All posts in Member Writing & Art

October 6, 2019

“Evidence of V” a Novel by Sheila O’Connor

Posted by Jack B. Rochester in Book Reviews, Member Writing & Art, Writing

Reviewed by Honorah Creagh In her novel Evidence of V: A Novel in Fragments, Facts, and Fictions, Sheila O’Connor pieces together the true story of her maternal grandmother, V, a woman whose existence was a family secret. O’Connor’s mother, June, was adopted by V’s sister, and O’Connor did not know about V until she was sixteen years old. Working from incomplete information, O’Connor colors in the spaces between the facts, transforming V from a name on court documents into an effervescent, audacious girl. In the process, O’Connor tells an affecting story not just about the injustices V and other young women like her suffered, but about what it means for someone to be family, and how a person’s influence reaches through generations. In 1935, fifteen-year-old V lives in Minneapolis and spends her nights singing at…

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October 5, 2019

“Little Black Dress” and “Collegiate Correspondence” by Rachel Gonzalez

Posted by Mike Rochester in Member Writing & Art, Writing

Two Stirring Mise-en-Scènes Little Black Dress Lilia walked 7,392 steps to and from her apartment on an average day. And being a woman, Lilia was, on an average day, cat-called at a new corner. A new stoop. A new shop front. Since her body became what it was meant to be, they were there, noticing out loud. A new man. The same bullshit. “Ay Ma, lemme talk to you!” “Yo Shawty! Where you goin so fast?” “Baby Doll! I got something for you!” Day in and day out, Lilia would leave her house in any manner of outfits—slacks, skirts, blouses, shorts, dresses, blazers, heels, flats—didn’t matter. Whatever it was, she shouldn’t be wearing it. Whatever she was wearing was subjected to a sordid request to the men she passed. If she was outside, she was…

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October 2, 2019

Your Habit or Mine? Two Poems by Chad Lutz

Posted by Mike Rochester in Member Writing & Art, Writing

859 Years they were singing Ave Maria in the streets when the flames leaped out of its crown like a scurry of small animals glass popping wood hissing from years of accumulated moisture they’re calling it a shared sadness it’s madness what we find in the losing ** If Anything, We Played Each Other you only smoke on occasion you smoke every day of your life fingers caked with the cancer you’ll contract the Turkish spices and menthol chards your lungs draw deep your mouth purses saying you’ll quit tomorrow telling me you’ll quit today we share a Size 8 waistline & every order of nachos you plant kisses on my earlobes & tuck your hands into the seat of my pants we dance but that’s it you’re everything to me a habit to pass…

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September 30, 2019

How To Succeed In Your Writing Career

Posted by Jack B. Rochester in Interviews, Member Writing & Art, Writing

An Interview with Fictional Cafe Barista Jason Brick In this wide-ranging, 30-minute conversation about today’s writing and publishing environment, Jason shares his knowledge and experience as a writer, an author, and a publisher with curious Fictional Cafe writers who wish to create a sustainable business and income from their writing, rather than its being a hobby in which one indulges in his or her spare time. Jason Brick is a professional writer, martial artist, travel addict, and dad whose work has been published across multiple genres and formats. He has contributed over 3,000 articles and short stories to print magazines and online sites on topics ranging from home improvement, to health and wellness, to cocktail recipes, to small business management. Some of Jason’s top-level corporate clients include BlackBelt and Thrillist magazines, American Express, Intuit, and Mint.com. Jason has ghostwritten more…

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September 28, 2019

Posing the Tough Questions — Poetry by Casey Aimer

Posted by Mike Rochester in Member Writing & Art, Writing

Lawrence Sullivan Ross In Aggieland where the Kool-Aid is laced with bled maroon were they conscious of the irony in 1918, preserving their Confederate General hero in bronze skin? Today, Sully, I mapped out your statue like you mapped out the West, my legs dangling, sitting on your copper head and Van Dyke beard. All so I could say this: When the immigrant sculptor, Pompeo Coppini, was re-forging your sole into existence I bet you struggled and resisted your creator. When your fingers were being hammered into submission you clutched in desperation didn’t you at the white work floor lights before being carted away in a colored wheel barrel. At your dedication you protested the brown and black pebbles underneath your podium. They reminded you too much of the people screaming freedom amid Reconstruction where…

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September 23, 2019

Dark Poetic Visions of Nigeria by Batunde Babafemi

Posted by Jack B. Rochester in Member Writing & Art, Writing

Reminisce You remember when we were too beautiful to smile? savoring the tears for another day? How we search our breath In our nose? You see the prophesy was true; we will all die But my lover’s death took away my spine. I crawl all night and wonder about the shadow of a man buried inside a plank—The day I heard his demise, I thought it was a prank Until I see tears from my eyes. My love, How long have you been cold? Alone, I buried my pain inside my gaze looking through our memories I heard your voice inside my speech, & when the clergy summoned me My words become flaccid Like this I know how much death took from me. Abigail Her silence has words burning inside her Same as a…

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September 21, 2019

“My Year in Art,” by Steve Sangapore

Posted by Mike Rochester in Fine Art, Guest Posts, Member Writing & Art, Writing

After graduating from college in 2013 with a degree in art, I spent the next five years maintaining a sharp focus on honing my craft as a painter. Countless studio hours were matched with even more time pursuing opportunities, schmoozing with gallerists, and making my presence known within Boston’s, and the greater Northeast’s, vibrant art communities. While each year yielded great leaps in my technical dexterity and academic proficiency as a painter, the art was virtually devoid of the most important component that separates art from craft . . . and I just couldn’t see it. Or, perhaps I could see it—I just didn’t want to. The debates between, “what is good art” and “what is or can be art” have been raging on for years – particularly since the mid-19th century with the birth…

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September 17, 2019

“The Good Pimp,” A Short Story by James Hanna

Posted by Mike Rochester in Member Writing & Art, Writing

While sitting in a Starbucks on Mission Street, I met a splendid pimp. The breakfast crowd had dispersed when he ambled into the restaurant, and he gave me a friendly nod before sitting down at the table beside me. He was a towering man with a heavy, black beard and menacing scar on his cheek, but his eyes were as kind as a minister’s and softer than poached eggs. “Good morning,” he said, his voice as smooth as butter. He was toting a leather briefcase, which he placed upon the floor, and he gazed at me like a spaniel hoping to gobble a tidbit. “Have you tried the strudel?” he asked me. “All my girls love the strudel. I assure you it’s the finest in all of San Francisco.” Having already sampled the nut bread,…

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September 12, 2019

“True Blue,” Every Man’s Fantasy – A Short Story by Paul Lewellan

Posted by Mike Rochester in Member Writing & Art, Writing

For fifty-three years the Hilltop Diner on College Street fed the academic community of the University of Southern Iowa (USI). Dr. Benjamin “Blue” Boru’s usual table occupied the back corner by the bathrooms underneath the giant wheezing room air conditioner. Blue arrived daily at six a.m. and ordered The Special: two eggs (fried hard), two slices of buttered toast, hash browns, pork sausage links, and black coffee. After breakfast, Sheila Morgan, the owner’s redheaded daughter, cleared away his plate while Blue poured over Nag-Hammadi manuscripts. She left him alone, except to refill his coffee. She waitressed mornings, cooked for the lunch crowd, then called in the produce orders. Late afternoon and evenings she studied. Sheila began a master’s degree in religion the year she turned forty-three. Her first class was Blue’s. He’d been a regular…

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