TRAVERSING Z

Littoral Drift

Lackington’s / Macbeth

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My story “Littoral Drift” is out, at last, in Issue 6 of Lackington’s. I am inordinately thankful for the editor’s divine patience with what I knew would be a tricky path to publication, and for being so kind as to move it from issue to issue to accommodate it. To have such faith in one’s work is an incredible gift.

I celebrated yesterday, a celebration that was as much relief as delight at seeing it out in the world at last. It is a . . . melancholic story; there was much blue within and without when I wrote it; and I honestly wasn’t sure for a while if it would get published at all. Perhaps fitting, then, that it should emerge when I’m putting the finishing touches on a story about artistic purpose and its price (that is, the finishing touches on a full draft ready for beta reading). Which has required me listening to the first two acts of Verdi’s Macbeth over and over, and especially this aria, here sung by Callas, a tragedy singing a tragedy being written into my own little tragedy. The relevant moment for the story, should you one day read it, comes at 3:34, that long lovely Re.

“Littoral Drift” to Lackington’s

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So at last I can announce that my story “Littoral Drift” will be in Lackington’s Issue 4. And it looks like I’ll be sharing a TOC with Rose Lemberg, which is pretty freakin’ awesome. I’ve known about the acceptance for a while, which made me all fidgety because I’m impatient and I like telling things . . . but it’s also given me time to see not just one but three issues of Lackington’s great selections, which has been a little humbling. So yeah. Me, in Lackington’s. Yowza.