I reviewed Jesse’s debut novel a while back, and one of the things that struck me about the book was his ability to write hard-hitting prose with ruthless efficiency. All killer, no filler.
Jesse is keeping up the tradition, and was recently selected for the Best Small Fictions 2017 anthology. The original story published in Pleiades, but you can view a snippet and and an interview about it here. Congratulations, Jesse!
“Oh Well (2)” courtesy of Lydia Komatsu
Marine Corps veteran and author Elliot Ackerman (Green on Blue, Dark at the Crossing) has a wonderful bit of elegiac longform up at Esquire. It’s about returning to Fallujah in 2016, to the site where he lost a friend during the nastiness of 2004. If you recall, we brought Elliot up for last year’s DANGER CLOSE ALASKA, so I’m always excited to see instructor alum putting their work out there into the world. Check the piece out here, but maybe brace yourself a bit: Goodbye, My Brother
“Oh Well (2)” courtesy of Lydia Komatsu
It’s strange when two vets from the same town, who participated in the same war, shake hands for the first time. Even more strange when it turns out they’re both writing about their time on the dusty fringes of the empire. And it gets super weird when both are endurance junkies.
That would be Eric Chandler and I, both from Duluth (I was born there while he retired from the MN ANG’s 148th Fighter Wing.) We met for the first time at AWP, after having conversed a few times over email and the Twitterverse. He’s got a great story that tracks the career of a fighter pilot, which just recently published with the Veteran Writing Project’s journal, O-Dark-Thirty, and I think you should check it out: The Dirty Dozen | O-Dark-Thirty
Matthew Komatsu 