Good morning, everyone.

Our book review this week was Rebecca Cuthbert writing about Vampires At Sea by Lindsay Merbaum (Creature Publishing). We're glad to have Rebecca's work in our pages for the first time, and to be sharing more writing by Lindsay soon.

Then our October series of spooky stories continued with "Drift" by Kevin B. 

And in research notes, Gigi Little wrote about Who Killed One The Gun?, recently published by Forest Avenue Press.

Congratulations to early contributor Amber Sparks, whose novel Happy People Don't Live Here was published by Liveright Publishing this week. I was honored to host a conversation with Amber at Harvard Books the other night, and the occasion was made even more special by the presence of past contributors Wyatt Bonikowski and Tim Horvath, as well as one of our great local champions of writers and literature, Nina MacLaughlin. What a pleasure to see all of them and to be reminded again how much of the joy of making art is building friendships and communities over the years through a shared love of each other's work and of what we're doing alongside one another. That's something of which Nina's own newsletter, New England Literary News, is also a frequent and recommended reminder.

Amber mentioned during our discussion that she had an essay about miniatures (which play a role in the novel) forthcoming the next day, and here it is at Lit Hub.

Thanks for reading,

Steve Himmer