A million reasons this issue is the best one yet.
When we lit Twitter up with our call for submissions under the theme of "consume," we didn't realize the response would be the biggest return we've seen in our two-plus year history.
With nearly triple the amount of submissions we usually receive (and double the amount received for "Strange & Unusual", our previously highest issue), we set out to bring on two additional readers. We were humbled and thrilled to have received the applications we did, and in the end brought on five new members to the Hearth & Coffin team; not only did we get to expand our team, but we were able to give the care and consideration to each submission that we always mean to.
We're thrilled to serve up this spicy little creature: flipping through our digital pages on this issue, readers will enjoy social media consumerism, gnashing monster maws, tongue-in-cheek recipes, and… y'all, a lot of cannibalism.
Did we mention the Culkin siblings make an appearance, too?
We're thrilled it's here and hope you enjoy.
Featured authors and poets for Volume 3, Issue 1: Consume
Fiction
Bread and Relish | Hilary Ayshford
Ouroboros | Alex J. Barrio
The Trembling Harp String | Carew S. Bartley
Should Have Got Off the Bus When You Could | Joyce Bingham
Toothbrush | Sophia Carlisle
You Should Smile More | August Blaine Centauri
Revenge (sweet) & Mad Scientist's Putrinesca | Zoe Davis
The Bounty We Are About to Receive | Eirik Gumeny
A Stew for the New Year | S.M. Hallow
It Starts With Forgetting | Chelsea Jackson
Sweet Nothings | Cecilia Kennedy
Evil at the Door | Logan McConnell
Antropófago | Samir Sirk Morató
Food Desert | Samir Sirk Morató
The Registry | Sophie Panzer
The Storage Closet at the Murray Public Library | Stephanie Sanders-Jacob
Lesbian Bed Death | Elizabeth Anne Schwartz
Not Quite | Abby Sundeen
Catching the Westbound | Gregg Voss
7th Culkin | John M. Withers IV & Eliza Gaston
Nonfiction
Rice Seaweed Vegetable | Callie S. Blackstone
Consumption | Danny Fantom
Kindness is Always in Reach When You Have a Pair of Tongs | Debbie Feit
The Alpha Consumer | James Marchiori
Wish You Were Here | Desiree McCullough
Poetry
Some people die and go to Hell, where they | Gale Acuff
Love Letter to the Butcher | James Ambrose
Ouroboros | D.W. Baker
octopus | Nicholas Barnes
Polluted Oxytocin | Sadee Bee
Cold | Nicole Cleary
Gnaw | Nicole Cleary
Doing Latin |James D’Angelo
Pica | James D’Angelo
Planning the Menu | Isabelle Evans
To wait in the evergreens | Richard Fox
The Monster Part | Erich von Hungen
Nibbling | Scott T. Hutchison
Day 22 | H.K.G. Lowery
Snow Moon in the Year of the Disappearing Forests | Eleonora Luongo
When You Become the Mother Tree, We Will Never Again Be Lonely | Eleonora Luongo
Banana Bread Wife | Hatteras Mange
doom | Abby Moeller
Busted Bubblegum Brain | Caroline Morris
The darkness continues to pout; | Caroline Morris
The Big Crunch: Many Poems Written by Many People In One Body | Tadgh Murphy
I SEE RED | SOUM (Screams of Unfettered Minds)
Vagina Dentata | Syd Shaw
An Invitation | Kelli Simpson
House Nostalgia in Perspective | Terry Trowbridge