Julia Wertz's first two books are called Fart Party, a great, attention-grabbing title. I remember grabbing the book off the shelf at the comic bookstore, poking my boyfriend and laughing

He was putting potatoes into my hands.

“What else you need. Salt?”

He stepped over a stack of plates. I moved around them.

“Here. This is good. You cook with this. No?”

The

Courtney Love’s mom lived in house three blocks away from mine when I was growing up. She was a therapist for married people and children of divorce, things like that.  Her husband (not Courtney

I.

A minimally invasive vaporization of the prostate, she says. Performed with high-energy light beams. Precise, she says. We're talking about the difference between a baseball and a

Flight Patterns

The night the ghosts got in we went out the third floor window.
I heard boot steps on the stairs and 
we were gone.
Out past paint flecked white wicker into the forest, 
we’d

Exley, Brock Clarke’s third novel, is the story of Miller le Ray, a boy whose father may or may not have left Miller and his mother to go and serve in Iraq.  Told from Miller’s point of view — and

The men I meet always want someone I’m not. Naturally, I think the one I’m meeting tonight will be different. I’ve never seen him before; we’ve only talked over the phone. He runs a voice mapping

with-draw \with-‘dro\ vb- withdrew; withdrawn; withdrawing-  a: to remove from a place of deposit < I check the pockets of my husband’s blue jeans before placing them in the washer andwithdraw a

Do not open your story by talking about the weather. Do not exceed the posted speed limits. Do not accept packages from strangers. Do not make any sudden movements. Do not interfere in an ongoing

FORECAST

Little Thomas and I are out in the yard, ripping up dead saplings by the roots so the wind won’t. Last week a gust sent a dry limb through the kitchen window. It took thirty minutes to

Headline: DON’T SAY MOVIE UNLESS YOU MEAN IT

Profile: Sometimes people invite me to watch a movie when what they really want is sex. This bothers me when the movie is one I actually want to

Stewart O'Nan,
Author of Emily, Alone, Last Night at the Lobster, and Faithful: Two Diehard Boston Red Sox Fans Chronicle the Historic 2004 Season (with Stephen

America’s Game: It is the place where memory gathers.
 – Walt Whitman

1.
My mother, Brooklyn-born and raised, used to tell me that if the Dodgers had been in the World Series in 1943,

He doesn’t float to the plate, just walks. A smattering of applause, what you’d expect on a Wednesday afternoon. “Now pinch hitting,” the announcer calls.

We look to the scoreboard, see what

Expecting Dodger Stadium to be half as awesome as Camelback Ranch

Asking husband why he can't lay down a bunt like he used to

Purchasing Swarovski crystal accented team logo tee

LATE SEASON

In Remington, concerned neighbors who had not seen Mrs. Gross, an elderly woman who lived alone in a corner house, in almost a week, called the police to report their fears about

Memory is its Medium: 
A Conversation with Bradford Morrow

Bradford Morrow's latest novel, The Diviner's Tale, uses some tropes of the traditional murder mystery and elements of the

Before I left for the army, there were five of us camping in my father’s one-room cabin in Vermont. I watched a blond girl named Ingrid vomit spaghetti for a half hour, heaped over the sap

Michiko takes a class to learn the guitar. The class is taught by a moustache and a pair of boots. Michiko's ex-boyfriend moves to Kyoto, which is not Osaka. Michiko's musical ability is

My aunt willed me a cuckoo clock. It’s the clock I ran to watch every hour after school, waiting for the bird to pop out, the cuu and then the coo while she taught singing lessons in the

Monster

The Loch Ness Monster Had A Baby! the front cover of the supermarket rag says and we scream and scream and scream THE LOCHNESS MONSTER HAD A BABY and we are so happy and we say WE

Editor’s Note:

The following interview was sent to Hobart unsolicited and un-pitched. It was also un-emailed. I was sent it through the mail, and it was the only file on a 3 ½”

The Elders rented a two-bedroom unit in Building 16. The office staff knew Harv and Jean from their numerous complaints. Marvin Gardens, located just five minutes from the university, sold

Patterson Thorndike is Dead

Patterson Thorndike was dead.  What was Dresden supposed to do with that information?  He felt a flush of shame, twice.  First for remembering every time he’d

Fitzhugh was there for the convention. Marcy held out a brochure which he took, then on his third lap around the hall, he asked her to dinner.  Over better-than-average calimari, he told