Currently open for submissions—until July 10 midnight EST! For updated guidelines: bulbregion.com/Submissions

Afternoon gang, Irritable friends looking for an outlet, Please find enclosed a new @sarpsozdinler.bsky.social wonder!

Have you ordered your personal volcano yet? It’s the exciting new way to keep all the unpleasant emotions right where you can see them! Or better yet, read my new piece, “My Personal Volcano,” in the wonderful @hexliterary.bsky.social and see what a simple online purchase could do for you. 🔗 below!

"My therapist says I need a healthier way to process my anger, so I purchase a personal volcano online." What a thrill to have the legend @sarpsozdinler.bsky.social up on @hexliterary.bsky.social this week! If you are feeling a little hot-under-the-collar, this one is for you! A surreal wonder!

stop what you’re doing & read this brief but magical eruption of sly sad whimsy by the never dormant @sarpsozdinler.bsky.social 👇 hexliterary.com?p=3377

Truly, I need a personal volcan of my own. Until then, I'm gonna carry @sarpsozdinler.bsky.social's in my billfold and pull it out whenever necessary, like now... and over here. This is brilliant and beautiful in so many ways.

upcoming stories / poems / readings with:

An unusually long piece that I started writing back in 2024 during a retreat just outside Lisbon has finally found a home at the amazing Expat Press. Thanks to Manny for trusting "The Monsters of Bethlehem." 🔗 in comments!

If you’ve ever(?) fantasized(?) about Titanic-ing(?) with a person of authority(?) on a rooftop (can happen to the best of us?), please be assured that one of my two micros in the latest issue of @gooseberrypielit.bsky.social is about just that. In case you wondered. Thanks to Jeff for all! 🔗 below

A silly little half-fiction I wrote after seeing Backrooms, on my way back home, and Cody over at A Thin Slice of Anxiety was kind enough to run it. Read “Ottoman Empire” through the link in comments below.

This new piece in Farewell Transmission (@farewelltransmiss.bsky.social) today might be the closest I’ve gotten to CNF in a while. Well, half-CNF. CNF-adjacent. One of those weird CNF-esque quasi-lucid-dreams. You get the poiCNF. 🔗 below!

“All those tiny portraits of dead queens and dirigibles staring back at him.” A Parade of Cents + 1 by @sarpsozdinler.bsky.social in @gooseberrypielit.bsky.social gooseberry-pie.com/a-parade-of-...

“I stuffed my duffel bag with tiny bottles of shampoo and the weirdest VHS tape I could find in the pile: some guy screaming into the camera about wheat prices while being surrounded by a gaggle of baby lemurs” @sarpsozdinler.bsky.social @bendinggenres.bsky.social bendinggenres.com/late-checkout/

Psssttt…lookie here. We have cookies over at The Bulb Region 👀 @bulbregion.bsky.social

"...and she laughed then said, 'It’s like they left behind all this stuff so as to stay here forever,' and I looked at her imploringly." Big love for this gem by @sarpsozdinler.bsky.social in @bendinggenres.bsky.social 💙💙💙 bendinggenres.com/late-checkout/

Delighted to be back in Bending Genres (@bendinggenres.bsky.social) with a new micro packed with baby lemurs and roadside dinosaurs and discarded VHS. Big thanks to Robert for giving my work a steady home, always. 🔗 below.

‘These days, he stands in the foyer with twelve carpeted steps, a landing where his middle used to be, and a banister that resembles his mother’s arm.’ What a great example of an extended metaphor. @sarpsozdinler.bsky.social in @bruisermag.com 😮‍💨 www.bruisermag.com/Sozdinler_Br...

"Her son’s vertebrae had already become fluent in the language of hospitality." Terrific micro by @sarpsozdinler.bsky.social

Stoked to have a new micro in one of the best journals doing it today. @bruisermag.com 🔗 below!

"Says I should invest in apricots, it will turn big. Says it’s best to avoid escalators these days, one can never trust gravity. One can never trust the dentists." Brilliant micro @sarpsozdinler.bsky.social in @dishsoapquart.bsky.social dishsoap-quarterly.com/5-19-26

Been gone awhile dealing with some difficult stuff, but I can’t think of a better way to come back than with some new DEAD serious stuff in Some Words (@somewordslit.bsky.social). Read the rest here 👉 somewords.boards.net/thread/83/sa... 💀

Hey, I've got a new piece in HAD (@havehashad.com) today. I’ll be a sore loser if you don't give “The Losers” a read. www.havehashad.com/hadposts/the... 💀

Stoked to have a new piece out today in the wonderful Dishsoap Quarterly (@dishsoapquart.bsky.social). "Paul from the Future" is about Paul. It is about future. It is about Paul from the future. dishsoap-quarterly.com/5-19-26 🍾

Read my new poem in Spectra today or a bad May. spectrapoets.org/Factory-Psal...

Delighted to have a new micro in one of my all-time favorite journals today. Give “Tilt” a read over at Wigleaf (@wigleaf.bsky.social) if you can: wigleaf.com/202605tilt.htm 🪙

For the first time ever, we're publishing work by a debut author in The Bulb Region, and I couldn't be more thrilled and excited. Please take a moment to read and share Nova's beautiful story.

These erasure poems are the most fun I've had in a while. "12 Wikipedia Poems" is now out over at Midcult* midcult.net/sarp-sozdinler

Super jazzed to have four tiny poems in one of the best online journals out there today, Michigan City Review of Books. I hope you enjoy them: mcrb.neocities.org/FourPoems_Sa...

It was stupid of me to miss this yesterday (it seems I need to work on my timings), but I'm stoked to have a new short story up at the great @maudlinhouse.bsky.social. Big thanks to @malsmart.bsky.social for championing my work, always. And I hope y'all enjoy it: maudlinhouse.net/pink-flaming...

Going through my email thread with @marioaliberto3.bsky.social, I was glad to see him bring up this story in @maudlinhouse.bsky.social. After so long, it remains one of the pieces I’ve enjoyed writing most, and it’s always a special feeling when it resonates with others. maudlinhouse.net/reversion/

"I didn’t tell him that my father, in his absence, had become like one of those words that could also mean their exact opposites. I didn’t tell him why I could be a father to him but not a husband to his mother." LORD! Wanna know what's good? @sarpsozdinler.bsky.social + American Literary Review!

“That summer was all exoskeleton—sunburns peeling from our shoulders, lemonade sweating through the glass, the ache of outgrowing.” Fantastic micro from @sarpsozdinler.bsky.social in @matchbooklitmag.bsky.social www.matchbooklitmag.com/mb/sozdinler...

‘…they’d blurt a laugh and exchange a glance that might indicate that they shared more…’ Such a beautifully rendered relationship from @sarpsozdinler.bsky.social in @bathflashaward.bsky.social 🍨 www.bathflashfictionaward.com/2026/02/2nd-...

Well, still processing the news, but my short story “More” has been selected as the 2nd Prize Winner at the Bath Flash Fiction February 2026 Award. Big thanks to Jude Higgins and Ingrid Jendzrejewski for the selection. Read all prize-winning work here: www.bathflashfictionaward.com/category/win...

Love promoting TBR writers’ older work through the other account, but I’ll make an exception here and highlight the story Matt (@veryrealbatman.bsky.social) and I had co-authored for a HAD call back in the day, which eventually got rejected but was so much fun to work on (and work with Matt), and…

New micro in 50-Word Stories. (Link in the comments section!)

Got a new micro in Milk Candy Review.

This book is now out in the world and I’m jazzed to have a story in it. eastoverpress.com/book/an-anth...

Word on the street has it one other particular The Bulb Region writer might (or might not) be making a cameo in Kevin Maloney’s (@kevinmaloney.net) hearty and brainy story “The Brokenhearted Whalemen’s Club.” 👀 Out today in The Bulb Region. bulbregion.com/The-Brokenhe...

Check out Claire Polder’s (@clairepolders.bsky.social) mind- and time-bending amazing hybrid piece, “Time Temperament Questionnaire.” “Imagine that for each anticipation, you’d have to sacrifice a memory.” Out today in The Bulb Region. bulbregion.com/Time-Tempera...

I'll be launching @bulbregion.bsky.social later today and then celebrate it by reading for @havehashad.com tomorrow! Make sure to be there and be quick as the call will be capped at 150.

Not to sound dramatic, but the last film of the year for my wife and I had been this sweet little miracle here and, uncannily enough, as soon as The End card appeared onscreen, the countdown came to null and the fireworks started popping outside, giving both of us a fair bit of goosebumps.

Published quite fittingly on the New Year’s eve where we wish for plenty of money and free shit, my short story “Free Shit” reckons with the idea that nothing is ever truly free. Out now in the last issue of The Journal (@osuthejournal). thejournalmag.org/archives/24812 #fiction

Got a new one-sentence story that has first given seed in a hospital waiting room, then progressed in the SmokeLong Fitness (@smokelong.bsky.social), and found its final shape on Complete Sentence (@completesentence.bsky.social) today. Hope you enjoy.

Glad to be finally back here, too. It was really fun to chat with @aaronburch.bsky.social about my short story, "The People Who Live Inside," which was published on Short Story, Long last week. Happy reading!

I wrote a micro fiction about what happens when you want to move into the Eiffel Tower and your dad doesn’t accept. It's called "L'America" and you can read it on Scaffold Lit Mag, thanks to the amazing Steve Gergley. www.scaffoldlit.com/microwriting...

Thrilled to have my first pub of the year in @gooseberrypielit.bsky.social #25! I’m so appreciative of being in the same issue with all these amazing writers. gooseberry-pie.com/daddy/

A big thanks to @trampset.bsky.social for nominating my story, "The Alphabet Soup," for Best Small Fictions! The link is below if you are interested in giving it a read:

Quite new here, so please mind my first-ever shameless hee-haw: I was lucky to have this little piece published in the one and only @jmwwjournal.bsky.social just before the year's end. It has Barack Obama, Jackson 5, and Judge Judy in it all at once—now do what you will with that. 👀

Just tried to explain my new year's resolutions to my dog and she walked out mid-meeting. Brutal feedback.