BANDERSNATCHES by Steve Steinbock Son of a King Last week I mentioned the growing pile of short story anthologies weighing down my nightstand. One of the books I named was 20th Century Ghosts. It’s by an author I’d never heard of, Joe Hill (although I had heard of his novel, The Heart-Shaped Box). The book […]

REIGNING CATS by Deborah Elliott-Upton For Ursula I’m having a difficult time writing this column today. On the way to the vet, my daughter’s cat died. Ursula had become a part of the family and no one was more surprised than I about how much I’d come to love her. You see, up until a […]

PILE UP by Rob Lopresti Today I was almost the sixth car in a five-car pile-up. I was on the highway, driving home from a business meeting, when a car zoomed past me in the left lane. He (why do I assume the driver was male?) tried to find a way between two cars in […]

INVASION of the SLEEP SNATCHERS by Melodie Johnson Howe On Sunday, Leigh had wonderful column where he was talking — ranting? — about television. I believe that television saps your soul. In fact I wrote a short story, “The Talking Dead,” about just that. (EQMM June 23, 2003) But if TV can drain your originality, […]

WANDERINGS OF A WORD by James Lincoln Warren On August 24, 410 CE, a Roman-trained and Arian1 Christian general invaded the city of Rome and occupied it for three days. A few public buildings were burned, but the churches were all spared. There was no wholesale looting and not a single report of a Roman […]

PLANES, TRAINS, and INTELLECT DRAINS by Leigh Lundin Once upon a time, good manners dictated we shut off the television when company visits. These days, some think it’s impolite not to have a television going while entertaining guests. No, this isn’t a rant against television; this is a complaint about the ubiquity of mindless TV. […]

SEE YOU IN THE FUNNY PAPERS by Angela Zeman My grandfather (never an articulate man) used that phrase a lot, and usually tweaked my nose at the same time. Imagine how bewildered he would’ve been to learn that a comic book (Art Spiegelman’s Maus: A Survivor’s Tale) would someday win a Pulitzer Prize. A review […]