Spark: A Creative
Anthology, Volume I
Ed. Brian Lewis. Empire & Great Jones Little Press,
$14.99 (242p) ISBN: 978-0988807211
Spark is doing a
wild amount of things at once. It lies somewhere between traditional anthology
and literary magazine. It houses stories from the very brief to the very long,
poetry, and illustrations created specifically to accompany the text. The works
occupy every genre from metered poetry to free verse, from literary fiction to
suspense, sci-fi, and steampunk. Its contributors are writers of all
backgrounds, from published novelists to high school students. Second and third
volumes are already planned and in their beginning stages. Brian Lewis has put
together an ambitious project meant to step outside boundaries.
Spark’s greatest
strength is that it showcases writers who are primarily new and emerging. A few
are established and widely published, but most are writers who are just
beginning their publishing careers. A couple are high school students. The
writing is a little less restrained and polished than what might be found in an
anthology packed with “bigger names,” but that gives the collection an electric
feeling, appropriate, given the title. There is clear energy and enthusiasm in
the work. One contributor’s bio begins: “Matt Lancaster is twenty years old and
neck deep in the world.” That statement points toward Spark’s function—to put you neck-deep in a world of fresh writing.
As a first installment, Spark
is a little uneven at points. It is weighted in favor of fiction over
poetry. The poems that are included are brief and on the whole not as strong as
their prose counterparts. The anthology also slants toward genre fiction, which
can make the pieces that aren’t feel a little out of place. And, as a side
effect of the pool of contributors, the quality is also varied, with some
pieces coming off trite or hastily wrapped up.
The book has its standouts, of course. “By the Gun” by
Alexis A. Hunter is a western that is interesting because it is a first
installment in a serial to be continued in the subsequent Spark publications. The final piece, “One Cog Short of Paradise” by
Kaitlin Branch, is the “origin story” to be series of forthcoming “Steampunk
adventure novels.” Peter Wood’s “The Fig Tree” blends science fiction and
theological speculation. “Forget Me Not” by Svetlana Kortchik is a quiet
suspense story with a sharp twist of an ending. Margaret Dilloway’s “Ever Since
I’ve Seen Your Face,” a short story about a woman in Hawaii who befriends a
young homeless man because he reminds her of a past love, is one of the
strongest pieces in the book. She binds together contrasting descriptions of
the island—from the rundown neighborhoods to the stunning beaches—with the
emotional peaks and dips experienced by her character.
Given the many spaces it inhabits, it is likely that the
forthcoming Spark volumes will be
even more rich and varied than the original. (April 2013)
Purchase Spark: A Creative Anthology, Volume I HERE.
Reviewer bio: Taylor Breslin graduated from the University
of Pittsburgh in 2012. She lives in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. She is on
Twitter: @taylorbreslin.
