As somebody who loves this time of year, I find that the colder months often involve ritual and retreat—the daily sweetness of a hot cocoa drink, the comforting softness of a favourite blanket, the lighting of candles after early darkness. It’s also a fantastic time for creative inspiration whether you’re inside or outdoors. I am absolutely delighted to introduce our fifth volume of wonderful works, which all reflect the talent and profound perceptiveness of their creators.
Winter is a season of contrast, and that’s exactly what we wanted to capture with our “Cabin Fever” theme. While cabins can be a symbol of coziness and nostalgia, they can also be hives of isolation and entrapment. Simultaneously, we had to honor Pornstar Martini tradition by embracing all that is fun and whimsical. “Cabin Fever” evokes a sense of both sickness and revelling, which we felt was an apt representation of finding happiness in a world that threatens its marginalized. Repeatedly, these pieces show us how to find a balance of resilience, mutual protection, and fulfilment.
In the final pages of this volume, you’ll find a list of community resources. Think of this as our poster board—there are organizations, spaces, and action items that cover different areas of the US, UK, and beyond. In resistance, we felt that it was important to provide a safe space that allows our readers to take care of one another and themselves. We encourage you to use and support these resources as much as possible!
Thank you once again to the fabulous Pornstar Martini Editorial Team, which has continued to grow and provide endless camaraderie throughout the publication process.
Volume V cordially invites you to stay in our range of different literary cabins—each with its own distinct location and feel. You’ll find witches and aliens, ranters and ravers, yearners and loners. You may also notice that the cabins get progressively more remote.
So without further ado: welcome in! Snuggle up and find out where you feel most at home.
With Literary Love, Harriet Taylor Editor in Chief
Pornstar Martini Cabin Co.
Things I hear on the last train on Christmas Eve somewhere in EnglandMadeline English 12-13 Psalm 77:7Holly B. McCauley 14-17
The Wizard That Is, The Wizard That Was: a Review of WickedIsabel Kettler 20-21
Hungover at the DMVGeorge Evans 22-23
Same Old Story: a review of two international films with very different outcomesHarriet Taylor & Jazmin Polido 24-29
Cabin 1: Ski Resort Stay
Revive your inner social butterfly at the heart of a thriving ski resort. With the buzz of life here, you’ll find yourself moving at a truly invigorating pace.
WHITE CARABINERS
Words by Blue Gacel (they/them)
Two carabiners hooked on each side, climbing a stolen mountain
A shelter in sight
The foyer lights up; the floor is wet with snow, with clothes, with sweat
You turn to each other’s embrace and dance tightly
The heat burns
Your new clothes are ablaze, Your new shoes go up in smoke, Your backpack is reduced to ashes. It’s not your home.
Your love is nothing but intoxicating traveling for novelty ‘exotism’
Rashes cover your skin
You joke while moving your hips Everything melts the walls collapse No birds. No clouds.
Two white naked bodies entangled
Your moans are silent
Completely exposed and dismissed the fire-softened ice Dance, burning body until the mountain thaws until grass sprouts again Dance until the cabin is restored
Carolers singing of a maimed fourteen-year-old in a current-day war zone where kids younger than Mary are bleeding amongst the rubble/the question, “Are they not holy, too?” ringing in my ears/brakes squeaking as I try to get farther north/the rumbling of the engine/a pen scribbling next to me/the settling of an old leather jacket I will pass down to my daughter/the distant laughter in a photograph taken somewhere in-between when all my siblings lived in the same home, and they radiated that kind of joy that sparkled with content and dissipated into the air as fast as it appeared, even though I will spend the rest of my life reaching for it/jingle bells/ paper crinkling with the weight of words and well wishes/my soul aching for the pieces of it left across an ocean/the ping of a notification shooting their precious thoughts to me instead of being announced with all the fervor and excitement love can bring close enough for me to hear/a train pulling into a station/not my station/not a station anyone carrying my blood or big nose would recognize/but a station nevertheless
Words by Madeline English
McCauley/Holly Miss PORNSTAR MARTINI AIRWAYS
Words by Holly B. McCauley
AA749 FEB MAD > CLT
PSM/VOL000000005 2/2025
Now boarding American Airlines flight 749 with service to Charlotte, North Carolina.
23A. Window seat. You walk past the woman begging someone to switch a window for a middle so her husband can join her and their toddler. You’ve never understood why people travel with children under ten. Maybe this is a remnant of growing up broke, or maybe it’s something you begin to understand with age—like conservative politics or sudoku. But like, just pay for the seat if it’s that important. Jesus. Several people watch as you stuff a too-heavy bag into a toosmall compartment.
You fish out your water bottle, filled post-security checkpoint, and force down a Xanax. Some doctor prescribed you thirty, enough for fifteen visits home. A decade’s worth, if you don’t share. All you had to do was tell her you had family in the States. You have ten minutes until it kicks in. You’ll know it’s working when your tongue feels too big for your mouth and looking out at the Atlantic doesn’t fill you with an acute awareness of what it would feel like to drown.
You start watching a show on the little screen based on a book by a professor who taught you that writing in second person makes it easier to write about pain. That the distance makes it possible to slice open your heart on the tray table and offer the insides to a Google Doc. But you probably should’ve finished the book when it was assigned, because you don’t remember this much nudity. You look around frantically when the word “masturbation” appears in the show’s closed captions, and then you begin thinking too deeply about how people perceive you. This leads to you realizing that you liked who you were better before you started trying to find yourself. You preferred the girl who didn’t do the reading to the woman who watches the show instead. But you push that realization aside, tell yourself no one was even looking at your screen. You manage to convince yourself that you’re the only person on this American Airlines flight who can read English. You switch your TV to The Grinch anyway.
Please direct your attention to the safety card located in the seat pocket in front of you as we review the safety features of this aircraft.
The plane begins to taxi to its takeoff point, and you keep fingers glued to your pulse point. Another long ten hours, hoping for another insufferable twenty three years. You find the Lord’s Prayer on the tip of your tongue, but you wipe it off with the provided towelette. You wonder if your aversion to the words is the work of the Devil. Can he be found on a Boeing-777, or does he only fly private? Is he a goat in the cargo hold or a man in First Class?
Matter of fact, what are you? High, sedated, a nervous wreck in the shape of a woman forever waiting to wake up back when things were good. When you weren’t so scared.
Flight attendants, please prepare the cabin for departure.
You spend most flights thinking about home, or the lack thereof. You grew up in the Bible Belt, where there’s a species called CEOs: Christmas and Easter-only Christians. The ones who only showed up twice a year. The ones who only prayed when something horrible happened. You were born one of these, and then in adolescence you developed into a twice a week Christian, then once weekly, and then you were bipolar and speaking to angels through repeating numbers, and now you guess you’re a heathen, though maybe you’ve always been all of these at once depending on who you asked. You wonder if there’s such a thing as a Plane Christian: someone who only prays during turbulence. You wonder if your fear of flying comes from an old childhood fear of the Rapture.
You’d save these questions for God, but He never picks up the phone. Or maybe you blocked His number. After all, you’re the one who stopped praying for eight years when your friend killed himself a week before his sixteenth birthday. You only started again when a teenager opened fire in your mom’s school and you promised the Lord that if everyone made it out alive you would return to the flock. But they didn’t, so neither did you. You decided then that if God is real, He’s not someone you care to know. You stopped lighting candles in cathedrals, and in this way He stole your dead alongside your living.
You didn’t just turn from Him; you ran, and you pushed the shelves over on your way out. Like a petulant child, you will refuse to ask Him for help even if this plane goes down. Please don’t let this plane go down.
Ding. You may now power on your large electronic devices. Please ensure all devices remain in airplane mode for the duration of the flight.
The woman in front of you is searching frantically for her family’s passports. This makes you a little bit nauseous—after all, your bicontinental residency means you can barely enter an airport without an entire DMV’s worth of identity documents, up-to-date and organized. You find yourself judging this stranger unfairly, and then judging yourself for judging her. You
remember a sermon about Matthew and ignoring the plank in your eye. The thought only lasts for a second before it drifts away.
Your mind has wandered to the complete injustice of your so-called Father destroying the Tower of Babel. A priest would say hubris led to the invention of border entry requirements, but it seems more like divine jealousy to you. Even Jesus left Nazareth to save Himself.
This is your captain speaking. We have reached our cruising altitude of 39,000 feet. You are free to move about the cabin.
Soon enough, you’re above the ocean that separates your two halves. Like always, you imagine the crash, the sinking, the frigid cold. They’d never find your body. Your mom would never recover. All those damn documents, gone forever. These thoughts don’t halt your breathing like they normally would. In fact, you find you don’t care at all. Your skin is cool to the touch. The monitor says it’s -72 degrees outside. Maybe you’re shaking, but your neighbor is pressed too close for you to tell. You’re free to move around the cabin, sure, but where is there to go? Even your feet are fighting one another for space. You wrap yourself in Basic Economy’s thin excuse for a blanket. You remember that it’s easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter Heaven.
We will begin our inflight service in just a few moments.
With your mind and body detached, you can finally think about the future. You imagine who you would be in New York City. You imagine who you would be in New Zealand. You find neither of these people measure up to who you were before, but that was, of course, back when things were good. Back when faith was a one-way ticket, back when exaltation was a passport stamp. Now you wonder how many goodbyes you have left, how many people you can possibly love, how many dreams one person can chase. The thoughts make your brain feel like soup, or maybe that’s the medicine. But you don’t have time to worry about these things, because the flight attendants are coming around with drinks, and you’re a sucker for free ginger ale.
Cabin 2: Lakeside Loghouse
Let your mind melt away with mesmerizing reflections off rippling waters. And why not indulge in this cabin’s vast entertainment selection?
The Wizard That Is, The Wizard That Was: a Review of Wicked
Words by Isabel Kettler
If you look at the notes I took during my second viewing of Jon M. Chu’s Wicked, there’s a point where my cursive scrawl stops and becomes a series of big, angry capital letters. “MOVE THE LIGHT SOURCE IN FRONT OF [THE ACTORS’] FACES” I tell John Chu. Chu cannot hear me. This movie has been in the can for ages, and the sequel is probably complete and biding its time until November 2025. Wicked has made over 700 hundred million dollars. It’s nominated for ten Oscars. I have exchanged real U.S. dollars to see Wicked twice, and the magic is still missing. Leave it to a movie about a charlatan to make you feel cheated.
Of course, Wicked’s popularity is more comprehensible when you understand it as the latest link in a long chain of adaptations of one of the most beloved stories of all time. A reexamination of L. Frank Baum’s The Wizard of Oz, Wicked follows Elphaba (played by Cynthia Erivo), the future Wicked Witch of the West in the years before she was Oz’s Most Wanted. Shunned for her green skin, Elphaba distinguishes herself at college as a sorceress and forms a close bond with Glinda, the future Good Witch (played by Ariana Grande). Of course, it’s too good to last, and Elphaba tarnishes her reputation and must go into hiding after she rebels against the duplicitous, tyrannical Wizard of Oz (Jeff Goldblum). Though loosely based on Gregory Maguire’s 1995 novel, Wicked is a much more direct adaptation of the blockbuster 2003 musical of the same name which continues to run on Broadway twenty two years after it opened.
I for one think directors should abstain from making musicals—or perhaps from using sound altogether—until they remember that film is a visual medium, because there is no reason for Wicked to look as dull and lifeless as it does. If Days of Heaven was the first film to be shot entirely at the golden hour, Wicked must be the first film to be shot entirely at one in the afternoon. There are no dramatic shadows, no delicately placed gleams to guide the audience’s attention; the glare of the midday sun makes everything look flat and washed-out. While everything on screen is equally illumined during the day, things are equally indiscernible at night; and no matter the time of day, the actors are never properly lit.
A popular explanation for the epidemic of poor lighting in films is that movies must be lit this way to avoid shadows in order for computer generated visual effects to blend into the environments more easily. I would argue that the computer effects aren’t worth the trouble. CGI goats and lion cubs get their fair share of screen time in Wicked, but they can’t escape the weightless uncanniness of photorealistic animation; and I would gladly forgo the decorative school of fish swimming in the ceiling of the Ozdust Ballroom if it meant Erivo and Grande could dance anywhere but a dimly-lit greenish void.
Wicked is reluctant to display its actors, which is especially strange given that they are the only things livening up the frame. Erivo’s performance as Elphaba is on the restrained side, but her voice is undeniably gorgeous and can easily enrich an otherwise bleak cinematic experience. Her “Defying Gravity” is great, but her performance in “The Wizard and I” is delivered with such winning glee and excitement that it is difficult not to be charmed. Grande is every bit as good as reviews would have you believe. As Glinda, she’s energized and eager to please, at home with broad comedy and operatic vocalizations. If bad press hasn’t killed her Oscar chances, I wouldn’t be surprised to see her crowned Best Supporting Actress.
The rest of the cast ranges from unobjectionable to grating, with the exception of Jeff Goldblum. As the Wizard of Oz, Goldblum’s affability combined with his huckster showmanship give his performance a sinister edge. The film’s construction even occasionally echoes the wizard’s sleight of hand: when Goldblum is introduced, the wizard does a brief tap dance, and the sharp cut from Goldblum’s face to an isolated shot of tap dancing feet make it clear that these are two different performers. It’s almost self-aware in its blatant substitution, laughing at how the smoke and mirrors of film editing make the brain combine the images into one person. It’s a shame the movie isn’t that self-aware all the time.
If the movie was self-aware, it would be embarrassed of itself for being almost three hours long with no real resolution. Shrinkflation has taken everything you hold dear, including complete films. Wicked is far from the first movie to split itself in two for no reason other than greed, but no matter how many times it happens it’s difficult to feel satisfied when you’re paying for a fullprice ticket to a half-movie. Most of the scenes added for the movie only belabor points already made in the original musical. It’s not enough for one telekinetic demonstration to emphasize Elphaba’s magic powers, surely we must spend ten minutes watching her try to levitate a coin! Given how lopsided the original musical is (most of the good songs are in the first half, and the second half mostly features characters reacting to the events of The Wizard of Oz), it will be interesting to see what they have to add to the sequel to make it longer than forty minutes.
And here we come to the elephant in the room. Wicked’s faults might not be so grievous if it were descended from any other intellectual property, but Wicked is as influenced by the original book version of The Wizard of Oz as it is by the widely known and loved 1939 film starring Judy Garland. Watching The Wizard of Oz after watching Wicked is as big a jump as going to Technicolor from sepia. Here is a tangible, colorful, tantalizing world. Bert Lahr is clearly a forty year old man in a lion pelt and latex makeup, and still I believe he’s a lion. Even when a matte painting marks the clear end of the real yellow brick road, the horizon still seems to stretch on forever. Sometimes the illusion is more believable when you can see the man behind the curtain.
Grey walls, drop ceiling.
Waiting an hour for a ticket that will let me wait and wait more fully.
The smell of hospital. The sound, a pastiche of phones ringing unanswered, the whine of a vending machine refrigeration unit trapped in this place of waiting,
“Now serving I-005 at desk number five.”
And I’m thinking about that Evan Williams, crackling the black plastic label in my mind to sniff the nail polish perfection of its memory musk, and swilling one more drop of bitters, one more dollop of sweet syrup, four perfect ounces of brown in a shaker-cyclone to be slathered on an iceberg the size of Kansas.
And I’m feeling that precision prick at the edge of my scalp that says enough enough enough.
And I’m wondering if my mouth will ever taste the way it used to: before this ashen-ass fungal rot slipped, dry and dying, beneath my tongue.
And I am told I will save eight lives if I agree to donate my inner meat post-expiration.
But the old giant next to me in the blue surgical mask, the three-piece suit, the trenchcoat—this Sketchered Don Quixote— stares intensely at his phone through a magnifying glass large enough to fill a manhole.
And he looks like Senior Citizen Sherlock Holmes distorted in a fishbowl.
And I am happy.
Words by George Evans
Same old story
A review of two international films with very different outcomes
Words by Harriet Taylor
Jazmin Polido
Editor in Chief Harriet Taylor and Review and Criticism Editor Jazmin Polido discuss Emilia Pérez and How to Make Millions Before Grandma Dies. Emilia Pérez is a French Spanish language musical crime action thriller (no, really) that follows the gender transition and life of Emilia Pérez (Karla Sofía Gascón), head of a drug cartel in Mexico. Supporting characters include Emilia’s lawyer (Zoe Saldana) and Emilia’s wife (Selena Gomez). HTMMBGD is a Thai comedic drama that follows M (Putthipong Assaratanakul), a grandson who drops out of school to take care of his grandmother (Usha Seamkhum) in an effort to receive her inheritance when she passes from cancer. These two international films have been received differently. While Emilia Pérez is highly accoladed with thirteen Oscar nominations and the first openly trans actor nominated for an Academy Award, HTMMBGD remains under the radar with a shortlist recognition for Best International Feature Film, but ultimately no nomination. Harriet and Jazmin set out to answer why this might have been, their thoughts on each film and their contexts, and what they feel worked and didn’t work in the end.
Jazmin Polido: I tried to watch the entirety of Emilia Pérez in one day, but I couldn’t. It was just too chaotic. On IMDb, it’s marketed as a tale of “three strong women,” but I struggled to find that thread because there’s no time to process. Of course there’s cartel kidnapping. Of course there’s a really awkward, terrifying, uncomfortable sex change operation song, “La Vaginoplastia.” Of course the movie ends with a flaming car crash. And while all of this is happening, the characters are singing at you. If you are easily overwhelmed, do not watch this damn film. Then there’s the music itself. The melodies feel half-assed and there isn’t a single chorus. Nothing repeats, so I don’t remember a single song.
Harriet Taylor: Apart from “La Vaginoplastia.”
JP: Exactly. They’re unmemorable unless they’re cringeworthy. The visuals are also incredibly high-contrast. There are extremely quiet moments and then BIG. DANCE. NUMBERS. There are dark darks and light lights, which is supposed to make the film feel dramatic. The editing is choppy too. I understand the visuals are supposed to be disruptive, but when everything is extreme, you lose the impact in the moments that matter. Emilia Pérez constantly screams at you.
HT: I watched How to Make Millions Before Grandma Dies in one sitting and found myself having to rethink my entire life after. It’s a very different film. It’s family-oriented and character-driven, which can make the plot feel a little slow, but I would say this is really a screenwriter’s movie. The plants, payoffs, and twists are all tastefully done. There’s good humor since it’s a tragedy and a comedy at the same time, and everything feels more grounded. You remember the one-liners. And it’s a really moving story centered around how we can honor life through death. It’s not a musical, and it didn’t need to be one. The score is gorgeous, the lighting is stunning, and a lot of the shots have a sense of quiet chaos—we do see some of the same sets over again, but they don’t feel performative.
JP: Right. There aren’t any super clean, nobody’s-ever-lived-here-before houses.
HT: Yes. Also, there’s no “third world” color grading in this film—thank God. No jarring yellow filter, but lush green tones. In general, a lot of the shots are very thoughtful foils of the plot. Rather than screaming at you, this film is singing a lullaby to you and handing out some tissues in the process.
JP: A nice gurgling soup instead of one that has too many ingredients.
HT: So true. From your research, Jazmin, how is Emilia Pérez being received?
JP: Plenty of nominations. The bigwigs love it, but the critics hate it. Most importantly, the people who are represented in this film hate it too. Voices from both Mexican and transgender communities say it’s a very simplistic, degrading portrayal. Don’t quote me on this, but I’m pretty sure even the French don’t love it. I mean, the people who love Les Misérables are probably not looking at this movie and thinking, “Yes, we made this”.
HT: From what I’ve seen, it seems as though HTMMBGD had a very positive reception especially in Southeast Asia, where its primary audience is. It hasn’t really hit the big screen in Western media yet, aside from being $5.99 on Amazon Prime. Within its locale, however, critics are praising it. It’s one of the highest-rated films on Letterboxd of 2024, and the Asian communities this film represents are very happy to resonate with the story. Honestly, HTMMBGD deserves the fanfare Emilia Pérez received.
JP: Literally banging my head on the screen.
HT: You can’t even argue that HTMMBGD isn’t as marketable as Emilia Pérez. Both films are almost the same length. HTMMBGD went viral in Southeast Asia because staff in theaters were handing out tissues before the movie even started. And viewers are making before-and-after TikToks showing how much the story made them cry. The film also centers on authentic representation. Usha Seamkhum (the grandmother) was scouted via a video of a dance competition for seniors and this is her debut. Real film, real reactions.
JP: That’s interesting because in a lot of ways, Emilia Pérez feels like a forced response to younger audiences’ demands. Like yes, we’ll talk about these really specific stories, but they’re not well thought out.
HT: Talk about stereotyping…
JP: Oh, there are so many. Just in case they didn’t want to miss a stereotype. We’ve got violent Mexican drug cartels that are particularly awful towards women. We’ve got people constantly going missing. We have a transgender lead whose feelings and interiority we don’t get to unpack other than seeing her mostly unhealthy choices. Emilia is stuck in a lack of love. So in merging Emilia’s character and the violence she participates in, there’s a disappointing sense of fear around trans people. Oh, and there’s a little tie-in of lesbianism. Nothing is digested or profoundly said, but the conclusions viewers might come to about the marginalized identities in this film are never good. Emilia is not humanized in any way.
HT: Which is so interesting because that is exactly why HTMMBGD works—it really humanizes its characters. I was initially concerned about the stereotypes of Asians being perfect, noble people defined by family—people whose sole conflict in a story will be making choices informed by duty. It was incredibly refreshing to see that the whole premise of HTMMBGD is imperfect people. There’s humor in death and endless scheming. The film does a fantastic job of acknowledging the awkward fact that yes, we do take care of our elders for money and material reward. At the same time, taking care of our family members is a beautiful way to connect as humans. And I think that both the grandmother and the grandson earn your love as the film goes on.
JP: See, that feels truly novel. With Emilia Pérez, it feels like the producers started with the marketing taglines and then worked their way to the story. The French writers tried to throw all these seemingly new things together–trans lead, musical, Mexican setting, women-led story–and it didn’t work out. Too many ingredients in a fusion soup with flavors that weren’t tested.
HT: HTMMBGD definitely started with an honest story and worked its way up. A perfected, slow-cooked soup.
JP: Oh God, then there are all the Emilia Pérez controversies. Karla Sofía Gascón’s bigoted tweets, which never help anyone. The inaccurate accents. And the use of AI to increase Gascón’s vocal range. The songwriters should’ve done better.
HT: Don’t get me started on that. Maybe it was supposed to be empowering, but there are so many other ways to incorporate the depth of trans voices into your movie. Trans people shouldn’t be made to feel like they have to use AI to be able to achieve certain things in their careers. I’ve seen really insightful perspectives, particularly one from critic Imani Barbarin on TikTok, who even suggests that Emilia Pérez is winning all of these awards because of its AI use. It’s a method of normalizing AI in the arts as a kind of propaganda tool.
JP: Period. At this point, Emilia Pérez is doing so well because it’s so bad and because of its controversies. I don’t want to fuel the hate-watch train. My conclusion is, if I could talk to the makers of this movie, I would say “Sir, please do some more research. Talk to the community you’re writing about. Understand the context of the community you’re writing about. It’s not hard to do.”
HT: In order to be original, you don’t have to pull shit out of the air. You need to be informed.
In that sense, the difference between originality and perspective is important because it’s hard, in a world of eight billion people, to have a story nobody’s ever thought of before.
JP: What is original is the perspective you have and the way that you tell that story.
HT: Totally. There’s showing things to the audience versus giving us something to think about.
JP: And that’s what thought, understanding, and authenticity brings to a film.
HT: Precisely. To wrap, I‘ll highlight a scene from HTMMBGD that really encapsulates our conversation. After the grandmother dies, there’s a beautiful sequence in which the core family members take her coffin past all the places that were important in her life. The grandson explains exactly where they are so her spirit will recognize the directions. And then the movie bookends in just the most heartwarming way, which I’ll leave as a surprise. That’s the way things should be–honoring the practice of revisiting with care.
The final verdict:
Emilia Pérez
“Do not watch this damn film.”
How To Make Millions Before Grandma Dies
“Deserves the fanfare Emilia Pérez received.”
Cabin 3: Forest Fireplace
Snuggle up in this sanctuary of cedar and pine, which is perfect for deep pondering and emotional release.
One Road In and Out of Topanga Canyon
Words by Amanda Postman
Sandwiched between the Kenneth and Palisades fires, my family sits down to dinner.
It’s two-for-one ribeyes from the Bristol Farms five minutes from our house. On the other side of the street, the evacuation zone starts. Something about my mom demanding a discount while smoke chokes out the sky is funny to me.
Garden lettuce salad, rice cooker rice, French bread. We cut both ribeyes in half and share between the four of us. The dog eyes the meat, knowing that she’ll get the fat and gristle once we’re done.
We cut in. We joke about the look on the dog’s face. “I hate Bonnie’s dogs,” my dad says. “They’re the worst dogs in the world.”
“They always scratch up your legs,” I supply. “Because she doesn’t trim their nails or train them.” “And they pee inside,” says Rebecca.
My mom laughs. “She’s staying at a friend’s house, and the friend won’t turn up the heat past sixty degrees. She just wears a lot of sweaters. And their dogs are fighting.”
Heard Bonnie and Mom talking today. The Palisades are ash./Is there anything salvageable?/ Just ash.
“Oh god, that sounds terrible,” I say.
“I know,” says my mom. “I feel bad for the people who have nowhere to go.” We don’t have anywhere to go, but I don’t say that.
“It’s like that movie,” says my dad. “Seeking a Friend for… for…”
“The End of the World?” I finish. “I think that’s what it’s called.”
“Yeah,” he says. “Where an asteroid is going to crash into the world, and there’s nothing anyone can do about it.”
We just got back into town yesterday. Me,Rebecca, and Mom were up skiing in Mammoth when it started. My mom jokes that we should have just stayed up there. But my dad was alone with two cats and a big dog, so we raced down the 5, past car after car after car after car frozen on their journey north.
“What would you do, if that was happening?” I ask. “If you had one day left.” “Break my dry January,” says my mom.
“Just get drunk?”
“Yup. A whole bottle of Josh rosé”
“What about you?” I turn to my sister.
“Probably get married,” she says.
“Really?”
“Yeah, it’s something I want to do. I’d just find someone off the street and marry him.” That’s her. She was talking about wanting to be a mom earlier this week. Says it’s her first priority.
“And what about you?” I ask my dad.
“Oh, I don’t know,” he says. “Play Scrabble.”
“Do the same thing you do everyday?”
“Well, I’d play it with more gusto. Spell something like ‘gusto’ on a triple word score.”
“I think it’d be like the Purge,” says my sister. “People killing and stealing and kidnapping.” “I don’t think so,” says my dad. “That’s only a few people.”
“Yeah, but they’d ruin it for the rest of us,” says Rebecca.
She went out to see a friend and sent a picture from the freeway today. Orange and black smoke filling the sky, more stopped cars.
“They wouldn’t even have time to do anything,” I say. “Like please, just let me be drunk in the pool in peace.”
“I’d probably do a lot of drugs,” my sister says, after some reflection. “To be so honest.”
“I mean, if you have one day left, it’s not like trying heroin is going to have a long term effect on your life.”
“And then, of course, the asteroid doesn’t hit,” says my mom. “And everyone has to live with the consequences.”
Took off work today so we could all pack our bags and get our shit in order. Don’t know what we’ll do if we get the alert. Drive north, probably. Not that we have anyone up north.
Celia texted me yesterday. Haven’t talked to her in a year. I’m sorry for everything. I love you and miss talking to you.
Haven’t touched the message. Don’t know what to say.
People from all over checking in to ask if we’re okay, since we’re so close to it. Still haven’t gotten the order yet. On pins and needles. Eating ribeye, a rare treat.
Clear our plates. Dad scrapes fat and gristle into the dog’s food. She and the cats can see the suitcases. They know something is happening.
Don’t know what to do. People keep saying just let me know how I can help. They can’t. They just can’t.
Joke with friends that we should start a commune in the ashes of LA. Been joking all day. Easier that way, but getting on people’s nerves.
Take a shower. If we have to leave, I don’t know when I’ll get another one. Suitcase crammed full of stuff on the floor. Everything else in my room left to burn. Just finished setting up my new vanity too, fuck.
Cold sore on the side of my mouth. Rub Aquaphor on it. Tongue it until it’s raw again.
Drink Prosecco. Sister tells me not to forget my weed pen. She’s in her room, choosing which vintage designer stuff to pack and which to leave behind. Agonizing. Before we left for Mammoth, she joked that if there was a fire, she’d rather burn than choose between her clothes. Choosing anyway.
Write all this shit down. Don’t know how to finish it. It’ll probably be alright. Has to be. Has to be. I love you all.
Community Resources pertaining to the recent wildfires in Los Angeles can be found in the final pages of this volume.
HOLOCENE VOLCANO
Words by Harriet Taylor
It happens seventy two minutes and forty one seconds into the match. Queens Park Rangers v. Preston, score 1-1. You’re sitting next to me and have been shouting at our players the entire time. I am silently rehearsing ways to reprimand you because you’re irritating everyone within a ten row radius.
Our goalie fails to clear the ball, kicks it to a nearby defender instead of hoofing it up the pitch—a mistake, yes, but one that proves inconsequential to the match, the league, the country. Last time I checked, the universe remains undefined by a bottom-of-the-table men’s Championship division fixture.
When the words leave your mouth, I notice you falter before the particular noun that sets me off. Your lips waver as if you’re scanning the menu for the perfect jibe to serve; waiting for the bigotry slot machine to click into place and give you the satisfaction.
That’s what frustrates me the most—of all the insults you could throw, it’s this one.
So when you shout, “You useless woman!” loud and unabashed, and with spit and hurt shooting daggers into the winter air, I mark the moment that our team turned into yours.
Dad, you never understand why I react so strongly to the words you say. You always double down with a “No need to be so aggressive,” which only hurts me more. You think in present moments that we stand on the same ground. You think this is an equal argument, so I’ve mustered up the courage to tell you why it isn’t.
To do that, I need you to understand the volcanic nature of my anger. Each time you make an unsavory remark, usually at home, usually at the television, the magma rises. Some recent examples include:
1) “Alright darling, stop screeching” and “Look at the size of her arse” to a woman on Love Island.
2) “Rap is a load of crap” while watching a music documentary. I ask if you have ever listened to a rap album and tell you to check your subconscious bias. You reply, “How dare you call me a racist.”
3) “Yuck” at two men kissing in a Netflix drama. This creates the deepest wound.
I often wonder, Dad, if I swapped places with the people on your screen and you didn’t know me—if I wasn’t a thing to parade around as a good consequence of you—would you hurl the same insults at me?
It’s these remarks, laden with discriminatory contexts only one of us can see, that trigger the seismometer and lower my tolerance for you. Eventually, they cause an explosion of furious, injured matter. I think of Vesuvius, Krakatoa, Mount St. Helen. Perhaps each eruption that has ever touched a man carries with it a thousand voices of feminine rage.
I don’t know how else to say your astonishing lack of self-awareness is the rub. You claim to be proud of your daughter, tell strangers in Costa about her life story and the honors she graduated with two years ago. You say she will marry a handsome and very rich man (I’m a lesbian) and win Oscars for shitty screenplays she writes for cash.
Yet every time she cries rivers of low self-esteem on telehealth appointments, her therapist identifies you as the source.
I’m sorry I blow up like I do. I know you’re a seventy nine year old man of your time. You’re not hateful, Dad, but you make me hate the world you brought me into.
In many ways, you make me a dyke. Not just because two of your three children are gay, but because a magmatic dike is a geological formation—a sheet of rock that forms when magma fills a fracture in an existing rock plane. Life is hard for lesbian volcanoes. You can’t see deep under my skin, but each time you split me with your words and make the magma rise, you etch a scar into my soul.
We’ll get over this particular football fight, talk again, laugh again, because we don’t really have a choice. After all, it’s very British to never discuss our feelings, and it’s even more British to refuse to listen if we did.
Perhaps it’s just a curse embedded in our country’s culture. You get football, and I get wishing Charli XCX felt more English than just her accent and her substance consumption. I wish there was something more for me and you to hold onto, a way of escaping the cycle.
For now, I don’t have the answer. Because the most English image isn’t a dead queen on a tea towel, a red bus, or an ageing 007 womanizer—it is this: a father watching football on the telly, holding nothing in. A daughter, peering up from her phone, holding everything in. And a mother, silently making both of them tea.
Nobody around us intervenes as we argue, as you try to grab my jaw in a physical manifestation of how silent you wish I was. Mum tells us both to calm down. I disengage after that, letting the ash settle on thick coats and the thudding sound of boots on grass.
Your team scores—I don’t stand to celebrate.
Your team wins—that happens more frequently now.
And while I wish I could truly explode on the pitch, shoot my guts into the back of the net, bleed out over perfectly painted white lines, my blood remains as is: hot, sticky, angry magma in my veins.
Words by Brendan Grande
I was baked in an oven, set to 399 degrees, but innocence carries a bitter taste, so they coated me in sugar and things that smell nice.
Grubby little boys prodded fingers on the glass far past their bedtimes.
Freshly baked goods under red lights, that’s what we were—strong and wild, edelweiss.
I fled my hometown forever.
And for what?
Babes throwing up on the sidewalk, sick to death of themselves.
Welcome to flavor country!
Heads on shoulders turned by the aroma of my sweet confection, at your service with a cherry on top.
A smile, more like a lure, emerged between wet lips, dangerous and sticky, belonging to a devilish man with whiskers and a smirk that might have sent me trembling had I not been feeling so delicious.
I never liked things with long tails, they reminded me of the rats that swarmed the trash yard behind the bakery where I used to work, discarding things that could no longer be sold.
But still, he drooled over me, thinking he deserved a treat.
Run run run, as fast as you can…said the eyes of women in the windows, but I was too busy melting into attention to notice as I crossed the disease-ridden canal and escaped down a dark alley, waiting for him to trod after me on all fours.
The air was thick with cigarette smoke, cold and icy.
A growl, then a low rumble.
The fox pounced on me hungrily.
First came tongue.
Slobber and rabies all over my mouth.
So much I couldn’t cry, swiper, no swiping!
Sharp teeth left scratches on my neck.
Tearing into me.
Exposing me.
Devouring me.
Like a greedy child licking frosting off his birthday candles before we even had a chance to sing.
His family, hidden somewhere in a foxhole, waited blindly as he bit my gumdrops, swallowed me whole, lacking the human decency to enjoy me on a plate.
I was his relief.
Paid by the pound.
He licked the raspberry filling that swirled inside of me.
My rotten blood.
I willed time to pass, knowing the best sweets are the ones to be savored.
And when there was nothing left, he burped out the taste and walked away with a swish of his tail.
All of me, condemned to broken parts amidst the freshly fallen snow.
Derelict on the ground in a pile of my own crumbs.
Waiting to be rolled out again.
Cabin 4:
Mountain Moor
Experience a complete retreat atop a snowy peak. With stunning vistas for miles around, you’ll feel far, far away from your usual daily life.
Blue Decimal after Jean Daive
Words by Réka Nyitrai
I laughed, and I turned into a liquid sky. Birds cut through my innards, and clouds drift over their wings. I push and lift them higher and higher until they become nothing but dots.
My dreams frighten me. Under their skins there are tiny spots of blood. Their faces are dusky.
Yesterday I was pathless, birds lost in my red and orange lakes.
Today I am thawed and blue.
I feel best when I hear geese honking. Did you know that they sleep on the wing? I wonder what geese dream of.
I never sleep anymore. I can’t afford it. I must be vigilant and record what the wind says.
I must groom the clouds. I must harness the rain.
I must be available.
Perhaps I laughed, and someone turned me into a liquid dot.
Words by Eddie Sun
It wasn’t fair, really. The effect of him, after this time, still as potent as it ever was. Soft feeling inside, tenderness, vulnerability maybe. His effect like a virus, autoimmune response. Body still aching for him. Meticulous organization of the brain compromised, knowing and remembering what it wants. And for what? Hadn’t talked to him in over a year. Even longer since leaving town. It was him who wanted to meet anyway. Around for a law society event or something like that. Could’ve politely declined. But no, unprompted text, asked if I was still around, notification on the screen brings a light feeling in the head. Hard to explain these things, Pavlovian response, the irrationality of it.
I’ll take a cold brew and a splash of cream, he says.
And a matcha latte for me, thank you.
Same orders as always. His favorite spot. Sitting by the sidewalk with the view down Sunset, the sign and observatory in the distance. Mornings spent like this, melting into the afternoon.
So, how’s everything going?
How to answer? Miss him very much, miss these days at the coffee shop, talking about whatever it was. Classes, stress of schoolwork. Writing a paper on Dostoyevsky, and it’s due by the end of the week. Always found his work interesting. Makes me a cynic, I suppose, digesting theory like fact, these texts debasing people to their worst wants and needs.
Things have been good, I guess. And you, still liking Chicago?
And him. Eternal optimist, sense of place and purpose in this world, a willing participant in society. Pursued law because of uncompromising belief in righting wrongs. Afternoons driving to the center, waiting for him to appear. In the car, almost ready to pass out. At the nonprofit most days, consoling tenants behind on rent, educating them on their rights. Unpaid, of course. Every day, more people on the verge of losing their homes. Must be something wrong with the system, the landlord class. Tiring himself out for marginal differences, shining the bright light of his righteousness.
Actually, yes. I think I might be there for a while. I’m starting at Latham out there soon.
Oh, corporate law? I didn’t know you were going that route.
It’s what makes sense for me right now. You know, pay off student loans, maybe save enough money to buy a house.
More than three years ago, last time before going to Chicago. Unceremonious split. Mutual decision, could call it that. Said it would be for the best, the rest of our lives ahead of us. Law school for him, to be a public defender eventually. Think about our dreams and ambitions. These paths adorned with gold, delivering us. And what was it we wanted anyways? Security, excess, satisfaction?
Hm. I thought maybe you’d still be doing advocacy work, like what you used to do.
Yeah, well, it’s not exactly tenable to make a career out of that, is it?
Youthful conviction like a miracle drug, even thought I would write something monumental. Mid-twenties now. How wrong we were, illusory potential of life, amounts to nothing more than working for the knife. Mornings open the laptop, look through messages in the inbox, check for any scripts to look over. Each day like machinery: a romance set in space, a man running on top of trains, narrative structures barely hanging by a thread. Assistant’s work, nothing more, and what did it matter anyway, boss gave the final green light.
Never wrote that magnum opus, told people it would be like a Beckett or Sartre. Haven’t even looked at the script in years. Clock out to deafening silence, the emptiness almost suffocating, and what to do? Scroll through messages and pick a man to entertain. Rolodex of first names in the contacts, know what they’re around for. Hard to say if they even enjoyed it. Seemed wrong to have people like that, disposable, just another body to warm the bed.
True. I guess I’m just a bit surprised. Seemed like you wanted that more than anything, you know, when I knew you.
Ah, right. Well, I don’t think we’re really in the same place now. Or the same people anymore, really.
It’s impossible to forget the life that was, severed by circumstance. And to think, to wonder, what to give to live an hour of that life again. Walking up to the porch, typing into the cold phone screen. Sound of his footsteps. Nothing else like that, great anticipation, opening of the floodgates. Waiting at the door, wry smile, two bodies in lockstep already knowing what they want: the entire world in the arms of the other.
The ceiling, chartreuse reflection of light from the green walls, low hum of the fan disrupting the silence. Corner of his eye shimmering, sharp jaggedness of his jaw. Inside of his mouth, between his legs, wet like a dog. Is that good? Yes. Mornings brimming with promise, the smell of gardenias and car exhaust. Coffee already brewed, him dumping the used grounds in the sink. What he represented, peace and tranquility. How could I ever forget?
The issue with love, the intensity. The sheer potency of feeling, its effect a stimulant, clarity of the mind rearranging life in perfect order. Dancers on the stage, all in the right places. Unanswerable question of human nature: the effect of people on each other, attraction, a blunt force trauma bludgeoning us into perception. Could it ever be fair? The sense of self completely beholden to the other. Governed by nothing, and yet. The only time when life made sense.
Cabin 5: Camping Canopy
Be at one with the wilderness by sleeping in the open and gazing at galaxies in the universe yonder. Are we really alone?
srU
Great heavens good god
Whispered dysfunction
Beckoned back to bed, I forget how to live here
When a big bear has new stars, does it have to find a new place in the sky?
Winter’s moved on, frost lining the exit door, and I can’t shake the cold when it returns, intent and unforgiving.
Can you survive this many hibernations alone?
I can only just maintain myself
When poisons surge, how will I stand?
Misty lethargy
I am never a passenger carrying the whole world on my shoulders, and none of its inhabitants consider trading places. It’s too much for me to ask, too selfish.
How many more distortions until the places I grew up no longer exist how they used to?
How long until I have to forge a home to keep growing in?
Who will weather the winter in my bed?
Shooting stars are all I look for, grounded like this wishing one would fall into my lap and hold my face in both hands all momentum lost
Beckoned to bed
Great heavens good god
Trace History
Words by Caleb Blumenshine
A profile view of slate-gray bedrock flashed on the display. Not much could be gleaned from the image, save for the existence of a slightly darker band of sediment that bisected the rock face, so thin as to be nearly invisible upon first glance. The bedrock was flecked with moss and crisscrossed with creeping wooden roots, an unassuming cliff face in a dense jungle.
“Radiocarbon measurement suggests this species existed anywhere between 65 and 80 million years ago. As is typical of relatively young species, its impact on its environment was tremendous. The distinct coloration of the strata in question will tell you as much.”
The paleontologist clicked a small device in its hand and the image zoomed in drastically. It clicked again. Two thin parallel white lines slowly faded in on the screen, one along the top of the dark band of rock and one below. It fidgeted with the clicker, making a mental note to remove the cumbersome fade-in animation for next time.
“Where this sample differs from those found elsewhere, however, is in the slenderness of the band, as well as the strikingly abrupt beginning and end of the unique sediment deposition. The edges of it are clear as day. This would suggest that this species achieved the ability to drastically alter its environment in a remarkably short amount of time. Perhaps in only a scant few centuries! The presence of a clearly demarcated upper edge on the strata likewise indicates a shockingly rapid loss of said ability. Cursory analysis shows that the unique chemical composition of the strata ends so rapidly and with such little blending with the bedrock above that the species must have undergone near-total degrowth or extinction over the course of only a few years.”
It clicked the device once more and a map of the world appeared on the display. In the center of the map was a singular, massive continent surrounded on all sides by a nearly unbroken plane of oceans dotted with minuscule islands. As it opened its mouth to speak, the paleontologist was interrupted by a barking question from the audience.
“What’s so special about this sample, or this planet for that matter? Have you analyzed the actual chemical composition of the band at all?”
The paleontologist turned towards the sound of the voice, exasperated by the breach in symposium etiquette. The wrinkled creature’s lengthy, fragile arms were crossed in front of its elongated torso and it sat erect, a full head above its bored-looking counterparts. The low gravity in the lecturer’s hall made the infrequent wisps of the creature’s silvered hair dance weightlessly above its liver-spotted scalp. Like the others in the room, its body had been made slender and brittle from untold generations aboard voidborne spacecraft. It peered expectantly at the paleontologist with massive black eyes, its gaze sitting just above the rim of thick bifocals. It was not often that a mere student got the opportunity to be the expert in a room full of aged lecturers, and it fully intended to assert its authority on the topic.
“I have,” snapped the paleontologist. “Every single one of the samples contained incredibly high concentrations of a polymer compound—specifically, polyethylene plastic. To date, the lack of fossil samples has prevented my team from drawing any concrete conclusions about the day-to-day life of this species, but we can only imagine that polyethylene was likely critical to their survival.”
One of the aged academics blurted out another remark, thrusting a bony hand upwards. Each of the knuckles of the five-fingered hands were knotted with arthritis. “Polyethylene is a low-grade toxin. How were they not aware of the chronic environmental catastrophe they were creating?”
The paleontologist, simultaneously disappointed at the total derailment of its presentation and elated at the growing interest from the audience, gave a thin smile and spoke:
“Perspective is crucial here. We have the benefit of millions of years of historical and scientific hindsight to guide our progression as a species, whereas they did not. I’m certain at some point in our species’ distant past we too freely produced plastics, unaware of its subtle impact on whatever planet we originated on. There is also the small chance they could have used plastics as a food source. There is precedence for such a thing, at least amongst a select few bioengineered microbes.”
The old lecturer sat back in its chair and pondered this for a moment. Once more it spoke;
“I’d certainly like to know what they could’ve possibly been doing with all of that plastic. You haven’t any clue what it was used for?”
“I do not, unfortunately,” the paleontologist replied, slipping the clicker into its pocket. The slide of the polymer remained on the display, but it was disregarded. The Q&A portion of the presentation had come early, and the paleontologist had begun to enjoy answering the questions about its research in such a free-handed manner.
“Despite the numerous dig sites my team has established across the surface of the supercontinent, not one identifiable artifact nor remains have been uncovered. Our current hypothesis is that they went extinct far too suddenly for the geological processes required for fossilization to take place. Regardless of the explanation, this alien race and its odd civilization resides within a proverbial black box, at least for the time being.”
“Disheartening,” chimed one of the grant writers in the rear, its voice tinged with the frustration of a million unanswered questions.
Losing itself for a moment, the paleontologist once again pondered this unknowable civilization; “More than you know,” it replied. “Millions or even billions of them once lived and died on that planet. They could have loved and dreamed. They could have told stories to one another…”
The paleontologist sobered and chose, for the sake of comfort, to instead imagine the denizens of the lost civilization to be mindless drones of some unthinking gestalt. It continued, “Or maybe they didn’t.”
Some of the more stubbornly uninterested audience members began to stir from their bored stupor and hone in on the words of the melancholic researcher-student. Decades of detached study often drove a wedge between them and the emotional weight of their field. Perhaps they had become callous to the implications of their work, or perhaps they simply could not grapple with the knowledge that every new world-site they discovered implied the death of billions. The paleontologist hoped the latter explanation was true. Regardless of the reason, it knew that the detachment had to exist. No being could bear the full weight of such cosmic tragedy. Within the forgotten blackness between the stars, one could still find hope in the form of knowledge, however. The paleontologist remembered this truth, and clung to it. It continued:
“Extinction happens every second in this universe. Statistical averages and the sheer immensity of the universe demand it. Humanity may command vast swathes of the galaxy now, but we are never fully free from the pull of oblivion. Given these facts, we have a duty to do everything in our power to prevent extinction from happening to us. By studying the collapsed civilizations of yore we are able to learn from their mistakes and apply them to our own race, and in return we prevent them from disappearing completely from the memory of the universe.”
“How do you know the creatures of this world are extinct?” One particularly frail woman asked as she raised a pale, nearly translucent hand, a look of desperation on her face.
The paleontologist rolled this question around her mind, and then, after a short while, replied;
“I…suppose I don’t. There is no evidence to suggest that any of them survived, but there is likewise no evidence to suggest all of them did not. Perhaps I’ve been too nihilistic. Maybe a few of them avoided the fate of their kin and rebuilt their species in a distant, unexplored corner of the universe. With millions of years between their time and ours, any exact answers would be impossible to trace.”
The woman seemed pleased with the answer, and she sat back in her chair.
Smiling slyly, the paleontologist retrieved the clicker from her pocket.
“The only way we can find out what truly happened to this race is to dig more, and the only way my team can dig more is if we have the funds…” she trailed off. The young student skipped forward through a dozen or so slides until a cursory budget for future planetside excavations flashed on the display.
The trio of grant writers in the back chuckled lightly at the boldness of the young student, and once more she resumed her pitch.
“Trapped by Circumstance”
by Edward Michael Supranowicz
Guestbook of Contributors
Volume #005
Winter 2025
Literature:
Amanda Postman
Blue Gacel
Brendan Grande
Caleb Blumenshine
Eddie Sun
Geertje Booij
George Evans
Harriet Taylor
Holly B. McCauley
Isabel Kettler
Jazmin Polido
Madeline English
Réka Nyitrai
Roman Reid Tristram
Art & Photography:
Blue Gacel
Edward Michael Supranowicz
Harriet Taylor
Design:
Harriet Taylor
With inspiration from Enrique Martinez III
Logo by Katie Liu
Editorial Masthead:
Harriet Taylor
Cassidy Kuhle
Isabel Kettler
Cal Geib
Rachel Roberson
Jazmin Polido
Holly B. McCauley
Hayden Hurt
Tara Ferreira
Selma Oueddan
Editor in Chief
Managing Editor
Poetry Editor
Features Editor
Fiction Editor
Reviews & Criticism Editor
Copyeditor
Marketing Editor
Editorial Assistant
Editorial Assistant
With thanks to:
CA
Fleetwood Mac Twitter
Pexels
Rawpixel
The Public Domain Archive
The Literary Editing and Publishing Master’s Program at The University of Southern California
Harriet Taylor (she/her) is a British-Malaysian writer and avid Stevie Nicks connoisseur from Penn, England, where sheep and the village ghost run free. She dreams of moonlit adventures and growing her platform boot collection.
Cassidy Kuhle
Managing Editor
Cassidy Kuhle (she/her) is a writer and editor with a soft spot for feminist horror. Originally from Phoenix, she enjoys painting, and cottagecore moodboards.
Isabel Kettler
Poetry Editor
Isabel Kettler (she/her) is a writer and artist from Nebraska. She likes movies, fiber arts, and jigsaw puzzles.
Cal Geib
Features Editor
Cal Geib (he/they) is a writer and editor with a passion for pieces about place, identity, and the meaning of “home”. Cal lives in Portland, Oregon where the outdoors, his cat, and his “old man hobbies” dominate his life.
Rachel Roberson
Fiction Editor
Rachel Roberson (she/her) is the Fiction Editor and a library enthusiast. Based in Seattle you can find her at an ice cream shop, in the library, or along a body of water— often with her dog Gracie
Jazmin Polido
Reviews & Criticism Editor
Jazmin (she/they) is an LA native that works in music and can’t wait to find her next favorite album. They love traveling, chai, and the search for the next iconic media moment.
Holly B. McCauley
Copyeditor
Holly (she/her) is a wanderer constantly searching for home. She resides in Madrid, Spain, where she teaches English and tells stories about strangers.
Hayden Hurt
Marketing Editor
Hayden (she/her) is from sunny San Diego. When she’s not lost in Canva designing graphics, you can find her creating romance fueled Spotify playlists, revisiting nostalgic movies, or reading the latest YA romance books!
Tara Ferreira
Editorial Assistant
Tara (she/her) lives in Rhode Island for the ocean. She reads and writes fiction about bodies and blood, the more unsettling the story the better.
Selma Oueddan
Editorial Assistant
Selma (they/them) is a community manager by day and spoken word poet at night. They write and read to make sense of the world and themself. A sea creature at heart, they love to spend their weekends surfing in Casablanca, where they live.
Community Resources
Feed the Streets | USA
https://www.feedthestreets.info/
Mutual aid organization bringing food, clothing, and other necessities to unhoused populations.
826 | USA
https://826national.org/
Writing non-profit offering free educational programs to underserved communities across the US.
New American Pathways | Atlanta, USA
https://newamericanpathways.org/need-services/
Atlanta-based immigration nonprofit offering a range of free and low-cost services for refugees settling in Georgia.
Nebraska abortion resources (NEAR) | Nebraska, USA
https://www.neabortionresources.org/
Nebraska Appleseed | Nebraska, USA
https://neappleseed.org/
Nebraska Appleseed works on issues directly impacting Nebraskans in urban and rural communities across the state.
A tea house that offers community building events.
DSA | Los Angeles, USA
https://dsa-la.org
Hosts community meetings that inform the people of their goals.
LA Works | Los Angeles, USA
https://www.laworks.com/2025fires
A good place to look for ongoing volunteering opportunities to help those impacted by the Los Angeles wildfires.
Kitty Bungalow Charm School for Wayward Cats | Los Angeles, USA
https://www.kittybungalow.org/
A wonderful cat shelter based in Leimert Park with regular volunteer roles.
Remainders Creative Reuse | Los Angeles, USA
https://remainderspas.org/
Remainders Creative Reuse is both a creative space and arts & crafts thrift store. They host sowing get togethers and different community craft events.
AS220 | Providence, USA
https://as220.org/
AS220 is an artist-run organization committed to providing an unjuried and uncensored forum for the arts. AS220 offers artists opportunities to live, work, exhibit and/or perform in its facilities.
LitArts RI | Providence, USA
https://www.litartsri.org/about
LitArts RI supports Rhode Island writers through community events, workshops, and shared creative workspace.
McMinnville Trans Network | McMinnville, USA
Instagram: @mactransnetwork
A community organization that hosts events for trans folks (and their families) and also provide gender affirming products to the trans community.
White Oak Books | Vancouver, USA
https://whiteoakbooks.net/books
A small family-run bookstore in Vancouver, WA that hosts book clubs, poetry readings, and writing/study events for children and adults.
Stonewall Housing | UK
https://stonewallhousing.org/
Free housing assistance for LGBTQ+ folks.
Trans Legal Clinic | UK
https://www.translegalclinic.com/
Trans Legal Clinic provides free and accessible legal help to transgender and non-binary people in need.
Protect Palestine | Anywhere
https://www.protectpalestine.org/
Site with resources and action items to help the fight for a free Palestine.
