We prepare this issue for the printer just as summer slips through our grasp, giving way to fall, the season that requires us to let go, to give up, to give in. We put away the things of sultry afternoons and glorious, sun-stretched evenings, begin to prepare for the shorter days, the early frosts, the long march through the cool and into the cold. That note of loss sounds through this issue’s stories and essays. In Farah Ali’s “Heroes,” winner of the 2016 Nelligan Prize for Short Fiction, selected by Gish Jen, a mother mourning her murdered son tries to reconcile some painful truths about him with her need to grieve. Karin Cecile Davidson’s “Rock Salt and Rabbit” concerns a Vietnam veteran’s coming to terms with the loss of a limb and the estrangement of his family upon his return. In Nina de Gramont’s “The Inconsistency of Sunlight,” a woman without custody of her young daughter must, amid blurring boundaries, withdraw from her relationship with a neglected neighbor child. And in Emily Temple’s “Better Homes,” a woman devastated by her divorce immerses herself in the bizarre world of extreme sandcastle competition and learns to accept her losses. Kelcey Parker Ervick’s essay “My Viking Name” examines the convention of women giving up their so-called maiden names and suggests that it’s time to reconsider the term. Susan Triemert looks to break with her family’s tradition of silence when faced with grief as she recalls a long-ago tragedy in “Indian Summer.” And in “Witness,” Rose Whitmore revisits the anxiety—and the wonder—of a childhood spent with adventurous parents in the great outdoors: learning to let go of fear, lean into the openness of the landscape, and accept the unseen and unknown.
Welcome to the fall/winter issue; having let go, perhaps, of your own attachments this season, let us replenish you.
—Stephanie G’schwind
Featured in This Issue
Farah Ali, Shauna Barbosa, Jessica Rae Bergamino, Jaswinder Bolina, William Brewer, Karin Cecile Davidson, Nina de Gramont, Claire Eder, Daniel Eltringham, Kelcey Parker Ervick, Adam Fagin, Jennifer Fitzgerald, Jennifer Foerster, Merrill Gilfillan, Katy Lederer, Paige Lewis, Joshua McKinney, Rusty Morrison, Jill Osier, Thibault Raoult, Michael Robins, Martha Ronk, Michael Ruby, Linda Russo, Emily Schulten, Marcela Sulak, Emily Temple, Jon Thompson, Susan Triemert, Sam Truitt, Mark G Wagenaar, Rachelle Wales, Rose Whitmore, Emma Winsor Wood, Amy Woolard, John Yau
