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The Baltimore Review – Summer/Fall 2004

Volume 8 Number 2

Summer/Fall 2004

Mark Cunningham

Probably one of the most unassumingly designed literary journals, The Baltimore Review stands up to the best of them with fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and book reviews that all have that special glint of treasures presented with a knowing wink of editorial conviction. This issue features six short stories, all impressively artful and absorbing. Joe Schall’s “Opossum”, winner of TBR’s 2003 Short Fiction Competition, treads with not a single unsure step the bizarre territory of agoraphobia, etymology, toxicology, and marsupials, blending it all together with a thematic grace that left me moved by the feeling that I’d just read one of the year’s best stories.

Probably one of the most unassumingly designed literary journals, The Baltimore Review stands up to the best of them with fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and book reviews that all have that special glint of treasures presented with a knowing wink of editorial conviction. This issue features six short stories, all impressively artful and absorbing. Joe Schall’s “Opossum”, winner of TBR’s 2003 Short Fiction Competition, treads with not a single unsure step the bizarre territory of agoraphobia, etymology, toxicology, and marsupials, blending it all together with a thematic grace that left me moved by the feeling that I’d just read one of the year’s best stories. “Nickels and Dimes,” a story by David Engelhardt about a little boy growing up amidst the swirling pressure of labor strikes in a company town, is also wonderful in a classic coming-of-age way. A brief but fascinating interview with author Manil Suri (The Death of Vishnu) makes for good reading, as do the ten frequently haunting poems presented here. The Baltimore Review sends yours eyes into a glide, and very soon you find yourself having traveled its pages from front to back, with nothing left to do but reread its fine fiction while you await the next issue. [The Baltimore Review, P.O. Box 36418, Townson, MD, 21286. Single issue $8. www.baltimorereview.org] – MC

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