new_releases Creative Nonfiction Archives

Getting the Last Word

Issue No. 207 ~ August, 2014

The day before Valentine’s Day, Dad called and told me he planned to take Mom to a psychiatrist to get her drugs strong enough to “drive the devil out.”

Christmas – Our Style

Issue No. 199 ~ December, 2013

Christmas is a great time for carousing. Men drink homemade brews that are concoctions of sorghum and millet solution, honey and yeast.

Hanoi

Issue No. 198 ~ November, 2013

She stopped before me. A flame-tipped roll-up hung from her mouth. She seemed ancient. This could be a hundred years ago, I thought.

My Father Stood Loading His Gun

Issue No. 176 ~ January, 2012

My father stood in the middle of the yard in front of me crushing the remainder of his cigarette into the snow. He reached for the red handkerchief in his back pocket and blew his nose. Birds still chirping, snow still falling. The pistol gleamed from his pants.

Home

Issue No. 172 ~ September, 2011

When the earthquake struck nearby Sichuan province that May, we did everything wrong; we did not leap from the one free window. We remained calm, sought out doorways and braced ourselves, hearing the windows rattle in their loose frames and the doors above slamming as the upstairs residents fled the building in fright.

The Overweight Anorexic

Issue No. 166 ~ March, 2011

The face of Jesus seemed to glare 14 karat-gold disapproval from the charm glued to the middle of the steering wheel of Fleming’s nickel-gray Buick Skylark, sticky with brown drops of Kettle One Skyy Coke.