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American Short Fiction

Publishing exquisite fiction since 1991.

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Anxiety

Web Exclusive Interview: Amy Stuber

by Erin McReynolds | May 13, 2019

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

Filed Under: NOTEBOOK, Web Exclusive Interview Tagged With: Amy Hempel, Anxiety, Erin McReynolds, Family, Interview, Joy Williams, Online Exclusive Interview, parenting, Web Exclusive Interview, writing

Things American: On Quitting the (not so) Great American Novel

by Barbara Bourland | June 5, 2018

Things American: On Quitting the (not so) Great American Novel

I want to tell you, because maybe it’s four in the morning and you’re googling “how to know when to give up on a novel.” How you are supposed to know? I’ve wondered this many times myself over twenty-three months, through a hundred and fifty thousand words, dozens of chapters, three false starts, and too many conversations to count. Then—in a moment—I came to the answer and I gave up on the book. I’ve written three books that came easily. The novel I walked away from was not one of those. The … [Read more...] about Things American: On Quitting the (not so) Great American Novel

Filed Under: NOTEBOOK, THINGS AMERICAN Tagged With: Anxiety, Barbara Bourland, Clinton, Fake Like Me, fear, Fiction, great American novel, I'll Eat When I'm Dead, Novels, on quitting, Politics, social media, Trump, writing

Things American: Treatment vs. Healing

by Jenna Kahn | August 11, 2016

Things American: Treatment vs. Healing

1. The nurse woke me at four-thirty in the morning to take my blood. Someone else had taken it less than six hours before, in the emergency room, but pointing that out seemed disrespectful because he was a nurse with years of schooling behind him, and I was just another suicidal senior in high school. After he left with five vials of my blood, and I was sufficiently drowsy, I rested fitfully until it was time for the morning devotional at six. Wrapped in a beltless robe and wearing … [Read more...] about Things American: Treatment vs. Healing

Filed Under: NOTEBOOK, NOTEBOOK FEATURE, THINGS AMERICAN Tagged With: Amy Bloom, Anxiety, Bipolar disorder, David Foster Wallace, depression, Esmé Weijun Wang, healing, hospital, Kevin Barry, lithium, Marya Hornbacher, medication, synthroid, therapy, treatment

Online Fiction Interview: Lincoln Michel

by Nate Brown | January 4, 2015

Online Fiction Interview: Lincoln Michel

Lincoln Michel's "The Supervillain Stalled in His Lair" kicks off our 2015 web exclusive fiction, and it's a lovely and bizarre look at the placid, boring world through the eyes of an ambitious and anxiety-rattled super villain named, uh, the Supervillain. As satires go, this one's less send-up than human interest piece. Told from the point of view of an admittedly diabolical (but amazingly amiable) malefactor, the story's  part of a novel that Michel's calling DOOM MOOD. We emailed the author … [Read more...] about Online Fiction Interview: Lincoln Michel

Filed Under: NOTEBOOK, Web Exclusive Interview Tagged With: Anxiety, Comics, Humor, Lincoln Michel, The Supervillain Stalled in His Lair, Web Exclusive Interview

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Issue 81

Guest-edited by Fernando A. Flores, featuring new stories by Yvette DeChavez, Julián Delgado Lopera, Carribean Fragoza, Alejandro Heredia, Carmen Maria Machado, Ruben Reyes Jr., and Gerardo Sámano Córdova.

You can preview the issue here.

NEWS

Read the winners of the 2024 Insider Prize

Read the winners of the 2024 Insider Prize

By ASF Editors

“Memories are a nuisance,” Peter wrote to one of our writers after reading his short story, “but nonetheless they seem to make us who we are, as this story confirms.” This year’s submissions told many stories burdened with memory, but just as many stared bravely into the face of hope, satirized the state of politics, speculated on the future of the world, or else built entirely new worlds to inhabit. In short, the stories written on the inside reflected the stories we wrote this year on the outside. Stories of human toil and dreams and everything in between.
 

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