Author: Heavy Feather

A Haunted Passages Excerpt from A Spectral Hue, a horror novel by Craig Laurance Gidney

For generations, the marsh-surrounded town of Shimmer, Maryland has played host to a loose movement of African-American artists, all working in different media, but all utilizing the same haunting color. Landscape paintings, trompe l’oeil quilts, decorated dolls, mixed-media assemblages, and more, all featuring the same peculiar hue, a shifting pigment somewhere between purple and pink,…
“Hear the Chorus Underfoot”: Jesi Buell Reviews Alice Hatcher’s Novel The Wonder That Was Ours

“How hard a thing is life to the lowly,and yet how human and real!”—W. E. B. Du Bois The Wonder That Was Ours begins innocently as a Caribbean cabbie picks up new passengers but quickly maneuvers past increasing racial, psychological, and ideological tensions until it crescendos at an apocalyptic fever pitch. The narrative and topical…
House of the Black Spot, a graphic novel by Ben Sears, reviewed by James Ardis

House of the Black Spot is the latest in Ben Sears’s Double+ graphic novel series. This is my first experience with Sears’ work, yet the world he imagines leaves an instant impact. In Bolt City, where much of the book’s early action takes place, there are streets lined with vibrantly-colored buildings and hovering robots capable…
Kelsi Brown on Miraculum, a carnival novel by Steph Post

“‘Step right up, gents! Step right up, ladies! That’s right! Prepare to be astounded, confounded and utterly shocked beyond your wildest dreams!’” The perception of the carnival as a happy place with the central purpose of bringing amusement and joy to the crowd gets waved to the side in this fantastical realist take on…
Settlers, a poetry collection by F. Daniel Rzicznek, reviewed by Esteban Rodríguez

In his latest collection, F. Daniel Rzicznek leads readers through a world ripe with abandonment and haunted by fragments of a past that are as mysterious as they are important, at least within the attempt to make meaning in the face of loss and desolation. Make no mistake, Settlers is full of life: fathers, dogs,…
What Could Be Saved, bookmatched novellas and stories excerpt, by Gregory Spatz

Going where most readers have never been—past the workshop door, behind the curtain to the hidden rehearsal space, and into the back room of a pawn shop or dealer’s office, Gregory Spatz’s new book delves deeply into the world of those who build, play, and sell (or steal) violins. This is a realm of obsession,…
An Excerpt from the Novel The Color Inside a Melon by John Domini

A disastrous earthquake has Naples reeling. While the government scrambles to maintain appearances, poverty and anarchy rack the people on Italy’s margins—the illegal immigrants out of Africa, known as the clandestini. One of whom has just been horrifically murdered. Enter Risto, a rare success story: a refugee from Mogadishu, orphaned in his teens, he’s now married…
“On Writing and Self-Publishing”: A Conversation Between Laraine Herring & Jennifer Spiegel

Well, this discussion stemmed from my mixed emotions surrounding my new novel, And So We Die, Having First Slept. It’s been both glorious and, frankly, really hard. As I got to tell Dave Abrams in November, This is the book I wanted to write. How many people get to say that? But, along with this joy,…
Hybrid Work for Haunted Passages: “Steppes of Null” by Mike Corrao

*Ed.’s Note: click on image to view larger size. Mike Corrao is the author of Man, Oh Man (Orson’s Publishing) and Gut Text (11:11 Press). His work has been featured in publications such as The Collagist, 3:AM, Always Crashing, and The Portland Review. He lives in Minneapolis. Learn more at mikecorrao.com.