People have been trying to take down the Influencers for some time now but I have my eyes fixed on just the one.
Been keeping this one in for a while, but I have a new story out, which interrogates the fixation on influencer culture within the fictionalized context of a quarantine, in dream literary magazine SmokeLong Quarterly, news which caused me to shriek and give Athena a great big scare when I got the email over a month ago. I wrote it back when COVID-19 first hit, and it was my first attempt at flash because the form seemed to suit the high strung panic of the time. Of course, the global panic has only increased, what with the magical thinking people are engaging in now, but that’s off-topic…
Anyway. I sent it out to a bunch of places but didn’t expect much, you know, since I have more or less been rejected approximately fifty times a year… a writer’s thick skin is her best asset, her own form of magical thinking, I suppose. And a couple of weeks later I got the news that it was longlisted / shortlisted / a finalist for their SmokeLong Quarterly Flash Fiction Award 2020!!
Long story short this was my first ever international acceptance and I will forever be grateful to SmokeLong for giving my baby a home. Now excuse me while I go off and have a celebratory beer, teehee.
x
Jem