Her characters — patchwork families, scrappy siblings, unraveling couples, strangers, neighbors, and women confronting the violent self-annihilation that attends motherhood — are wracked by their actions and inactions. Surreality may be the only way out. If she did not coin the term flash fiction, we have her to thank for singlehandedly growing and elevating the dynamic form, securing its indelible place in the literary canon. With Wild Life, Fish demonstrates time and again why she is one of the most exciting and influential writers we have. Her range is on full display in this brilliant, comprehensive collection, an absolute must for students and teachers, for writers and readers across the genres." Sara Lippmann, author of Doll Palace

    Follows three sisters over three decades as they manage adversity in very different ways, culminating in loss, growth and self-knowledge.

    An eclectic collection of 48 flash fictions by Christopher Allen, award-winning author and managing editor of SmokeLong Quarterly.

    A foul-mouthed posse of machete-wielding scoundrels wreak havoc on a small-town mayor. A second-rate boxer starts a torrid affair with the wife of the Invisible Man—who just might be watching (and enjoying) all the freakiness.Darrin Doyle’s latest collection of short stories is an electrifying look at men behaving badly—or just being weird. Hilarious, madly inventive, and compellingly readable, this unforgettable collection will leave the reader dazzled, delirious—and begging for more.“What a pleasure it is to read this book! Hilarious, formally inventive, fearless, these stories thrum with brilliance and a deranged, strongly beating heart.”* Andy Mozina, author of Contrary Motion and Quality Snacks“Innocents beware! Darrin Doyle has always put a strong, clear, deceptively rational prose voice at the service of a dangerous imagination. But Scoundrels Among Us takes this paradox to a new, scoundrelly level. In these short and shorter stories, as cleanly worded as ever but mined with vile surprises, a darkly impish, even occasionally malicious wit prevails, playing rough and deliciously dirty in the sandbox of the reader’s expectations.”* Jaimy Gordon, author of Lord of Misrule, winner of the National Book Award“This collection is a revelation: formally and thematically adventurous and wide-ranging, playful, scabrously funny, weird in the best ways.”* Michael Griffith, author of Trophy and Bibliophilia

    Stories with a strong sense of place, transporting us from the seashore to the city, from India's monsoon to the heat of Cuba, and from the supermarket aisle to a Catalonian fiesta. We meet a baby that never existed, a car called Marilyn, a one-eyed cat, and a boy whose kisses taste of dunked biscuits.These stories all have something in common; each is a glimpse of what it's like to be human. We make mistakes, we do our best, and most of the time we find hope.

    There’s tragedy, there’s humour, there’s science fiction and drama, there’s a mixture of just about everything here, from completely new and long-established short story writers. You will never know what lies waiting for you on the next page… Published by Clarendon House Publications

    A flash fiction prequel to Martin Hospitality. Can be read in any order.Read for FREE only through subscription to Abigayle Claire's bi-monthly newsletter: http://eepurl.com/co5SCr

    Arzate’s stories are stark, depressing, thought-provoking, and hilarious.” - Brian Whitney (Author of Raping the Gods.) A house with cancer, a killer soda, an unusual church, strange TV shows, the true story of the creation of the Universe. All this and more is contained in this debut collection of stories from the amazing mind of Ben Arzate.

    Poetry. THE BEST SMALL FICTIONS is the first contemporary anthology solely devoted to honoring the best short hybrid fiction published in a calendar year. The series, which began in 2015, has featured an international group of both seasoned and emerging authors who work in flash, micro fiction, prose poetry, haibun, and other hybrid forms. Tara L. Masih founded this annual series and now serves as consulting editor. For our 2018 edition, we welcomed Sherrie Flick as series editor and Pushcart Prize winning author Aimee Bender as guest editor. This latest edition includes 53 works by writers such as Lydia Davis, Rumaan Alam, Diane Williams, Kathy Fish, Matt Bell, Aleksandar Hemon, Maxim Loskutoff, Michael Parker, Meg Pokrass, Deb Olin Unferth, and Desiree Cooper. Past guest editors have included Pulitzer Prize-winning author Robert Olen Butler (2015), PEN/Malamud Award winner and O. Henry Prize winner Stuart Dybek (2016), Rea Award and PEN/Malamud Award winner Amy Hempel (2017).

    That complexity is, in her new collection, Alligators at Night, heightened further by the fertile invention and unpredictable interplay of these beautifully crafted pieces.— Stuart Dybek, author of Ecstatic CahootsMeg Pokrass is my favourite flash fiction writer at the moment. These stories work like stories within stories, the tiny cogs in the wheels of a bigger story machine but which, like fractal patterning, retain the shape of the whole story in perfect miniature form.— David Gaffney, author of Sawn Off TalesThese small fictions are elegantly wrought, diamond-hard, and supremely satisfying.— Robert Scotellaro, author of What We Know So Far and Bad MotelIf you ever hear someone say they don't get flash fiction or ask what impact can you possibly make with prose in such few words? - tell them to read Meg Pokrass.— Paul McVeigh, author of The Good Son

    But now a brave new genre has emerged: very brief fiction. FLASH! identifies the qualities that make for excellent flash fiction, demystifies the writing process, and guides writers by exercise and example through the world of the very short story. John Dufresne’s characteristic warmth, wit, and humor remind writers of the joy in the creative process, making this a perfect guide for any writer interested in trying a new form.

    “A beautifully crafted novella-in-flash, small and perfect slices of life written with skill and heart.” Kit de Waal“In his debut novella Michael Loveday sketches with a delicate brush the colourful lives of three troubled men living on the edge of London. With poetic language and emotional precision, Loveday writes like a cartographer about the wilderness we call ‘the human heart’.” Meg Pokrass“This is a novella full of the aches and bruises left by loneliness. It's written in fragments, like a bottle smashed during a solitary boozing session, but it coheres around the vividly captured edgeland that haunts the three men. This a heart-felt book, but its prose is controlled by a steely intelligence. It's funny, too – and moving and scary. Michael Loveday is a name to watch. He's writing a new kind of fiction.” David Swann

    Punchlines, plays on words, dad puns, and yo’ mama jokes straddle the saddle with deep metaphorical lessons on society today, making companions of dark humor and serious wit. A séance of poetics and politics, this collection of glimpses into the disheveled and desperate, the cerebral and celebrated, the gangly and glorious, conjures what it is to be American in a society as stupid as it is terrifying.Illustrated by Jacob Heustis.“Short fiction from two masters of the form.”—NERVE“Ranging from short to super-duper short, the prose-poetic stories in Ryan Ridge’s and Mel Bosworth’s Second Acts in American Lives zig and zag, fake and fade, keeping the reader guessing on every page, and the illustrations by Jacob Heustis are every bit as funny and surprising as the words they accompany. It’s a pinball machine of a book, full of bounce and light and crazy ricochets: sentences start, you don’t know where they’ll end up, and this dynamic unpredictability is what gives this collection its life and its victory.”—Kathleen Rooney, author of Lillian Boxfish Takes a Walk

    Overall, the book tries to present, metaphorically, a human life, from birth to death.[Flash Fiction: fictional work of extreme brevity (up to 1000 words) that still offers character and plot development; also known as microfiction, sudden fiction, or micro-story. (Wikipedia)]