TV, greed, comfort, surprise: but a few of the reasons sequels bewitch us. Why we love more – more story, more character. How sequels draw us in, why we crave them, and which ones we’d pay a million bucks to see in print.

Shawn Mitchell gets under the hood of Pinckney Benedict’s Miracle Boy and Other Stories to see how the author manages to pack an apocalypse into each story. In his newest book, Benedict revisits his Appalachian heritage and peoples it with mythological bulls, dogs, mudmen, and robots.

Editor’s note: As part of our focus on teaching this month, we’re delighted to present this guest post by Kevin Haworth.
People tell me that I am a poetic writer.
My response to this characterization varies from Thanks! to What does that mean? to Yes, my novel did sell like poetry to I want people to love [...]

AWP provided a perfect opportunity to discover what has captured the imaginations of fellow writers with vastly different viewpoints. One such writer is Eric Hendrixson, who introduced me to Bizarro fiction. As Hendrixson described his novel, Bucket of Face, I realized I’d been completely unaware of this genre that Horror World calls “the literary equivalent [...]

Andrea Nolan examines the new “nature writing” taking place in such journals as Ecotone, Flyway, Orion, and Fourth River, as well as how environment shapes the work of all contemporary writers.