Clifford Garstang's Blog, page 4

2025 Literary Magazine Ranking–Poetry

Below is the 2025 Literary Magazine Ranking for Poetry. To understand the Rationale, Methodology, and Calculation for the Rankings, please go here.

Note that every effort has been made to verify the website links, but magazines do sometimes change their web addresses and occasionally you will encounter a broken or incorrect link. If that happens, please let me know by emailing info@cliffordgarstang.com.

If you find these rankings useful, please consider supporting this website by making a or by purchasing one or more of my books.

2025 Literary Magazine Ranking for Poetry

Note the following:

© means that the magazine/press is closed

(H) means that the magazine/press is on hiatus

(?) means that it’s unclear what’s going on with the magazine/press

2025 RankMagazine2024 Rank2025 Score1Poetry265.52American Poetry Review161.53Kenyon Review3354New England Review6334Poem-a-Day5336Threepenny Review429.57Yale Review1028.58Adroit Journal17269Southern Review823.510Paris Review72211Copper Nickel1521.512Rattle1220.513Ploughshares917.514Alice James Books1916.514Georgia Review1516.514Iowa Review1916.517Smartish Pace111618Agni1214.519New Ohio Review181419Pleiades341421Alaska Quarterly Review2713.522Beloit Poetry Journal121323Manhattan Review191224Common, The4911.524Sun1911.526BkMk Press271026Gettysburg Review ©231026Glacier, The271026Here: A Poetry Journal681026Torch Literary Arts681026Two Sylvias Press6810321Blackbird31932Ecotone23932Five Points38932Florida Review33932Plume119937Conduit348.537Image348.539Foglifter25839Missouri Review130839Southeast Review130839The Journal38843American Journal of Poetry ©417.543Four Way Books277.543Greensboro Review1407.543Massachusetts Review417.543New Criterion1407.543Quarterly West417.543Rhino417.543Salmagundi417.551Cincinnati Review54751Michigan Quarterly Review31751Prairie Schooner54751Swamp Pink (fka Crazyhorse)54755Hudson Review516.555Palette Poetry386.555Tin House ©516.558Boomerlitmag54658Consequence54658Copper Canyon Press34658Court Green (?)54658Four Way Review54658World Literature Today54658Zephyr Press54665Birmingham Poetry Review265.565Hobart655.565Shenandoah655.568Anacapa Review568Arkansas Review68568artangel68568Ashland Poetry Press68568Bellevue Literary Review568Bloomsday Literary68568Boston Review41568Boulevard68568Chicago Quarterly Review68568Circling Rivers Press68568Clarion Magazine68568Deep Wild Journal568Dialogos Books68568Fjords Review68568Flyway568Glassworks68568Good River Review568Gordon Square Review68568Grain Magazine68568Gulf Coast41568Heart Poems68568Heat568Hole in the Head Review68568Hopper, The568Iamb68568Indianapolis Review68568James Dickey Review68568Jewish Currents568Lana Turner41568Ligeia Magazine68568Light68568Lost Horse Press68568Manoa68568Moon Tide Press68568North Meridian Review568Orion68568Parentheses Journal68568Pinch568Pirene’s Fountain68568Reed Magazine68568River Heron Review68568Saginaw (?)68568Salt Hill Journal68568Sidereal (?)68568Sky Island Journal568Slipstream68568Sparks of Calliope568St. Bridgid Press68568Stonecoast Review68568Sundog Lit68568Terminus68568This Broken Shore (?)68568Turtle Point Press68568Vallum: Contemporary Poetry685122Southern Indiana Review1194.5122ZYZZYVA1194.5124Arroyo Literary Review (H)1223.5124Bennington Review1223.5124I-70 Review1403.5124LitMag1403.5124Poetry Northwest513.5124Spillway543.5124Tar River1223.5124Tiger Bark Press1223.5124Virginia Quarterly Review493.5124Volta ©1223.5124Willow Springs543.5135American Scholar653135Literary Imagination1223135Narrative1303135Nepantla (?)1303135Ninth Letter1223135Prelude1303135Tahoma Literary Review1303135White Pine Press1303143Abstract Magazine TV1402.5143Bare Life Review ©682.5143Bettering American Poetry (?)1402.5143Butcher’s Dog (H)1402.5143Cave Wall1402.5143Clover ©682.5143Codex (?)1302.5143Constellations1402.5143Crab Orchard Review1402.5143Foundry (H)1402.5143Hawaii Pacific Review1402.5143Hopkins Review1402.5143jubilat ©682.5143Kweli Journal1402.5143Lake Effect1402.5143Love’s Executive Order (?)682.5143LSU Press1402.5143Moonpie Press (H)1402.5143Nerve Cowboy ©1402.5143New Orleans Review1402.5143Nimrod1402.5143Prism1402.5143Purple Passion Press1402.5143Saturnalia Books1402.5143Seneca Review1402.5143Shade Journal1402.5143Sixth Finch1302.5143Storm Cellar1402.5143Summerset Review1402.5143Sycamore Review ©1402.5143TAB-Journal1402.5143Thrush1402.5143Tipton Poetry Journal1402.5143Tule Review1402.5143Tupelo Press682.5143Twyckenham Notes682.5143Washington Square Review682.5143Waxwing Literary Journal682.5143Wordtemple Press1402.5182Field ©682182Rust and Moth1862184Grub Street1811.5184Iron Horse Literary Review1791.5184MIZNA1811.5184River Styx1811.5184Salamander1791.51893: A Taos Press1861189A Public Space1861189Adirondack Review (?)1861189Airlie Press1861189Arts & Letters1189Bamboo Ridge Press1861189Boiler, The1189Brilliant Corners1189Broadsided Press1861189Catamaran1189Cherry Tree Magazine1861189Coal City Review1189Colorado Review1811189Columbia Review1861189Cortland Review1861189Cultural Daily1861189Delta Poetry Review1861189Denver Quarterly1861189Driftwood1189Empty Bowl1861189Evening Street Review1189Fine Print Press1189Gertrude ©1861189Glass, A Journal of Poetry ©1861189Good Life Review1861189Grayson Books1861189Guernica1861189Halcyone1861189Honey Literary1861189Hong Kong Review1861189Ibbetson Street Press1861189Ilanot Review1861189Inverted Syntax1861189Jersey Devil1189June Road Press1861189Lascaux Review1861189Leon Literary Review1861189Los Angeles Jewish Journal1861189Matter (?)1861189Mercer Univ. Press1861189Mississippi Review1861189Modern Haiku1861189New Poetry in Translation (?)1861189Night Heron Barks1189Okay Donkey1189Orange Blossom Review1861189Pangyrus1861189Persea Books1861189Pitt Poetry Series1861189Quarry, The1861189Radar Poetry1861189Red Wheelbarrow1861189River Mouth Review ©1861189Roadrunner Review1861189Sarabande Books1189Sheila-Na-Gig1861189Sixteen Rivers1861189Split Lip1861189Sugar House Review1221189Sundress Publications1861189Terrain1861189Third Coast1861189Trio House Press1861189TriQuarterly1189Upstreet ©1861189Verse Daily1861189Vox Populi1861189West Branch1861189Wordfarm1861258Academy of American Poets2460.5258Awl ©1300.5258Bauhan Publshing2460.5258Believer2460.5258BOA Editions2460.5258Chinquapin Literary Magazine2460.5258Chiron Review2460.5258Cimarron Review2460.5258Cleveland State Univ. Poetry Ctr.2460.5258Cossack Review (?)2460.5258Cutbank2460.5258Enizagam (?)2460.5258Epoch2460.5258Exit 72460.5258Great Weather for Media2460.5258Gulf Stream2460.5258Gun Powder Press2460.5258Hampden-Sydney Poetry Review2460.5258Heart ©2460.5258Hotel Amerika2460.5258Hunger Mountain2460.5258Indiana Review1810.5258Jai-Alai (?)2460.5258Lake, The2460.5258Little Patuxent Review2460.5258Louisiana Literature2460.5258McNeese Review2460.5258Meadow, The2460.5258New Letters1860.5258New South1860.5258North American Review2460.5258Offing2460.5258OmniVerse2460.5258One Throne (H)2460.5258Pembroke Magazine1860.5258Pluck (?)2460.5258Poet Lore2460.5258Poetry South2460.5258Porkbelly Press2460.5258Portland Review1860.5258QWERTY2460.5258Radius (?)2460.5258Raleigh Review2460.5258Rove ©2460.5258Rumpus2460.5258Saranac Review2460.5258Scablands Books (?)2460.5258Springhouse (?)2460.5258Tupelo Quarterly2460.5258Upstairs at Duroc (?)2460.5258Valley Voices (?)1860.5258Yarn ©2460.5258Zone 32460.5

2025 Literary Magazine Ranking–Nonfiction

Below is the 2025 Literary Magazine Ranking for Nonfiction. To understand the Rationale, Methodology, and Calculation for the Rankings, please go here.

Note that every effort has been made to verify the website links, but magazines do sometimes change their web addresses and occasionally you will encounter a broken or incorrect link. If that happens, please let me know by emailing info@cliffordgarstang.com.

If you find these rankings useful, please consider supporting this website by making a or by purchasing one or more of my books.

2025 Literary Magazine Ranking for Nonfiction

Note the following:

© means that the magazine/press is closed

(H) means that the magazine/press is on hiatus

(?) means that it’s unclear what’s going on with the magazine/press

2025 RankMagazine2024 Rank2025 Score1Sun1502Granta339.53Threepenny Review5374Georgia Review2315River Teeth9276Fourth Genre16266Orion4268Gettysburg Review ©5249Agni823.510New England Review1319.511Kenyon Review91912Creative Nonfiction ©717.512Ploughshares917.514Chicago Quarterly Review191615n+11315.515Narrative1315.515Salmagundi915.518Longreads211518Sewanee Review191518Virginia Quarterly Review171521Brevity2612.521Tin House ©1712.523Paris Review211223Pinch211225Point, The241125Reed Magazine331127Hedgehog Review491028American Scholar25929Oxford American28830Ecotone307.531Ninth Letter44731Yale Review27733Conjunctions316.533Iowa Review366.533Terrain316.536Colorado Review36636Emergence Magazine33638Antioch Review365.538Caught by the River365.538Consequence365.538Tikkun ©365.538Transition365.538True Story (?)365.538World Literature Today445.545Harvard Advocate44545Awanadjo Almanack (WERU)44545Sarabande Books44548About Place Journal494.549Alaska Quarterly Review58449Bennington Review49449Common Reader53449Hudson Review49449Missouri Review54449New Letters28449Southern Review58456Baffler543.556McSweeney’s333.556Southampton Review543.559Electric Literature58359Mississippi Review58359War, Literature and The Arts58362Bat City642.562Believer842.562Fourth River642.562Gigantic642.562Image842.562Pleiades752.562Prairie Schooner642.569Another Chicago Magazine64269Arrowsmith75269Bellevue Literary Review75269Big Roundtable (?)75269Chautauqua Anthology (fka Journal)96269Common, The64269Guernica75269Hopkins Review75269Massachusetts Review64269Offing96269Raritan58269Swamp Pink (fka Crazyhorse)64269TriQuarterly64269ZYZZYVA84283Blackbird961.583Bomb841.583Boston Review751.583Brick961.583Epiphany1351.583Five Points1351.583Gulf Coast751.583Michigan Quarterly Review841.583Mount Hope1351.583Water-Stone Review841.583Willow Springs841.583Witness841.595A Public Space96195Arkansas International195Blast96195Book Post96195Briar Cliff Review ©96195Brink96195Broad Street ©75195Catapult ©96195Columbia Journal96195Comment195Copper Nickel96195Current195Flyway195Free State Review96195Hong Kong Review96195Kelsey Review96195Live Encounters195Maine Review195Manoa96195New Ohio Review84195New Orleans Review54195New Rivers Press ©96195North American Review195Nowhere Magazine (?)96195O-Dark-Thirty (?)96195Oregon Humanities84195Pen America96195Pidgeonholes96195Prism96195Rumpus96195Shenandoah96195Southern Indiana Review96195Spiritus195University of Massachusetts Press195West Branch961130American Chordata1350.5130Baltimore Review960.5130Barrelhouse1350.5130Black Warrior Review960.5130Boulevard840.5130Brain, Child ©960.5130Catamaran1350.5130Chattahoochee Review ©960.5130Cincinnati Review960.5130Crab Orchard Review1350.5130Denver Quarterly1350.5130Epoch1350.5130Harvard Review960.5130Heyday Books1350.5130High Desert Journal ©960.5130Kitchen Work1350.5130Milkweed Editions – Press1350.5130Normal School840.5130Pacific Standard ©1350.5130Passages North1350.5130Potomac Review960.5130Provincetown Arts1350.5130Red Hen Press960.5130Redivider1350.5130Room1350.5130Ruminate ©1350.5130Santa Monica Review1350.5130Slice ©1350.5130Speak960.5130StoryQuarterly960.5130Sweet1350.5130Tahoma Literary Review1350.5130Third Coast1350.5130Timberline Review1350.5130Turtle Point Press960.5130Under the Sun (?)1350.5130War Horse960.5130Zone 31350.5

2025 Literary Magazine Ranking–Fiction

Below is the 2025 Literary Magazine Ranking for Fiction. To understand the Rationale, Methodology, and Calculation for the Rankings, please go here.

Note that every effort has been made to verify the website links, but magazines do sometimes change their web addresses and occasionally you will encounter a broken or incorrect link. If that happens, please let me know by emailing info@cliffordgarstang.com.

If you find these rankings useful, please consider supporting this website by making a or by purchasing one or more of my books.

2025 Literary Magazine Ranking for Fiction

Note the following:

© means that the magazine/press is closed

(H) means that the magazine/press is on hiatus

(?) means that it’s unclear what’s going on with the magazine/press

2025 RankMagazine2024 Rank2025 Score1Ploughshares257.52Paris Review1502Zoetrope: All Story4504Conjunctions2405One Story539.56Missouri Review9367Narrative6348Southern Review8338Threepenny Review73310New England Review1231.511Noon103112Kenyon Review1130.513Yale Review152814Sun1426.515Virginia Quarterly Review1325.516Idaho Review1522.517Wigleaf262218Cincinnati Review2121.518McSweeney’s1821.520Gettysburg Review ©1720.521American Short Fiction192021Santa Monica Review282023Iowa Review2319.524ZYZZYVA241725Bomb2816.525Colorado Review3316.525Granta2516.525Sewanee Review2216.529Boulevard391630Tin House ©2015.531Georgia Review3014.532Glimmer Train ©3013.533Story371334Agni3412.534Ecotone Magazine2712.536Bellevue Literary Review321237A Public Space3611.537Copper Nickel3511.539Image391140New Orleans Review3710.541Hudson Review349.541Oxford American399.543Alaska Quarterly Review79944Chicago Quarterly44844Pleiades46846Bennington Review447.546New Letters547.548Epoch42748Fiction108748Jewish Fiction46748n+146748Southampton Review (?)46748Witness46754American Scholar956.554Brick956.556Common, The42657Mississippi Review545.557Baffler, The1635.557Harvard Review565.557Post Road565.561Electric Literature66561Fractured Lit58561Harvard Advocate58561Hysterical Rag ©58561Leapfrog Press58561Pinch46561Pushcart Press58568Ninth Letter644.568Swamp Pink (fka Crazyhorse)464.570Michigan Quarterly Review663.570Raritan663.570Sarabande Books703.573Catapult ©75373Epiphany70373Five Points64373New Madrid (H)75373New Ohio Review70373Prairie Schooner70373Shenandoah75373Zone 3108381Arts & Letters792.581Black Lawrence Press952.581Catamaran792.581Egress ©582.581Juked ©752.581Paper Darts ©582.581Prime Number Magazine792.581Salmagundi792.581Southern Indiana Review792.581Stillhouse Press792.581West Branch792.592Another Chicago Magazine89292Hopkins Review79292Notre Dame Review79292One Teen Story89292River Styx89292Salamander108292Terrain89292Fairty Tale Review2100Antioch Review891.5100Blackbird951.5100Chattahoochee Review ©951.5100Chautauqua Anthology (fka Journal)951.5100Chicago Review951.5100Gulf Coast1081.5100Pembroke Magazine951.5100Transition1631.5108About Place Journal1081108As You Were1081108Autumn House Press1081108Berkeley Fiction Review1081108BkMk Press1081108Black Warrior Review1081108Broadkill Review1081108Cimarron Review1081108Cleaver951108Consequence Magazine1081108Crab Orchard Review1081108Drift, The1081108Exile1081108FC21081108Grand Journal1081108Green Mountains Review ©1081108Greensboro Review1081108Grist951108Healing Muse1081108Iron Horse Literary Review1081108J Journal1081108Joyland951108Lake Effect1081108Laurel Review1081108Massachusetts Review1081108Meridian1081108Nimrod1081108Orion1081108Outlook Springs1081108Oxford Magazine1081108Oyster River Pages1081108Per Contra (?)1081108Phoebe1108Prism1081108Puerto del Sol1081108Quarterly West1081108Reed Magazine1081108Ruminate ©701108Rumpus1081108Scoundrel Time ©1081108Shade Mountain Press1081108Smoke Long Quarterly1081108Southwest Review891108StoryQuarterly951108Upstreet ©1081108Willow Springs1081108Worcester Review1081108Woven Tale Press1081108Alta Journal1108Center for Appalachian Studies1158African American Review1630.5158Barrelhouse1630.5158Bat City1080.5158Blue Fountain (?)1630.5158Broadkill River Press1630.5158Brooklyn Rail950.5158Chapter House (fka Mud City)1630.5158Cola (fkaYemassee)1630.5158Confrontation1630.5158December1080.5158Dr. T.J. Eckleburg Review1630.5158East (?)1630.5158Elm Leaves/ELJ1630.5158failbetter.com1630.5158Fiction International1630.5158Fifth Wednesday ©1630.5158Fjords1630.5158Four Way Books1630.5158Gascony Writers Anthology (?)1630.5158Gigantic (?)1630.5158Glossolalia (?)1630.5158Graywolf Press1630.5158Hunger Mountain1630.5158Indiana Review1630.5158Kweli1630.5158Leaf Litter (?)1080.5158Literal Latte (H)1630.5158Literary Review (?)1630.5158Litmag1630.5158Mid American Review1630.5158Midwestern Gothic ©1630.5158Minnesota Review1630.5158Moon City1630.5158Mythium ©1630.5158New Delta Review1630.5158Obsidian1630.5158Potomac Review1630.5158Provincetown Arts1630.5158Pulp Literature1630.5158Quiddity1080.5158Redivider1080.5158Reservoir Journal (?)1080.5158Rupture (fka The Collagist) ©1080.5158Salt Hill1630.5158Sixfold1630.5158Spectacle1630.5158Third Coast1080.5158Tweed’s (?)1630.5158Vassar Review1630.5158Water-Stone Review1630.5158Western Humanities Review1630.5

2025 Literary Magazine Rankings–Overview

It is time again for the annual Literary Magazine Rankings for Fiction, Nonfiction, and Poetry. As explained in more detail below, these rankings are based solely on the number of Pushcart Prizes and Pushcart Special Mentions the magazines have received over the past ten years. They are intended as a guide for determining where writers might submit their work for publication.

If you find these rankings useful, please consider supporting this website by making a or by purchasing one or more of my books.

2025 Literary Magazine Ranking for Fiction

2025 Literary Magazine Ranking for Nonfiction

2025 Literary Magazine Ranking for Poetry

Rationale. When I first started submitting my short stories to literary magazines, I didn’t know what I was doing. I knew that some magazines were more prestigious than others, but I didn’t have a way of evaluating prestige. I subscribed to several (and still do) but choosing where to submit my work was often hit-or-miss until I started tiering. I didn’t invent the idea of tiering submissions, but when I learned of it, I thought it made great sense.

Tiering is an aid to simultaneous submissions that groups the best magazines in the top tier, somewhat less prestigious magazines in the next tier, and so on. It is advisable to submit work to the top tier first, or at any rate within the same tier, so that an acceptance by one, which requires withdrawal from the others, won’t be painful. (If you get an acceptance from a lower-tier magazine while you’re still waiting to hear from a higher-tier magazine, that could lead to a difficult withdrawal. Withdrawal is ethically required, but what if the higher-tier magazine was about to accept the piece?) So, I decided to rank literary magazines—first in fiction, because that’s what I was writing, but later in poetry and nonfiction because many people requested that—to help me decide where to submit. In theory, I would aim toward the top of the list and work my way down until someone finally accepted my story.

Methodology. To create the rankings, I considered looking at the various annual anthologies (Best American Short Stories, O. Henry, and Pushcart) to see what the editors of those volumes considered the best magazines to be. Ultimately, for several reasons, I settled on using only the annual Pushcart Prize anthology. For one thing, it excluded the “slicks”—magazines like The New Yorker, Atlantic Monthly, and Harpers—whose prestige is well-known. Those markets are really in a category by themselves, and writers should definitely submit to them if they deem their work suitable for publication in these elite magazines. For another, consideration for inclusion in the Pushcart Prize anthology seemed somewhat more democratic, or at least transparent, than the other options. Although there are Editors-at-Large who nominate for the anthology, every magazine has the opportunity to do so as well, so the Pushcart editors see thousands of entries and can pick from work that has appeared in hundreds of different journals, both in print and online. Finally, when I began ranking poetry and nonfiction magazines, too, it was fortuitous that the Pushcart Prize anthology included those genres. Otherwise, I’d have had to look at separate volumes for each genre and I still preferred the relative fairness of the Pushcart approach. It should be noted that the Pushcart editors have been slow to recognize the quality of online literature, but that has been changing, and quite a few of the honored pieces were first published only in digital form.

Calculations. I decided from the beginning to use a ten-year rolling formula to determine the rankings. It seemed to me that reputations aren’t won or lost in one year, and that the best magazines, the markets where I’d really like to be published, are the ones that have been around awhile and have established themselves. So, I created a formula that used a fixed-point value for each Pushcart Prize won in each of the ten years and a smaller number of points for each special mention (those are the stories listed at the back of the book as also being worthy of note). The formula adds up all the points and ranks the magazines based on the total. (The total number of points is shown in the far-right column of the ranking.) Several years ago, I adjusted the formula so that prizes and special mentions earned in the last five years are weighted more heavily than those from the first five years of the period. The intention of this adjustment was to recognize the fact that in the digital age, magazines may emerge and be deserving of accolades more quickly than was the case in the past. So, a Pushcart Prize won today gets more points than one earned six years ago. Note, too, that the rankings are as objective as I can make them. The editors of the nominating journals and of the Pushcart Press are exercising their judgment, of course, but I’m just going by the numbers. My rankings don’t take into account how much the magazines pay, or whether they charge for submissions, or how long it takes them to respond. Different writers feel differently about those factors, and so I don’t want to impose my judgment in place of theirs. For a different ranking approach, check out Erika Krause’s Rankings.

Frequently Asked Questions

XYZ Magazine is Closed, so why is it included in the rankings? When I am certain that a magazine has closed, I will include the symbol © next to its name. I think it’s useful for historical purposes to note that, for example, Tin House, was a fine magazine until it shut its doors. Also, some closed magazines still have their archives online or other useful information, so I’ve included links to their websites, even though they’re no longer open for submissions.

What do the other symbols mean? Quite a few magazines decide to take a break from publishing (the pandemic seems to have had that effect on several) but not to shut down entirely. They may say that they are on pause or on hiatus. When I know about it, I’ll mark the magazine with (H). Other magazines have broken website links or websites that haven’t been updated in some time, suggesting that they may have closed. But if don’t know that for sure, I don’t want to declare their death prematurely, so I’ll mark the entry with (?).

It’s a ranking of literary magazines, so why are there some small presses included? Good question. Technically, the Pushcart Prize recognizes the “best of the small presses,” and so stories, essays, or poems published in collections from independent presses frequently win prizes or special mentions, landing them in the mix for the rankings. I think it’s useful to include them in order to draw them to the attention of writers who may be looking for places to submit whole collections.

This endeavor seems like a lot of work. What do you get out of it? As I noted above, I created the first rankings many years ago when I needed guidance on where to submit work. When I started sharing the rankings, the feedback I heard from many people was that the rankings were very useful. I’m happy to provide this service and if people want to make a donation (or buy one or more of my books) to support it, that’s much appreciated.

2024 Reading — October

It was a busy month and I got shockingly little reading done, but these are three significant books.

North Woods by Daniel Mason was my book club’s selection for the month. The book is a novel focusing on a single plot of land in Western Massachusetts, following the inhabitants of a cottage from pre-Revolutionary War days to the near present. Residents die off but in most cases, their ghosts linger, although that isn’t apparent in the novel immediately. The plot is unconventional (there really isn’t one), but the writing is beautiful and the question of what’s going to happen next still drives the reader forward.

The Heart in Winter by Kevin Barry is a novel I picked up because I’ve been reading some contemporary Irish fiction lately. Although Barry is Irish, this novel is set in Montana, featuring early Irish immigrants in Butte. While the plot was compelling (with some improbable turns), from the very beginning the language is startling in its freshness. I was going to give my copy away, but I want to spend more time studying his word choices.

The City and Its Uncertain Walls by Haruki Murakami is a novel I was asked to review for the Washington Independent Review of Books. The book comes out in November, but I’ll just say here that Murakami’s brand of magical realism can be a lot of fun, although sometimes difficult to follow. My full review should appear mid-month.

Literary Days . . . and Nights

In my last newsletter, I described the literary adventures I had on my recent trip to Ireland. After that appeared, a couple of people forwarded to me an article by New York Times Book Critic Dwight Garner (the piece from the NYT also ran in the Irish Times) about his own visit to Dublin this summer. We visited many of the same places, took many of the same photos, and it was fun to revisit the adventure. I joked that it seemed to me that Garner had cribbed from my newsletter, or at least had borrowed the idea.

Since I’ve been home, I’ve been busy with domestic literary activities, and that’s the subject of today’s letter.

A week after returning from Ireland, I went up to the Washington, D.C. area for an engagement at The Writers Center in Bethesda, MD. When I lived in Washington, I took writing classes at TWC, my first real exposure to creative writing workshops. I’ve been happy over the years to do several readings in that space (including after they had awarded me an Emerging Writer Fellowship). It was great to have an opportunity to present The Last Bird of Paradise there, along with my friend David Ebenbach, who also has a new book out this year.

Two days later I was at Bluebird & Co., a cute little bookstore in Crozet, VA (Crozet being a lovely town just across the Blue Ridge Mountains from here, basically a bedroom community for Charlottesville). On this occasion, I was joined by Leona Sevick, who has a new poetry collection out from Trio House Press.

That weekend was the online Professional Development Weekend for the Queens University MFA program. I graduated 21 years ago, but I’ve continued to be involved, both for my own development and to help more recent graduates. I was on two panels, one on Historical Fiction with my friend Valerie Nieman, and one on the Path to Publication, moderated by my friend Bruce Overby. Before the pandemic, these weekends were held in person on the campus in Charlotte, but this event was on Zoom. I’m hopeful we can gather on campus again one day.

The next week, in addition to appearing on a couple of podcasts, I gave an “Author Talk” for the University of Virginia Osher Lifelong Learning Institute (OLLI) in Charlottesville, VA. I discovered in talking about my new book over the last several months that people know very little about Singapore, so the talk includes a slide presentation about the history of the country in addition to my book. (I’m giving the same talk next month in Staunton, VA.)

The week after that I had the pleasure of meeting with a book club at a local library. The members had all read The Last Bird of Paradise and we had an engaging discussion about the book. The club members—about ten people—were also interested in hearing about my earlier work. I love meeting with book clubs, especially when all or most of the people have read the book and can ask salient questions.

The following week was very busy. On Tuesday night I attended a book launch event for the debut young adult novel by a friend. The presentation (which included a puppet show!) was very well attended. On Wednesday I was back up in the Washington D.C. area for the Fall for the Book Literary Festival at George Mason University where I was moderating a panel. The three books being presented by their authors on the panel were terrific reads and I think the discussion in front of 40 or so people went very well. Moderating a panel like that takes a lot of work to read the books and develop questions for the whole panel and some tailored to each author, but I consider it part of being a good literary citizen.

Then on Saturday was the inaugural Queen City Word Fest, an event organized by a local bookstore, The Book Dragon Bookshop. In the morning were panels at the Staunton Public Library and in the afternoon was an author “Meet & Greet” where about 30 local authors had an opportunity to chat with readers and sell their books. The store plans to expand it in the future, but this year’s festival went well, I thought.

This past Saturday was the inaugural Crozet Book Fest sponsored by Bluebird & Co. the store I mentioned above. I wasn’t on a panel, but I had friends who were, so I headed over to be supportive. Being supportive in this case meant buying books . . .

And finally, I’ve spent much of the past few weeks reading and attempting to understand the new novel by Haruki Murakami which will be released in mid-November. I occasionally accept review assignments from the Washington Independent Review of Books (and other publications) and I was eager to tackle this one. The novel, The City and its Uncertain Walls, is about a man who seems to have separated from his shadow, which now exists in a different reality.

I have a couple of events lined up for November, but I’m hopeful that I can now, at long last, get back to working on my new book!

I’ve Got Questions for Lori D’Angelo

Editor’s Note: This exchange is part of a series of brief interviews with emerging writers of recent or forthcoming books. If you enjoyed it, please visit other interviews in the I’ve Got Questions feature.

The Monsters are Here by Lori D’AngeloWhat’s the title of your book? Fiction? Nonfiction? Poetry? Who is the publisher and what’s the publication date?

My book is fiction. It’s a short story collection called The Monsters Are Here. The publisher is ELJ Editions, and the publication date is 10/31/24.

In a couple of sentences, what’s the book about?

This book is about people struggling with problems like depression, addiction, heartbreak, love, loss, becoming a vampire and not being able to see their reflection in a mirror. The protagonists in these stories, mainly women, are trying to navigate the realities of their everyday lives while also dealing with logistical challenges like suddenly becoming a werewolf or being unrelentingly haunted by the ghost of a dead husband.

What’s the book’s genre (for fiction and nonfiction) or primary style (for poetry)?

It’s a speculative fiction collection, and it includes shorter flash fiction pieces and longer stories. It kind of walks the line between literary and genre fiction. It draws on genres like horror and science fiction as well as satire, but I would say it still falls under the umbrella of literary fiction.

What’s the nicest thing anyone has said about the book so far?

One nice thing people have said about the book is that it’s original. Stephanie Vanderslice, author of The Geek’s Guide to the Writing Life and The Lost Son said,

“You’d better strap in because Lori D’Angelo is taking you places. A little bit of Kelly Link, a little Kathy Fish, D’Angelo is most of all herself, bringing us the most imaginative collection of fiction I have had the pleasure of reading in a long time. The Monsters Are Here heralds a new voice in contemporary fiction—I can’t wait to see what Lori D’Angelo does next.”

What book or books is yours comparable to or a cross between? [Is your book like Moby Dick or maybe it’s more like Frankenstein meets Peter Pan?]

The book draws inspiration from multiple traditions including science fiction, literary fiction, and horror. But it also owes a lot to the strong tradition of American satire including the work of Ray Bradbury. I feel like it’s comparable to Aimee Bender’s The Girl in The Flammable Skirt but with a more The Lottery and Other Stories undertone. I owe a lot to Gothic writers like Nathaniel Hawthorne and Bram Stoker, but this book tackles the subjects of witches and vampires from a more feminist (and humorous) perspective.

Why this book? Why now?

I feel like speculative fiction allows writers to deal with important social issues in an innovative and interesting way. Some of the complex issues that this book attempts to wrestle with are racism, sexism, and addiction. I feel like now, in American politics, we’re seeing a surge in anti-immigrant sentiment, and one of the questions the book attempts to reckon with is how do we treat people who are different from us, and what does that say about who we are?

I also just love science fiction and horror films, books, and TV shows, and I wanted to borrow from those genres. In terms of subject matter, I enjoy reading stories of vampires, witches, and werewolves, and I wanted to use those creatures to talk about subjects that matter to me. One Gothic fiction technique that I utilize in some of these stories is the unreliable narrator. Given the subject matter and the characters in these stories, It shouldn’t come as a surprise that I love the movie Beetlejuice, and my favorite holiday is Halloween.

Other than writing this book, what’s the best job you’ve ever had?

One really fun job that I had was as a summer intern for The Erie Times-News in Erie, Pennsylvania. I got to write such interesting articles on diverse topics such as shoreline erosion, summer beach reads, national ice cream month, and living on houseboats near Presque Isle State Park.

What do you want readers to take away from the book?

I want readers to believe that though the world can be difficult and sometimes terrible, life is filled with everyday magic. I also want readers to be able to laugh at life’s absurdities and difficulties rather than being defeated by them. I hope my plucky determined protagonists will inspire people to keep going even in the face of potentially crushing despair.

What food and/or music do you associate with the book?

“What Remains” begins in a coffee shop, and I personally love coffee shops, so there’s that connection. 

Hot dogs are also mentioned in several stories including “Hot Dog from Heaven” and “Street Show Magic.” In “Hot Dog from Heaven,” a family trying to enjoy cookout food is forced to use condiments and picnic sides to defeat a giant flying hot dog.

Air Supply’s “All Out of Love” and “Space Cowboy” by the Steve Miller Band are two of the songs that are referenced in the book. These songs, I think, capture both the longing, the heartbreak, and the humor that I’m attempting to portray in these stories.

I was born in the late 1970s, and I love music from that era. Songs from the 1980s especially, take me back to memories of my childhood.

What book(s) are you reading currently?

I’m currently reading Charlottesville Fantastic, a speculative fiction anthology featuring work by local authors. I’m also reading Elizabeth Strout’s Lucy by the Sea, Ellen Datlow’s body horror anthology Body Shocks, and Leila Slimani’s The Perfect Nanny. I’m usually reading and writing a bunch of things at once rather than focusing on one project at a time.

Lori D’Angelo

Learn more about Lori on her website.

Follow her on Twitter and Instagram.

Buy the book from the publisher, Amazon.com, and Stone Soup Books.

2024 Reading — August and September

I was traveling at the end of August, so didn’t get my reading list posted for the month. Here’s a double entry:

The High Mountains of Portugal by Yann Martel is weird. It’s told in three parts that are linked in various ways. In the first part, in the early 20th century, a man loses his lover and son to diphtheria and begins to struggle with his religion as a result. He goes into the High Mountains (which aren’t very high, apparently) in search of a religious artifact that proves men evolved from apes. In the second part, a pathologist, who hallucinates his dead wife’s religious dialogue, performs an autopsy on a man whose body is filled with things it shouldn’t be, and it develops that he was the father of a boy accidentally killed by the central character in the first part. In the third part, a Canadian whose parents emigrated from the High Mountains, loses his wife to illness and now, for reasons neither he nor the reader understand, he adopts a chimpanzee and they move to Portugal. Very weird and probably open to numerous interpretations.

In the Lonely Backwater by Valerie Nieman is a novel set in coastal North Carolina. A coming-of-age story and a mystery, it features Maggie, a complicated high school girl who is a suspect when a cousin goes missing and then is found dead. The dead girl is popular and pretty. Maggie is neither of those things and hangs out with a couple of guys who are also on the social fringe. She works in her father’s store at a marina and helps maintain their houseboat, while also enjoying the freedom of sailing and exploring the coastal environment. Because her father is an alcoholic, she begins to look to the detective investigating her cousin’s death as a father-figure, but still struggles to tell him everything she knows.

The Commitments was Roddy Doyle’s first novel. It centers on Jimmy Rabbitte who gets together some friends and local musicians to form a band to play Soul music in a fictionalized version of Dublin. The band members settle on the name The Commitments and proceed to develop their sound (in some cases, learning how to play their instruments). They get pretty good and are starting to book gigs, with a certain amount of drama along the way, which is to be expected. I read the book on my way to Ireland and enjoyed telling people I met there that I had done so, and invariably the conversation shifted to the film based on the book, which, alas, I haven’t seen.

Not a Novel by Jenny Erpenbeck is a collection of essays that help the reader to understand where the writer’s fiction is coming from. Erpenbeck, who won the International Booker Prize this year for her novel Kairos, is a German writer born in what was then East Germany. I first started reading her a year ago as I was preparing for a trip to Berlin, which is the setting for her novel Go, Went, Gone. This collection of essays includes remarks she has given at the presentation ceremonies for several of the awards she has won.

The Good Deed by Helen Benedict is a novel set on the Greek island of Samos. The story involves an American woman who is suffering from a personal tragedy, one that is revealed to the reader slowly over the course of the book. She’s rented a room on this island to get away and maybe forget, but that’s easier said than done. The island also contains a refugee camp that houses refugees from the Middle East and Africa who have fled, most of them by boat, and are awaiting official status. As with the American’s story, the horrific tragedies of several of the refugee women come out in stages. The American is sympathetic, but what can she do to help these people? Meanwhile, what about her life back home?

A History of the World in Twelve Shipwrecks by David Gibbins was my book club’s selection for September. It has a lot of fascinating information about the underwater exploration of shipwrecks, some of them extremely old. The author, a marine archaeologist and novelist, has participated in bringing to light information about these wrecks, not just a catalog of the contents but also researching the origin of the ships, the causes of their sinking, and details about the people involved. While it’s amazing what he has assembled in this book, it’s difficult to absorb, in part because there’s no development, just a series of explorations.

Village Weavers by Myriam J. A. Chancy is a novel that covers a lot of territory thematically. It’s about two women on opposite sides of the U.S. who were childhood friends in Haiti but had a falling out long ago and so have not been in touch with each other. There are issues of class and color among the Haitians and Dominicans, but also corruption and authoritarian repression in Haiti and also colonial exploitation and its aftermath. The narrative comes in a braid of timelines and points of view, but it all works together.

Living Things by Munir Hachemi, translated from Spanish by Julia Sanches, is a short but powerful novel that is a story but also an exploration of story-telling. The narrator, Munir, ponders the literary art of writing from one’s own experience, which raises the question of how much of the story that follows is from the author’s own experience. Munir and three friends from Madrid drive to France in hopes of finding work harvesting grapes. The harvest is delayed because of earlier rain, but they get other work that embroils them in a mystery and other troubles. Thematically, in addition to literary theory, the book is exploring the exploitation of migrant labor and also class struggles in Spain.

September Events

Readings/Discussions in Bethesda (Washington DC Area) and Crozet VA.

I’m pleased to announce that I have two events coming up next week and I’d love to see you if you’re in the area.

The first is at The Writer’s Center in Bethesda, Maryland, just outside of Washington DC. In the 1990s, when I lived in Washington and was beginning to explore the craft of fiction writing, I participated in workshops there. I’ve been pleased to return several times over the years, including as an Emerging Writer Fellow ten years ago.

On this visit, I’ll be discussing my latest novel, The Last Bird of Paradise, and will be joined by my friend David Ebenbach, whose novel Possible Happiness, is just out. We’ll both have books for sale.

Tuesday, September 24, at 7 pm. The event is free. Registration is recommended.

I’m also excited to be appearing once again with poet Leona Sevick. Leona’s terrific new collection of poetry, Bamboo Wife, has just been published by Trio House Press. We’ll be reading from and discussing our recent books at Bluebird & Co. in Crozet, VA, on Thursday, Sept. 26, at 6:30 pm.

If you’re not familiar with Bluebird & Co., it’s a wonderful shop in the heart of Crozet. Please come out to support this great addition to the community.

And while I’m on the subject of community, let me mention book clubs. I’ve been a member for 14 years of a book club I started in 2010. We’ve read more than 150 books together, and I look forward every month to our get togethers and discussions.

I also love to meet with book clubs who are discussing one of my books, which I did recently. I love hearing what people loved about the book, which characters they liked or didn’t like, and what themes they found to be of particular interest. If your book club might be interested in discussing one of my titles, please let me know. I’d love to join you by Zoom or, if feasible, in person.

As always, information about my books can be found on my website.

A Busman’s Holiday

I just got back from a delightful trip to Ireland. Given the importance of literature to the Irish and the number of literature-related activities I undertook, and the fact that I’m working on a new book, I wonder if this qualified as a “busman’s holiday?”

Cliffs of Moher

I did a lot of touristy things that weren’t about books (listening to traditional music, visiting historic sites, a boat trip to the Aran Islands, etc.), but here are some literary highlights:

On my first day in Dublin, I took a walking tour of the central city. As it turned out, my guide was a playwright, so he made sure to point out some important sites, such as the birthplace of Jonathan Swift, the Marsh Library, which houses an important collection of incredibly old books, and various locations that James Joyce mentions in Ulysses as being stops for Leopold Bloom on his “odyssey” around Dublin.

Non-literary on its surface, I took an Irish Food Tour in order to be sure that I sampled typical items on an Irish menu. While Irish cuisine won’t be one of my favorites, the guide who took us to three restaurants (one for each course) was yet another playwright. This one also happened to be an actor who appeared in The Ferryman by Jez Butterworth in London’s West End, a terrific play that I saw on Broadway a few years ago.

I also joined a Literary Pub Crawl one evening. This was led by an actor and a singer who had plenty of stories and songs about Irish writers, punctuated by recitations from some of the great works by Joyce, Wilde, Yeats, and others. Beginning on Duke Street, continuing to Trinity College, on to a couple of pubs with literary connections, and then back to Davy Byrnes on Duke Street, another of Leopold Bloom’s stops. Duke Street is also home to the Ulysses Bookstore, a great shop for collectible editions of books by Irish writers. (I was tempted to buy something there but managed to resist.)

Ulysses Rare Books, Duke Street, Dublin

The next day I went to the Museum of Literature, which was right around the corner from where I was staying. A small museum, it contained displays about all the major Irish writers and some I was less familiar with. It also had a gift shop with lots of books and items with a literary theme. I think the museum would be a great place to linger and attempt to really absorb its contents, but there’s a lot to take in all at once. It also had a nice looking café, which must be a great place to hang out.

I went to three libraries in Dublin. The first was the Trinity College library, which houses the Book of Kells, a 1200-year-old illuminated book containing the four gospels in Latin created by monks who fled to Ireland to escape the Viking invaders of Britain. The library also has a massive collection of ancient books in a gorgeous reading room, although most of the books have been removed for cleaning and restoration. In fact, the entire building will soon close for renovation. The second library was Marsh’s Library attached to St. Patrick’s Cathedral. It also has an amazing collection of books, many from the late 15th Century. Some of the books are in little caged rooms. The cages were protection against theft, but I also heard a story that some of Ireland’s famous writers had themselves locked into those rooms in order to focus on their work! Finally, I went to the National Library. While its rooms aren’t generally open to the public, they do have an exhibition space in the basement which currently has a great display about the poet William Butler Yeats, complete with audio of his poems being read aloud.

Trinity College Library

In addition to Dublin, I also spent a couple of days in Galway on Ireland’s West Coast. It has a very different vibe, and I enjoyed walking its labyrinth of streets. On one such walk, I discovered Charlie Byrne’s Bookshop, a great bookstore in which I could have spent hours. The last thing I needed was more books in my luggage, but they had such a fantastic selection that I couldn’t help myself, especially when I discovered the table of hardcover remainders. (One of the books I bought was a collection of stories by Kevin Barry, a contemporary Irish writer I’ve been wanting to read.) I paid for my books and then saw a poster about an event happening that night in the store featuring the American historian Kevin Boyle, who is not only the chair of the History Department at my alma mater, Northwestern University, but also a winner of the National Book Award for his book Arc of Justice. Naturally, I had to come back for that, and I’m very glad I did (even though it cut short my enjoyment of a traditional Irish music session in a local pub). Boyle spoke mostly about the rise of MAGA in the US, which the Irish were quite interested in, but there were also a few of us Americans in the audience. I had worn my Northwestern hat to the store, so we talked about NU for a bit, and of course I felt compelled to buy his most recent book, The Shattering: America in the 1960s.

Finally, on the train back to Dublin I chatted with a nice Irish gentleman who recommended a play that was still running at the Gate Theatre, Dancing at Lughnasa by the late Brian Friel. I looked up the theater on my phone, saw that a good seat was available for €50, and booked it for that very night. It’s not a new play, but it’s set in rural Ireland in the ‘30s and, a bit like The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck, manages to illustrate the depths of hardship during a bleak period. The production was excellent. I confess that I didn’t recognize the name of the playwright, but I’ve since learned that he was very well known in Ireland.

It’s no surprise that so much of my trip had something to do with books and literature. Before I left home, I had already read three short novels by Claire Keegan. On the plane I read Roddy Doyle’s first novel, The Commitments, and while I was in the country I re-read Dubliners by James Joyce. Now I’m keen to read Kevin Barry and some other contemporary writers who have recently received attention, and maybe even tackle a re-read of Ulysses.