“Children’s lives never belong to them. The grown-ups own us…That’s why we have to try hard to survive until we’ve grown up ourselves,” (Murata 71). Natsuki is different from other girls. In fact, she might not be from this planet at all, or at least that’s what her stuffed hedgehog Piyyut tells her. Armed with a …
“That’s women’s work though, isn’t it? To take a bowl of shit and find something that glimmers, something that makes the pain of having to put up with it all just about worthwhile,” (Shields 48). Seven years before King Lear takes place, Lear’s three daughters struggle to have their voices heard in a patriarchal world. Goneril is a …
I’ve been having trouble writing. It’s not like this hasn’t happened before. I wouldn’t call it writer’s block so much as an anxiety towards my own writing, which just sounds silly. There’s a piece I’ve been working on for some time now that seems like it will never be perfect. It’s a story I care …
“‘Why did it have to be me?’ The stray echoed the words of the story. ‘But she was simply in the wrong place, at the wrong time, with the wrong person,” (Rose). Margot and Mama live in an isolated cottage in the woods where they eagerly await the visit of strays, people who get lost in …
“With henching, you know where you stand,” (Walschots 202). Anna is a hench, meaning she takes temp jobs for the world’s more dastardly (or starting-up) villains to make money. It isn’t honest work, but in this economy a person has to survive any way they can. But once she becomes permanently injured after a well-known superhero …
“Well, when she does all the thinking and knowing, won’t I be … dead?” (Jackson 241). Twenty-three-year-old Elizabeth Richmond lives an ordinary life. Orphaned and living with her maiden aunt Morgen, Elizabeth spends her days working at a museum and living off of her dead mother’s inheritance, but strange things have started to occur. Threatening letters …
I received this book from River Street Writing in exchange for an honest review. “Every day, I want to reach / inside my chest, dig my fingers in, / and pull my rubs apart: / let me breathe / until I burst,” (“Ritual for Release,” Bates-Hardy, 9). In Anatomical Venus, Courtney Bates-Hardy writes a collection of poetry where she takes …
I received this book from Playwrights Canada Press in exchange for an honest review. “Lily: They’re all dead now,” (Act 1, Prologue, 14). An adaption of Ann-Marie Macdonald’s novel of the same name, the play follows piano tuner James Piper and his thirteen-year-old wife Materia Mahmoud, their four daughters Kathleen, Frances, Mercedes, and Lily. Dark secrets are unearthed …
I received this book from River Street Writing in exchange for an honest review. “By not claiming space for my art, I am the aporia, the one feigning uncertainty, the one who pretends to others like I don’t know what it is I want to do,” (Purdham 187). A long time advocate for people with disabilities as …
“If someone looks out at the world…they should not be surprised if the world looks back,” (Leduc 61). In 19th-century Scotland, Josiah MacDougal is banished to Siberia with a small Christian mission after claiming that animals can speak to him. While scrubbing the floor of the church one night, he is visited by God in animal …
Sarah O'Connor 