My Life in Seven Speedways
Introducing slushies to the two Chinese exchange students who were on set was either the best or worst thing I’ve ever done for Sino-American diplomatic relations.
Annaka b’Koach
She shakes her head once, before looking up back at me with holy certainty. “You have no idea who you are,” she declares.
The Five Stages of Grieving a Bad Book
It is not uncommon for readers at this stage to lash out at others; example behaviors include a savage Twitter mention and/or telling the librarian who recommended the book that he should “seek a new career path.”
Best of 2022, Part Three: Editors’ Picks
Most of the time, we’re just readers with admin permissions.
More Festive Erotica with Your Favorite Librarian
Fun new surprises to this volume include the worst pet name for any child, several cameos from the Michelle Love extended universe, and multiple scenes that make one go, “I can’t imagine that’s how sex clubs actually function.”
Curse Tablets
And I just don’t have it in me to explain to a cop why I’m burying Reynolds Wrap under the hostas.
Don’t Worry, I’m Boring Too
When every thought you had about anything has already been espoused by someone more eloquent and witty than you, universal boredom seems like the inevitable end of human experience.
Faillyship
It’s the last time they ever come to the library.
Sacrificing My Soul on the Altar of Gay Porn
As a woman, I was late to the scene, and as a hopelessly asexual person, the scene did nothing for me.
Legacy America
I remember thinking, with all the considerable certainty that a fifteen-year-old can muster, that if this doesn’t change us, nothing will.
Annaka Koster (1996 – )
More likely, though, her inevitable termination was brought on by her unending affection for sugary beverages, which she does not regret.
What We Lose When We Ban Books
I am more worried about the effects that these conversations have on adults.
Pulling Weeds in the Allegory Garden
“Please don’t call the police,” she says.
Spoil Me
Kay throws out dramatic, world-altering twists as easily as your ex-roommate spoils the new Spiderman on Twitter.
Best of 2021, Part Two: Writers’ Picks
Amidst the bad, the broken, and the baffling, our writers sought and succeeded to chronicle all that and more.
Festive Erotica with Your Favorite Librarian
Our paranormal pair spend most of the story thinking about how their relationship failed because David was bad at sex, not chasing down whoever is putting up mistletoe all over town and giving a couple folks some minor frostbite.
Not Even Mad About It
“You’re Koster’s sister, right? Why aren’t you a ginger?”
Walden & Wind Turbines
The whole thing was a real exercise in accelerated bildungsroman.
The Co-op Killer
All we had to do to win was get both of our pawns to the launch pad.
Worse Angels
You are suddenly and acutely aware that when you die and go to hell, this is what awaits you.
Yuhki and Me
I’d start by telling them about the lies I used to tell in middle school.
Everybody Loves WWII
It might seem strange to describe a global event that cost some eighty-five million people their lives with the same adjective that Kohl’s uses to describe underwear.
Unsolicited Updates
For a creature that technically does not have a brain, Clive has a great sense of dramatic timing.
Bogeyman
He lurks behind church ladies when they ask if I’m still single.
An Incomplete List of the Worst Book Covers I’ve Ever Seen
Listen, book, your aesthetic can’t be both “lazy Warhol knockoff” and “grandpa forced to take a photo at Ye Olde Wild West Land.”
The Tremendous Samaritan
You would rather die than have some people pity you.
Best of 2020, Part Two: Peers’ Picks
Is anyone listening? Does anyone care? Or are we just writing into the void for the satisfaction of our own egos?
Merry Bloody Christmas
Much of my problem with Mary stems from my own somewhat-fraught relationship with my reproductive system, which is to say that I hate it and wish that it didn’t exist.
Thanksgiving Prayer
For those who shout down ignorance even past the point of no return, who know we are less than two minutes from midnight and continue anyway.
November 9, 2016
The professor in charge of my primary tutorial would, in what conservative pundits would later call “a total snowflake move,” offer to move back the due date on that week’s essay.
