“Mr. Palm Beach” may be my weirdest story yet, but it’s a good kind of weird, I promise. What do you think? Thanks to @kimmagowan.bsky.social and everyone else at @pitheadchapel.bsky.social for giving it a great home! #AmWriting #ShortStories #MagicalRealism pitheadchapel.com/mr-palm-beach/

So delighted to have a flash story in this tremendous issue of @pitheadchapel.bsky.social! And to share a masthead with @willwilloughby.bsky.social, a fellow Maine writer!

Our December issue is live! Read here: pitheadchapel.com/volume-14-is... Words: J. CONDRA SMITH @rebecca-turkewitz.bsky.social @willwilloughby.bsky.social NICK REES GARDNER MAX LIN JASON FRALEY Cover art: DEEMS ORTEGA

"Last week, I thought the river was speaking to me." @rebecca-turkewitz.bsky.social in @pitheadchapel.bsky.social pitheadchapel.com/the-great-mi...

Casco Bay protesters hope Gaza flotilla will help turn tide

Gov. Janet Mills issued an order Friday that allows all health care professionals in the state to administer the COVID-19 vaccine to all Mainers. It goes beyond what new federal guidance had allowed, and comes after weeks of uncertainty over who would be able to get the shot, and at what cost.

The Department of Justice says the detailed data is needed to ensure Maine is accurately maintaining its voter rolls. But Secretary of State Shenna Bellows, a Democrat, says the DOJ is overstepping its bounds as part of a "fishing expedition." www.mainepublic.org/politics/202...

President Trump directed the Defense Department to take a larger role in domestic law enforcement, including by “quelling civil disturbances,” in an executive order that comes as he threatens to broaden deployments of the National Guard in cities run by his political enemies.

An M.I.T. study found that 95% of companies that had invested in A.I. tools were seeing zero return. It jibes with the emerging idea that generative A.I., “in its current incarnation, simply isn’t all it’s been cracked up to be,” johncassidysays.bsky.social writes.

Professional criticism is not the same as individual reviews. They can both be useful but criticism is a skill-based genre like any other writing. The yelpification of criticism isn’t evolution.

The President is trying to ransack the Constitution, and the Supreme Court often seems complacent. Class-action lawsuits may be one remedy, Amy Davidson Sorkin writes.

Our submission window for our annual short story contest opens this Friday! This year, we welcome @andrewporter01.bsky.social as our guest judge. We're excited to share our Q&A with him on craft, writing, and more!

Read about color trends in our future climate dystopia and a funereal lament for a language that isn’t quite dead yet, in two poems by Hafsa Zulfiqar. buff.ly/CFYyTWX

Our annual contest opens for submissions August 1st! This year's guest judge is Andrew Porter. Keep an eye out for our Q&A with Andrew soon. Find more details about our contest here: pitheadchapel.com/larrybrown/

Whether it’s Hillary Clinton sending risotto recipes to campaign staffers or Donald Trump sending naked pictures of women to a pedophile, both candidates engaged in highly inappropriate communication.

"If this can happen to Colbert and a storied franchise, this can happen to anyone": www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

Colbert confirmed the cancellation during a show taping on Thursday. CBS said the move was "purely a financial decision against a challenging backdrop in late night."

“I could fill pages with lines from EXIT ZERO – that makes this a must-read collection. Go read this.” @Gabino_Iglesias reviews new work from Marie-Helene Bertino - locusmag.com/2025/07...

Sarah Stillman investigates a widespread crisis of deaths by starvation in America’s county jails. Most of the victims she identified had been arrested in the midst of a mental-health crisis, often on petty charges tied to their psychiatric distress.

Exclusive: A neo-Nazi has sent us footage of Zohran Mamdani playing air guitar at his high-school prom.

wow! Debutiful.net/email

Here are 10 poetry collections you should pre-order right now! debutiful.net/2025/07/01/1...

Join us in welcoming local authors @rebecca-turkewitz.bsky.social and Rylan Hynes to discuss the sea, the night, ghosts, and other queer stuff with author @mollyolguin.bsky.social on Tuesday, July 1 at 7pm! All 3 writers will be in conversation about their work and will answer audience questions.

"Whether it is a glance, a throwaway line ('You always go home with the hot women'), or the scenes where Maverick has sex with a woman, there are subtle instances of straightness that are impossible to deny."

Ben Cohen, a co-founder of Ben & Jerry's, was arrested on Wednesday in Washington, D.C., after he interrupted a Senate hearing to protest Congress’s funding of Israel’s military as it wages war against Hamas in Gaza.

Too many people are allowing Donald Trump to continue because “they’re thinking of what is in their own personal, financial well-being, and not what is in the well-being of our democracy,” Cory Booker says.

If you’re on TikTok, I’m making a series of videos telling funny, creepy, hopefully interesting stories about Zero Saints, which is coming back May 27th and you should totally preorder wherever you buy books because preorders are CRUCIAL! Anyway, first video is about beheadings.

Hear me out…. www.nytimes.com/2025/04/24/s...

We decided to watch “School of Rock” last night because it has “Minecraft Steve in it” (I know…It is what it is) and I decided to google a bit and, yall, the little singer girl just got married to the big security guard boy /in real life/. She’s a OBGYN sonographer and he’s a music industry lawyer.

In the few cases challenging President Trump’s executive orders that have made their way to the Supreme Court, “its messages have been repeatedly—and, I believe, deliberately—muddled,” Ruth Marcus writes. “Now, finally, clarity plus backbone.”

Kind, decent, and compassionate, Pope Francis was badly out of step with contemporary western culture.

Submissions are OPEN for Personal Narrative and The Commuter! Send us your flash, poetry, graphic narratives, and creative nonfiction before we hit our cap. We can't wait to read your work! buff.ly/znX5yZY

“Well, well, well, what do we have here?” U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi said as she held up the weapon with a rubber glove theonion.com/doj-pla...

25 more days left to enter! Grand prize $2500! Total prize pot more than $4700! Big money for tiny stories. Do you have a gem just lounging around on your computer, in your journals, in your beautiful mind? Deadline May 10! www.smokelong.com/the-smokelon...

In a new report, Sarah Stillman investigates deaths related to starvation, dehydration, and neglect in county jails across the U.S.—a crisis that at times has been covered up by private health companies and government officials. nyer.cm/hMT7u9R

Here's the reality: they've backed themselves into a corner. If they bring him home there will be hell to pay. It's clear that they believe that the lesser hell is not bringing him home. So we need to make that hell the worse hell. Start calling and screaming at all of your representatives now! 1/2

The funds had been initially withheld following President Trump's clash with Maine Gov. Janet Mills over the issue of transgender athletes.

Today’s Daily Cartoon, by Brendan Loper. #NewYorkerCartoons Sign up for our free humor newsletter to never miss a Daily Cartoon: nyer.cm/PJhMpSk

The Associated Press wins reinstatement to White House events after judge rules government can’t bar its journalists, citing the 1st Amendment.

Everybody romanticizing about the heyday of American manufacturing needs to carefully listen to one (1) Bruce Springsteen song.

Unconscionable.

A federal judge has ordered the Trump White House to let Associated Press journalists return to the Oval Office and other spaces to cover news events, ruling it was unlawful to block the news service in a dispute over its choice of words.

Breaking News: Several top officials at the IRS, including the acting commissioner, resigned after the agency agreed to assist with deportation efforts.

Federal cuts leave Maine food pantries with empty shelves and more need than ever

Breaking News: A senior Justice Department lawyer was put on leave after questioning the administration’s decision to deport a Maryland man to El Salvador.

My contributor interview about my queer mill worker story in @coloradoreview.bsky.social is up! We talk about trying out historical fiction as a genre, my obsession with Maine’s old mills, and non-traditional communities! coloradoreview.colostate.edu/2025/04/a-co...

I’ve got a new Weird flash fiction piece out in the world over at @flashfictiononline.bsky.social! It’s called Drown-Haunted and you can check it out here: www.flashfictiononline.com/article/drow...

I’m kind of obsessed with historical horror right now. @sgj.bsky.social @silviamg.bsky.social @tananarivedue.bsky.social @victorlavalle.bsky.social

The PseudoPod portal is open, you say? Yes! But ONLY FOR stories that have been, or will be, published in anthologies or collections in this year of our lord* 2025. Hold on to your previously unpublished work for now: that door's opening in the summer. [*we'll leave you to decide who that is]

They meant “doing fraud waste and abuse” not “finding fraud, waste and abuse.” www.wired.com/story/doge-t...