Fictionaut Blog

Ms. Manivannan is a master at short story telling, because she knows how much to tell, how much to leave out and when to stop. [Read more]

Recently:
   Line Breaks: “In the Cemetery Where Al Jolson Is Buried” by Amy Hempel
   Fictionaut Five: Darlin’ Neal

I’ve given a lot of faves, more than eighty, some for friends, but most to writers I didn’t know and was pleasantly surprised by. All of them I stand behind, each of us putting together our own anthologies. And for those who don’t know, “recommended stories” can be sorted for “all-time,” where James Robison’s “Mars,” Kathy Fish’s “Spaceman,” and Pia Earhardt’s “Ambulance” crown the heap. [Read more]

Recently:
   Tweetable, 2/27
   Fictionaut

Five: Nicolle Elizabeth
   Line

Breaks: “Credentials” by John Holman

“Infinite Things All At Once” makes you look inside your heart, try to comprehend and sigh. A true gem of a story. [Read

more]

Recently:
   Fictionaut Survey
   Checking in with Second Tongue
   Fictionaut Five: Kirk Farber

In “The Way It Smelled” by Dylan Nice, Buster, a CVS clerk, loses his virginity to Eleanor, a sour-smelling girl with one pink eye. A simple enough premise, but Dylan makes the story idiosyncratic, funny, sweet, innocent, and, above all, awkward to the point of cringe. [Read more]

Recently:
   Checking in with Hypertext Fiction
   Line Breaks: “Pink” by Terese Svoboda
   Fictionaut Five: Jen Michalski

I’ll admit I’m an impatient reader these days. I’m looking for stories to delight me with their language, even more so than the story itself. I want each sentence to be like eating popcorn–every kernel a delight to ingest, so you want to keep going to the end. This is why I like Ben Chadwick’s “True Love and the Giraffe” so much. [Read more]

Recently:
   Checking In with Deckfight
   Fictionaut Five: Gina Frangello
   Luna Digest, 2/2
   Line Breaks: “The Line” by James Robison

Like all Angi Becker Stevens‘ stories, “If Everything is Inevitable” made me ache just right. I love the imagination and inventiveness here, the tenderness and yearning. [Read more]

Recently:
   Checking in with Short Story Challenge
   Line Breaks: “We” by Mary Grimm
   Fictionaut Five: Susan Tepper
   Luna Digest, 1/19

Like Elizabeth Bishop or Joseph Cornell, Morgan Harlow’s art is not great but small. An Elizabeth Bishop poem or a Joseph Cornell box reveals a world in miniature and invites us directly in. These two artists offer us layers of art, a sedimentary aesthetic that contain boxes within boxes, riddles wrapped in paradoxes, suffused in mystery-there is a certain indeterminacy in their work that multiplies hermeneutical possibilities and closes off no room for investigation. [Read more]

Recently:
   Checking in with Opium
   Fictionaut Five: Jim Ruland
   Luna Digest, 1/12

On Derek Osborne’s “Neon Fire”
by Susan Tepper
What captivated me immediately about this little gem of a story is the straightforward way that Osborne presented the characters, place, details and plot. Yet “Neon Fire” is by no means simplistic. It’s a deeply layered, textured story of two people trying to be in love. [read more]

Recently:
   Checking in with First Lines We Love
   Line Breaks: “Shopgirls” by Frederick Barthelme
   Fictionaut Five: Mike Young
   Luna Digest, 1/5

To kick off the New Year, Fictionaut begins a new series, Fictionaut Faves, where Fictionaut members discuss one story they have faved. We thought it would be great way to revisit some wonderful writing that has appeared in the community by offering personal and critical analysis by other writers. Some of the stories may be familiar, others new discoveries, but all share the admiration of their peers. Enjoy!