NCLR Online Fall 2025

featuring North Carolina LGBTQ+ Literature

cover art by Ashon T. Crawley

The Productive Power – and Possibility – of Redemption and Healing

section introduction by Dwight Tanner, Guest Feature Editor

“I am struck reading most of these reviews by the powerful ways that each contributor describes these works as artfully depicting the reality of pain and trauma while still illustrating the productive power – and possibility – of redemption and healing, which feels like an apt way to wrap up 2025’s special feature.”

The Foundations of the Earth
a short story by Randall Kenan
introduced by Margaret D. Bauer
art by Ashon T. Crawley

In the End at the Beginning
a review by Catherine Carter
Minnie Bruce Pratt, Magnified

Fragile Beauty
a review by Dwight Tanner
Jim Grimsley, Dream Boy

The Beginning in the End
a review by Onyx Bradley
Gregory Ariail, The Gospel of Rot

The Courage to Confront What Hurts Us
a review by Bridget Bell
Jayme Ringleb, So Tall It Ends in Heaven
Han Vanderhart, What Pecan Light

Restless Spirits
a review by Amber Knox
Zelda Lockhart, Trinity

The Beauty of Noticing
a review by Evan Peter Smith
Georgann Eubanks, The Fabulous Ordinary
and Rural Astronomy
photography by Donna Campbell

Flashbacks: Echoes of Past Issues

Networks of North Carolina Writers

section introduction by Margaret D. Bauer, Editor

“Back in our 2016, twenty-fifth issue, Network Director Ed Southern explored what makes North Carolina so special that it inspires so many writers; read in this issue his homage to forty years of the Network, in which he notes that it is the networking that distinguishes this writers’ support system from others.”

NCLR and Clyde Edgerton Honored
at the North Carolina Writers Conference
with remarks by John Rosenthal

North Carolina Writers’ Network at Forty
by Ed Southern

Freeing the Past, Lifting Up Voices
a review by Michael Beadle
Glenis Redmond, The Three Harriets and Others
Carole Boston Weatherford, Kin
art by Jeffery Boston Weatherford

Vanitas
a poem by Michael Beadle
art by Stephen L. Hayes, Jr.

Unexpected Places: Wildness Within and Without
a review by Barbara Bennett
David Gessner, The Book of Flaco

The Arborist
a poem and photography by Sylvia Freeman

The Thrill of Southern Noir
a review by Andrew K. Clark
Michael Amos Cody, Streets of Nashville

Be Still and Know
a poem by Jane Shlensky
art by Michael Dorsey

Just One More Thing You Don’t Know
a review by Rebecca Duncan
Angel Khoury, Between Tides

Sand and Spirit
a review by Chelsey Parsons
Hannah Bunn West with Ann-Cabell Baum,
Save Our Sand Dunes
art by Larry McCarter and Anne Marshall Runyon

North Carolina Miscellany

More, More, More

section introduction by Margaret D. Bauer, Editor

“With thanks to Book Review Editor Kristi Southern, with this issue, NCLR can boast reviewing 69 books in our three 2025 online issues. I call that fulfilling our mission to promote North Carolina writers.”

Green Performance Poetry Prize winner Asma Abike

The Jaki Shelton Green Performance Poetry Prize
Contest Brings New and Returning Voices to NCLR
by Devra Thomas

Facts
Jaki Shelton Green Performance Poetry Prize
poem by Asma Abike

Our History Revealed
Performance poem by Dionne Hunter

Dirty
Performance poem by JeanMarie Olivieri

Shadow Work
Performance poem by Marcial (CL Tha Artist) Harper

The Stained Ouroboros
a review by Dustin Pickering
Kashiana Singh, Witching Hour

Dance for the Little Angel
creative nonfiction Elisa Troncoso-Cabello
art by Doris Barahona

The Dangerous Myths of Motherhood
a review by Janis Harrington
Bridget Bell, All that We Ask of You Is to Always Be Happy

Playing with Postmodern Pastiche
a review by Sharon E. Colley
Alan Michael Parker, Bingo Bango Boingo

Alex Sees Him on the Water
fiction by SD Williams
art by Nat Dickinson

The I and the Eye:
Poetic Ways of Seeing and Showing
a review by David E. Poston
Terri Kirby Erickson, Night Talks
Irene Blair Honeycutt, Mountains of the Moon

Salty Son
Barrax/Bayes Prize poem by Hunter Mendenhall
art by Ed Macomber

A Journey of Identity, Magic, and Power
a review by Abby Trzepacz
Tracy Deonn, Bloodmarked
photography by James O. Reynolds

The Art of War
a poem by Terry Cawley
art by JJ Jiang

A Collection of Characters Gathering Outside the Margins
a review by Kristi Southern
Joanna Pearson, Bright and Tender Darkand Now You Know It All