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American Short Fiction
American Short Fiction Volume 21 Issue 67, Summer 2018
New Writing by
Fernando A. Flores
Michaela Hansen
Mark Mayer
Joyce Carol Oates
Holiday Reinhorn
Kevin Wilson
New Writing by
Fernando A. Flores
Michaela Hansen
Mark Mayer
Joyce Carol Oates
Holiday Reinhorn
Kevin Wilson
136 pages, Paperback
Published January 1, 2018
2 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
September 7, 2024
Picked out this collection from an outdoor little library and expected nothing special, but I've got to say that each story is charming in its own way.
The Clown - Mark Mayer (CW: murder, SA) 3/5
Made me feel uneasy, similar vibe to American Psycho when you don't really trust the narrator.
Our Lady of Perpetual Sadness - Holiday Reinhorn (CW: suicide and self-harm mentioned)
Made me experience a messy family dinamics. The prose itself felt chaotic and tense like I imagine a traumatized group of people can feel like. I enjoyed getting to meet the narrator's family and trying to figure out what everyone's deal was, just as the narrator gets to re-meet them after a while.
The Lost Baby - Kevin Wilson (CW: kidnapping/missing child) 4/5
An okay story, I liked the magical realism feeling of the last part. I wasn't sure if they actually found the baby or they were hallucinating from the devastating pain.
The Devil in the Barn - Michaela Hansen (CW: religious cult practices, false imprisonment) 3/5
Interesting story, like a small slice of life in a cult-ish religious group. I got the feeling that the older sister had never really believed the cult and had just waited for the right time to escape this whole time, while the more gullible younger sister believed her act and adopted the cult mentality. I enjoyed seeing that the cult mentality had not broken down their relationship and the younger sister was able to trust her older sister. It intrigued me to imagine that they joined the cult to escape something or someone.
The First Ever Punk Band in the World (Out of Raymondville) - Fernando A. Flores 3/5
Silly short prose. I enjoyed the irony that permeated it, like making fun of hipsters. Didn't have much plot, but it painted a picture and I enjoyed it.
Night, Neon - Joyce Carol Oates (CW: graphic sexual assault, abortion mentioned, stalking, infidelity, alcoholism, relapse) 3/5
This felt like it was written today by a woman with the soul of a 40s Hollywood actress. It's the longest story in the collection. It made me uncomfortable to understand the internal thinking of a woman so different than myself. I researched the author and I now understand that this is written by an 80 year old woman author, who probably experienced lots of sexism and statistically is very likely to have experienced sexual assaults herself. So I understand that the character's mentality (I'm a woman therefore an object, men have the power to own me but I am beautiful and they're not, I'm going to have a husband because society wants me to) has to be born from trauma, and that helped me empathize with the writing. I enjoyed the theme of bars as a place for danger and arousal, the yearning for a transgression, and the being incapable of stopping going in, the magnetic pull of a place. I didn't enjoy seeing the character give in to society's expectations over and over, but it was an understandable worldview given the character's life experiences. It was more of a "it's not fair that these events happen to most women and some have to start thinking like this in order to not go insane" and not as much of a "I can't stand this character and I'm angry at what they do and think".
The Clown - Mark Mayer (CW: murder, SA) 3/5
Made me feel uneasy, similar vibe to American Psycho when you don't really trust the narrator.
Our Lady of Perpetual Sadness - Holiday Reinhorn (CW: suicide and self-harm mentioned)
Made me experience a messy family dinamics. The prose itself felt chaotic and tense like I imagine a traumatized group of people can feel like. I enjoyed getting to meet the narrator's family and trying to figure out what everyone's deal was, just as the narrator gets to re-meet them after a while.
The Lost Baby - Kevin Wilson (CW: kidnapping/missing child) 4/5
An okay story, I liked the magical realism feeling of the last part. I wasn't sure if they actually found the baby or they were hallucinating from the devastating pain.
The Devil in the Barn - Michaela Hansen (CW: religious cult practices, false imprisonment) 3/5
Interesting story, like a small slice of life in a cult-ish religious group. I got the feeling that the older sister had never really believed the cult and had just waited for the right time to escape this whole time, while the more gullible younger sister believed her act and adopted the cult mentality. I enjoyed seeing that the cult mentality had not broken down their relationship and the younger sister was able to trust her older sister. It intrigued me to imagine that they joined the cult to escape something or someone.
The First Ever Punk Band in the World (Out of Raymondville) - Fernando A. Flores 3/5
Silly short prose. I enjoyed the irony that permeated it, like making fun of hipsters. Didn't have much plot, but it painted a picture and I enjoyed it.
Night, Neon - Joyce Carol Oates (CW: graphic sexual assault, abortion mentioned, stalking, infidelity, alcoholism, relapse) 3/5
This felt like it was written today by a woman with the soul of a 40s Hollywood actress. It's the longest story in the collection. It made me uncomfortable to understand the internal thinking of a woman so different than myself. I researched the author and I now understand that this is written by an 80 year old woman author, who probably experienced lots of sexism and statistically is very likely to have experienced sexual assaults herself. So I understand that the character's mentality (I'm a woman therefore an object, men have the power to own me but I am beautiful and they're not, I'm going to have a husband because society wants me to) has to be born from trauma, and that helped me empathize with the writing. I enjoyed the theme of bars as a place for danger and arousal, the yearning for a transgression, and the being incapable of stopping going in, the magnetic pull of a place. I didn't enjoy seeing the character give in to society's expectations over and over, but it was an understandable worldview given the character's life experiences. It was more of a "it's not fair that these events happen to most women and some have to start thinking like this in order to not go insane" and not as much of a "I can't stand this character and I'm angry at what they do and think".
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January 25, 2019Solid stories, solid work, solid issue. Super unsettling.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews