“I missed having a father. I missed being a son. I was incomplete without that relationship.” —excerpt from “Tilting at Windmills” by Dean Rader

“Poems and stories are the whisperings of angels we cannot see.” —Jayne Anne Phillips, “Annabel Begins”

“that the forest no longer exists doesn’t undo the forest just as once touching the lake now dry can’t undo the ripples” —excerpt from “The Trees Their Axes” by Franke Varca

Cartoon by David Gomberg

This November, gratitude looks like access. Free literature. Open archives. Voices that stay available, no matter who tries to silence them. Thank you to every reader who keeps coming back. www.narrativemagazine.com/archive/auth...

The deadline for our Fall Story Contest is November 21! Submit your work today: www.narrativemagazine.com/fall-2025-st...

“Finger tracing the terrain, you hold me through autumn’s loss of color.” —Chloé Yelena Miller, “Pop Rivet” @chloeyelenamiller.bsky.social

Join @caroledgarian.bsky.social as she traces the origins of “bully” from sweetheart to our modern usage. bit.ly/3t85Mqp

“I was a ‘Miami Herald’ reporter. The photographer and I were among a crush waiting for JFK and Nixon to meet.” —excerpt from “The Art of Becoming a Citizen: A Meditation” by Gail Godwin

“The pumpkins are looking up my skirt, making orange a kind of festive.” —Lynn Melnick, “Lucky”

The leaves are starting to change, and the air is getting cool. It’s the perfect time to curl up with a blanket and get writing!

“It is the night of whores and monsters, but without the killings.” —Ebony Chinn, “Tradition”

Happy Halloween! 🧛🏻‍♂️ Cartoon by Seth Fleishman

October is for stories that unsettle. That’s the point. The best literature shakes something loose. If a book makes you uncomfortable, it’s probably worth reading. Find the ones that still speak:

“An ocean away, people write vows to perform for themselves at their weddings of one or hire a silent someone they can drift beside at the grocery store.” —excerpt from Matthew Gellman’s “Weddings of One”

“What’s in cryostasis should stay in cryostasis. Do not core-sample the frozen alien.” —Dean Young, “Demonic Possession Is 9/10 of the Law”

Bay Area Writing Project director Hillary Walker shares her path to teaching and the Writing Project in this @narrativemag.bsky.social interview: bit.ly/46UecSD #nwpwritenow

Thanks @narrativemag.bsky.social ✨🩷✨ 🏆🥹 #writing #narrativeprize #award #blackartist

My cartoon for @narrativemag.bsky.social

“Fuck it. I’m too porous. Everything rushes in. Everything that ever drove me crazy with dumb hope, every letdown. Here it is.” —excerpt from Dion O’Reilly’s “Oh for Fuck’s Sake” @dionoreilly.bsky.social

“touching the lake now dry can’t undo the ripples like to deny love can’t undo the feeling of it” —excerpt from Franke Varca’s “The Trees Their Axes”

“He was / the skeleton / walking past my house a glowing skull and ribs I ran & tackled his / white / bones / in the street His candy spilled out / like a million pinto beans” —Natalie Diaz, “Hand-Me-Down Halloween”

“But if god resembles anything, let it be the larkspurs growing by the highway’s crest” —excerpt from “Transcendentalism I” by Rob Shapiro @rob-shapiro.bsky.social

“Who has not, a hundred times, found himself committing a vile or a silly action, for no other reason than because he knows he should not?” —Edgar Allan Poe, “The Black Cat”

“You graze the dangling Spanish moss, Find you choose not to avoid anything that comes.” —Arthur Sze

Book bans aren’t history. They’re policy. Right now, authors from Margaret Atwood to James Baldwin are being stripped from shelves. Narrative keeps them free. Always.

“Now her father began a familiar harangue: how everything he did was for Mary, how he didn’t care about the boat, how he’d never go fishing again except for her.” —excerpt from “Dark Birds” by Jane Lange

“Draped in a white bedsheet, cut holes for my eyes, I get my wish. I’m finally invisible, a ghost of myself.” —Jill Bialosky, “A Childhood in Four Acts”

Enjoy Carol Edgarian’s (@caroledgarian.bsky.social) recitation of Galway Kinnell’s poem “Wait.” bit.ly/3t85Mqp

“Then a darker realization shook him: he’d left Jason at the bottom of the steps, alone.” —excerpt from “Sorry” by R. D. Saporita

“His shirt, he realized, was completely soaked, and he could actually see his heart rippling beneath the cotton.” —excerpt from Baird Harper’s “Motherland”

“I was made for the library, not the classroom. The classroom was a jail of other people’s interests. The library was open, unending, free.” —Ta-Nehisi Coates, “Between the World and Me”

“ ‘I read about that attack. There was a photo. . . you look like your father,’ I said gently. ‘Is that who you were thinking of when you read me that poem?’ She tightened her fingers around the cup, then whispered, ‘I was thinking of my son.’ ” —from Massoud Moussavi’s “Were All Stars to Disappear”

Yes, we are making “fetch” happen! Join @caroledgarian.bsky.social's exploration of the word “fetch.” bit.ly/3t85Mqp

“Sometimes the most common words are packed with riches that we’ve forgotten along the way.” —Carol Edgarian @caroledgarian.bsky.social

Cartoon by Joseph Dottino and Alex Pearson

It’s here! This year’s Narrative High School Writing Contest prompt is “One True Thing.” Using this prompt as a springboard, we invite you to write a story, essay, or poem that takes your reader on a journey toward at least one crystalized moment of truth. Submissions open January 6!

Students are back in class. But too many classrooms are missing the books that matter most. Narrative’s library boasts the work of more than 2,000 artists.Everything is there—always open, always free. A library in your pocket!

“My dear Vivian, don’t coop yourself up all day in the library. It is a perfectly lovely afternoon.” —excerpt from Oscar Wilde’s “The Decay of Lying” Happy birthday to Oscar Wilde!

“Are there any rules for the making of a novel, which, if we neglect, the tale must be called by another name?” —Guy de Maupassant, “Of the Novel”

“I rode my imaginary horse across the yard, up and down the slopes. I rode it all spring and into the summer even as it was steamy hot and bees buzzed. And I rode it into the fall when the leaves turned and the wind blew them into swirls like little tornadoes.” —excerpt from The Horse by Mary Morris

“Don’t be scared of yourself.” —Ocean Vuong Join us in celebrating Narrative Prize winner Ocean Vuong’s birthday today!

Happy pub day to our pal Susan Orlean and her memoir “Joyride”! Here’s a blast from the past. Enjoy! @susanorlean.bsky.social

“There is no parallel universe. This one is the only one we’ve got.” —Lisa Dordal, “Parallel Universe”

On Wednesday we announce the prompt for the FREE Narrative High School Writing Contest! Follow us to be the first to see this year’s prompt.

“Don’t say that we’re the last generation —soot is cooling in our hands, ash in our blood— that people stop waiting by closed doors.” —excerpt from “If All the Birds Are Killed” by Anzhelina Polonskaya @poloniuma.bsky.social

Cartoon by Mick Stevens

“Show me your darkness, your nothing-to-see and everything to touch.” —Bryce Emley, “Prayer in Rain, Autumn Night”

Cartoon by Jon Adams Want more cartoons? Check out this month’s collection: www.narrativemagazine.com/issues/narra...

Banned Books Week is almost here. One week isn’t enough. Censorship happens year-round. That’s why Narrative’s library of more than 2000 authors will always be free and accessible.