Our fiction editor for September and October is Gabrielle Bellot. Gabrielle, who has also written under J. Bellot, holds an MFA from Florida State University, where she is currently a PhD Candidate in fiction. She has contributed work to Guernica, Prairie Schooner, The Missouri Review, Small Axe’s sx salon, The SouthEast Review, and other journals. She grew up in the … Continue reading
Our poetry editor for September and October is Oliver de la Paz, the author of four books: Names Above Houses (SIU Press 2000), Furious Lullaby (SIU Press 2008), Requiem for the Orchard (U. Akron Press 2010), and Post Subject: A Fable (U. Akron Press 2014). With Stacey Lynn Brown he co-edited A Face to Meet the Faces: … Continue reading
On Wednesday issue 4 comes to a finale with an essay by Xochitl-Julisa Bermejo. Below are thoughts by editor Courtney Kersten, on why she selected Xochitl’s essay. This past spring, I had the good fortune to take a workshop with the generous, spirited, and wise writer Allison Hawthorne Deming during her time as a … Continue reading
I didn’t choose the poems in this issue based on their technical skill, or original voice, or unique imagery – I chose them because when I had finished reading them and was washing the dishes or writing an email, they were the ones that came back to me. Continue reading
But the stories I’ve selected for Issue 4 all immediately made me put down my cheese and focus. I even had to sit up because I was laughing and it’s hard to lie on my back and laugh with cheese in my mouth. You try it. Continue reading
You’ll be left behind. And not in the fun apocalypse way, but in that used bookstore way when you find an old lit journal that claims to have been contemporary but there’s nothing in those pages that actually speak to the time those people lived. Instead of reflecting culture, you’ll just continue to reflect an indifferent, blind world. Continue reading
What happens when previous contributors become editors? You get issue 4. Visit the editor spotlight for Kamala Puligandla, Courtney Kersten, and Yasmin Belkhyr to refresh on why they became editors for May and June. We can’t wait to share this issue with you. With poetry by: Jamison Crabtree, Meggie Royer, Kelly Jones, Maya Jewell … Continue reading
A man who drinks between my long white columns/
tastes history: the first time I/ touched my breasts,/
then below, when I changed into an/ ocean from a dam—/
my belly a sculptor of people, fed by/ the milk-springs/
of my mountains. Continue reading
He always insisted that barbeque was meant to be eaten with one’s hands—anything more and you were deemed a sham, just another half-assed pretender at life. Sweet Baby Ray’s served as blood while I was taught to pop bones from sockets, and like a fledgling under the wing of a hawk, I tore at things once living beneath my father’s cool shadow. Continue reading
Certainly doubt can be a refuge, especially when a ray of light is beyond my reach. Continue reading
The James Franco Review 