"I am John Collan \ today in the yere 1483 I will defeat the goat. \ In the name of honnour and glory to god highest & for reson that it knocked me in the mud again today \ & has TRODDEN churlishly over my back \ has despoiled \ ! \ an insult that…
'"No," the king says, dashing her hopes. "None at all. They claim it cannot be done. That matter cannot be transformed, that something cannot be brought forth from nothing." Phosyne chews her chapped lip to keep herself from arguing. Or, worse yet, agreeing.' Caitlin Starling, The Starving Saints, pg. 5 The Starving Saints begins with…
'The scent of fresh-baked bread and roasted meat drifts toward her, and hunger blooms, sudden and bright, but when she moves toward the table, Andrés catches her wrist. "Leave it," he says again, and María knows, by the tone of his voice, that his hunger has a different shape.' V.E. Schwab, Bury Our Bones in…
"I could not hear even one of them over the screaming wind. But that is a sight that will never leave me. The waves of earth crashing over the prairie. The sky exhaling all her birds." Karen Russell, The Antidote, pg. 23 Uz, Nebraska, is full of ghosts; ghosts of regrets, of accidents, of mistakes…
"I've seen a body taken by the sea, and the state of it will rid a man of any hubris. We are soberingly weak under its hammer. This woman, delivered by such a sea--one more powerful than most--is clinging on with a bewildering defiance." Charlotte McConaghy, Wild Dark Shore, pg. 5 The sea is many…
'"I host a radio show," Aiden says calmly. "Maya called in to ask for dating advice." My hand clenches around the phone. "Dating advice? She's twelve." "She didn't call for herself. She called for you." He makes a small huff of amusement. "My name is Aiden Valentine and you're live with Heartstrings, Baltimore's romance hotline.”'…
“The whole wreck heaves, and then the two men are lifting something from within. A body in white, soaked through with rainwater, her long chestnut hair streaming free from her limp head like a flag of a wrecked ship. Darkness rises all around me, and I sink to the earth.” Kat Dunn, Hungerstone, pg. 27…
'"You like her too much," Zamena says. Nobles are not like us. Never forget it." "She is different." "Why? Because she was born common? She isn't common now."' Costanza Casati, Babylonia, pg. 173 I'm always one to make sweeping predictions for what the new year will bring, literary-wise. Last year, I predicted that 2024 would…
I'm not much of a winter fan, much to the chagrin of my snow-loving partner. Too much sleet! Too much hidden ice! Even the pigeons under the bridge around where I live are shivering! The only way I can convince myself to go outside between November and February is helping out at my local…
“They stared down at the ground in stony imitation of the graveyard angels, without the blank unblinking eyes or patchy beards of lichen. When they heard Edie’s footsteps round the Drewalt obelisk, they looked up and she looked down and realized that what they were actually staring at was a hole in the ground.” M.L.…
