Author: Allison

Allison

Showcased in the Ekphrastic Marathon (Again!)

Last month I took part in the Ekphrastic Review‘s Ekphrastic Marathon for my second time! Last year was Lucky 8 and this year was Nine Lives. (Here’s my post about last year.)

As with before, I wrote several pieces based on amazing works of art. I really enjoy using art as writing prompts, so I look forward to this marathon every year.

I’m excited that my story inspired by “If only i hadn’t wished for what I thought i was missing” by Paraskevi Frasiola was featured in the Marathon Showcase!

Read it, and many other amazing pieces, here.

click the pic to read the full piece

Allison

“You can get hurt handling broken pieces”: A Review at MicroLit Almanac

I have a review up for Shannon Robinson’s surreal short story collection The Ill-Fitting Skin!

Check it out at MicroLit Almanac and then get your copy of the book!

Allison

National Flash Fiction Day Pubs

I had a great time writing and submitting to The Write-In on National Flash Fiction Day! I’m thrilled that 10/10 of my submissions were published! I’m sharing the links here, along with the prompts to give an idea of the guidelines/constraints.

Tidal: Write a flash about a rare weather or meteorological phenomenon.

Leave It All Behind: Write a flash in four sections, with each section having a heading ‘Air’, ‘Earth’, ‘Water’ and ‘Fire’, no more than 300 words!

And Now It’s Here: Write a flash in which someone encounters the end of the earth.

Wreckage: Write a micro flash of exactly 13 words.  Give it a title.

“People Also Ask”: Write a flash or micro in which every sentence includes at least one use of the word ‘why’.

Life Changing: Write a 50-word flash (or shorter) that starts and ends with the same sentence.

Not Simple: Find a FlashFlood story and choose five interesting words from it. Write a flash of no more than 100 words that uses all five of these words.

Fish on Vacation: Write a flash about someone who feels like a fish out of water…

The Grocery Gatsby: Write a flash using or referencing characters from fiction or poetry that was written at least 100 years ago. Set it in modern times.

Make Your Move: Write a flash in the form of a series of directions to somewhere.

(The featured post image showcases the badges I earned for the pieces I wrote and submitted.)

Allison

“Forget Me” published at Gooseberry Pie

I have a piece in Issue 12 of Gooseberry Pie Lit Magazine!

“Forget Me“ was written in a Sarah Freligh workshop, inspired by Edward Hopper’s painting, Summer Evening.

I think it stands without seeing the artwork, but appreciate the additional context the painting gives. What do you think?

Allison

Aching Strangeness: A Review at MicroLit Almanac

I have a review up for Lisa Johnson Mitchell’s astounding short story collection So as Not to Die Alone!

Check it out at MicroLit Almanac and then get your copy of the book!

Allison

“Dendrology” published at Briefly Write

I’m so excited to have a piece in Briefly Write with some amazing writers!

Read Dendrology here!

I actually wrote this as a story for Visual Verse, so I wanted to share the original picture by Olga Naida. I was bummed when it wasn’t accepted for that issue because I thought it fit well – and wouldn’t stand on its own. But I’m so glad Briefly Write picked it up!

If you read it without seeing the picture, what did you think? Does seeing the image change your interpretation?

Allison

How It Is to Be a Girl: A Review at MicroLit Almanac

I was so pleased when an editor at MicroLit Almanac reached out to me about writing a review of Sarah Freligh’s A Brief Natural History of Women. I love Freligh’s writing, have taken several of her workshops (and had several pieces published that started in those workshops!), and previously read the book several times for a Shorter is Better book club meeting.

Check out my review here!

Allison

Dead Girl Erased

I can’t believe that I forgot to log this submission on my spreadsheet, and therefore forgot to mention it in my 2023 Writing in Review post!

Last March, Gnashing Teeth Publishing posted on Twitter that they were tearing pages out of a book (Dead Girl Running by Christina Dodd) and sending them to anyone who requested one. Once you got a page, you’d create an erasure or blackout poem and send it back to be published in an anthology.

I love strange constraints and any type of project, so I requested a page. When it came in the mail, I think I was frozen for a week or two. I had no clue where to start. What if I blacked out a word I wanted back later??

I decided to take a photo of the pages and use the mark up feature on my phone to draft some poems. I’m really glad I took that approach, though I don’t remember changing a lot of the words. In fact, I kept taking away more. But it was nice to have the original page to look back on when I wanted. And once I completed my poem, I could carefully black out the right sections on the book page.

With that done, I mailed the page off and waited. And forgot about it, honestly! Then preorders were announced, so I preordered and forgot about it again! Which means I was pleasantly surprised by a book in my mailbox one day.

It was so cool to not only see my poem in this book, but to see how other people approached the erasure aspect of the project. There are some works of art in here! It’s also really interesting to see how many poems kind of fit together. Probably because the book is one cohesive work so it’s understandable there’d be some overlap in the poems, but it’s still fascinating!

You can grab a copy here.

Allison

Shorter is Better Book Club Recap

Another fun thing from 2023, besides the writing publications I previously mentioned, was starting Shorter is Better book club with Chelsea Stickle and Suzanne Hicks.

We started in April with After the Rapture by Nancy Stohlman. The rest of the books were as follows:

We took December off, and will do the same in 2024. We’re also taking February off in consideration of AWP and so many authors and small presses being swamped that month! However, we already have our January book picked: The Anchored World by Jasmine Sawers. Grab a copy from Rose Metal Press and join us on January 16th at 7:30 pm ET.

You can find us on Twitter and Instagram to keep up with our reading progress and join in on the meetings!