FANZINE | All Entries (Fiction)

The world of employment agencies and temp workers is a bizarre one, and when it intersects with a graveyard shift proofreading at a legal firm, things can can get downright maddening. Here, Robyn Weisman recounts the experience of working with the kind of woman that temp agencies just love - pleasant, chatty and eager to increase her words-per-minute - and watches her true identity emerge over the course of the night. Art by Danny Jock.

"Purple Dolphin"

Nick Sylvester

06.18.08

Well we had to get this joke out of the way from the git-go...that it's a true blast to finally read Nick Sylvester's "real" fiction (which is to say if the gonzo reporting tradition was never your cup of tea, then there are plenty of News Corp. outlets out there now to get your "facts" from...). Here's a chapter from Sylvester's debut novel, the forthcoming Ten Minute Wait about "a secret society of waiters on the brink of exposure, a mistranslation that triggers a city-wide kitchen staff revolt, and a desperate downtown poet-waiter type who accidentally becomes famous off a silly pomo gag." Art by Danny Jock.

Wilderness Year

Sean Dungan

05.05.08

Psychic messages from a military base bagboy. Sean Dungan just published his first collection of stories, Unwelcomeness, a book designed with class by Caryn Aono and beautifully illustrated by Gail Swanlund. Dungan, a west coast author, whose range and strangeness of vision harkens (to this blurber anyway, if I may take liberties) the work of George Saunders, Ben Weissman or Ben Marcus. Here's a taste, the story "Wilderness Year" - featured in Unwelcomeness that is very welcome here on Fanzine. Art by Danny Jock.

Sitter

Rachel Sherman

04.22.08

Like the teacher who thought you'd amount to nothing, or the boy in the third grade with the runny nose you couldn't help having a secret crush on, it isn't easy to forget your babysitters. Bet none of them were like this one. Fanzine first encountered Rachel Sherman, author of The First Hurt (a finalist for the 2006 Frank O'Connor prize), on Jaime Clarke's Talk Show column. Here she brings to the table a flash work of fiction. Art by Danny Jock.

Gatlinburg

Douglas Light

04.03.08

Here's a deft dab of a story by Douglas Light, author of the 2006 Benjamin Frankling Award winning novel, East Fifth Bliss. In it, a couple, soon to be 'Life-mate's, find themselves at an impasse of words.

Manifest Destiny

Andrew Lewis Conn

02.21.08

Andrew Lewis Conn returns to Fanzine with an unsparing short story about a father, a son, and the American Dream. Frederick Jackson Turner never imagined a theory of the frontier like this. Illustrations by Robin Brasington.

from The Season of Gene, a novel

Dallas Hudgens

09.25.07

Dallas Hudgens, FANZINE regular and author of the rollicking Drive Like Hell, returns with another novel for sports fans and literati alike, The Season of Gene (available now). Here's an excerpt (Chapter 20 in fact) of this tale of beer league baseball, mobsters and gamers, pain pills, lost love and lifted lids. Illustrations by Danny Jock.

Gardeners Anonymous

Trinie Dalton

09.02.07

Trinie Dalton, author of Wide Eyed, delivers Fanzine a tale of ghosts, gardens and Pinocchio, just right for ringing out the summer! The story was inspired by the accompanying plant drawings by Dalton's brother Greg, an avid botanist and artist based in LA.

Is this Ed Park?

Ed Park

06.30.07

Ed Park's first novel, Personal Days, will be published by Random House in 2008. While we wait, Park shares with us another peek at his Borgesian work-in-progress, The Dizzies. Illustrations by Park himself.

Concerning the Work of Dark Red Paw

Ed Park

10.28.06

In what is arguably Orson Welles' best movie, F For Fake, the director (with sly chagrin beaming from glassy eyes) serenely references a line from Kipling: "It's pretty, but is it art?" Later in the film, he updates this question with more modern, art market apropos flair: "It's pretty, but is it...Rare?" Ed Park's hero from this excerpt of his manuscript The Dizzies is forced to ask himself: Is it pretty, did I break it, and how much are we talking about here? Fanzine is proud to have this preview from Park, a founding editor at The Believer and a caustically funny, formidable storyteller in his own right. Enjoy now, and remember later, you read it at Fanzine first.

accompanying illustrations by the author

"In the Blink of an All Seeing Eye"

Ben Bush

10.16.06

Ben Bush delivers to us this tale about superfamous filmmaker Vic Graburn (in words and illustrations by Bush himself).

Sh...

Peter Jacoby

04.01.06

Meds, Cereal, and Horror Movie Icons: a new story by Peter Jacoby. The title photo "Chain of Doors" is by Adam Lampton. The illustrations of Freddy and Jason are by James Braithwaite.

Untitled: A Review

Joshua Cohen

10.27.05

A book reviewer finds that a submission is more than a tad bit personal. 6 million pages worth. This story is from Cohen's recently released collection on Twisted Spoon Press called The Quorum.

Ohne Titel (der Punkt)

Matty Byloos

09.09.05

Berlin in the last days of Hitler. A travelling spot on one's foot. Bicycles. An accident. Matty Byloos delivers one of his signature surreal stories in the tradition of Kafka, tinged with the neuroses of Bernhard.

Oceanic