Narrative nonfiction

/Tag:Narrative nonfiction

Please, Be Safe

By | 2020-02-17T14:14:23-08:00 February 20th, 2020|Categories: Issue 104: 20 February 2020|Tags: , |

By Tyhi Conley   Before they arrived, we were laughing, telling stories outside of the convenience store. Over the years, the store’s owner got to know us. He’d sold to us since we were kids buying dollar Arizona’s and 50 cent honey buns every summer day on our way to the pools, courts, or houses of [...]

The Rainbow Sign

By | 2020-01-06T07:46:57-08:00 January 9th, 2020|Categories: Issue 101: 09 January 2020|Tags: , |

By Sara Marchant   We went, my mother and I, to get haircuts. The previous appointment was still there, standing in front of the mirror, talking. This woman’s hair made her look like a pretty Afghan dog; her large green eyes did little to compensate for wearing clothes too dowdy for a woman in her forties. [...]

Good Mourning, America

By | 2020-11-06T15:38:01-08:00 August 8th, 2019|Categories: Issue 92: 08 August 2019|Tags: , , , , , , , |

By Kit-Bacon Gressitt   It’s eighth-grade writing class day and the weekly morning jaunt to my favorite little school, nestled in a rural Southern California valley. Here, the water table’s level prevents developers from bulldozing nurseries and groves, and there’s still a farmer’s grange. A canopy of Live Oaks shades my drive to the school, where [...]

Just the Facts, Please

By | 2019-05-27T14:08:09-07:00 May 30th, 2019|Categories: Issue 87: 30 May 2019|Tags: , , , , |

By Caroline Taylor   It’s okay if you don’t recognize the make or model of the car that hit you. It’s okay if you can’t be sure it was gray or silver, and no one expects you to recall the license plate details. After all, they came out of nowhere. Your car is totaled, and you [...]

Between the River and the Rock

By | 2019-02-18T19:24:16-08:00 February 21st, 2019|Categories: Issue 81: 21 February 2019|Tags: , , , , , |

By Liz Kellebrew   We were born to this place, to the broad bowl of the sky and the rolling fields of the plains, to the buffalo and wild horses, to the clouds and tall grass. We tore strips of lightning from our sides, and our ribs spread out like the wings of eagles. This is [...]

A Shithole Is

By | 2020-11-06T15:50:21-08:00 January 25th, 2018|Categories: Issue 54: 25 Jan 2018|Tags: , , , , |

By William C. Anderson   A shithole is an astronomically wealthy nation that refuses to provide healthcare for all people. A shithole is an astronomically wealthy nation that refuses to guarantee access to clean drinking water and heating for schools in the winter. A shithole is a nation that has enough wealth to end poverty, but [...]

Civil Discourse in the Trumpocalypse

By | 2017-12-12T14:04:20-08:00 December 14th, 2017|Categories: Issue 51: 14 Dec 2017|Tags: , |

By Sara Marchant   My brother Marvin is calling me, and, as usual, I debate whether to answer the phone. My mother claims she never had an affair with Curb Your Enthusiasm’s Larry David, but my brother is so similar to the self-centered, self-absorbed, neurotic nervous maniac David, that I’m not sure I believe her. I [...]

#MeToo

By | 2017-10-17T18:42:41-07:00 October 19th, 2017|Categories: Issue 45: 19 Oct 2017|Tags: , , |

By R.R. Marsh   #MeToo. It took me several moments to post the words on my Facebook account. I had to think through my past—a place I generally prefer to avoid—and consider events I had ignored for quite some time. Had I been a victim of sexual assault? Or was I fashioning mere slips of male [...]

Going to Ground

By | 2017-08-09T13:35:37-07:00 August 10th, 2017|Categories: Issue 35: 10 Aug 2017|Tags: , |

By Sarah Einstein   Like a good citizen, I call my senators at least once a week these days, but their aides are brusque. They tell me that Alexander and Corker support the president’s education agenda/healthcare reform/immigration order or whatever I’m outraged about on a given day. In the first few weeks, they’d thank me for [...]

Inaugural Bird Omens

By | 2017-06-15T12:01:59-07:00 June 15th, 2017|Categories: Issue 29: 15 June 2017|Tags: , , |

By Annie Connole inauguration (n.) 1560s, from French inauguration “installation, consecration,” and directly from Late Latin inaugurationem (nominative inauguratio) “consecration,” presumably originally “installment under good omens;” noun of action from past participle stem of inaugurare “take omens from the flight of birds; consecrate of install when omens are favorable,” from in- “on, in” (see in- (2)) [...]

I Still Am

By | 2017-05-10T15:00:17-07:00 May 11th, 2017|Categories: Issue 24: 11 May 2017|Tags: , |

By David Martinez   I’m reading Open Veins of Latin America—because I’m writing my South-American book—when the woman in the parking lot starts to scream. The man’s screaming, too, and it’s violent screaming and I can’t see them. But I know they’re both red-faced and she’s crying. She’s shrieking. They’ve both been shrieking for a lifetime, but I couldn’t [...]

Miscarriage

By | 2017-03-06T10:19:44-08:00 March 16th, 2017|Categories: Issue 16: 16 Mar 2017|Tags: , |

By Heather Herrman   A month ago, I lost my daughter to a miscarriage. Science did not tell me she was a girl, but I knew it through every bone in my body. My great-grandmother, Wilhelmina Volk, came from Germany when she was sixteen to an arranged marriage with a drunk. The man gave her two [...]

The Invisible

By | 2017-03-09T04:23:20-08:00 March 16th, 2017|Categories: Issue 16: 16 Mar 2017|Tags: , |

By Jason Metz   You do not see us, so let me show you. I’ll start here, with a needle. First, there’s an antiseptic pad to sterilize the injection area, to the left of the belly button, just below a birthmark. The needle is more like a fat pen, a pre-filled syringe encased in plastic with [...]

Something More

By | 2017-03-02T17:39:29-08:00 March 9th, 2017|Categories: Issue 15: 9 Mar 2017|Tags: , |

By Cynthia Romanowski   2017: January. Huntington Beach. I'm on my couch. Tears rolling down. Obama just thanked Michelle in his farewell and I've finally lost it. This is not about politics, at least it doesn't feel like it, it feels like something more. In the kitchen my boyfriend opens a package from the mail. It's the [...]

Blue Plate Special

By | 2017-02-23T11:29:15-08:00 February 16th, 2017|Categories: Issue 12: 16 Feb 2017|Tags: , , |

By Sara Marchant   The little girl in the booth behind me is bouncing on her vinyl seat in excitement, and I stop chewing my crunchy salad in order to better eavesdrop. My back is to her, and her back is towards me, so I can hear her breathy voice over the bouncing creak of the [...]