"My mother could swallow insults whole like a crocodile." Georgi Bargamian's miCRo enchants with its incantatory, riddle-like charms, swirling from line to line. Link in thread.

We're delighted to announce our 2025 nominees for Best of the Net. Congratulations to all, and good luck! @Talkinghyphae.bsky.social @cberwick.bsky.social

You read that right! miCRo submissions are OPEN! Send us your best work of 500 words or fewer.

"This liminal mood would spill into the house itself, no longer a constrained space, but porous and crackling with dangerous possibilities." This week on site, Associate Editor Andy Sia explores eerie and liminal spaces in a Halloween feature. Link in thread.

"For a decade I carry the rotting mango, its pit humming with maggots. I cannot rid myself of it, I cannot glance away." What happens when something goes from delicious to sickeningly sweet? Preeti Talwai's miCRo has all the answers! Link in thread.

"We’re taught that disability is tragic, sad, and maybe inspiring. But comedy is the genre of survival." Today on the site, contributor Anya Groner interviews @btrapperkeeper.bsky.social about his new novel, RANGE OF MOTION.

"That damn soul is going to go someplace else. It’s going to shrug me off the way we shrug off our raincoats, overcoats, and Ulster coats." This week's miCRo by Shikhandin pays mind to possession: what we own, what we do not own, and what we feel owed to.

Congratulations to contributor Paula Bohince on today's publication of A VIOLENCE with @princetonupress.bsky.social !

Congratulations to former CR editor @btrapperkeeper.bsky.social . His much-anticipated debut novel, RANGE OF MOTION, publishes today with our friends at @acrebooks.bsky.social .

Congratulations to former CR editor AND contributor Christian Moody on today's release of LOST IN THE FOREST OF MECHANICAL BIRDS, the winner of the Dzanc Short Story Collection Prize!

Playwrights (and CR contribs!) @bydanobrien.bsky.social and christopher oscar peña in conversation with director and producer @markarmstrong4.bsky.social about the two's recently published play trilogies and more. Link in first comment:

"I won't call it a detonator. But after pressing the button, I scamper around the refrigerator, taking cover behind layers of sheet metal and white plastic finish from the machine's invisible munitions." In a miCRo essay, @ellenkfee.bsky.social takes us on a tour of the microwave's origin.

Congratulations to contributor @amitmajmudar.bsky.social -- his new book, THREE METAMORPHOSES: NOVELLAS IN VERSE AND PROSE was released last week by Orison Books!

The 2025 winners of the Robert and Adele Schiff Awards are: Robert Sorrell Bynum (fiction) for "Like a Star" @jessicacuello.bsky.social (literary nonfiction) for "Your Life for Another" A. D. Lauren-Abunassar (poetry) for "Three Bombardments" See our site for more! Link in first comment.

As September draws to a close, we celebrate the inclusion of CR contributors (and a former editor!) in lists from @clmporg.bsky.social. Check out work by @cdonosowriter.bsky.social , @memi-writes.bsky.social , Inger Christensen, and José Angel Araguz!

Now on our site, three writers from Nigeria share their experiences of the literary culture there and in the US. Thanks to Frances Ogamba, Hussain Ahmed, and KÁNYIN Olorunnisola! Link in thread.

"...even if the task is to leap across the aporia or the big vacuous gap, if that is the task that sits before you, then that is your task." Today on the site, Edgar Garcia discusses research, collaborative listening, and dreams. Link in thread.

Excellent interview with @cincinnatireview.bsky.social podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/p...

"...sometimes I dream about her thigh tattoo: 'Call your mother,' inked in curling script above a dolphin with an M16 clutched in its tiny, perfect flippers." This week's miCRo by Sarah Chin navigates the sticky terrain of grief. Link in thread.

Congratulations to contributor @mardery.bsky.social ! Her collection LEVEL WATCH is released today from @juneroadpress.bsky.social .

This evening at 5:30 pm in the Elliston Room we have the privilege of hosting three very successful UC creative writing alumni: @mariannelchan.bsky.social , @litmagreject.bsky.social , and Emma Hudelson. Assistant Editor Blessing Christopher asked each of them about legacy.

"Clear. Nuclear. Like the Visible Woman in her plexiglass-clear skin once lied to me I wouldn’t grow to be. One button for her heart to light up red. One for the nervy, branching rivers in her head." Alexandra Teague floods nervy, hot branches of language in this week's miCRo.

A very special congratulations today to two friends of the magazine: former Assistant Editor @hollicarrell.bsky.social 's debut, APOSTASIES, releases today from @perugiapress.bsky.social , alongside contributor (& former UC faculty member) Brock Clarke's SPECIAL ELECTION from @acrebooks.bsky.social

"We know that literary journals often come from a deep place of admiration and love, and to see this piece of literary past is akin to napping under a handmade quilt, hearing an old 45 as it spins, taking a sip of localized, antiquated soda."

"She did not try to make each pot unique, did not sign them. This was not that kind of art." This week's miCRo is an ekphrastic prose poem by Matthew Thorburn. Read more at our site; link in thread.

Want to get a behind-the-scenes peek into how we edit? Managing Editor Lisa Ampleman appears on today's episode of the Page Count podcast, courtesy of Cleveland Public Library's Ohio Center for the Book!

Our miCRo submissions are now CLOSED. Stay tuned here for future open calls!

"I’m drawn back to these places, these ruins, because they form the imagistic, psychological core of me, but I also don’t want them to become anyone else’s porn. Take your camera elsewhere, part of me whispers" Now on our site, a craft essay by Maya Jewell Zeller; link in thread

That was fast! Submissions to the print journal are now CLOSED. miCRo submissions (of pieces 500 words or fewer) remain open. Visit our submissions page for more details.

"By the end of class half the goldfish were dead, / and Mr. K had to collect their bodies into a / white plastic bucket used for dirty mop water." This week's miCRo by Ting Lin captures both that back-to-school feeling and the violence of coming-of-age. buff.ly/KZDCJ3j

Congratulations to contributor Teo Shannon on today's publication of A CHRONOLOGY OF BLOOD with University of New Mexico Press!

“Every night we reach that place where we forgo the will to exist. Behind us are the usual strange...” Read Inger Christensen’s “The World Wants to See Itself,” translated by Bradley Harmon, in @cincinnatireview.bsky.social this #NationalTranslationMonth: www.cincinnatireview.com/micro/micro-...

We are once again OPEN for submissions to both our print journal and miCRo! We strongly encourage you to submit to the print journal within the next day or so, as we tend to reach our cap just days after opening up.

An appreciation for a book of nonfiction with a novel's sense of scene, setting, and character: Home of the Happy by Jordan LaHaye Fontenot (@marinerbooks.bsky.social). Read @lisaampleman.bsky.social 's thoughts about it on our site. Link in first comment:

"the thin blank beach is survival, & so we run around the edges playing, building sandcastles, erasing thoughts of what could destroy us..." This week's miCRo is "Fascism," by Mark Strohschein, an ekphrastic prose poem about Kazimir Malevich’s 1915 painting, Black Square. Link in thread:

"What happens when the things we love—whether beings, objects, or places—have lifespans that do not match our expectations?" Today on the site, issue 22.1 contributor Zoe Ballering explores the idea of life spans in fiction. Link in thread.

"I try to picture them all as babies. Whenever my stomach lurches around a man, I remind myself he once toddled around in diapers ..." Today's miCRo is "In Transit" by Bella Gibbs, picked by our summer assistant editor, Jess Silfa. Link in thread.

Keep those August #prose submissions coming! 📚🖊️

A special feature on our site now: an essay by @debraspark.bsky.social in which the "I" speaker doesn't emerge until halfway through. Instead, the piece tells the story of a woman learning the dark secret in her mother's past. Link in first comment:

"Eyeglasses described the stars to Rocketship, who needed no prodding. So Eyeglasses served as navigator, and with Rocketship went exploring other universes." This week's miCRo is "Eyeglasses and Rocketship" by Chris Haven. Link in thread.

"The queer community is my number one most important audience. I never want to put anything in my books that would be alienating or dumbed-down-feeling for a queer reader." Today on the site, former Assistant Editor Lily Davenport interviews author @lydiconklin.bsky.social -- Link in thread.

Poet and Editor #DonBogen on the magic of @marthasilano.bsky.social both in person and on the page. Martha's posthumous volume, TERMINAL SURREAL, is forthcoming from Acre Books this fall. #poetry tinyurl.com/59fst2wu

"Through the erasure of [my mother's] often confessional correspondence to her own parents, I render visible some truths that are difficult for me to speak..." On our site, a visual poem by @brennawomer.bsky.social using collage and erasure of letters to find her own idiom. Link in thread:

Congratulations to miCRo contributor @clairepolders.bsky.social on today's release of WOMAN OF THE HOUR: FIFTY TALES OF LONGING AND REBELLION with @vineleavespress.bsky.social .

🚨🚨🚨Ricky Rozay raps, “put Molly all in her champagne, she don’t even know it”, my poem which was originally published @cincinnatireview.bsky.social is the featured poem for today @versedaily.bsky.social !!

"Running into [Martha] in the bookfairs of various AWP conferences over the years was like catching a jolt of open sky amid the general fog of crowds and schmoozing." Today on the site, Editor-at-Large Don Bogen shares a tribute to frequent CR contributor Martha Silano.

“The love of his life is a doll made to look exactly like him, down to the asymmetrical fuzz of the upper lip and the strands of long, greasy hair.” Today on the site, we feature one of the wildest stories that's ever come across our desks: "Self-Care" by Brett Hymel Jr. Link in comments.

The Schiff Awards close at 11:59 pm!

Only one day left to polish up your best fiction, nonfiction, and poetry to submit to the Robert and Adele Schiff Awards! Win $1000 and publication in The Cincinnati Review. All submissions are considered for publication! Contest closes tomorrow, July 15. Details here: buff.ly/mDOMzaV

2024 Robert and Adele Schiff Award winner in literary nonfiction Erika Gallion Velasquez on validation in her writing practice. "Paradise is Ours" is featured in our current issue. The 2025 Robert and Adele Schiff Awards are OPEN until next Tuesday, July 15!