I Love You but I've Chosen Darkness: A Novel by Claire Vaye Watkins (2021)

Ten-Item Edinburgh Post-Natal Depression ScaleMy sister visits and asks how much a doula costs. Does a person really need one ( Read more... )

Something Wild: A Novel by Hanna Halperin (2021)

Part IISTRADDLING NESSA ON THE HOTEL BED, Tanya has not been this physically close to her sister in years, probably since that day in their mother’s bathroom fifteen years ago. When she feels on Nessa’s cheeks that her sister is crying, Tanya pretends that she doesn’t notice. The danger of getting ( Read more... )

O Beautiful: A Novel by Jung Yun (2021)

Chapter 14Elinor grew up in military housing. On the base in Marlow, families lived in a concrete gray apartment complex where all the living room windows faced a large interior courtyard. Whenever she and Maren followed their mother through the courtyard to go to town or the PX, Elinor felt watched by every ( Read more... )

Cosmogony: Stories by Lucy Ives (2021)

A Throw of the Dice“I want,” I thought that night, “to be free. But freedom is an intellectual demand and, as such, has nothing to do with pleasure.” Far, far below, there was some sort of silvery substance. I could see it glittering there. Truthful, perhaps. Perhaps eternal ( Read more... )

Winter in Sokcho by Elisa Shua Dusapin (2021)The temple was built into the cliffs above the beaches. The nuns were meditating, we’d have to wait. A fine rain began to fall, dampening the ground. Then, suddenly, a downpour, rain funneling down on us, falling in torrents. We took shelter under the overhanging roof. A raspy sound of chanting filtered ( Read more... )

Chouette by Claire Oshetsky (2021)

OneIt’s time for me to be in the kitchen with the other wives, who are all busy with their little tasks, shredding cabbage and slicing beefsteak tomatoes into slabs and so on. Now and then the other wives try to engage me in conversation. But these other wives speak in concrete word-bricks, whereas I prefer to ( Read more... )

Interesting Women: Stories by Andrea Lee (2021)

2. Full Moon over MilanTheir footsteps echo on the walls of the narrow streets with a late-night sound that Merope thinks must be peculiar to Milan, as each city in the world has its own response to night voices and footfalls. As if her scolding had pushed a button that vaporized inhibitions, Nicolò ( Read more... )

Everyone in This Room Will Someday Be Dead: A Novel by Emily Austin (2021)

Part Three: Ordinary TimeI find it so bizarre that I occupy space, and that I am seen by other people. I feel like I am falling through space and Eleanor just threw me a rose. It’s such a sweet, pointless gesture. It would be less devastating to fall through space alone, ( Read more... )

Tales from the Cafe: A Novel (Before the Coffee Gets Cold Series Book 2) by Toshikazu Kawaguchi (2021)

II - Mother and SonThe names of coffee beans mostly derive from where they are grown. In the case of mocha, the beans are grown in Yemen and Ethiopia and named after Yemen’s port city of Mocha, where they were traditionally shipped from. ( Read more... )

Filthy Animals by Brandon Taylor (2021)

PotluckThe conversation was difficult to catch. Everyone was talking in extended references to other moments, other events, other parties, and each reference, instead of drawing two things into relation, was instead the whole of the idiom, the entirety of the gesture. Which was fine, okay, he had gone to ( Read more... )