🔥 Introducing Firewords Campfire
Fortnightly creative content in your inbox
Big changes are afoot at Firewords!
It is too long to wait between each edition of Firewords so we have rethought the way of delivering content to you and are delighted to introduce our new serialised format called Campfire. Every fortnight, come get cosy with us while we toast some marshmallows and tell stories into the night. Each piece will be accompanied by the ‘usual’ amazing, unique and colourful illustrations that jump further off the screen than they’ve ever managed to get from the page - the perfect platform to showcase upcoming literary talent.
To read about the reasons for our change in format, check out our latest blog post.Â
How it will work
For £5/month or £50/year, Firewords Campfire will drop in your inbox every two weeks, featuring fiery fiction, poetry and striking custom illustrations to match the words.
In keeping with this new online format, Issue 16 - the complete collection of all the Campfire digests between now and then - will be compiled into a digital format and be available to buy from April 2024 (and paid subscribers will get a 50% discount).
As a taster of what Campfire will be like, scroll down to read two of our favourites from the archive that suit this issue’s theme.
Is there still a free newsletter?
Don’t worry, you can keep on the current mailing list without a paid subscription to Campfire. Here, occasional emails will keep you updated on the usual; subscriptions opening, new developments within Firewords and the date of the next issue being published. You can start a paid subscription, and cancel it, anytime you choose. The great thing about the new format is its flexibility, no strings attached.
My Stepmother’s Neck
a story by Sage Tyrtle (from Firewords Issue 14)
No one else can see the hyena draped around my stepmother's neck. He lives there.Â
This morning, on the way to school, he peers around the driver's seat and opens his mouth. He wrinkles his muzzle in what seems like a grin but is a threat. A promise. Those teeth are sharp.
My stepmother's voice is sweet. Like real maple syrup, not the corn kind but the kind that comes from Vermont. When I fall at the playground, she runs faster than my dad to pick me up and ask honey, are you okay, but when she leans in to look at my bloody knee the hyena is there too, laughing. His greasy fur touches my face and I fight to keep still. I say, too loud, that I'm fine, Stephanie, and I'm trying to drown out the high and sour laugh but it doesn't work.
You should call her Mommy, says my dad. And it sounds like a command but it's a plea, a prayer, a hasn't it been long enough yet and no. It hasn't been long enough because there is no long enough. Not for her. At dinner she is saying, "You got a B+ on your math test? I am so proud of you!" and the hyena stares at me. He reaches down with a casual paw and paints the blood that's pooled on the plate around her steak in stripes on her arms.
On their wedding day, a purple and blue butterfly alights on my stepmother's veil and she giggles and says that even God is happy they're getting married. But I can see the hyena under her veil. He nuzzles her neck, then pokes his long nose out from under the veil like a cat under a blanket. His breath smells like spoiled meat.
I give my dad away to a chorus of awws and stand at his side as he says I Do and the hyena's muzzle is dripping with drool. Wedding ring on her finger, my stepmother marches down the aisle with the man who was my dad and the hyena turns to look at me trailing them. Eyes howling with the knowledge that sweetness isn't necessary anymore. That kind words will vanish.
Tomorrow my dad will go to work and it will be just me and my stepmother, alone in the house. And the hyena will climb off her shoulders.
Sage Tyrtle’s stories have been featured in NPR, CBC and PBS. She is a Moth GrandSLAM winner. tyrtle.com
Artwork by Pauline Cremer, a Berlin-based illustrator. She loves to create humorous characters and experiments a lot with different printing techniques. paulinecremer.com
Aboard a Flight from Houston to Prague
a poem by Dante Novario (from Firewords Issue 13)
Soaring like thunder through the boundless Shimmering jewels of an endless sky and trapped I stand firm that God did not give humanity Wings for an unknown yet solid reason I button the flight attendant over to ask if the adult beverages Are free, she kindly reminds me that they are only so For first class flyers I imagine our primate ancestors must be proud Gliding monkeys Finally on par with seagulls and angels Roaming through an ocean of puffy, soft and caring clouds and trapped Seeing the horizon as it had not been seen By any human before us and turning to my partner to ask for another pill another sip of sparkling wine Trapped and hurdling and watching day-time television I begin to pray I must be closer to God up here, I reason the reception must be better I pray to the first birds for guidance I pray for a miracle but realize I’m already experiencing one I pray for heaven to let me go I’m leaning my seat back with the other chickens in the slaughterhouse Icaruses flying higher and higher Ignorant to the difference between steel and feathers A thousand prophecies of old never predicted it Mythical birds take nest at the sight Searing metal cages shooting across the horizon Like meteorites posed for their next extinction With me, one trapped monkey inside, praying unnoticed.
Dante Novario is a Louisville-based writer who can sometimes be found selling odd scrolls of his poetry throughout the city. @dante_novario
Artwork by Madison LaRose, who received her BFA in 2018 at Massachusetts College of Art. In 2020 she completed MFA in Illustration at Edinburgh College of Art. madisonlarose.com