Letter from the Editors:

Dearest Readers,

Magic is the impossible. Whether it’s a coin appearing from behind the ear, a rabbit disappearing into a hat, or a double rainbow across the sky, magic is what we wish could happen. It’s a suspension of disbelief to just enjoy the moment for what it is. It’s hope. And we could all use some hope and magic in our lives now.

This issue, the pieces are divided into the three parts of a magic trick as named by Christopher Priest in The Prestige: The Pledge, The Turn, and The Prestige. Contributors have taken on illusions, magicians, heroes and villeins, life and death, but the constant remains that these pieces promise and deliver on impossibilities that can only be described as magic.

Live in the moments these pieces provide. Return to your childlike wonder. And then turn your attention to the magical bard who was Shakespeare and write those sonnets, scenes, or whatever else, by November 30th.

Best,
Deep Overstock Editors

(Cover art: Ōme Tarot Card by Viviann Ruiz)

Listen to the pieces on the DO Fiction Podcast:
https://open.spotify.com/embed/episode/4Asnw2abfMOWxXqFQYABET

The Pledge

Ben Crowley – A Circle of Witches
Kate Falvey – Green Ghost Remembers: The Death of the Wizard
Doris Ferleger – Centos 1-5
Jo Griffin – The Color of Luck
Bogdan Groza – A Recipe for Disaster?
Hibah Shabkhez – Grey Hair
K. B. Thomas – Surprising Things
Jonathan van Belle – The Kerskiffet Sourhisk Dictionary of Magical Heilungery
Nicholas Yandell – Wrestling with Magic

The Turn

Kummam Al-Maadeed – Awaken
Yuan Changming – Immortalizing: for Yuan Hongqi
Mickey Collins – My Grandpa Was a Wizard
John Delaney – The Magic of Living
Kate Falvey – The Woolgatherers
Timothy Arliss OBrien – a lesson in technical magic
Farnilf P. – Everything Dies – Magical Antidote #3
Jonathan van Belle – The Garden of Forking Tongues

The Prestige

Shireen Arora – That shallow, musty grey, almost stagnant creek
Rachel Aydt – Tiny Babbitt
Desiree Ducharme – Heroes and Villeins
Lynette G. Esposito – Marco Believed in Magic
Ryan Shane Lopez – Five Seed Swindle
Walter Moon – Synchrony
David James Poissant – Magic Act
Michael Santiago – Beyond the Velvet
Eric Thralby – My Father, the Villain

Editorial

Editors-In-Chief: Mickey Collins & Robert Eversmann
Managing Editors: Michael Santiago & Z.B. Wagman
Poetry: Jihye Shin
Prose: Michael Santiago & Z.B. Wagman
Translation Editor: Vicky Ruan
Copyeditor: Leora Joy Jones