Author: skipjackreview
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Spotlight on “Ghost Town” by Paulette Guerin
Ghost Town Published in “Cave Region Review” “Another tie chipped into the river, hitting sky. The boys stripped their shirts, hooking them on iron spikes in the rotten wood of the train bridge. the scent of rain clung to the underside of every leaf; silkworms pillowed poison sumacs along the bank. The boy I liked…
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Ope Here: The Dead Herring Prize
Ope here, Holy mackerel, it’s July! I just don’t believe it. Where does the time go? Makes me wonder. You know, I spend a lot of my time wonderin’. And, you know what else? It seems like, the more I wonder, the less I know. Ain’t that funny? Not ha-ha funny, you know,…
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Announcing the Dead Herring Prize
Art—even lower-case-a art or writing—is not a surefire way to get rich. Sure, it would be nice, but for creative people, the process itself is the reward. We create art because it helps us to maintain some semblance of sanity—creating things heals us. We create because we must. But, hey, baby’s gotta eat! The editors…
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Five Journals to Submit Nature Writing
Reckoning This stellar publisher has an other-worldly love of the natural world, showcasing both literary and genre work. Like Skipjack Review, Reckoning does not limit themselves to literary phenomenon and seeks to publish “cli-fi” and other sorts of slippery, slipstream writing in addition to traditional narrative styles. https://reckoning.press/ Split Rock Review SRR is creating quite…
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The Pouting Trout Life Jacket
Good morning and good day, you pretty, shiny fishes and creatures. This is the Pouting Trout. Feel the sun’s healing and know it is a new and better day. I just wanted to let you know I am out here. I am listening. I know what you’re going through, and I know it isn’t easy,…
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5 Places Writing Comes to Life in Springfield, Missouri
You don’t necessarily have to travel anywhere to write, but sometimes a change of scenery can break up the mental monotony. Even a desk with a view can lose its artistic edge after a while; getting some fresh air makes a big difference too. So, if you’re like us and enjoy a little adventure or…
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#amwriting #freewriting
Developing a solid writing habit is not easy, and often, it’s plain hard. How can I make more time to write? What should I work on now that I’ve made the time? Where do I start? Where do I go from there? How do I know if I’m on the right track? I don’t know…
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Five Midwest Journals To Submit Your Writing
Storm Cellar: A literary journal of safety and danger Oof! Love, love, LOVE me some Storm Cellar. In the Midwest, they have these twisters, you see–land hurricanes. Zero water. Zip. But they can be just as deadly. Midwesterners dig hobbit holes in the ground which they then crawl into when the weather threatens to whisk…
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Ope!
Ope here, Excuse me. Pardon. You got a second? You know what I’ve been thinkin’ a lot about lately? Lately, I’ve been thinkin’ a lot about internal dialogue. I’ve been asking myself, Hey, Ope, what in the heck is going on inside people’s heads? Maybe I’m crazy, but all day long I look around and…
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#amwriting #really #noreally
The more we write—and even more so, the more we read—the more glaring it becomes how much more we have to learn, not only as writers, but as participants in the world at large. It’s easy to imagine that people like Stephen King (perhaps the most obvious example) are exempt from this notion and simply…
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Five Journals to Submit Speculative Fiction
Three-Lobed Burning Eye What a name. They say to name is to know—whoever they are, whatever they know. One thing’s for sure: the folks at 3LBE know what they’re doing. If you’ve written a gripping, writhing head-scratcher of a speculative story, you should send that puppy to 3LBE! Even if you haven’t, you should swim…
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Spotlight on “Mattress” by Dave Malone
When I was in my late twenties, I had a tumultuous romantic relationship. If your readers know of John Alan Lee’s love styles, then this affair would be categorized as erotic and manic.
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No Joke: We’re Ope’n!
Ope here, The day has finally come: April Fool’s day and the first day of Skipjack Review’s inaugural reading period. Pardon my pun, but the editors and I await your submissions with baited breath. Finish up your final polishing and send us your work! We here at Skipjack Review love reading, as writers and…
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#amwriting #endings #beginnings
I keep a running list titled Things I Want to Write About, which is an insanity in itself because the list gets longer and longer and my free time less and less, and the more I think about it, the crazier I get. So, I don’t think about it. In fact, it helps not to…
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#amwriting
Failures, rejections, and efforts that don’t take flight are our best teachers—though rarely do we learn anything in the moment from such lessons. We just feel the sting. If we’re lucky, criticism is punctuated with admiration and we receive some kind of insight about how to improve a manuscript, for example, but the days of…
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Five Journals to Submit Unconventional Work
Ope! Excuse me! Check out this list of literary journals I fancy.
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Who is Skipjack?
Who’s askin’? Skipjack asks the questions. A better question is, Who’s Ope? Skipjack is the fringes itself, the outer limits, the abyss staring back after you’ve stared long enough. Wait—what was the question? Here, hit this. Conceived in early 2022 at the River Pretty Writer’s Retreat in the Missouri Ozarks, USA, Skipjack Review is named…
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Ope!
We all know about skipjack herrings and their obsession with those lights we see at night. You’re probably thinking we’re a little silly, throwing our bodies and everything we’ve got at what amounts to nothing more than an idea, or a curiosity. None of us knows what’s waiting for us up in space, and thus…
the water and the gills 