The Literary Issue

With a staff of ten readers and editors it can be difficult to come to consensus about which stories and essays are selected for publication in each issue. Add to that the task of ensuring we have a good representation of cultures and perspectives, and making sure that each staff member’s tastes are represented, and that we keep to Orca’s stated aesthetic, and you have a recipe for chaos. Were this a “real world” situation, the process might devolve into the kind of animosity we see every day in the media. And yet, looking at the table of contents for this issue, connections and commonalities appear as if by magic between and among the pieces, and somehow we wind up with what we intended from the start—a literary journal that intrigues without insulting, challenges without provoking, and maintains fealty to the best attributes of the old and the new forms of literature. We believe that’s the beauty of art at its core—that it is essentially a forum for thoughtful discourse.

– Joe, Zac, Renee, Marci, David, Ronak, K.A., Jacob, Liz, and Tommy

Table of Contents (click the links for stories and excerpts)

About the Cover
The Risk of Death With This Procedure is Minimal, Eliot Li
Divorce is Like Anything Else, Siamak Vossoughi                                                                          
Birds, Andrew Cusick
The Magus, Catherine Parnell           
The Mermaid Pool, Cate West          
Two and a Half, sid sibo        
The Peculiar Perils (and Excitements) of Living in One Language and Writing in Another, Aditya Gautam         
Seen or Not Seen or a Combination of Both, Mark Gozonsky         
Everyone is Dead, Steve Fox
The Weight of Light Redux, David Luntz    
Last Dance with Fancy Pants, Dennis McFadden     
Fledgling, Andrea Bishop      
Spot the Differences, Kimberly Turner
Autorittrata, Miles White      
There I Will Take Your Hand, Nancy Ludmerer                                                                              
Yahrzeit, Nancy Ludmerer
The Most Righteous Adulterer in Vilna, Jacob Appel

Please consider purchasing a copy of the full issue using the sidebar to the right. A pdf is a mere $4, and a print copy is $11.99.

Editor’s Note: We have not Americanized spellings and grammar native to other English-speaking countries, but have left them in their original form in order to fully convey the voices of our authors.