants no part of this event hoping the boy would “fly out without a trace.”  The story takes an interesting perspective on how he comes to terms with the reality of what life delivers. Read it here at Switchback.

"A League of Pity," by Louise Beech

No one wants to be pitied. The two characters in this story have all that it takes to draw that demeaning sentiment from others.  On the one hand, the story is realistic in the way the protagonist is portrayed with her grief and anger. Spoken dialogue and internal thought are masterly woven in the writing.  An itinerant vendor of tea (this is England) bridges the real with the super real. He is magical in his physical deformity and spiritual profundity. There’s a delicious ambivalence of fairy tale that works here.  Read it at On the Premises here.

"The Anniversary," by Sanja Condit

The opening dialogue works with musical rhythm. Condit’s writing entices us immediately to listen to the characters as their relationship and situation unfolds.  The close point of view leans well into associative leaps like the houses once were as”neat as wooden blocks./He’d made a set of wooden blocks for Olivia...”.  Through the way the character’s mind works we get close to the emotion of loss and loneliness experienced in this story.  And the story moves in surprising ways as it uncovers this complex character immersed in a life that always seems just out of reach. Read it here in Sleet Magazine.

"No Gold Rush," by Alta Ifland

This story walks the line between fable and philosophy complete with an unreliable mustached peasant. It poses questions about the nature of love, the beloved and the lover, the object and the subject.  There is an alchemic quality to the story that leaves the reader pondering questions like, what did that mean, and do I believe this story-teller?  When the narrator reveals “that we are nothing but molecules of being completely cut off from each other, and that in order to make existence bearable we have been inventing fictions since the dawn of time, fooling ourselves that something like “love” existed, when in fact the only thing that exists are our skin and bones,” the reader deftly moves with her through the worlds of prosaic experience and ideas.  I’m reminded of the Calvino novel, Invisible Cities, a wonderful mix of fiction and geography of the world. If you like Calvino, you’ll love this story. If you are not familiar with him, give this story a try here at Identity Theory. 

"Divine Beings," by Michelle Lawrence

Tight economic times take marriages into tough places.  This marriage is no different.  When her husband finally lands economic success by creating and selling Jesus zucchini, he stretches the patience of his wife.  With the endorsement of his mother and church, he invites his wife to join the fold. The language is packed with character revealing description and action.  The surprise at the end is well earned with a twist on the religious thread that runs throughout.  For a great read turn here to Stones Throw Magazine.

"Orphans," by Douglas Light

It’s a story of loss.  She’s without parents since nineteen years old and family connections .  What she has now is only the memory of an abusive uncle.  Advice was given by a neighbor’s dad, a policeman, who counseled her to get a gun. While drinking wine, she remarks about cork: “Twenty-five years it takes the tree to mature.  Then it’s stripped naked of its bark, and stripped once every nine years after that.  The thought terrifies me.”   Language moves this story forward with inevitability of character.  She is now twenty-five.  For a chilling read go here to failbetter. 

"The Map," by Don Schwartz

This story has the ambience of a modern film noir and a chilling discovery about the Nazi’s penchant for detail surrounding a mysterious map. But the story delves deeper than any film noir movie. The relic from Hitler’s private collection is a corner of a map of the Warsaw ghetto before the Jewish uprising. And the map was an exact replica of every block, every building, every nook and cranny used for hidden munitions and hidden passages where children confiscated bread from outside the ghetto and returned and delivered their bounty to their parents. With remarkable intrigue and references to actual events and people, Schwartz weaves a story to illuminate what it means to be German. Read it here at The Adirondack Review.

“Since the Accident: A Story,” by Michael Croley

What at first the reader perceives as a trauma sustained from a car crash later burrows deeper into character aspects of integrity and honesty and the quiet conflict with her spouse. Secrets and the difficulty of communicating truth fester below the accumulating snow of this winter tale. The story unfolds a common enough life of a middle class couple in a small town where there are expectations about starting a family. But something’s wrong. Read the story here at Narrative Magazine to find the clues about this woman’s internal dilemma.

"Caution," by Nathaniel Bellows

The story opens with a clear statement of fact: “It was Mrs. Adams, a woman from their town, who had died.” The omniscient voice tantalizes us with its distance from events and emotion. A girl and her mother share something curious, a penchant for hiding emotion and facts. Bellows’ story is full of tension and mystery. Some things in life happen and we cower, other things happen and we deny their occurrence. Sometimes the factual details of events cushion painful emotion, masking as denial. And then there are shocking moments that can only be explained through sheer passion of emotion. This story delivers on all of this as well as mystery, death, and violence in a seemingly quiet Vermont town, which carries an invisible air of violence. Read it here in memorious for the pure pleasure of it and the puzzling facets of detail.

"Backbone," by Glen Pourciau

In some relationships there is an imbalance of power. To an outsider, it can seem almost funny but inside the situation it’s another story. One partner has more backbone and is more determined than the other to take control. A seemingly small mistake, paying for one dessert that they did not order, appears to linger silently but resurfaces ten years later. Why we hold onto old wounds is the stuff of therapy. But Pourciau shows through sharp dialogue how the upper hand in this situation shifts from wife to husband. Read it here at Apple Valley Review.

“Four Shorts about Feet,” by Louisa Wolf

I don’t often think about my feet until they talk back. There’s the occasional bruise, or such matters of aging like bunions, fallen arches, and plantar fasciitis. Regardless of the insult, our feet convey our heft through life but the first person narrator in these stories takes a perspective closer to the soul. Rich imagery and memory weave a series of stories as child, wife and mother. While the image of feet links these stories, here’s an image that stuck with me. The language evokes a parent’s conflicting feelings during the teenage-rearing years: “My heart, a leathery pouch as wrinkled as a hobbit’s purse, hiding hope, and maybe a dagger.” Read it here at Agni Online.

"To Pieces and To Death," by Amanda Rea

A woman alone feels deep silence and emptiness in her apartment after her pet fish dies. Outside the neighbors argue and words of domestic violence penetrate her living space and imagination. She can’t sleep. A few months earlier she’d left her husband without warning, a guy who professed his love, a guy who was really nice to her as well as strangers. All around, a really nice guy. But somehow he responded with hysterics to only things she’d said to him. Unlike her, he had refined tastes when it came to wine and avant garde films. There are some intriguing internal stories to link with her sense of loss like the one about the missionary woman who became emaciated for refusing to eat another banana, but her husband force-fed her the mush and she eventually died of fright. Another is a dream about her fish that apparently survives and finds freedom in flying. And the neighbor survives another round of domestic abuse, police tape surrounding her place. The associative leaps between encounters and thoughts are strong. Read it here in Wazee Journal.

"The Girl On The Bus," by Brian Patrick Heston

How many times do teens set out looking for validation only to be crushed by rejection? Heston captures the way a high school sophomore thinks about a girl whom he often sees on the bus. There is also the authoritative voice of his friend who obviously has more experience in the ways a girl thinks and behaves. He’s one of those kids upon whom no detail is wasted and if the details don’t satisfy, he’ll convince anyway. This friend’s influence is both humorous and controlling. The dialogue is fresh and moves the story with the force of a twister that can unexpectedly change course. And that’s what happens with the depth of character given these two boys. Get the experience. Read it here in Our Stories.

"Last Call For A Loner," by Tom Sheehan

The mystique of traditional story telling offers a look through the amber of the frozen, inexplicable moment. A stranger hitchhiking; he’s a loner without place or connection and accepts a ride from a driver of a rig who offers an invitation to his home. Serendipity enters, and by coincidence the loner and the driver’s father find a connection. There are details here about pervasive loneliness that strike a chord beyond the story. The descriptions are mesmerizing like this one: (he) “…felt again that unknown sweep of energy come across his chest …making him think he was in a kind of wind tunnel.” The ending satisfies like a tale well told and must be read entirely to appreciate the spoiler that will not be revealed, here at Serving House Journal.

"Colloid," by Justin D. Anderson

Anderson’s story weaves brief scenes with associative connections between fathers and sons. It’s a “solemn” lyric story that moves between particular details and ambivalent meaning such as the opening line, “My old man used to tell me about rumors.” The title holds the piece tightly, which I realized after consulting my dictionary and then experienced the story with a slight shift, for the better. It’s quite an experience reading this story. Think of a watercolor painting blurred around the edges that calls attention to realism but does not shy away from impressions. Read it here at Necessary Fiction.