Author: Heavy Feather

“INFERNO: Just Like Gold”: ES Sandberg on August Strindberg’s Autofictional Novel

A very wise person once posited that the historical provenance of Sweden’s sustainable mindset is attributed to the absence of substantial oil reserves. Wealth has never been on tap, so to speak, and as such the country implemented something more long-term, if not resilient by cultivating and expanding on renewable practices. Danes on the other…
Fiction Review: Arreshy Young Reads Joachim Glage’s Apocryphal Story Collection The Devil’s Library

There is an unraveling in the testamental helices of the AJPD which speaks: “A man is a scream, smothered by the avalanche.” And from that strand there breeds this gonadal fiqh: “the blood of those who submit to the squeeze—the breeders, the feeders, the readers corresponding to the serfs, the megalopolis and the monastery—evaporate communally.…
Poetry Review: Toni Hornes Sullivan Reads Liz Worth’s Collection Inside Every Dream, a Raging Sea

Liz Worth’s Inside Every Dream, a Raging Sea is a lovely book of poetry that’s sure to intrigue those who are interested in the natural world, the otherworldly, and the emotional realm. Across 80 plus pages, Worth writes us through an experiential landscape, hoping in and out of experiences, mixing them it with spiritualism and…
Fiction from the Future: “Stephen Rogata” by Hugh Behm-Steinberg

The TV is on halfheartedly, a documentary about human flies the kids and us are sort of watching, though as a ghost I’m drawn more to the spaces in between the pixels than the imprisoning overall grid itself. My brother Kevin, head full of beard and nodding, leans against my side of the couch but…
Fiction for Bad Survivalist by Russell Brakefield: “A Temple and a Church and an Ashram”

Julian had a way of falling into shadow even in the dark. As the fire kindled, he shifted in his camp chair, avoiding the flame’s oblong spotlights. “Are you cold?” I zipped my own coat higher and tucked my hair inside my hat, one of the green beanies I’d knit when I was pregnant with…
Fiction from the Future: “How to Use This Instruction Manual” by Ron Burch

Remove the Instruction Manual from the container. Usually this is a box, mostly cardboard, with the item to be constructed also within. This may also include parts and tools. Do not throw anything away. It has all been enclosed to help finish the project. Separate the parts and identify with the Instruction Manual that they…
Side A Poem: “Levelland” by Kirk Keen

Levelland we impose stark beauty potluck of words to shut your mouth realign velocities our open mouths bless your heart pull up a chair here for your smart phone cotton hoe social media whatever let’s explode the sun everyday cash in on methodist hands warbling poetics of hearing nothing my first day i hold my…
Side A Graphic Essay: “Fire” by Jesse Lee Kercheval

Mini-interview with Jesse Lee Kercheval HFR: Can you share a moment that has shaped you as a writer (or continues to)? JLK: My very first writing teacher—and a wonderful one—was Janet Burroway, who many people know from her textbook Writing Fiction. We met again, after I had finished my first novel, The Museum of Happiness,…
Olivia Ivings & Shane Snyder Talk with Poet Erin Carlyle about Grief, Memory, and Poverty in the South

I’ve known Erin Carlyle for twelve years. We shared living spaces for ten of them—first as partners, then as spouses—and in that time we struggled together. Struggled to find a place to settle. A place of stability. A place we could call home. It was a depressingly mundane American story defined by movement, money, and…