Found a home for this one

A story that is. Finally. I was beginning to wonder if it'd be relegated to the bottom drawer where unloved stories go to die.

It's called Love Scenes (Double Feature) and is up over at Metazen. Link is here!

Theatre Review: Julius Caesar at the RSC 2012

Got a review up of the RSC's latest production of Julius Caesar over at The Hollywood News.  I loved this production; it was also televised a few weeks ago on the Beeb as part of their Shakespeare Unlocked season.  Not that I could watch it again as it clashed with a certain England football match...

Kissing Frankenstein and Other Stories

Introducing the Flash-Fiction South-West Anthology Kissing Frankenstein and Other Stories.

Featuring a collection of teeny tiny flash fiction stories from all over the south west of the UK in celebration of Flash Fiction Day 2012.

I'm really excited to have one of my stories 'Little Bug' in here! You can buy it here as a printed book and I believe a Kindle edition will be following.

Definitely looking forward to getting this and reading through all the other flashes :)

Poems

Some of my poems are now up over at Danse Macabre. Two (The Collector and Fault Lines) are in the Isotropic poetry section, and one (On the Couch) is part of their "Du Jour" teaser. I'm putting the links here but I think the second one might change later on.

This all made me very happy! Danse Macabre has some really wicked themes and the quality is always high. The theme for this issue is "Strontium". According to DM:

"Strontium is a soft, silvery metal most widely known for the synthetic isotope strontium-90 (⁹⁰Sr), a product of nuclear fission. Strontium-90 is present in radioactive fallout (aboveground testing 1945-1980) and releases from nuclear power plants (e.g., Chernobyl in 1986 and Fukushima last year)."

and

"STRONTIUM, however, is different. This time, you bring the context with you."

Jersey Devil Press

My story 'Exposure' is up on Jersey Devil Press today.

This one went through a few changes - mainly in tense and perspective.  It was first person for a while but I think the change to third works much better.

Direct web link here: Exposure or you can download the whole edition and see the other stories as a PDF here: Jersey Devil Press Aug 2011.

Metazen

I've had one of my stories put up on Metazen (which I'm most pleased about).

It's called My Body, by Starlight.

Metazen is always worth a look and has some great pieces up every day.

[phantom kangaroo]

I've had my first poetry acceptance/publication this week - something I'm pretty excited about.  It's in an online magazine called Phantom Kangaroo which I've been reading for a little while now.  Initially the name grabbed me, but when I looked at the manifesto I knew it was the sort of publication that was right up my street:

Phantom Kangaroo is published on the 13th of each month, and features 13 poems by 13 poets.

We accept poems in any form, of any subject, or of any length, but favor is given to poetry in the shape of ghost sightings, horoscopes, obituaries (preferably yours), fortune cookie fortunes, tales of UFO abductions, and home-made love spells (preferably ones that work). 

It's run by poet Claudia Lamar - you can check out her work here:
http://claudialamar.com/

Anyway, here's a bit of background context about my poem 'A Ghost About Town'.  Last summer John (I work with him, he's an English teacher too at my college) kind of got me into this induced, heightened state of poetry writing.  He'd give me some material (a quote, newspaper article or myth) and I'd produce a poem, and quite often he'd also produce one and we'd compare.  This one came about from a quote from Robert Benchley, the American humorist, about ghosts.  It got me thinking about America and Europe and our differing ideas about/sense of history.  Also at the forefront of my mind were ideas from New Historicist Stephen Greenblatt (Hamlet in Purgatory) - hence my slight manipulation of a Shakespeare quote in there.  So all these ideas slopped around my head for a while and this was the result.
Here's the link, but please do check out the rest of the issue.
http://www.phantomkangaroo.com/issue-no-5/a-ghost-about-town.html

[molotov cocktail]

I've just found a home for this flash fiction piece I wrote before Christmas.  It's in Molotov Cocktail, which I'm really stoked about as it's a quality flash journal online.  Have a look and check out the other pieces in there (and the back issues).

http://themolotovcocktail.com/past-issues/vol-1-issue-23/leavethecity/