Tag: Short Story Review

  • ODDS and ENDS: Adjunct Professor Strike, Christmas Trees, and What’s the Deal?

    (I say what I say…)

    There is a brewing movement underway being led by adjunct faculty and students. Hell Gate ran this story yesterday about students at the New School, here in New York City, joining the faculty strike, which has been going on for 23 days. If you didn’t know, University of California academic workers, have also been on strike. For far too long, adjunct professors, basically part-time teaching staff, and academic workers, who are teaching assistants, tutors, graduate student researchers and postdoctoral scholars, have been doing more and more of the actually teaching at universities. Across the country, full-time and tenured positions at universities have been shrinking, while at the same time administrative positions have been growing. I don’t think anyone will find it surprising that administrator salaries have been growing, while faculty pay has remained flat for years. A reckoning is coming. For the past forty years, American universities have become little corporations – making money and growing endowments comes first, and education is second. And to accomplish that, administrators have to keep their labor costs low. It has gone on for too long, and now faculties are pushing back. I see strikes like these growing and continuing in the coming years.

    Tomorrow, our Christmas Tree arrives. We ordered one, it’s fake, which was designed to fit specifically in small apartments. The base diameter is like 23” and it’s 6’ tall, so it’s a think pole of a tree. I can admit that that since we put up decorates after Thanksgiving, it really hasn’t felt like Christmas in the apartment, and that’s not really surprising. The Tree does tie the whole thing together.

    So, what’s the deal with all the views on my post: Short Story Review: “The Face in the Mirror” by Mohsin Hamid? When I originally posted it, I received 11 views which, for my humble little blog, was rather respectable. In the last two weeks, the same post has received 42 views, which is an outlier for me. So, what’s going on? If people are enjoying what I wrote, then that’s cool, but being that this blog is, well, little, then I find it odd when people notice it. Or is this just a bunch of bots screwing with me?

    (INSERT JOKE ABOUT LIKING THIS BLOG.)

  • Short Story Review: “ODE TO LOKI, OR AN ABSURD GLORIFICATION OF EXISTENTIAL LONELINESS” by Gabriela Denise Frank

    (The non-fiction short story, “ODE TO LOKI, OR AN ABSURD GLORIFICATION OF EXISTENTIAL LONELINESS” by Gabriela Denise Frank appeared in Rejection Letters on December 7th, 2022.)

    (I do SPOIL it.)

    I stated that one of my new favorite lit mags is Rejections Letters, which I subscribe to, and I got an email this morning which featured this non-fiction short story; “ODE TO LOKI, OR AN ABSURD GLORIFICATION OF EXISTENTIAL LONELINESS” by Gabriela Denise Frank. And I think you caught that this is not a fiction short story, and I will get into that in a second.

    This is a confession/love letter to the fictional Loki character from the Marvel Cinematic Universe as played by the very talented and charming Tom Hiddleston. This is a piece that is full of references, play on words, allusion to Marvel movies and television shows, and even Hiddleston’s real life. I am sure a few went by me, but the language used makes this work feel like a funhouse of tumbling discovery. I wasn’t sure where this piece was going, but I was being entertained, and felt like I was uncovering someone’s obsession that had remained internal, only now being shared to the external world.

    I enjoyed how this expressed a very creative encapsulation of a person’s obsession. But when I went back and read the piece for a second time, I saw the trajectory of the work; the inevitable path that it took. How one starts infatuated, desiring one that might not be right, overlooking their faults, then an action occurs which changes feelings, the consummation of those feelings only to know the truth – that one cannot deny who they truly are – leaving one in a cold detached place. It was a melancholy arc; though as I said inevitable but not predicable.

    And then we are left with the label of this being a non-fiction story. Did the author have a relationship with Hiddleston? Possible but unlikely. Is this a depiction of the authors infatuation/obsession with the Loki character and Hiddleston? Very possible. But I was left churning over this “non-fiction” label for this piece. I went back to the title, or the second half of it, “…AN ABSURD GLORIFICATION OF EXISTENTIAL LONELINESS.” I feel like that could be used to describe that last two COVID years. Is this piece a confession of the author’s obsession over Loki which was used, or needed, to survive their loneliness? I don’t know. Maybe I’m projection my COVID loneliness on this piece. Oh, that would be dark, wouldn’t it? I am sure there was a reason it was labeled this way, and I don’t want to know the answer; I want to ponder, and wonder about it.

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  • My New Favorite Lit Journals

    I alluded to this yesterday in my short story review, which is that I have found myself reading more flash fiction and short-short stories. The sources of this material has been coming from, primarily, online lit journals, which I have been spending more of my time looking for. What I am enjoying from these publications, and this applies to most but not all, is that they are showcasing writers that are playing and experimenting with the short story form.

    I know there are many quality online publications out there, but these four I have found very intriguing and inspiring of late.

    The Drift – This is probably the most traditional of all the publications, and also not exclusively online either, as they also print their editions. I won’t lie, I’d like to work for this group. Their short story and poetry selection is great. They showcase different viewpoints and styles, and aren’t afraid to try new things. Their Mentions section is of particular note.

    Taco Bell Quarterly – When I first discovered them, I wasn’t sure if they were a joke or not. Their posts on Twitter are highly anti-publishing establishment, to the point of being militant, but still retaining a sense of humor about it all.  Supposedly, the stories they publish must have a connection to Taco Bell, which may or may be true. The point is that they publish what they like, and don’t care what anyone thinks.

    Rejection Letters – According to their own “About” page, they started out publishing fake rejection letters. What they are now is a place for short fiction and poetry that can veer into the absurd. I find that the pieces they publish to be honest, but also they can be rather funny. I subscribe to them, which gets me a daily email with a new story or poem.

    Memoir Mixtapes – This is just a good idea for a journal – it’s all essays about people and the songs they find important, memorable, or fascinating. I love finding out about new music, and I really enjoy hearing articulate people describe why songs are important to them. Not only do they select good writers, but the added bonus is going out and finding these songs that were just described to you.

    I know there are a ton of other great publications out there. If you know of any, leave their names in comments so we can all share with each other.

  • Short Story Review: “My Wonderful Description of Flowers” by Danielle Dutton

    (The short story “My Wonderful Description of Flowers” by Danielle Dutton appeared in the December 5th, 2022 issue of The New Yorker.)

    (I can’t help it; I spoil this story…)

    Photograph by Ioulex for The New Yorker

    I have been getting into short short stories, and flash fiction. What I am enjoying about these smaller works is that is that I feel like most of the writers are playing with the short story form, and experimenting with what can work when it comes to narrative. Maybe this is a reflection of the digital age, and texting – use as few words as possible and get to the point.

    “My Wonderful Description of Flowers” by Danielle Dutton is not a flash fiction piece, but for The New Yorker, it is a shorter short story at just three pages. There is no plot to this story, and I think that was purposeful. The story functions like a dream, and in the first paragraph, the narrator tells us that her husband had a dream, though he very rarely dreams. And with that framing, the story is on its way. There are a few narrative threads, or lines that weave in and out of the story; the husband not returning a text message, their child playing a video game that doesn’t seem to be like any type of normal game, a lecture and reception, a stranger who had corresponded with the narrator, and then a train ride that leads to the end of the line.

    The prose is lovely, light, and ethereal in the sense that it flows back and forth from narrative threads, which could only work together in a dream. What keeps the narrative moving forward is the growing frustration with the messages not being returned, and the train literally running toward the end of the line. These two threads do function as the device that creates the rising action, so the story has the feeling of a plot, or at least that a climax is coming. Dutton has created this frame for the story to live in, and then she goes on to fill spaces with movements, gestures, actions and observations. It’s a wonderful experiment in testing what a narrative can be, and be used to hold a story together. And like a good guest, the story knows not to overstay its welcome, and gives an ending that isn’t climatic, but is satisfying as it fits within the atmosphere of this dream-like world.

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  • Short Story Review: “In the Garden” by Elliot Harper

    (The flash fiction story, “In the Garden” by Elliot Harper appeared in The Molotov Cocktail.)

    (Yes, I would say that this story will be spoiled.)

    I like flash fiction, and, I do take some responsibility for this, but most of the flash fiction I encounter is rather serious. Coming across a piece that is humous, and one that also delivers a punch, is like finding a tiny gem. “In the Garden” by Elliot Harper is that sort of flash fiction. I mean, it is about a foul-mouthed gnome who lives in a garden, and has a rather unconventional philosophical conversation over tea with the narrator.

    The story exists in a dream the narrator is having, and a bookend structure is used here; the story fades in from darkness to light, and then ends by going from light to darkness. Between those fades, we are in the narrators garden, but it is never clear if the garden exists only in this dream, or is the garden from the narrator’s real life and is being dreamt about. We can assume that the garden is from real life, as the narrator claims ownership of it, knows the gnome because the guy is referred to being in his usual place, and the narrator says he has worked hard on the garden – but is this setting from the narrator’s real life? I say this because the gnome says to the narrator that everything one sees is just the brain’s interpretation. Do we even see the same things? Can two people interpret reality the same way?

    And then I started to think that this story might actually be a metaphor about death, and how our existence is only momentary compared to the totality of the Universe. The gnome has a mini-milky Way galaxy under his red hat, and then the narrator mentions how it will be a shame to have to leave the garden soon. This lead me to start wondering about the bookend structure again; the story ends with a fade to black, and not the narrator waking up. Such as, the story comes into existence, and then goes out. Even the last line, referring to the fade out as “existence” in a “half-forgotten dream.”

    Did I mention that the story is funny? It is, by the way.

    It’s refreshing to read a piece that makes you think. It’s impressive to do it in such a compact form.

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