Aspen Audley

Friends, Writing, Stories, and Humanity

Pop Lit Fiction

MUCH discussion has taken place this week in the online literary world about distinguished(?) Granta magazine running a prize-winning short story later discovered to have been generated by AI. This raised the question of what kinds of stories literary publications, such as our own, should be running. How do we react to the ongoing AI onslaught?

WE BELIEVE the key to survival of the art is to keep it grounded in reality, with emphasis on our humanity. Our experiences, emotions, sensitivities, friendships and frailties. As portrayed in our excellent new feature short story, “A Fading” by Aspen Audley. A tale about two childhood friends, and the progress of that friendship over the years. We hope you enjoy it!

That was when our M-C folders were born. Megan came up with the idea. She said she wanted to “preserve” my letter, “make it a testament to true friendship”—“for our children, our grandchildren, our great-grandchildren, our great-great-grandchildren, and all future generations of best friends.” We found a couple of cardboard folders, mine bright orange, hers royal blue, and spent the afternoon decorating them. Megan invented a secret code, and in lieu of a blood oath, we cut sections of each other’s hair and taped them to the cover. I suggested we put our commitment to each other in writing. We got two sheets of notebook paper and, on each one, wrote the following:

This is to proclaim that forever and ever, Megan and Camila, also known as M-C, will be best friends and love each with all our hearts.

The Go-To Spot

Announcement

GO!

That’s what we’re aiming for, rather ambitiously, with our Fast Pop Lit site (also linked on our menu). The idea being to quickly post new work on an instantaneous basis (almost)– to create a colorful kaleidoscope of criticism, commentary, quirkiness, satire, sneak previews, short fiction, poems, and gossip. Sometimes off-the-wall, and other times completely serious. Or utterly ridiculous.

THIS MOMENT

Our newest post at Fast Pop is a poem, “Moment (October)” by James Croal Jackson, who appeared in one of our unique print zeens, ZEENITH. (Still available at our POP SHOP.)

NEXT UP

We have coming Thursday a quick interview with Aspen Audley, who penned our current feature, “White Crane Spreads Its Wings.” After that, a Sneak Preview of our next feature; short interviews with other writers; more James Croal Jackson poetry; and a short essay about the “Worst Literary Critic Ever” (not to miss); and much more!

We aim to be all things and everything books, writing, and literature related.

Autumn Fiction

Pop Lit Fiction

Hello! Welcome to autumn and more great fiction. We’ll be presenting fewer full features at this site, as we move many of our hit-and-run activities to our Fast Pop blog (see top of this page)– which is why we’re making sure the features we do present are choice. Emphasis on the reading experience.

As example, our new feature– “White Crane Spreads Its Wings” by Aspen Audley. A tale about a tai chi class– something with which many of us can relate. Is there a Mr. Know-It-All in the class? Of course! Read the story to see what happens.

It was only my third lesson, but I’d already fallen in love with this beautiful dance-like form of martial arts. Its slow, graceful movements soothed me, and I was intrigued at how every motion, no matter how elegant, had its roots in self-defense. It was all about harmony: for every right turn, there was a left; for every pull, there was a push. The steps and poses somehow felt intuitive to me, as though my body had been designed for them.