Staircases: THE DOCK: March 2015

HFR: This piece has a wonderful tendency to juxtapose humor, the mundane, and tragedy. In one moment, we're with the quirky Fox-Neck, or on the phone with a family member, and in the next we're looking at the great-grandmother's skin like crumpled paper. What do you think the importance is of shifting tones in this story?

EB: The most significant scenes from my own life—and most people’s lives, I think—are riotous with feeling. Not just one. Chaos invites a certain kind of manic alertness and the antenna goes up, jerking us in and out of emotional stations. Where there is predicted pain, I think we become receptive, eager, for a different feeling. The shift is a survival instinct. I think the narrator’s erratic experience of death in this story is just one version of everyone’s. What we all notice, say, project, ignore, what we tune in and out of, shift between, is the way we protect ourselves from the permanence of loss. From a craft standpoint, the tonal shift can wake readers up and keep us ready for the next jolt, but it only does that because we want that turn in life.

Dana DMarch 2, 2015Fiction, Online Content, The Dock

Contributor Spotlight: Blair Hurley

I’ve always had an abiding interest in religion, and in Buddhism specifically, thanks to early exposure from a family friend who told me about her conversion. We’d sit at the kitchen table playing gin rummy and she would try to tell me about her experience. She said it was like her head was splitting open and the universe was pouring in. I often wondered what it felt like and whether I’d ever have that sort of experience. I wondered whether I wanted it, or whether I was afraid of the loss of control such ecstasy might feel like.

Dana DFebruary 24, 2015Buddhism, Fiction, Issue 55, religion

We Try to Find the Spring in Spring Rock Park in Western Springs, Illinois: THE DOCK: February 2015

This month, the brilliant Joseph Scapellato shares an anecdote and a story.

HFR: What's the story behind the story?

JS: I grew up in Western Springs, Illinois, a due-west-of-Chicago Chicago suburb. As a kid I played in Spring Rock Park. In Spring Rock Park there is no spring.

Dana DFebruary 13, 2015Chicago, Fiction, The Dock, Western Springs

Review: Almost Famous Women by Megan Mayhew Bergman

Almost Famous Women, as the title promises, delivers entertaining, touching, and very absorbing short stories based on the lives of women who in their time found a marginal fame, were written about, talked about, and seen, but then were almost lost to history, almost forgotten, and almost became invisible.

Dana DJanuary 16, 2015Almost Famous Women, Biographical Fiction, Fiction, Issue 56

Contributor Spotlight (+Free Story!): John Picard

The highlight of my two years in UNC-Greensboro’s MFA program was the workshop led by visiting writer Richard Bausch. He inspired the class with his practical advice and his obvious love of the written word. I was encouraged by this man who made himself into a writer by sheer will, who, despite having a wife and children and a full time job, despite not being gifted with the innate brilliance of a Hemingway, say, or an Updike, was unflagging in his determination to turn himself into an accomplished writer. Bausch’s workshop boiled down to one particular piece of advice: “Just show up every morning. Something will happen.”

Sam MartoneJune 2, 2014Contributor Spotlight, Fiction, Prose, issue 54

Oyster Shells, Broken Bones, and Snow-Houses: A Conversation with Catherine Zobal Dent

In a week we'll be closing our "500 for 500" Flash-Prose contest. We're so excited to have Catherine Zobal Dent, author of Unfinished Stories of Girls, judging the contest.

I first met Catherine five years ago. I was an undergraduate writing major at Susuquehanna University, and Catherine and her partner, Silas, were applying for an Associate Professor position at the SU Writers Institute. To no one's surprise, they got the job. Over the following years, I was fortunate enough to know Catherine first as a professor, and then as an adviser, writing mentor, author, and friend.

Dana DMay 9, 2014500 words, Art, Contests, Fiction, Flash-Prose Contest, Issue 55, Susquehanna University

Behind the Masthead: Gary Garrison, Prose Editor

Have you heard about the new staff of HFR? Our intrepid intern Kacie Blackburn already spoke with Brian Bender, our new international poetry editor, and now she's interviewed one of the prose editors, Gary Garrison. Check out their interview below, and if you want to put this new staff to work, check out our flash prose contest--deadline: May 15th!

Sam MartoneApril 24, 2014Behind the Masthead, Editing, Fiction, Interview, Nonfiction, Prose

This Week in History, Earth Day Inspires a Brief Glimpse into Literature and the Environment

Is there any day on the calendar that is not marked with "National Something Day"?

April 21 is National Chocolate Covered Cashews Day (now I am wondering who forgot to inform me that I should have been celebrating the union of two of my favorite snacks yesterday) as well as National Kindergarten Day. April 23 is National Talk Like Shakespeare Day (the slightly less popular cousin to National Talk Like a Pirate Day, which occurs on September 19) as well as National Picnic Day, National Take a Chance Day and National Cherry Cheesecake Day.

Tricia HesterApril 23, 2014Earth Day, Environment, Fiction, History and Fiction, Poetry

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