issue 40

Editorial

Summer is a wonderful time: sunny weather, longer days, get-togethers with friends and family.  We may have a few drinks with a loved one and reconnect, or connect with someone we will come to love. We may splash in a pool with children or sit in air conditioning, doing anything we can to keep cool during the intense heat. We may spend some moments daydreaming, reliving the past or re-envisioning our present. These moments can be fleeting. 

But sometimes it can be nice to spend a little time escaping into the world of others. Despite the activity and socializing of summer, no matter what, I'm always drawn to flash fiction. With powerful fictions, I tend to think about the characters long after I've finished reading a piece, and enjoy the quiet reflection they offer me.  Many times I reread these succinct, yet still wonderful, created worlds, even in the midst of my own active life.    

In Web Issue 40 of Vestal Review, we invite you to share created moments and times. Lili Flanders gives us a world of talk and of quiet, but most importantly love; Ellen Scheuermann shows us the power of a slip; Douglas Campbell leaves us letting go.  Hope and wanting infuse the work of Theodosia Henney, W.J. Barris, and Vincent Scarpa with a poignant magic. Dean Keller Jacobs weaves a complex life story through loss.  A fantasy of belonging by Doug Cornett reminds us what it's like to be a child.

I have found pieces of myself in the stories presented here. And, if only for a moment, I invite you to do the same.  

—Cheryl Chambers