I wanted to pass the word about a few works of fiction that have either just come out or are very close to being released. My caveat is that I've had some association with all of them when our paths crossed in a literary way but apart from that, they're all marvelous writers I strongly recommend that people investigate. In no particular order, they are "The Great Believers" by Rebecca Makkai, "The Amazing Mr. Morality" by Jacob Appel, "All of the Above" by Brian Cox, "A Necessary Hero" by Bill Kennedy, "Bigfoots in Paradise" by Doug Lawson, and "The Wildlands" by Abby Geni. In the coming weeks, I intend to read them all so that in a subsequent post, I'll be able to talk about them some more. I'm very much looking forward to this. As the song goes, "it's nice work if you can get it."

I'd also like to mention that I recently won the 2018 Solstice Short Fiction contest with a story called "Retrieval" about a husband with marital trouble who visits a favorite family resort in the northwoods that is scheduled to close, and what happens when distant memories reassert themselves there. It should be published in mid to late August at www.solsticelitmag.org. Regardless of that story, the magazine consistently features very fine work from a diverse set of voices so you might want to keep that site in mind.