All the street’s a stage—one that’s eerily deserted in Paul Wilborn’s comic-noir Florida Hustle. This trickle-down era tempest is weathered by a jaded, albeit generous, Prospero, Cavanaugh Riley—whose past promises finally come due, especially for his long-forsaken daughter. Her dedicated and eventful search finds her in the wilds of West Palm, Florida, en route to her father’s […]
Michele Wirt
Michele Wirt is a long-time faculty in the humanities and visual arts with the College of Central Florida. A resident of Citrus County since 1974, fan of swamp literature and film, such as Feral State set right here in my home town. Member of various local arts and historical groups, mother of two, enjoys studio […]
Read of the Month: “The Girl from the Red Rose Motel” by Susan Beckham Zurenda
In this review/interview hybrid, Associate Editor Dawn Major discusses with author Susan Beckham Zurenda her second novel, The Girl From The Red Rose Motel (Mercer University Press 2023). DM: Susan, I thoroughly enjoyed your first book, Bells for Eli, and absolutely identified with Hazel’s character in The Girl from the Red Rose Motel even more. […]
“Everybody Here is Kin” by BettyJoyce Nash
Everybody Here is Kin (Madville Publishing 2023) by BettyJoyce Nash is a moving, well-written literary story about family—the ones we are born into and the ones we create. It is also a finely tuned tale of a tight-knit community living on a small barrier island off the coast of Georgia—a place where the year-round islanders […]
“The Bullet Swallower” by Elizabeth Gonzalez James
The Bullet Swallower (Simon & Schuster 2024) by Elizabeth Gonzalez James is a wild yarn of a story with elements of a classic western adventure invigorated with mystical realism and more than a gloss of karmic turbulence. In short, it’s fascinating. Literary historical fiction at its finest, this is an ambitious novel which more than […]
“The Digital Self: Poems and Illustrations” by Wesley Bishop
“It felt like a time apt for apocalyptic writing,” says Bishop in his note at the end of The Digital Self (Lulu 2023). “Yet,” he says, “we continued to create countless traces of ourselves with each day spent in the digital sphere. The things we liked, or shared, or rage posted about, or emailed, or […]