'Lamu' by Noel O'Regan

“ As Aisling drives, Noah struggles to match the abandoned streets that now stream past his window with the city he has experienced the past few days – gone is the feeble crawl of traffic, the strangling smell of diesel, the stutter through roundabouts where knuckles harried closed car windows, and hands offered roasted corn on a stick, fresh mangoes, pineapple, and, one time, a kitten.”

Photo by Miville Tremblay, via Flickr.

The August 2017 Long Story, Short offering, 'Lamu', is by Irish writer and Sean Dunne Young Writer winner Noel O'Regan. Join hopeful but uncertain Noah on a road trip with a former flame through Kenya, as they skirt the boundaries of reconnection and dissolution. READ 'LAMU'.

Salisbury Beach by Sean Conway

Our father, Charles Hartley II, hanged himself in the attic in the spring of 1977. I was five years old. My brother Kelly was eleven. May 25th: the same day that Star Wars opened, though I didn’t make that connection until later.

'Salisbury Beach' is the May 2017 offering from Long Story, Short Journal, by author Sean Conway. Visit a seaside town on the decline, where a young boy's life is spinning wildly on carnival's tilt-a-whirl, from his first tastes of both love and bereavement. READ 'SALISBURY BEACH.'

The Brothers Kaplan by J.A. Bernstein

To the casual observer, the interior of the Pittsfield Building, in the Jewelers Row District of downtown Chicago, resembles the setting for some seedy film noir. The Gothic-style, marble-faced atrium, replete with burnished brass mail chutes and antiquated shops – mostly other obsolete jewelers – struck Sid Kaplan as a cell, one in which he had been confined for the last thirty-six years of his life, ever since he agreed, however hastily, to continue the family trade.

Long Story, Short's April 2017 edition is by Hackney Prize and Knut House Prize winning writer J.A. Bernstein. 'The Brothers Kaplan' brings readers into the confidence of two men whose private lives are hidden from each other, their estrangement exacerbated by one's acceptance, and the other's rejection, of family legacy. READ 'THE BROTHERS KAPLAN'.

'Entrusted' by Fiona Whyte

Something had caught hold of her at the grave, had reached inside her and awoken a tremendous urge to go home once more. Now nothing would do to set it aright other than to head out at once for Ballinlough before it was too late. Mary Frances accompanied her, muttering all the while that Annie wouldn’t appreciate unexpected visitors.

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The March 2017 edition of Long Story, Short Journal is 'Entrusted' by Irish writer Fiona Whyte. Just in time for St. Patrick's Day, we have a tale of two countries -- of the Irish who travelled to America for work, adventure or escape -- and the inevitable impact such a distance would have on a family. READ 'ENTRUSTED' BY FIONA WHYTE.

'No Wake' by Jenna Isherwood

“On the drive down to Joe’s, Kelly has chided me for being a tourist because I suggested paying for a boat trip, as if her two years in Florida have made her a local. I got the idea of manatee spotting from the dog-eared cartoon sea cow dangling from Kelly’s rear-view mirror, its air-freshening chemicals long-since expended.”

Endangered sea creatures and endangered friendships feature in May 2016's edition of Long Story, Short Journal: 'No Wake' by Jenna Isherwood. A visit to Florida swampland searching for the vulnerable that lives just beneath the surface makes for perfect early summer reading.  Photo by Bob Miller. READ 'NO WAKE'.

Mandy Taggart's 'Pride'

“Across the road, Laverty’s shop lies shuttered behind steel. Closed two years now, the neighbour told her, after Laverty retired and the sons weren’t interested. Some resourceful vandal has covered the spray-painted obscenities across the shutters with neat squares of white, each one topped with a smiling face in acid yellow. A van swishes past, and Laura feels something in the air shoot free, like the blockage in a straw. When she looks again at the opposite pavement, Laverty’s lion is waiting for her.”

What do you do when a lion follows you home? February 2016's edition of Long Story, Short Journal unique short story, 'Pride', answers the question. Author Mandy Taggart, previous winner of the Michael McLaverty Short Story Award, gives readers a window on a life marked in equal measures by vulnerability and strength. Accompanying photo by American photographer Austin Granger. READ 'PRIDE'. 

Gyurd by Shane Strachan

“It had been nearly six years since Diane had last seen the Lerwick postmark on a letter addressed to her. When she picked the letter up off her welcome mat she felt her body stiffen and her hand grip tight on the cream envelope. In a daze, she walked through her lobby to the kitchen and put her mail down on the table next to the other envelopes she’d been given throughout the week: her birthday cards. She started opening them. Most so far had ‘40’ on the front but some gave her other names like ‘Cousin’ and ‘Friend’. She knew fine well what the one in the cream envelope would name her.”

The November 2015 edition of Long Story, Short Journal is an image from German photographer Alina Hartwig and a story, 'Gyurd', from Scottish writer Shane Strachan. 'Gyurd' is a Shetlandic Scots word meaning 'gift', referring to the many offerings, complex in their attachments and consequences, which are given within the tale. READ SHANE STRACHAN'S 'GYURD'.

Tiny Dancer by Lisa Lang

Photo © Alan McCord

"From her window she watched the street. There were people in good coats – with no pilling, no unflattering bulk – walking with clear purpose, cyclists gliding by. It was late afternoon, night was falling, and the alien, blue-rinsed light settled on her like a kind of despair. She had a sense of being adrift on a vast, indifferent ocean. Whether she ate her dinner or not, went to sleep or stayed awake all night, or even stopped existing, who was to know?" 

Long Story, Short Journal's June 2015 edition is 'Tiny Dancer' : an examination of the solitude required for artistry, detailed in a portrait of a young dancer who is living away from home for the first time. Author Lisa Lang is the recipient of The Australian/Vogel Literary Award for her début novel Utopian Man.  CLICK HERE TO READ 'TINY DANCER'. 

Sheela-na-Gig by Susan Burke-Trehy

She settled into her seat near the back of the bus, grateful that her dishevelled appearance would discourage the other passengers from sitting close to her. She had, in the last few weeks taken to dressing in dungarees, fleeces and wellies. Added to this were a few well chosen gardening titles from the library and a straw basket so that she just about passed for an organic farmer-type, the kind that would not look out of place on a bus bound for West Cork. As she peered out of the grimy bus window, she allowed the last glimpses of Cork to slip out of sight, pushing away any feelings of regret or fear. All is as it should be, she whispered under her breath...

The March 2015 edition of Long Story, Short Journal leads readers into the darker heart of spring with emerging writer Susan Burke-Trehy's 'Sheela-na-Gig'; photo by Alan McCord. Rose Hawthorn is on the verge of a new life, returning to her childhood home to settle an old debt in a tale that merges a contemporary narrative of estrangement with an undercurrent of Irish mythology. CLICK HERE TO READ 'SHEELA-NA-GIG'. 

Forests of Antarctica

“That's it. Three weeks worth of stuff packed in twenty minutes. It might be a personal best,” Sam said, hovering in the doorway. It was after midnight when Sam walked into the kitchen of their cottage, where Diana liked to do her work at the massive butcher block table, and he looked tired but there was a warm glow in his cheeks. Diana stared at the screen, typing things that she would have to erase later and making notes that meant nothing.

'The Forests of Antarctica' by Courtney Watson takes place in Ushuaia, Argentina--the last stop before Antarctica--where the motto is the end of the world, the beginning of everything. Here we find a couple coping with the strain of distance as the husband ventures off on long-term scientific expeditions, leaving his wife to welcome a visitor from his past. Watson's work is understated and moving, accompanied by a photo by Russian photographer Dimitrii Smirnov. CLICK HERE TO READ FORESTS OF ANTARCTICA.

Sundown

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Photo © Ola Zackrisson

Angela wondered how far from home Pearl actually was, and what kind of trouble she’d found. Accustomed to shielding her mother from Pearl’s problems, Angela shoved this fear to the back of her mind and steeled herself for this encounter, not sure what she’d find: a self-pitying decline or a ramped-up snit.

 'Sundown' is the story of a woman struggling to keep contacts with both her estranged daughter, and her mother who is unhappy with life in a nursing home. It is an exploration of grief, punctuated by moments of transcendent beauty, encouraging the reader to find solace in patience and hope. Writer Jan English Leary's short-story collection manuscript, Frequent Losers, was named a finalist in the Flannery O’Connor Award. CLICK HERE TO READ 'SUNDOWN'.