Happy New Year! Here are a couple of literary things to help you start 2012 off right!
First, there’s a new anthology out called Stripped: A Collection of Anonymous Flash. I’ve got a story in it, alongside Sherrie Flick, Randall Brown, Michael Martone, Roxane Gay, Devan Goldstein, Kathy Fish, Ethel Rohan, J Bradley, Amber Sparks, Nicole Monaghan (who also edited the collection) and far too many other fantastic writers for me to list here.
I can’t tell you which story is mine, because all of the pieces have been “stripped” of their bylines, forcing the reader to confront them without knowing anything about their authors. Because each story is, to some extent, about gender, the result is an interesting guessing game that brings to mind The Guardian’s V.S. Naipaul test. I’m very much looking forward to getting my copy and puzzling over who wrote what. For the curious, the stories will all be matched to their authors in one year and the information made available here, on Nicole’s webpage. Cool, right?
Second, there’s a new Special Issue of PANK Magazine live today. It’s the Science & Fiction Issue, guest edited by myself and my partner in crime, Devan Goldstein. We were flooded with submissions pretty much right out of the gate. It does my heart good to know that so many writers are interested in writing about science. Needless to say, we read many more brilliant pieces than we could fit into one issue, but we’re so happy with the final product. There are great stories and poems by Sal Pane, Benjamin Nash, Jess Stoner and Garrett Ashley, among others. I’ll be re-reading it many times, I’m sure. I hope you’ll read and enjoy it, too.
Aubrey Hirsch 