Posts by author
Claire Burgess
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This Week in Short Fiction
It’s December, that magical time of year when newspapers and websites across the globe unveil their “Best of the Year” lists. Valeria Luiselli has been all over them with her innovative novel The Story of my Teeth, and lucky for…
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This Week in Short Fiction
What do you get when you combine a missing sister, an attic door that won’t close, a biohazard cleaning team, and a cameo from two blind tabby cats named Dr. No and Mr. Goldfinger? A new Laura van den Berg…
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This Week in Short Fiction
Over the last several weeks, The Offing has been releasing a stream of stunning work from its 2015 Trans Issue, and the collection of transgender/non-binary voices they’ve cultivated forms one of the most powerful issues of any magazine we’ve seen this…
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This Week in Short Fiction
This week, Bryan Hurt gives us a fabulist story in which CEOs practice blood sacrifice to ensure quarterly profits. (Believable.) The story, “Contract,” went up on Lit Hub on Wednesday and is part of Hurt’s debut collection Everyone Wants to…
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This Week in Short Fiction
On Tuesday, Michael Cunningham’s collection of reimagined fairy tales, A Wild Swan, burst from a magic pumpkin and into the world. (Just kidding on the pumpkin part.) Cunningham is no stranger to short stories (see, notably, “White Angel”), but this…
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This Week in Short Fiction
Stories have power, and not just the big ones, the myths and legends. The narratives we spin to explain our choices to ourselves, our small personal mythologies, those have perhaps the most power of all. And, as Lee Conell reminds…
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This Week in Short Fiction
It’s that time of year when everyone is dying for a good scary story, a tale with thrills and chills, one to make you check over your shoulder around the campfire. But what makes a story truly scary? Is it…
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This Week in Short Fiction
This week, let’s talk about dialogue. As with any facet of writing, there are “rules.” Don’t be too formal—real people don’t talk like the dictionary. Don’t be so informal—all that slang is distracting. Use dialogue tags sparingly. Use more dialogue…
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This Week in Short Fiction
You know it’s fall because of the crisp air, the changing leaves, the decorative gourds, and, most importantly, because the fall issues of literary magazines are launching. This week was Virginia Quarterly Review’s turn. On Monday, its Fall 2015 issue…
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This Week in Short Fiction
On Thursday, Guernica’s October issue went live with a fantastical tale of childhood by Sofi Stambo. “A Bunch of Savages,” which was chosen by Aimee Bender to win the Disquiet International Literary Program Award in fiction, follows a maybe gypsy,…
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This Week in Short Fiction
Imagine a world in the late 21st century: countries are underwater from the rising oceans, Europeans have become refugees, and a mathematical formula has been discovered that explains the entire universe, the applications of which include human flight (sans airplane)…
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This Week in Short Fiction
This week brings us two stories in translation. First, “Six Days in Glorious Vienna,” at Hobart, is a quiet story with a punch. By Japanese author Yoko Ogawa and translated by Stephen Snyder, the story is part of the anthology…