This month, we're sharing a group of Rust Belt-oriented pieces recently published at our newly-launched publication, the Pittsburgh Review of Books (PRoB). PRoB isn't only focused on our region, but part of our mission is to introduce this region to the world (and vice versa). www.beltmag.com

"The iceberg shuddered, a deep crack split the surface, wide as a shoe, closer now, spiderwebbing toward the three of them. The ship hull strained against the ice, an ancient, animal shriek." Read "Endure" by Anthony Swofford, based on a photo by Huck Beard. beltmag.com/endure/

A group of Pittsburgh writers recently convened in the historic Pump House in Munhall to share pieces created in response to the evocative photographs of Huck Beard. We’ll be sharing them this week, back from our hiatus, now publishing as Rust Belt Magazine. beltmag.com/october-2025/

“More than in the subject matter we publish, or literally where we’re headquartered, the 'Pittsburgh' in The Pittsburgh Review of Books is a matter of mentality, of perspective...” We're live! Read a message from our founder and Editor-in-Chief, Ed Simon. pghrev.com/the-foundry-...

A sit-down strike is not an obsolete tactic. It’s a blueprint for better working conditions, and for a revival of the middle class. The tumultuous Flint sit-down strike of 1936-1937 at General Motors is proof of that. #LaborDay @beltmagazine.bsky.social

An interdisciplinary humanities periodical housed in Carnegie Mellon University’s Dietrich College of Humanities and Social Sciences and published by @cmuenglish.bsky.social, PRoB will feature essays, reviews, interviews, and excerpts engaging with salient and pressing issues. Launching Sept. 3!

A new hub for literature! The Pittsburgh Review of Books will be both in Pittsburgh (and the Rust Belt) and of the wider world; a means of introducing the region’s vibrant literary community into national conversations as well as bringing those conversations here. beltmag.com/introducing-...

"I know people tend to hunt and peck in short story collections, but I think of it more like a record album. I present it as a whole." Thanks to @beltmagazine.bsky.social for this interview with AHP Author @sherrieflick.bsky.social!

A new hub for literature! The Pittsburgh Review of Books will be both in Pittsburgh (and the Rust Belt) and of the wider world; a means of introducing the region’s vibrant literary community into national conversations as well as bringing those conversations here. beltmag.com/introducing-...

I had a great talk with the amazing Bill Lychack about my new story collection 🐻 Up at the also amazing Belt Magazine @autumnhousepress.bsky.social

A conversation between Bill Lychack and @sherrieflick.bsky.social, in which the latter discusses the mystery of bears, the art of joy in writing and life, and her new collection of stories, “I Have Not Considered Consequences” (Autumn House Press, 2025) beltmag.com/considering-...

“That’s how they mark the restroom doors here, Hymns and Hers. When I was a kid this bar was a funeral home. Prior that a foundry.” Read “Hymns & Hers” and three other poems by Kristofer Collins. beltmag.com/four-poems-b...

“That’s how they mark the restroom doors here, Hymns and Hers. When I was a kid this bar was a funeral home. Prior that a foundry.” Read “Hymns & Hers” and three other poems by Kristofer Collins. beltmag.com/four-poems-b...

“Keweenaw County, Michigan, once the heart of America’s copper mining industry, now stands as a quiet testament to the rise and fall of an industrial empire.” Read “Keweenaw County’s Echoes of Copper Mining” by Paul Gordon. beltmag.com/keweenaw-cou...

"The film was a proper history lesson for me, the piano, a tangible symbol of a not-so-distant time when people were auctioned and enslaved, sold and sent away from their families in exchange for an instrument." Michael Bennett on the work of August Wilson. beltmag.com/relearning-t...

“Charles Goodyear sowed as many seeds as John Chapman but he did it from the kitchen…” Read “Goodyear & Chapman,” a poem by Jeffrey Nathan Marks. beltmag.com/goodyear-cha...

“Baseball is poetry in motion.” His elegant movements in right field, his powerful swing glorified in stanzas, and his laser-like throws from the outfield demonstrated an athletic artistry that few players have matched. beltmag.com/the-sky-belo...

“While the coal industry has come and gone, Slavic churches have remained a backbone of the community for over a century. They offer tranquility and craftsmanship in a world that is increasingly devoid of both.” Read “Onion Domes of the Anthracite” by Gavin Moulton. beltmag.com/onion-domes-...

“random memories scrawl across the knuckles of a clenched fist pounding its way into my house Drunk.” Read “Shut Me Down,” a new poem by Holly Day. beltmag.com/shut-me-down

“random memories scrawl across the knuckles of a clenched fist pounding its way into my house Drunk.” Read “Shut Me Down,” a new poem by Holly Day. beltmag.com/shut-me-down

“We need to worry less if a homeless person wants to live by choice under a bridge and more about the social bridges of connection, kinship, and community collapsing all around us.” -- Dana Grande beltmag.com/gephyrophobia/

Read this essay I wrote about my father’s death and my family’s legacy sandwich over at @beltmagazine.bsky.social beltmag.com/true-story-o...

"The Parker Sub doesn’t want those things. It likes simple. Plain. Which is why it’s something a simple and plain man has to ask for." @laurenparker.bsky.social with The True Story of a Sandwich. beltmag.com/true-story-o...

“We drive forty-five minutes for fried fish & eat it, barefoot, at the beach.” Read two new poems by Patrick King. beltmag.com/two-poems-by...

Great to see Kent State University Press alongside our friends at @upittpress.bsky.social, @uakronpress.bsky.social, and Cleveland State University Poetry Center in this writeup of poetry publishing in the Rust Belt!

It was such a pleasure chatting with Rose Bialer on behalf of @ksupress.bsky.social about the vibrant Rust Belt poetry scene. Between amazing poets and publishers with longstanding poetry lists, it's an incredible community to be a part of ❤️

"We can be of our region and communities while also being part of a larger thing—whether that be American poetry, university press publishing, or just publishing in general.” Read “A Rust Belt Poetry Renaissance” by Rose Bialer. beltmag.com/a-rust-belt-...

“It’s difficult to associate the Freudian couch with anything other than a New York shrink catering to that unique kind of neurosis that afflicts the upper-crust of the cosmopolitan metropole.” Read “Psychoanalysis in the Midwest” by Matthew Moore. beltmag.com/psychoanalys...

“Mary had Blackwater. i have Skunk River: swimming upstream in august; spook owls in october; all the farmers yearning arriving late and wet in november; and i have december too--” Read three poems by Tara Labovich. beltmag.com/three-poems-...

Saunders grew up in Pittsburgh’s Hill District and attended Saturday art classes at the very museum that houses his first major retrospective exhibition. Read Emma Riva's review of the Raymond Saunders show at the Carnegie Museum of Art. beltmag.com/raymond-saun...

"Around 1895, [Frick's] enhanced status at the Carnegie Company and developing acumen as an art collector led to an explosion of painting purchases." An excerpt from Ian Wardropper's THE FRICKS COLLECT: AN AMERICAN FAMILY AND THE REVOLUTION IN TASTE IN THE GILDED AGE. beltmag.com/clayton-the-...

As we prepare to refresh our site over the summer, we want to hear from YOU! If you have a few minutes, we'd appreciate you sharing your thoughts about Belt in our Reader Survey. www.surveymonkey.com/r/YYQKRNF

Do you have a second to help us out? Share the below post to your network! Thanks. ⬇️

As we prepare to refresh our site over the summer, we want to hear from YOU! If you have a few minutes, we'd appreciate you sharing your thoughts about Belt in our Reader Survey. www.surveymonkey.com/r/YYQKRNF

From the archive: “#MayDay isn’t just an estimably American holiday, it’s a particularly #RustBelt holiday, forged in the cauldron of Chicago’s streets and factories, born from the experience of workers in the mills and plants of Detroit, Pittsburgh, and Cleveland.” beltmag.com/may-day-is-a...

“I now own four of his paintings, but this kind of stuffy collector language feels silly to use. People at his shows are always smiling, because it’s impossible to be art-gallery-serious around this work.” Margaret Grebowicz on Buffalo painter Robert Harris. beltmag.com/robert-harri...

“Lucy’s is not a white savior story. It’s a complex story about Black emancipation and white allyship, and how in the fight for justice and equity, the best of intentions is absolutely necessary, but often not enough. Paul Sturtevant on Lucy Martindale. beltmag.com/an-ohio-teac...

All orders of DISPATCHES FROM THE RUST BELT directly support our mission of paying writers to share authentic experiences of life in this region! Get your copy today. ⬇️

It’s #NationalPoetryMonth — no foolin’! We publish new poetry from authors in our region each week, with our archive always freely available. beltmag.com/poetry/

Recovering Alice Dunbar-Nelson: an underrated writer and survivor tied to a controversial Dayton great. By Janyce Denise Glasper. beltmag.com/recovering-a...

All orders of DISPATCHES FROM THE RUST BELT directly support our mission of paying writers to share authentic experiences of life in this region! Get your copy today. ⬇️

“All my worry has come down to the decision of compassionate, reasonable human beings. I would hug these medical heroes, including the hospice nurse, if they were present — virus be damned.” -- Ed Davis An excerpt from HINDSIGHT: UNTOLD STORIES FROM 2020. beltmag.com/going-gently/

“My dad describes his childhood drives across the Detroit border as if he were Dorothy entering Oz…” A new poem by A. J. Frantz. beltmag.com/alter

“Jakiela is a master of an essay form that is distinctly her own, a kind of integrated collage style that brings together her background as a journalist and the author of collections of poetry, weaving together quotes, facts, musings, digressions, and stories.” beltmag.com/skating-with...

“Americans take up a lot of space. We sprawl. We come from a big country, where we’re not used to holding anything, our opinions, even our arms and legs, in. Our body language is open, as if we can absorb the whole world.”

“I stayed in Ireland for two weeks, a visitor, a tourist. Everywhere Sinead and I would go, we’d play a game Sinead invented called ‘Spot the American.’” An excerpt from ALL SKATE: TRUE STORIES FROM MIDDLE LIFE by Lori Jakiela, just released by Roadside Press. beltmag.com/of-the-wolf/

“Sepia murals of workers coat the walls— smelters, farmers, such drudgery.” Read “Woman Singing in the Post Office,” a new poem by Cleveland writer Cathy Barber. beltmag.com/woman-singin...

Need some spring break reading? Rep your region with a copy of DISPATCHES FROM THE RUST BELT, our annual print anthology of the most-read stories from the site. beltmag.com/product/disp...