Darin Bradley reports that Farrago’s Wainscot, Issue 11 is now live, featuring fiction by Paul Abbamondi, Forrest Aguirre, Autumn Canter, Edward Morris, Mari Ness, and Angie Smibert. Issue 11 also features poetry by Lee Stern, Amy Riddle, William Doreski, and Mark DeCarteret—as well as an experimental wordform by Mike Keith.

I have always been a fan of Farrago’s, and not only because they have published my work twice, but because they continually push the limit in terms of content and style.  It is my belief that very soon now, Farrago’s Wainscot will start to win all sorts of awards for its fiction.

I am happy to announce that Sybil’s Garage is now available for sale at Word Brooklyn in Greenpoint, with a possibility of readings at some future date.  Thank you, Stephanie & Kelly!

I recently received my contributor copy of the Hatter Bones anthology, edited by Paul Jessup.  Chock full of creepy, cutting edge fiction, I devoured the book in two days.

Paul Jessup asked, in his guidelines, for “contemporary, strange, broken things” and “stories made from bird bones, broken bits, cobbled together out of things spoken in the rain.”  What resulted from that prompt was my short story, “The Girl in the Basement,” told in brief vignettes about a girl who spends her life locked in a basement by her parents.  It is one of my favorites, and I’m glad it has seen print in such a fine publication.

And what a great Table of Contents to be on too!  I’m alongside such talents as Matt Cheney, Darin C. Bradley, Ekaterina Sedia, Cat Rambo, Jason Sizemore, Lavie Tidhar, Forrest Aguirre, Becca De La Rosa, and lots more.  Many of the stories are dark, unforgettable things that punch you in the gut without remorse.  Some are science fiction, some are horror, some are fantasy, and many are in that interstitial place where a lot of excellent new fiction is taking place.

And I’d be remiss to not mention the artwork.  Artist Jesse Lindsay does a fabulous job illustrating each story.  (Click on Hatter Bones and then “The Girl in the Basement” to see the artwork for my story).

So check out Hatter Bones from ENE press and let me know what you think!

Not one, but two Sybil’s Garage reviews were posted yesterday.  The first was from Cat Rambo at Fantasy Magazine.  She says:

“Ever since first discovering the magazine Sybil’s Garage in 2005 after being shown it by Kris Dikeman, I’ve loved the small press magazine produced by Matt Kressel of Senses Five Press. The magazine’s steady climb in quality moves to upward from an already pretty high starting point, and this issue shows the trend continuing.”

You can read the full review here.

The second review came just minutes later from Charles Tan at Bibliophile Stalker.  Charles says:

“One of writer Damien G. Walter’s challenges is that “We need more beautiful magazines” and Sybil’s Garage No. 6 easily fits that bill. While not as experimental as McSweeney’s, editor Matthew Kressel does a lot of outstanding things with this issue. Aside from the well-designed layout, each story/poem is preceded by a recommended song and this presentation is consistent. There’s also what seems like random scribblings by an enigmatic writer at the end of various texts but it all culminates into one meta-narrative that this reviewer found tear-jerking, even if it’s just a simple plot and conceit.”

You can read his full review here.

And remember, you can always get a copy of Sybil’s Garage No. 6 here.

I had set three alarms.  Two on my clock radio which I’ve had since college, and one on my iPhone.  Of course, I was up at before all of them.  It was 2:45 am, and I was on my way to Jim Freund’s radio show, “Hour of the Wolf.”  Still Friday night/early Saturday morning, the noise from the evening (I happen to live close to several bars) had just faded only an hour or two before.  I showered and swallowed a cup of coffee when normally I’d be delta-deep in REM sleep.

As soon as I stepped downstairs the car service I had reserved pulled up, and next thing I knew I was off, speeding out of Greenpoint towards the BQE.  I told the cabbie to listen to WBAI, 99.5 FM and he immediately tuned in to a reggae/talk politic show.  “Do you like science fiction and fantasy?” I asked.  “No, not really,” he said.  But he seemed more than happy to tune into the station and listen, I suppose because most of the folks he picked up at this quiet hour were either drunk or business folk worried about catching their flight.  How many had asked him what he liked?  Or perhaps he just wanted a good tip.

The caffeine kicked in as we sped along the BQE.  I felt high, superb.  It had been a long time since I was up this early, long before my circadian rhythm would have me, and as we sped over the Brooklyn Bridge, I glanced over at Manhattan, half-asleep, city lights dimmed for the night.  It felt magical, surreal, wonderful.

When I pulled up to the WBAI station, out pops Jim Freund from his car service.  With bagels.

We went upstairs and noshed and chatted and soon the rest of Altered Fluid showed up.  This time it was Rajan Khanna’s time to read on the air.  We shuffled into the studio, introduced ourselves to the listeners, and then Raj began “School Bus,” a story of a bus driver whose mother is dying from cancer and enrolls in an experimental drug program to get money to support her treatments.  But the drug, it seems, has unintended side-effects.  It was interesting, I recall as I write this, that in the car on the way to the studio, the talk-show host was talking about how prescription drugs often have side-effects which cause the same symptoms they are trying to cure.  Sometimes the universe just synchronizes that way.

Rajan has an excellent radio voice and did a superb job with his story.  (He’s recorded podcasts for Jeffrey Ford, among others.)  Then it was time for our critiques.  Eugene Myers, who was traveling, could not attend.  But thanks to the magic of Google Voice, Jim was able to play Eugene’s critique live on the air while we read a mostly accurate speech-to-text conversion of his voice.  Had we not prompted him, the casual listener might have thought he was present.

Overall, the morning went extremely well.  We even got to take several calls.  (Though, sadly, no trolls.)  Before we knew it, it was 7am, the show had ended, and the sun had risen over New York, and the East River, dark before, was now flooded with light.  All too fast, I thought.  All too fast.  Not to worry, though, I told myself.  We’d be back before long to do it again.  It’s become a regular thing.

For those interested, you can listen to a recording of the show here.  And you can see some of my photos from the show here.