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SmokeLong Quarterly

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“The Nature Issue”—A Letter from the Editor

Story by Tara Laskowski September 19, 2016

First off, just a reminder that we’ve extended the deadline for the 2017 Kathy Fish Fellowship applications. You can submit through September 30, 2016, so if you’re eligible I encourage you to send us your work. Check out the requirements and award terms here. We are excited to read your submission!

Issue 53 marks the kick-off of our Global Flash series. Christopher Allen discovered a wonderful German flash, Aufgaben: ein Triptychon, by Rupprecht Mayer. We are looking for flash fiction in other languages, and translators to help us translate these stories. If you are interested, please email us at editors@smokelong.com.

As we welcome fall, nature plays heavily in Issue 53. Two stories—”One Degree of Safety” and “The Dead Are Not Hungry”—feature bees as a central image. In “The Nest,” a tree inside a house might be the final destruction of a couple’s relationship. The fragility of eggs plays a major role in “Egg Baby.” And sights and sounds and emotions abound in the beautifully done “The Farmers’ Market.”

You’ll find those stories and much more in our latest issue. We hope, as always, that you enjoy. Thank you for your support of SmokeLong Quarterly.

Best,

Tara Laskowski
Editor, SmokeLong Quarterly

About the Author

Tara Laskowski

Tara Laskowski has been editor at SmokeLong Quarterly since 2010. Her short story collection Bystanders was hailed by Jennifer Egan as “a bold, riveting mash-up of Hitchcockian suspense and campfire-tale chills.” She is also the author of Modern Manners For Your Inner Demons, tales of dark etiquette. Her fiction has been published in the Norton anthology Flash Fiction International, Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine, Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine, Mid-American Review, and numerous other journals, magazines, and anthologies. Tara lives and works in a suburb of Washington, D.C.

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SmokeLong Fitness – The Year-round Community Workshop of SmokeLong

In September 2022 SmokeLong launched a workshop environment/community christened SmokeLong Fitness. This community workshop is happening right now on our dedicated workshop site. If you choose to join us, you will work in a small group of around 15-20 participants to give and receive feedback on flash narratives—one new writing task each week.

Learn more…