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“Pig House” by Kay Vaindal
When the power goes out, whole cities die. Your rebreather stops pulling oxygen and if it zeroes before you can charge it: suffocation. Heave into your lungs the useless air. Deep breath, nothing. And another and another. Aunt Beth died that way when Rochester went out. That was the fifteenth biggest one in the States—Rochester….
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“For The Pollinators” by A.D. Sui
Shirtless and sunburned, a lone man climbs a hill. The bees buzz in his skull—relentless. Their drone drowns out the raging freeway, curses from tired drivers, a distant siren. Angry-red skin peels from his shoulders. Outgrown toenails peek through his torn sneakers. Sometimes he loses his footing, and the bees sting his eyes from the…
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“Drinking Dead Brazilians” by Lia Mulcahy
Here I am in glorious technicolour, standing in the lights that strobe and chase across my skin like flies on a carcass. There is a floor-length mirror, streaky with handprints and faceprints and lipstick stains, the ghost-tokens of dozens of lovers gone by. The dancefloor writhes. The dancers admire themselves and each other in the…
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“The Rubberist” by Molly Miles
Ottery St. Mary Tar Barrels [Event]: On November 5th, or thereabouts, of every year the inhabitants of Ottery St. Mary, a village in Devon, strap barrels of tar to themselves and set them alight. They then run through the crowds of people, who gather in the village for the event, while the barrels burn. The…
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“The Passion of Pope Formosus” by LC von Hessen
Behold, sinners, and quail in terror, as the Holy Man emerges from his tomb! Borne on the broad shoulders of four strong friars, his mitre jostled, his robes caressed, as the palace doors fling wide, as the chamber’s great throng parts in a Red Sea of gasps, whispers, and living flesh before the grim procession….
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Everything We Assume is Wrong: an interview with R.L. Summerling, author of Fleshpots
Jonny Pickering: Hi Rebecca, thanks so much for chatting to us. Before we dig into your writing, I’d love to talk film with you for a minute. We both share a love of Ben Wheatley’s dark fantasy horror film A Field In England for its unsettling vibes and refusal to over-explain anything to the viewer….
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The Nature of Alex Garland’s Ex Machina and its Immoral Philosophy of AI by Ben Lockwood
A helicopter soars over a vast, glaciated landscape bright with the crisp whites of boreal snow, the clear blues of glacial meltwater, and the lush greens of northern trees. It’s one of the opening shots of Alex Garland’s Ex Machina (2014), and serves as both a natural backdrop with which to contrast the film’s technological…
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Everywhere the Sea is Rising: a review of Dehiscent by Ashley Deng
It’s a hell of a thing to sit in the lap of luxury while the world burns around you. I’m able to work in the comfort of my home and write this essay for you to read, probably in similar comfort, while half a world away Gaza is burning, and everywhere the sea is rising,…