Category: Haunted Passages

Fiction: Brett Beach’s “Eastside”

The missing boy lived a block over, in the part of town where children often disappeared. This was in May, when you folded back your jeans to show me pink lace. Your skin was shadow beneath my fingers pressing toward warmth. Your mouth to mine, I joked that you were trying to steal my breath.…
Fiction: “A Texas” by Laura Ellen Scott

Bonnie & Jack Bonnie collects Jack from rehab. Fucking bougainvillea everywhere. “Thanks.” He slides into the passenger seat, tosses a half-empty duffel into the back of the white pickup and says, “Jesus.” He can’t believe it, the day, Bonnie, anything. He’s out. She can’t really bring herself to it. It’s east Texas, wet and hot.…
Fiction: Joe Baumann’s “A Paper House”

When we knock on your door only a week after your husband’s suicide, flashing our badges even though we don’t need to, telling you we’re here to check the walls for the girl’s body, the fact that you don’t even flinch makes us fall in love with you again. You step out of the way,…
Fiction: Amanda Goldblatt’s “The Way We Feel Sometimes”

First I’m confrontational with shift workers. The pharmacist asks for my signature, if I have any questions, if the dosage is correct. “Obviously,” I hammer. She is small with rosacea. I am not tall; I feel tall in her presence. I watch her wilt. Give her what she wants. Regarding any transaction, I’m taciturn. When…
Fiction: Alex Myers’ “In the Dark”

The pots simmered on the stove, and NPR babbled through their steam, cadenced voices delivering the day’s news in careful clips. James felt good, better than he had for months, better than he’d felt since Dennis had gone to his ashram or whatever. He peeled carrots, swept the spirals of skin into the trash bin,…
C.F. Lindsey Reviews Knives, Forks, Scissors, Flames, a new novel by Stefan Kiesbye

“Knives, Forks, Scissors, Flames have no place in children’s games.” This haunting nursery rhyme drips with dread and foreboding, and establishes the tone for Stefan Kiesbye’s novel. Set in a small German village, the book is a shining example of classic Gothic literature, but spun with a modern twist. Knives, Forks, Scissors, Flames is indeed…
Two Poems by Amanda McCormick

[ ] Bow to my thighs or I’ll break you with them.Anthills of poison, delivery track.Pump up the sex if you want to chewin the new year as her cavities grow.I couldn’t centralize my stomachafter you’d gone; I left my heart behind a fishnet. Flopping like bait in a fishnet,my…
Robert Dean’s Novel The Red Seven Reviewed by C.F. Lindsey

Grit, outlaw-cowboy justice, and blood, lots of blood; these phrases come to mind when discussing Robert Dean’s novel The Red Seven, following the tale of a cowboy bounty hunter on a hunt for vengeance. After the brutal mutilation and murder of his family—the Masterson clan—the renegade known as “The Ghost” saddles his faithful mount and…
“How a Shark Encouraged Blake Lively to Finish Medical School,” a Haunted Passages essay about grief by Tasha Coryell

Someone is dead or someone is dying before the shark even arrives. Sharks can smell blood in the water, even if this blood is only a metaphor. In The Shallows, the shark has ostensibly been attracted to the beach by the floating whale carcass. In actuality, the shark was attracted by Nancy Adams’ grief. I…