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The Claire Witch ProjectThere are many things you can easily explain to your parents. Accidentally blowing up your uncle is not one of them.

“You are so busted, Claire,” said my sister Lindsay, eying the singed curtains and the freshly made crater in my bedroom floor. “Wait until Dad finds out you were practicing transmorph spells in your room unsupervised.”

“We can still fix this,” I replied hurriedly, switching spellbooks on my Kindle. But I’d only downloaded the basic transmorph spells and hadn’t gotten the counter-curses yet. Blast it.

“Claire, look!” Lindsay hopped off my bed and stepped towards the

Want to be a good writer? Read this journal.http://gapingvoid.com/2012/05/29/bacon/
Read that article.  I think Hugh (a major, MAJOR influence of mine) put the words in my mouth that I have been unable to find:
Where people are soooooooo fixated on the desired RESULT, that they have lost all genuine, intellectual interest in the actual STEPS that will actually get them there.  Even if it's precisely BECAUSE you're interested in the steps, in the PROCESS, is what allows you to get any kind of result in the first place.  These people are hard to work with. Because they can't see anything but the mythological result they're chasing. Even if, yes, the result doesn't actually exist yet.
I see a LOT in the lit community, especially in the forums (and sometimes in the chats), a lot of new writers who are obsessed with their stories.  So obsessed with what could be that they are afraid to take, like he

Mrs. LubonekNobody knew how old the Luboneks were, but they’d lived at the top of Pecan Hill since before Cumberland was built, and the town grew up around them. Mr. Lubonek had a voice like gravel and always smelled of engine grease, sweat, and the gritty scent of someone whose friends were machines and whose family were the tools he kept in the shed. Mrs. Lubonek was airy as a bird and every bit as flighty, yet there was a sharp, witty glint in her eye that you only caught if you were looking for it.

The Luboneks lived a simple, dusty life atop Pecan Hill. Mr. Lubonek ran a small mechanic shop out of his garage and Mrs. Lubonek sold baked goods.

Stop Using Subscript in Your LitOr, Why Tiny Text Is Bad.
(FACT: It's not just because some of us have crappy vision.)
I know some of you like the effect, but here's the deal: do whatever you want on your own monitor and keep your hands off mine.
Did you know that, in Windows, holding Ctrl and moving the scroll wheel up or down changes font size? You do now, and it's not much harder to change zoom size on a Mac (I hear it is most likely cmd++ or cmd+- , cmd+0 reverts it to the original size). I know it's just as easy in Linux, anyway.
I already have my browser's text size display set to what I want, thank you very much.
Anyone who uses Word must be familiar with the concept of font size in points: 12pt Times New Roman, especially, when it comes to turning in essays for teachers. (And 13pt periods for those of you who couldn't hit that minimum page count

)
Well, here's the deal: Web display doesn't work quite the same way. You can force all text to be 16

Smokingi've decided to breathe poison.
i don't like the way it tastes,
the bitter stain on my tongue
or the telling smell that sticks to my hair
i like the way it feels
lighting one cigarette with another,
ash falling to the damp earth,
melting in to nutrient-rich soil for the plants to eat
i control how deep
the smoke buries itself in my lungs
but not how long it settles there
and i enjoy the hazy
silhouette of euphoria
that comes with each grey exhale.

Cookerymy blender does not understand
smoothies
"Accept My Gift of Pineapple
Thou Foul Beast!"
this is a blood sacrifice
and she is sadly unreceptive

I begin the main course
I have cupboards full of words
See-Jane-Runs
quick brown foxes
I have half a mind (no, three-fourths of a mind)
to sauté them
into
the golden eggs
more difficult to crack
than I had thought they would be
(forge? My stove doesn't get
hot enough,
I think)

I will spice the adjectives with
madness
I will verb these nouns
throw in a voodoo doll or
tulips! Two! Lips!
Crack open a maraca
and sell you some rhythm

Oh you will love this
you will devour th

Famous Photographs: Lunch Atop A SkyscraperWhilst the most famous photographs from across the years often feature famine, death, destruction and war, it's sometimes refreshing to catch a glimpse of one or two that don't exhibit depression, demise and conflict. Photo-journalism can work both ways to brief the viewer of an image on what it's like to step into somebody else's shoes. It can shock, bring a tear or even, by some miracle - a smile.
Lunch Atop A SkyScraper does exactly that. It provokes a smile, it features across the world in postcards, books, greeting cards and other formats and ultimately it tugs at that part of your heart that knows there can be good in the world. So what makes it famous?
Source: Wikipedia
The Photograph itself shows eleven working men eating lunch, sitting on a steel girder. Nothing extraordinary about that right? Wrong. Their feet are dangling 256 metres above New York City. Nobody actually knows w

Primevaland I don't smoke, but all my poems talk
of cigarettes and ashes because my father smoked
for forty years and now he can't breathe

and I can't breathe.

the chill from the rain seeps through the glass panes
and feels swollen in the loneliness of a crowded train;
the air is pregnant with an umbilical thread
connecting us to something intangible,
something necessary to our being

yet we don't exist at all.

smoke and vapor crawling out our mouths;
we talk because the silence is sometimes frightening,
and because we're searching the dust visible only
in the places where light bends for words that won't disappear

Literature Gallery RestructureUPDATED GALLERY STRUCTURE - APRIL 4
If you haven't browsed Literature lately, it's a mess. Sure, some of it comes from people whose work truly transcends genres (ever read the Library of Congress classification for Gravity's Rainbow?) and some of it comes from how people choose to interpret certain genres (godsdamnit, 'dark' is not the same as 'horror'! No, this gallery hasn't existed in ~6 years. Stop judging me).
But a lot of it comes from people having trouble navigating the galleries.
Based on your feedback and more backroom discussion, we've reupdated things! Please keep in mind that a lot of discussion went into the updates, so when you do get mad about them do it with the assumption that there's a reason behind this

All galleries will accept text and PDF submissions unless otherwise specified.

Characters & Settings
The original divisions of Contemporary, Historical, and Sci-Fi & Fantas

BlackIt began in the quietest hours of the night. Granny was snoring up a storm, her bed creaking with each breath and twitch of her bigness. That's always the first thing I remember, thinking back. She always snored in the same way Pappy revved up the engines of his prized Cadillac. Loud, proud, and never ending.

I s'pose I should start with what happened before hand. Nothing will make sense if I don't. It don't make no sense anyhow, but the story won't be right if I don't start before everything got bad.

So we were in the market, Granny and I. We go every Sunday while my parents and siblings are at praise and worship with most of the rest of t

The DoppelgangerThe first time I saw the other girl, I was standing on one side of the high street. Because it was the end of September, and we were in Britain, it was raining, but the main bulk of water had passed before lunch, so all that was left was the kind of rain that's annoying in its intermittency.

I watched her look in both directions and then cross the road, stepping carefully through the pool of mingled rainwater and rainbow engine oil in the bus bay. She was unusual, not just because she wasn't carrying a handbag, or wearing a coat, but because she was dressed in a chain mail and leather dress, and leggings. The second strange thing was that no

The TimesI was printed on the evening of November 27th, 2008, just as the weather was turning from chilly to cold. I was tomorrow's news. At the moment I came off the press, I told the future. I knew things before the rest of the world; it was wonderful. I knew what my purpose was: to inform as many people as possible about the world's happenings.

As I was put to bed, bound against my brothers and sisters, I dreamt of being passed around a construction site, making sure all the workers were aware of which sports team triumphed, and which celebrity was getting a divorce. I dreamt that corporate peons debated over politics, and the state of the economy

Gus Number FiveGus Number Five

Jenna and Cindy filled their mouths with watermelon seeds, spitting them fast and hard until the air swarmed with seeds like shiny black dive-bombing gnats. “My seeds are winning,” twelve year old Cin yelled, her thin body tense and urgent with victory.
Jenna just kept spitting seeds. Eight years old, she already knew the seeds that flew the farthest would be Cin's no matter what.
Jenna puckered her mouth preparing for another losing bombardment. Suddenly she paused, lips plump and pouting as the mouth of a painted candy box cupid. Spitting the seeds into her palm, she stared at them for a moment, chewing the

Why You Should Keep Writing

Q: What do you guys think of my story so far? Should I keep going?
This seems to be a very popular question. I'll argue it's a useless question, and explain why.
This reply is directed at new writers, and despite the tone that may follow, I really do intend to be sincere and helpful. I was once a newbie, too. And although I'm certainly not going to claim to be great, I've fallen flat on my face enough times to learn how to pick myself up and produce something I'm proud of.
Here's why you need to not ask this question. You're either going to succeed, or you're going to fail. But, either way, you'll be better off for having:
1. Tried
2. Figured out how to motivate yourself to continue
3. Completed the entire first run of the story yourself
1 ~ I can speculate that there are plenty of people out there who are afraid of failure. I know first-hand. I'm not a professional writer. I teach mathematics. And it is my job every Fall to convince a hu

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Expressionless Darkness"You've got to have some cash on you." Angie said, closing her phone.

Nina checked their stash spot for their important commodities and found a ten. She sniffed it. "Dude, I can't give this to him."

"Go Febreeze it; tell him it fell in the toilet."

"What was the total?" Nina asked, anticipating a night inside where she didn't have to worry about junkies or the enforcers or anything.

"I was gonna give him thirty, and that includes tip." Angie said. "I've got fifteen. We need at least another five."

"Think they'll be like Original Big Sal's whose drivers would take a joint or a bump in trade?" Ni

Bad IdeaJune 16 2010

Nina wasn't used to dates that could be perceived by others as "going well".  It was usually some drive-through and screwing after a sixer of tallboys back at his place.  She never wanted them to know where she lived.

She sat on Ben's couch in her t-shirt and underwear, watching him walk around his apartment in her skirt.  He didn't have any beer.  Over drinks at Louie's, he said he didn't drink.

There's something about alcohol that brings out the worst in me

She doubted sobriety was a good alternative.

"So you don't have anything here?  No wine, no old vodka, not

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This is what editing looks likeby `raspil

Photography / Conceptual

©2013 `raspil

Tell me again why you don't think you need to edit your work.

NO ONE GETS IT RIGHT THE FIRST TIME!

Edit that shit.

*SurrealCachinnation Jan 24, 2013 Student Writer

I need to invest in a printer... my dad promised me one when I started last semester, but it didn't happen. I think that'll be my first purchase once I get a job. Hard copies make editing so much easier. x_x

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`raspil Jan 24, 2013 Writer

before i went to culinary school, i bought one because i'd been using my uncle's printer for years. i picked up a little HP inkjet for like $120. that was the end of 2004. it's still kicking. recommended.

but always, find the printer that isn't just in your price range but that has the cheapest ink. a printer is generally a one-time purchase. you'll need ink at least 3-4 times a year depending on usage.

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*SurrealCachinnation Jan 24, 2013 Student Writer

I'll definitely keep that in mind. I'm pretty sure that's what my parents use (and I used throughout high school).

And YES. God, ink gets expensive.

Thanks for the advice.

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~SonAmyFan362 Jan 22, 2013 Hobbyist Writer

Whoa. That's an awful lot of correcting. But, you do make a good point.

Reply

`raspil Jan 22, 2013 Writer

no one gets it right the first go-around, no matter how long they've been writing. editing and revision - it's the "work" part of writing, but a simple change of perspective can have it mean it's when we are really super improving what we already might think is pretty good to begin with. it's not that what we write is "wrong", but that we're making it better. who wouldn't want to do that?

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~SonAmyFan362 Jan 22, 2013 Hobbyist Writer

True. You speak very truly.

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`raspil Jan 22, 2013 Writer

thank you

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~SonAmyFan362 Jan 22, 2013 Hobbyist Writer

You're most welcome!

!

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*ShadowedAcolyte Jan 16, 2013

THIS. THIS. THIS. THIS. THIS.

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`raspil Jan 16, 2013 Writer

thank you

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