iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Barbara Lock @barbaralockmd.bsky.social · 10/04/2026

Many thanks to Alice Hoffman and the editors @pshares.bsky.social for seeing the beauty and peril in my story, "Keep You Safe," winner of the

An image of page 144 of the literary magazine Ploughshares, Vol. 52, No. 1, announcing Barbara Lock as the winner of the Alice Hoffman Prize for Fiction.

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Barbara Lock @barbaralockmd.bsky.social · 04/10/2025

Looking to build your physical library? Willing to give these 5 literary novels to a good home. I'll cover shipping to a mutual in contiguous US.

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John Chrostek @johnchrostek.com · 13/07/2025

It’s a Sunday afternoon in the dead center of the year. Life barrels along. Best of times, worst of times, y’all know the score. Please consider checking out my two new books this year: Boxcutters has been out in the world for two months and Feast is but a month away!

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Ploughshares Literary Journal @pshares.bsky.social · 13/07/2025

Celebrate Summerween with Ploughshares! Join us at 6pm on July 16th at Trident Booksellers in Boston, MA, for the launch of our sinister Summer 2025 issue, guest-edited by Victor LaValle and filled with werewolves, monsters, and more. Register here: pshr.us/sinistersummerlaunch

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Suzy Eynon @suzyeynon.bsky.social · 02/07/2025

My first book will be out May 2026 🖤

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Barbara Lock @barbaralockmd.bsky.social · 13/07/2025

At church today we sang Get Together by The Youngbloods. You know how it goes: Come on, people now Smile on your brother Everybody get together Try to love one another right now

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Barbara Lock @barbaralockmd.bsky.social · 13/07/2025

The cat is meowing at ghosts again.

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Ploughshares Literary Journal @pshares.bsky.social · 09/07/2025

Our sinister Summer 2025 issue is out now! Guest-edited by Victor LaValle, this issue features prose by Helen Phillips, Deesha Philyaw, S. A. Cosby, Joanna Pearson, Carolyn Ferrell, and more. Grab your copy today: pshr.us/summer25

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Ploughshares Literary Journal @pshares.bsky.social · 09/07/2025

We are pleased to present Ramona Ausubel with the annual Ashley Leigh Bourne Prize for Fiction for her story, “Perfect Numbers,” published in the Summer 2024 issue. Read the full announcement and a profile in our Summer 2025 issue: pshr.us/summer25

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Barbara Lock @barbaralockmd.bsky.social · 11/07/2025

Reading @nadiabulkin.bsky.social in @pshares.bsky.social edited by @victorlavalle.bsky.social : "She has never had therapy. Doctors take five minutes, and exorcisms take five days, and she figures this is a good compromise."

Ploughshares Summer 2025 is Sinister in the best way!

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Barbara Lock @barbaralockmd.bsky.social · 09/07/2025

Will you be in Boston next Wednesday? Come out to hear us read from Sinister Summer, edited by @victorlavalle.bsky.social.

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TRossi (she/her) @trossiwriter.bsky.social · 09/07/2025

@variantlit.bsky.social’s own @barbaralockmd.bsky.social Her story’s sunlit-subtle menace will have you looking over your shoulder in a literary way!

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Barbara Lock @barbaralockmd.bsky.social · 09/07/2025

Will you be in Boston next Wednesday? Come out to hear us read from Sinister Summer, edited by @victorlavalle.bsky.social.

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Emily Rinkema @emilyrinkema.bsky.social · 30/06/2025

What an honor! Thanks @variantlit.bsky.social for seeing something in this story!

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Tori Walters @victoriaceann.bsky.social · 02/07/2025

Have you read our newest issue yet?!?

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Barbara Lock @barbaralockmd.bsky.social · 05/07/2025

The masterful narrative and metaphoric content of Vittorio Ottaviani's work takes my breath away.

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Variant Literature @variantlit.bsky.social · 21/04/2025

Celebrating new work from one of our poetry readers!

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BOObara Byar 👻👻 @barbarabyar.bsky.social · 16/01/2024

Thrilled to share the cover of #MOTEL, the anthology I'm editing for @cowboyjamboree.bsky.social

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Barbara Lock @barbaralockmd.bsky.social · 07/11/2023

Reading Thomas Merton's anti-poem, "Original Child Bomb."

33: The men in the plane perceived that the raid had been successful, but they thought of the people in the city and they were not perfectly happy. Some felt they had done wrong. But in any case they had obeyed orders. “It was war.”

34: Over the radio went the code message that the bomb had been successful: “Visible effects greater than Trinity … Proceeding to Papacy.” Papacy was the code name for Tinian.

35: It took a little while for the rest of Japan to find out what had happened to Hiroshima. Papers were forbidden to publish any news of the new bomb. A four line item said that Hiroshima had been hit by incendiary bombs and added: “It seems that some damage was caused to the city and its vicinity.”

36: Then the military governor of the Prefecture of Hiroshima issued a proclamation full of martial spirit. To all the people without hands, without feet, with their faces falling off, with their intestines hanging out, with their whole bodies full of radiation, he declared: “We must n

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Jared Beloff @readinstead.bsky.social · 31/10/2023

Join me @writesloud.bsky.social and friends for a moment of peace and poetry this Friday. All donations are for humanitarian aid via Doctors without Borders. PoetsforPeace.Eventbrite.com

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Will Musgrove @willmusgrove.bsky.social · 23/10/2023

Have a new flash in @havehashad.com today about Slappy, the dummy from the Goosebumps books. Check it out. Link to the story: www.havehashad.com

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Elizabeth Fletcher @esfletcher.bsky.social · 24/10/2023

The butterflies in my stomach can attest that this is happening tonight www.eyeoftheheartcenter.org/conversations

eyeoftheheartcenter.org

Conversations — Eye of The Heart Center

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Katie Manning @katiemanningpoet.bsky.social · 20/10/2023

The new journal my grad students and I are creating has gotten a flood of poetry and fiction submissions (yay!), but the editors are especially hoping for more open genre (hybrid, multimedia) and nonfiction pieces too! Send them some good longform work!

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BOObara Byar 👻👻 @barbarabyar.bsky.social · 19/10/2023

If you'd like to vote for my story PEACE PROCESS for Irish Short Story of the Year, please vote here: The short story category is at the bottom of the page. Your support is much appreciated and anyone can vote! www.irishbookawards.ie/vote/

irishbookawards.ie

Vote - Irish Book Awards

AN POST IRISH BOOk AWARDS Public Vote 2023 Vote for your favourite books of the year here and win €100 of National Book Tokens Scroll down and vote for the book you would like to win each award cate...

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TRossi (she/her) @trossiwriter.bsky.social · 19/10/2023

@barbarabyar.bsky.social’s story is stunning. If you haven’t yet read it, it’s here: variantlit.com/peace-process/

variantlit.com

Peace Process

Visit the post for more.

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Dan Crawley @danbillyc.bsky.social · 15/10/2023

"I moved onto the windowsill. Jack moved into my room. He nicknamed me squirt." Big love for this #flashfiction by @willmusgrove.bsky.social 💙💙💙

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Barbara Lock @barbaralockmd.bsky.social · 08/10/2023

Once, when I was transitioning from one job to another, I sought the advice of a dean who was also a psychologist. She asked me: when you were 13, what did you think you would be when you grew up? The she said: each night, just before bed, write a list of what you did that day that you enjoyed.

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Barbara Lock @barbaralockmd.bsky.social · 05/10/2023

Morning. Son tells me to be a wide receiver and I catch the ball through the fog, touch down in the driveway. In my noticing, I forget to have opinions.

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Barbara Lock @barbaralockmd.bsky.social · 03/10/2023

Write a poem, then nap for a while. Inspect the crawling insects. Stare down a cat staring down a squirrel.

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TRossi (she/her) @trossiwriter.bsky.social · 30/09/2023

In case anyone’s up for it, here’s an exciting literary event being held this Friday in Hartford in a cool art gallery to boot! A panel of six 2023 O Henry Award winners (including David Ryan), with series editor Jenny Minton and prize judge Lauren Groff! www.riverbendbookshop.com/event/bestsh...

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Barbara Lock @barbaralockmd.bsky.social · 28/09/2023

Retreated with these writers, so fun!

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Barbara Lock @barbaralockmd.bsky.social · 25/09/2023

"...in any language it is a struggle to make a sentence say exactly what you mean." ARTHUR KOESTLER

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Barbara Lock @barbaralockmd.bsky.social · 20/09/2023

“You can understand nothing about art, particularly modern art, if you do not understand that imagination is a value in itself.” MILAN KUNDERA

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Barry Bergman @barrybergman.bsky.social · 18/09/2023

Bay Area cat lovers: These 6mo sibs (a boy and a girl) need a home. Got one you can share? (If not, I know they'd appreciate it if you could boost this beyond my paltry 25 followers.) Thanks

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TRossi (she/her) @trossiwriter.bsky.social · 09/09/2023

A story about writing, vulnerability, and relationship to the reader. Read it here! www.invisiblecitylit.com/fiction/make...

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Barbara Lock @barbaralockmd.bsky.social · 30/08/2023

Kids singing thriller on the microphone in the living room and school doesn’t start for a week.

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Barbara Lock @barbaralockmd.bsky.social · 30/08/2023

I just want to say that the close neighbor of stability is stasis and the close neighbor is stasis is….

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Barbara Lock @barbaralockmd.bsky.social · 30/08/2023

Infinite like. That’s the mood I’m in.

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Barbara Lock @barbaralockmd.bsky.social · 29/08/2023

At some point I’m going to get up off this sofa and edit something.

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Barbara Lock @barbaralockmd.bsky.social · 29/08/2023

Lying on a sofa on the porch listening to frogs counts as writing.

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Barbara Lock @barbaralockmd.bsky.social · 29/08/2023

Good luck to all the teachers and students starting this week! May you be gentle with each other.

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Barbara Lock @barbaralockmd.bsky.social · 22/08/2023

True story: once I worked a hospital which installed speakers in public corridors that put out subliminal messages. An admin, who had one of these speakers right outside her door, was unable to tell me the content or intention of the messages, and soon after my question she dropped dead.

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Barbara Lock @barbaralockmd.bsky.social · 18/08/2023

Went to a great book launch in Brooklyn last night—basically a craft talk. Read Witness by Jamel Brinkley!!

Jamel Brinkley at Books Are Magic for the launch event for his second collection Witness.

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Barbara Lock @barbaralockmd.bsky.social · 17/08/2023

We adopted this beautiful girl today. She's a rescue. We fostered her through a medical journey. She's healthy and purring and spreading love in the household.

Barbara Lock with her 9 month old black and white kitten Reina.

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Myna Chang @mynachang.bsky.social · 11/08/2023

Tara Campbell is one of the best writers and teachers! Happy to have the chance to talk with her about her new book & a few of her masterful #flash stories. "The World Is An Uncomfortable Place: An Interview with Tara Campbell" in X-RAY @taracampbell.bsky.social @xraylitmag.bsky.social #author

xraylitmag.com

THE WORLD IS AN UNCOMFORTABLE PLACE: An Interview with Tara Campbell

I just kept doing it until I had over three dozen paradoxes saved on my computer. Some of them allowed themselves to be shaped into publishable stories.

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