Though our Web Exclusive "Belly of the Beast" was published on Halloween, it's a timeless story, drawing on folk tale traditions of employing monsters to contend with painful human realities. In this case, a spouse grows distant, frightening, and dangerous, lost (literally) inside of a beast. It's a tender and desperate story that accommodates any number of ways in which our partners can abandon us. We talked with author Joy Baglio recently about the flash form, the Master Switch of Life, and … [Read more...] about Web Exclusive Interview: Joy Baglio
Web Exclusive Interview
Web Exclusive Interview: Nora Lange
In Nora Lange's flash fiction, “Her Cousin Lena,” Rose records a long-distance phone call with her mother. Their exchange reveals a disconnect that, though often funny, describes the “love and horror” of a certain flavor of mother-daughter relationship. Haunting the conversation is the absent figure of Rose’s cousin, Lena, to whom the mother constantly compares her daughter, and who becomes the axis point of their unaddressed tensions. We chatted recently with Nora about her story and … [Read more...] about Web Exclusive Interview: Nora Lange
Web Exclusive Interview: Min Han
If you remove technology and industry, anything remotely modern about human beings, what sort of animal are we? What is the shape of our heart, after all? To explore these questions, Min Han went back to the Stone Age for August's Web Exclusive, "Ara's Man." We talked with the debut author about telling a universal story set in another world, about the importance of travel, and how bullshit it is that there aren't more stories where early females occupy the significant roles (that archaeology … [Read more...] about Web Exclusive Interview: Min Han
Web Exclusive Interview: Amy Stuber
Amy Stuber's flash fiction story "I'm on the Side of the Wildebeest" distills a familiar modern dilemma into a crystallized moment. On a road trip, a mother contemplates a very different childhood for her kids than the one she had—one in which technology, the constant deluge of information, and the threat to the planet create anxieties that are harder to escape. But despite these anxieties (or maybe because of them) we feel the sweet gratitude for a moment that is good, one we know will become a … [Read more...] about Web Exclusive Interview: Amy Stuber
Web Exclusive Interview: Keenan Walsh
January's Web Exclusive, "Flood," describes a significant moment of change in a troubled family's life. It's notoriously hard to master a run-on sentence, but author Keenan Walsh does it here. In editing, we realized there was no way to break it up without losing its very necessary urgency, that the whole thing was an intricately woven tapestry that needed to stay intact. What's more, the form forces the modern, harried reader to slow down and take in shimmering details that they might otherwise … [Read more...] about Web Exclusive Interview: Keenan Walsh
Web Exclusive Interview: Zach Powers
In Zach Powers' flash fiction story, "Surface Treatments," a father paints himself into a corner—literally. While the circumstances are absurd, there is such an accuracy and familiarity in the helpless acceptance of his wife and children alternating between observing and gamely participating in his self-exile. We spoke to Powers about writing, this story, and—since he's also an expert on the subject—what to do when you're in Savannah. — Erin McReynolds: Something about this scenario—an … [Read more...] about Web Exclusive Interview: Zach Powers