Issue 32 | Spring 2025
Our latest issue fans the flames of righteousness as we teeter toward a smoke-crazed horizon. We are tracing the minutia of generations through room-sized replicas and reenactments. We are drying laundry on a patchwork of metal sheets. We are back on campus, on the prowl, clawing at mattresses, chasing ghosts and radiance, plagued by absentia. Above all, we are secure in our knowledge that every fact reigns absolute, even its opposite.
Chalk Talk
By Marcus Silcock
“The detective scans the tree. Jacaranda sticks to her sandals. Yes, you guessed it. It’s that time. The time of flowers. The fiesta of flowers.”
I Don’t Like Anybody
By Kathryn Kulpa
“It’s August, Saturday, and we’re tired of summer. Watching Creature Double Feature on Channel 56. Me and Danny and Angie.”
Ash Wednesday
By Sarp Sozdinler
“I lift my mother’s urn high to show her the places she’d never seen inside the house when she was alive.”
Bind yourself to us with your impossible voice, your voice! sole soother of this vile despair.
—Arthur Rimbaud, “Phrases”
Latest Reviews
Featured Interview
Newest Essay
The Carnival of Accidental Heroes
By Sarp Sozdinler
“Basking in a carnival that never folds its tents. In this vision, dogs wear monocles and deliver telegrams scented with lavender and loss.”
AbuSharekh’s “Zeppole (aka Awama)” Selected for Best American Essays
Congratulations to Khalil AbuSharekh, whose essay “Zeppole (aka Awama)” was selected for Best American Essays 2025. “Zeppole (aka Awama)” originally appeared in YIV 30.
Open Wide the Door to Your Heart: The Lost Book of Zeroth by Barbara Harris Leonhard
Review by Peter Mladinic
“The Lost Book of Zeroth is comic, tragic, and ultimately human. The irony is that the book’s first three sections are “peopled by robots:” Sophia, Little Sophia, Little Spark, AI Robot Barbie, Cyborg Guy, AI Robot Amica, AI Robot Optimus, and Nurse Grace.”
Levine’s Mice 1961 Named Pulitzer Finalist
Congratulations to the incomparable Stacey Levine, whose novel Mice 1961 was a finalist for this year’s Pulitzer Prize! We were fortunate enough to publish an excerpt back in issue 27.
Review: The Confines by Anu Kandikuppa
Review by Kelsey Squire
“Through nuanced, precise, devastating language, Kandikuppa provides readers with stories of yearning and discovery that will remain with them long after finishing.”
The Longest Day of the Year
By Jeff Harvey
“After watching The Gong Show, my younger sister and I enjoyed popsicles made from cherry Kool-Aid that were frozen in a plastic tray Mom received for hosting a Stanley Products home party where she spent twelve dollars on snacks and didn’t make any sales.”