Just finished reading issue 6 of The Literary Commune and I liked it a lot. Some of the pieces here are startling: clear, weird, raw, delicate - a seething mass of contradiction. ("Embrace your contradictions", as the man said).
Excellent stories that possess that elusive element, authenticity: not only detail, sentence-structure, but a between-the-lines knowingness you cannot fake. "With Relish" by Chris Dungey, "Angels, Monsters, Superheroes" (Andy Tu) and "Gate Money" by RA Allen are real stand-outs from over the pond.
Some great British and Irish writing, too: an experimental piece on the attempted assassination of Margaret Thatcher by GA Rice, "Lucky" by Jacqui Grima - who I discover was shortlisted for the Luke Bitmead run by my own publisher, Legend.
No-one's put a gun to my head - I recommend the TLC to anyone interested in reading or writing work that is new, now and dangerous. If you have words inside you, eating their way out, send those words and see if they appear, like magic, on TLC's pretty white pages. Like mine did, in issue 5, and hopefully again soon.
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