February 6, 2024

An American Family in Crete

An American Family in Crete

Veteran FC Barista and lifelong iconoclast Jason Brick moved his family and his writing to the Greek Island of Crete for a year to learn about another people and their culture. We were delighted to hear about his Odyssey and eager to find out what it was like, so Jack interviewed Jason recently and got these comments and photos back to share with you, our faithful Coffee Clubbers. Please share your Comments and ask Jason any questions you may have. He’ll be back. Jack: What in the heck are you doing in Crete? Jason: I’ve brought my family to Greece for a year so we can experience what it’s like to live in a country and a culture distinct from America. We’re on the island of Crete, which is off the coast of mainland Greece—the…

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January 28, 2024

Meet PS Conway, Our New Poetry Writer-in-Residence

Meet PS Conway, Our New  Poetry Writer-in-Residence

After a grueling quiz with poet PS Conway, administered by your Fictional Cafe poets Yong and Vera, along with me, your founder, on the six most fascinating drinking establishments in Ireland, an explanation of a potato famine, and a perfect recitation of Molly Bloom’s soliloquy in James Joyce’s Ulysses, we have anointed PS Conway our new Poetry Writer-in-Residence for 2024-25. Delighted with his perfect score we capped his nomination with this interview below, which confirmed him as an excellent choice. Another P.S.: we choose a Fiction Writer-in-Residence and a Poetry Writer-in-Residence every two alternating years. Expect to see, and read, a lot of PS’s captivating poetry in both images and words. JACK: Hello, faithful members of Fictional Café’s Coffee Club. I’m here with Vera West, our former Poetry Writer-in-Residence, to interview Vera’s successor, PS Conway,…

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December 17, 2023

Fictional Cafe Collaborates with Pushcart Press

Fictional Cafe Collaborates with Pushcart Press

A Few Words About the Pushcart Prize FOR THE THIRD YEAR, Fictional Café’s baristas have chosen and submitted what we agreed were the best six works—three of fiction and three of poetry—we’ve published in the past year for consideration in the Pushcart Prize competition. As usual, a work from each of our Writer-in-Residence and Poet-in-Residence has been selected for the Prize. Congratulations to our six nominees! Here are their links on FC. Please check them out. Vera West, FC’s Poet-in-Residence: https://www.fictionalcafe.com/poet-in-residence-vera-west-shares-her-work-for-national-poetry-month/ Rachel Gonzalez, FC’s Writer-in-Residence: https://www.fictionalcafe.com/the-secret-society-by-rachel-gonzalez/ PS Conway, Poetry: https://www.fictionalcafe.com/coddled-by-mountains-poetry-by-ps-conway/ Levi Dodd, Fiction: https://www.fictionalcafe.com/cherry-black-a-story-by-levi-dodd/ Cori Sims, Poetry: https://www.fictionalcafe.com/poem-and-personal-essay-for-19-june-2023/ Bill Suter, Fiction: https://www.fictionalcafe.com/you-just-never-know-what-will-happen-at-the-cafe-chimera/ Just as you submit your own work for consideration on FC, Bill Henderson’s Pushcart Press asked literary publications, both print and online, for submissions to its Pushcart Prize Best of the Small Presses…

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November 6, 2023

The Hurricane Book: A Lyric History

The Hurricane Book: A Lyric History

New Creative Nonfiction by Claudia Acevedo-Quiñones How do we mark the passage of time? How do we reconcile what we remember of our life and those we love – and have loved – against the mutability of memory? Like author Marcel Proust (À la recherche du temps perdu), Ms. Acevedo-Quiñones grapples with her life growing up in Puerto Rico and her identity as a writer in Brooklyn, marking the journey with the island’s six great hurricanes of the 20th century. With our deep gratitude to Rose Metal Press for publishing this book, we herewith present excerpts from Claudia Acevedo-Quiñones’ remarkable work. These excerpts do not do full justice to her innovative narrative, so please read the book. Meet the author live tomorrow (Wednesday, November 8, 2023) evening, in conversation with poet Paolo Javier at the…

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October 5, 2023

“Out of the Far North” – A New Novel of International Intrigue

“Out of the Far North” – A New Novel of International Intrigue

The Third Nir Tavor – Nicole le Roux Mossad Thriller, Just Published With over 100,000 copies of Operation Joktan and By Way of Deception in print, authors Amir Tsarfati and Steve Yohn deliver again with another pulse-pounding novel of international intrigue. Enriched by its being based on true events – as well as Tsarfati’s having been a major in the Israeli Defense Forces – your editors at The Fictional Café loved Out of the Far North and think you will, too. When the story begins we find Israeli Mossad secret agent Nir Tavor outside Damascus, Syria, bribing a road guard with a carton of Alhamraa cigarettes, and we’re off and running. The very contemporary backstory concerns Russia and Putin, who is furious and plotting revenge on Western energy markets. Europe, once reliant on Russian gas, have…

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