On Friday 16th October, Nikki Dudley will be reading from her newly released pamphlet, My Body is a Stranger, published by V Press. She will be joined by other V Press writers, including Laura Besley...

Here’s what’s coming up from your your friendly neighbourhood freelancers, lit mags and awesome independents over the next couple of months.

Ted by Rachel M. Hollis My son turned six and all he wanted was a potato. Raw. Whole. When he opened his gift—a spud wrapped in yesterday’s newspaper—he drew a smiley face on it. Named it Ted. ‘Doe…

The 250-word Microfiction Challenge is an international creative writing competition that challenges participants to create very short stories based on genre, action, and word assignments in 48 hours.

"The Bone Hermit," flash fiction by Lyndsey Croal

Six days of burnt bulbs. Of whispers, no vowels and nothing

So happy to receive my contributor’s copy of What Whispers Back: Spinning Hawaiʻi’s Spooky Tales from Bess Press in the mail last night. It’s so pretty!

Caution by Liz deBeer Inside a cavity of a crooked white birch, a bird’s black beads dart, sweeping the snowy landscape for predators, calling out, “Chree, Chree, Chree,” when it eyes a lanky girl …

Just before the mold was declared an emergency, Mr. Ng placed a massive order for egg noodles. “Noodles are comfort food,” he told me. “People will want comfort during this strange time.” Earlier t…

We had been standing in front of the Komodo dragons for fifteen minutes by that point, and she was already getting tired. She pressed her small face as close to the barrier as possible as the giant…

A flash fiction website for writers and readers. One 75 word tale published daily. Plus author interviews and writing group map

I can’t pinpoint the exact date in our teen years that Gracie got the bright idea to become her favorite popstar. All I know is, once that lightbulb turned on, there was no switching back. She had …

Randy’s playing poker at the senior center, as he does every Wednesday, when his friend Joan walks in and waves him over. Standing beside Joan in the doorway is a woman Randy has never seen before,…

Dr. Lian Kessler built the system to teach empathy. That’s how she pitched it. A synthetic intelligence designed not to diagnose, but to understand. A neural net trained on case studies, anonymized…

The first thing that disappears is your name. It doesn’t vanish dramatically. No thunder, no announcement. It’s just missing from the places it should be. The barista hesitates when calling your or…

Why she was invited for her son’s promotion, the banquet and celebration, she didn’t know. And by that, she did know—deep down, she knew—but the pain of knowing is not worth its admission. So…