Stonecoast Review Issue 17 is available for purchase here. You can also visit the link on the “archive” page.
We are exceedingly proud of this issue, which contains poems, screenwriting, short stories, and more. But no matter the format, the tales told in Stonecoast Review Issue 17 stir the heart and the imagination alike.
Allow us to quote directly from the foreword to Stonecoast Review Issue 17:
Narrative has an undeniable impact upon our reality. A swriters and readers, we know this. The Covid-19 pandemic has not ended, despire what half-removed distancing stickers, empty hand sanitizer dispensers and lifted mask mandates suggest. The reigning narrative, perpetuated on an individual level by some and on a national level by those in power, is that it has ended. It’s an understandable desire to pretend it’s over; it’s been nearly three years since the pandemic began. This is the fufth issue of the review published during that time. But the truth that must be acknowledged is that the pandemic has not ended, nor have the rippling effects of the pandemic on the planet’s most vulnerable people.
The work contained within this issue of the Stonecoast Review seeks to acknowledge the reality of our world: the ongoing pandemic, the leaked draft decision to repeal the rights provided by Roe v. Wade [note: Roe v. Wade had not yet been overturned when Issue 17 had been sent to print], Russia’s unprovoked war against Ukraine, mass shootings in public places, places of learning, commerce, and faith.
It was not entirely our intention to craft an issue that spoke to such topics when we began. It coalesced with each accepted piece. In hindsight, it is not entirely surprising–writers have always responded to the state of the world and sought to preserve the truth of it. But the work contained within this issue goes beyodn acknowledgement on a global level, beyond just preservation. It acknowledges truth on an individual level, the loss, grief, determination and joy we have all experienced in recent years. Acknowledgement and preservation are no longer enough, we must amplify the voices of those speaking. This issue of the review is seeking to do just that.
Keep reading. Keep writing.
Sincerely,
The Stonecoast Review Editorial Team
Photo by W. Goodwin.