"Ella and the Elephant"

Tiegen Kosiak’s piece “Ella and the Elephant” from the online journal Hot Metal Bridge is well written and sad. The title may very well also be a reference to Hemingway’s story “Hills like White Elephants” although elephants are also mentioned in the story itself. It is set during Lent and covers a week’s worth of time from Saturday to Friday.

I can see how the story fits the journal’s submission guidelines: “We want literary fiction that is so well written, it has a magnetic pull. Stories that make us want to google you and read everything you’ve published. That get us fired up and make us want to write or read or create.” This piece did, in fact, make me want to google the author.

From googling the author, I learned that she has an M.F.A. in creative writing from Minnesota State University Moorhead. I also learned that the author writes poetry, which doesn’t surprise me since the language in this story was so lyrical.

Fences Fly By

Today's blog post, "Fences Fly By" focuses on a piece of flash fiction. Flash fiction is just another way of saying very short fiction. Depending on who is doing the defining, flash fiction is usually defined as fiction under 500 or 1000 words.

I picked today's piece because it a) contains some very nice writing and b) captures place well. Also, I admit it; I'm biased. The third reason I chose today's piece, by Salvatore Pane, is that it's set in Pittsburgh, which is where I'm from.

Today's piece is partially set at a restaurant in Bloomfield, which is on the East End of the city. Here's a picture of that restaurant, the Church Brew Works.



What do you think of today's piece? Does it grab you? Does it move you? Why, or why not?

"Where You Are Going, Where You Have Been, Whether You Are In a Relationship and If It Is Complicated or Not"

Joyce Carol Oates. Love her or hate her, you have to admit that she is a force to be reckoned with in American fiction.



According to that venerable source Wikipedia, she has written over fifty novels. Wait, what? That doesn't even include all of the other types of writing that she has done.

I'm more in the love camp. I admire anyone who puts that much stuff out there into the world, especially when some, a lot of that stuff, is really good.

Her latest book, A Widow's Story, is a memoir about the sudden and unexpected death of her husband.

But this post isn't about Joyce Carol Oates. Or it is, and it isn't. This post is about a recent story that parodies (or modernizes) one of Oates' best known stories, "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?" If you haven't read that piece, check it out. It's a classic.

Today's piece, "Where You Are Going, Where You Have Been, Whether You Are In a Relationship and If It Is Complicated or Not" by Danny Pelletier can be found at MonkeyBicycle. Read. Laugh. Enjoy.

--Lori