ISSUE 14
Dedicated to the memory of Lianne Simon, Eastern Iowa Review's Girl Friday. (1952-2021)
You will be missed.
You will be missed.
Editor's Note:
Again we received well over a thousand pieces of writing for this issue. We had to turn down many very good ones in favor of what we consider to be the very best. Of course, there is a certain amount of subjectivity in selection, as to be expected, and usually what strongly resonated with our managing editor and the reading team was ultimately chosen. We hope you continue to visit us here online, and in print when we release our next anthology of select pieces from recent issues. We appreciate both our contributors, selected or not, and our readers. You are invaluable to us.
About the artist for this issue: "Jan Price has enjoyed winning a few poetry competitions over the years in Australia and overseas, her work has been published in boxed anthologies, and her poetry has been read on radio and printed in newspapers. Jan belongs to three writers groups and performs her work at literary functions. She loves to paint and many of her works appear as literary journal covers."
We hope you enjoy these lovely selections!
Jean Biegun - "Green Bowl" (prose poetry)
Eli Coyle - "After the Beat Museum in San Francisco" (prose poetry)
Ranney Campbell - "Just Leisure Enough" (prose poetry)
Melissa Darcey - "A Toga, A Dress, A Cardigan" (creative nonfiction)
Diana Donovan - "Something About Triangles" (prose poetry)
T.K. Edmond - "The Pease River King" (prose poetry)
Meg Freer - "Sleepwalking" (prose poetry)
Anne Gudger - "How to Prepare for Widowed" (creative nonfiction)
Jennifer Harrison - "All of Us" (prose poetry)
Jeffrey Haskey-Valerius - "Quiet Catastrophes" (prose poetry)
Paul Ilechko - "Everything is Bounded" (prose poetry)
PB Johnson - "Airstream" (flash memoir)
Kara Knickerbocker - "[I should have always stayed flying. I should have never stopped writing]" (prose poetry)
Jeremy Marks - "My daughter reads" (prose poetry)
Daniel Edward Moore - "Genesis 22:12" (prose poetry)
Jody Rae - "Heroines of Antiquity" (creative nonfiction)
Mary Lynn Reed - "Combinatorics" (prose poetry)
Mary Jo Robinson-Jamison - "We Have Moved So Far From the Rivers" (prose poetry)
Melinda Ruth - "Dundalk, MD 2006" (prose poetry)
Geoff Sawers - "A Tree Half in Flames" (prose poetry)
Travis Stephens - "Baba Yaga Thinks of Love" (prose poetry)
Lucinda Trew - "Rust" (prose poetry)
Lisa Trudeau - "Lady Crusoe's Message" (prose poetry)
Jay Waters - "Quarter" (prose poetry)
Ann Weil - "Blade Upon Bark" and "On her back her mind wanders" (prose poetry)
Mike Wilson - "Chimes" (creative nonfiction)
ELVES
Patrick Murray - "Sage and Eggs" (fiction)
Raquel Nixon - Artwork 1
Again we received well over a thousand pieces of writing for this issue. We had to turn down many very good ones in favor of what we consider to be the very best. Of course, there is a certain amount of subjectivity in selection, as to be expected, and usually what strongly resonated with our managing editor and the reading team was ultimately chosen. We hope you continue to visit us here online, and in print when we release our next anthology of select pieces from recent issues. We appreciate both our contributors, selected or not, and our readers. You are invaluable to us.
About the artist for this issue: "Jan Price has enjoyed winning a few poetry competitions over the years in Australia and overseas, her work has been published in boxed anthologies, and her poetry has been read on radio and printed in newspapers. Jan belongs to three writers groups and performs her work at literary functions. She loves to paint and many of her works appear as literary journal covers."
We hope you enjoy these lovely selections!
Jean Biegun - "Green Bowl" (prose poetry)
Eli Coyle - "After the Beat Museum in San Francisco" (prose poetry)
Ranney Campbell - "Just Leisure Enough" (prose poetry)
Melissa Darcey - "A Toga, A Dress, A Cardigan" (creative nonfiction)
Diana Donovan - "Something About Triangles" (prose poetry)
T.K. Edmond - "The Pease River King" (prose poetry)
Meg Freer - "Sleepwalking" (prose poetry)
Anne Gudger - "How to Prepare for Widowed" (creative nonfiction)
Jennifer Harrison - "All of Us" (prose poetry)
Jeffrey Haskey-Valerius - "Quiet Catastrophes" (prose poetry)
Paul Ilechko - "Everything is Bounded" (prose poetry)
PB Johnson - "Airstream" (flash memoir)
Kara Knickerbocker - "[I should have always stayed flying. I should have never stopped writing]" (prose poetry)
Jeremy Marks - "My daughter reads" (prose poetry)
Daniel Edward Moore - "Genesis 22:12" (prose poetry)
Jody Rae - "Heroines of Antiquity" (creative nonfiction)
Mary Lynn Reed - "Combinatorics" (prose poetry)
Mary Jo Robinson-Jamison - "We Have Moved So Far From the Rivers" (prose poetry)
Melinda Ruth - "Dundalk, MD 2006" (prose poetry)
Geoff Sawers - "A Tree Half in Flames" (prose poetry)
Travis Stephens - "Baba Yaga Thinks of Love" (prose poetry)
Lucinda Trew - "Rust" (prose poetry)
Lisa Trudeau - "Lady Crusoe's Message" (prose poetry)
Jay Waters - "Quarter" (prose poetry)
Ann Weil - "Blade Upon Bark" and "On her back her mind wanders" (prose poetry)
Mike Wilson - "Chimes" (creative nonfiction)
ELVES
Patrick Murray - "Sage and Eggs" (fiction)
Raquel Nixon - Artwork 1
We are a non-paying market except for our annual genre awards.
GENERAL INFORMATION
1. Submit as many times as you wish, but only after you've heard back from us.
2. As always, nonfiction must be smart and preferably lyrical, and prose poetry must be tight.
3. Send material in its final form, as we cannot allow substantial changes once we receive your work. We rarely edit from this end. Make sure your work is typo-free.
4. Please give us six weeks or so to review and respond to your submission(s), though generally we hope to reply much sooner.
5. If you want a quick reply, use our speedy reply donation option which will be available during some reading periods. "Speedy reply" means a simple yes or no within 15 days.
6. We read BLIND. No author name or address on the manuscript or file name. The Title space on Submittable should only contain the title of the work. Your name and bio goes in the box marked Cover Letter on your Submittable submission form.
7. All submitted material should be in Times New Roman, 12 pt. font, double-spaced.
8. If it helps you decide what to send, please know that we enjoy short, pithy, language-driven work that makes sense. We love beauty and lyricism.
9. We reserve the right to edit an author's bio for whatever reason.
10. Accepted contributors will be required to sign an author's agreement.
What we hope to avoid: purple prose, erotica, horror, bawdy and base elements, base humor, predictability, gratuitous sexuality, racial or sexual bias, bigotry, name-calling, preaching / conversion attempts / agenda in religious or philosophical work, political works without story and literary bent or which aims to convert. Stories for children. Excessive and unnecessary drama for drama's sake. Darkness for darkness' sake. Find better ways to employ strong emotion in your writing.
Miscellaneous Facts
Simultaneous submissions are fine but as per usual please let us know immediately if you receive an acceptance before you hear back from us, as is customary.
We do not favor reprints unless it's a piece that meets our requirements above and has been published in a well-known literary venue.
Any writer from any country in the world is welcome to submit work in English.
Include a short third person, 50-100 word bio in the Cover Letter box on the Submittable form.
This will be an online-only issue; accepted work will be posted online either month-by-month or all at once, TBD. Select work may be included in a future print anthology.
Our final decisions will be based on work quality and current needs (though we may occasionally solicit work). That being said, we eschew favoritism in all its insidious forms.
Submissions may be nominated for the Pushcart award, Best of the Net, Best American Essays, etc.
Please do not ask about a free submission until at least 4 months have passed.
GENERAL INFORMATION
1. Submit as many times as you wish, but only after you've heard back from us.
2. As always, nonfiction must be smart and preferably lyrical, and prose poetry must be tight.
3. Send material in its final form, as we cannot allow substantial changes once we receive your work. We rarely edit from this end. Make sure your work is typo-free.
4. Please give us six weeks or so to review and respond to your submission(s), though generally we hope to reply much sooner.
5. If you want a quick reply, use our speedy reply donation option which will be available during some reading periods. "Speedy reply" means a simple yes or no within 15 days.
6. We read BLIND. No author name or address on the manuscript or file name. The Title space on Submittable should only contain the title of the work. Your name and bio goes in the box marked Cover Letter on your Submittable submission form.
7. All submitted material should be in Times New Roman, 12 pt. font, double-spaced.
8. If it helps you decide what to send, please know that we enjoy short, pithy, language-driven work that makes sense. We love beauty and lyricism.
9. We reserve the right to edit an author's bio for whatever reason.
10. Accepted contributors will be required to sign an author's agreement.
- Please stretch your lyrical wings. Give us the beautiful, the musical, even the odd & quirky. Think Annie Dillard meets Gertrude Stein, but make sure it makes sense.
- Please, no standard poetry, journalistic essays, book reviews, etc. If you've not read Annie Dillard, you may not have discovered the smart lyricism we especially love.
What we hope to avoid: purple prose, erotica, horror, bawdy and base elements, base humor, predictability, gratuitous sexuality, racial or sexual bias, bigotry, name-calling, preaching / conversion attempts / agenda in religious or philosophical work, political works without story and literary bent or which aims to convert. Stories for children. Excessive and unnecessary drama for drama's sake. Darkness for darkness' sake. Find better ways to employ strong emotion in your writing.
Miscellaneous Facts
Simultaneous submissions are fine but as per usual please let us know immediately if you receive an acceptance before you hear back from us, as is customary.
We do not favor reprints unless it's a piece that meets our requirements above and has been published in a well-known literary venue.
Any writer from any country in the world is welcome to submit work in English.
Include a short third person, 50-100 word bio in the Cover Letter box on the Submittable form.
This will be an online-only issue; accepted work will be posted online either month-by-month or all at once, TBD. Select work may be included in a future print anthology.
Our final decisions will be based on work quality and current needs (though we may occasionally solicit work). That being said, we eschew favoritism in all its insidious forms.
Submissions may be nominated for the Pushcart award, Best of the Net, Best American Essays, etc.
Please do not ask about a free submission until at least 4 months have passed.