By: Midge Raymond – Posted: July 15, 2010
The ferry pulled into the harbor at dawn, and they watched the sun rise behind the cliffs. The craggy bluffs of Santorini towered over them, exposing layers of black, white, and gray earth, all streaked with dark red, as if sprinkled with powdered blood.
She outlined the harbor with her eyes. When he told her he would bring her here, she bought a book about the island. So she knew, as she looked out at the sea, that the island used to be round, that she was not overlooking a body of water but a submerged volcanic crater, flooded centuries ago by a catastrophic eruption.
By: Tony Press – Posted: July 8, 2010
“Elvis died on my birthday. My fourteenth. We lived in Delavan then. My mom worked at the club on the lake.”
Stirring wretched coffee with a fork while a tinny radio played something that must have been relevant to the assertion, fifty-seven year old Alonzo Johnson wondered how it had been decided, at that moment, in a packed Greyhound diner, that the stranger sharing his two-person table would disclose that particular piece of information. Or, more properly, those pieces, as it wasn’t only the Elvis-death-birthday declaration, but there was also Delavan, the mom, and the club. That must have been Hugh Hefner’s old place on Lake Geneva. He wondered which was most pertinent.
By: Sarah Martin Byrd – Posted: June 11, 2010
The first year after Henry’s death, the Blackwells cleared the hilly land. By the next spring, a half-dozen acres were ready to plant. On a frosty March morning, Mary headed to Harrisonburg. In her right pants pocket was ninety-two dollars folded over with twine into a tight, thick wad. She could feel its weight on her thigh, but she reached into her pocket just to feel it, to touch it and make sure it was still there. This was her and Henry’s life savings, and most of it would be spent that day on those little black specks of gold called burley seed. The future of the Blackwell family depended upon seeds.
By: Kate LaDew – Posted: March 29, 2010
The boy’s skin was very pale. Arms turned down, thin strips of black wrapped around, mapping where the skin didn’t meet. He was very handsome and Murmur was glad.
By: Elizabeth Edelglass – Posted: January 11, 2010
Ginnie and Roger were already planning next year’s trip, when they’d just arrived for this year’s annual family vacation, one of the lesser Caribbean islands with a Catholic-sounding name. They preferred to just call it Paradise, as in Next year in Paradise we’ll rent a car for the far beach, the one with the goats. When their daughter Maxine was little, Roger would hoist her on his shoulders to hang their bag of peanut butter sandwiches from a high branch so the mangy gray goats couldn’t nuzzle for a bite. By next year, Maxine’s baby would be old enough to make goat sounds, if Ginnie sang “Old MacDonald’s Farm” like she used to with Maxine.
By: Anne Whitehouse – Posted: January 5, 2010
It’s strange to grow old. I feel I’m the same person inside. All my life I was around people more or less my own age, and suddenly there are hardly any left. I think about death all the time. I guess you could say I’m apprehensive. I don’t want to suffer. I live my life as if my actions could make a difference, but I suppose at heart I’m a fatalist. Whatever happens, happens. I have to accept the fact that my efforts might not have the results I want them to have.
By: Rion Amilcar Scott – Posted: November 20, 2009
Snow fell again like feathers tumbling from the sky and when they hit the concrete, they dissolved into a clear liquid.
The old joke that Phoenix used to tell Jalen when it snowed back in Cross River was that he’d spotted two snowflakes that were exactly alike. It was never that funny, or even original, but year after year he’d tell it and cackle as loudly as he did the first time Pop Pop or his father (he couldn’t remember who told him the joke) first said it way back when he was five or six. Now, Jalen wasn’t around to hear the joke. Cliff was, but he was a poor substitute. It seemed he had forgotten how to laugh.
Maggie Parr is a finalist in the 2009 Literary Awards Program. Below is an excerpt from her entry, Faith.
The skin of my fingertips is tender from the long climb the day before, stripped down to the thinnest of layers; pink and newborn. I touch the cool morning rock. An ocean breeze blows in past the knuckled headland, curling down the inlet and up the brushy slope to the base of [...]
Adam Sturtevant is the third place winner in the 2009 SFWP Literary Awards program. We’re excerpting a story from his winning collection, Ease Chest Tuck Hid Debt Art.