Letter from the Editors

Beloved Readers,

Thank you for picking up the third issue of Deep Overstock, the booksellers’ journal.

In March of 2018, Deep Overstock started as a means to connect and share the creative work of booksellers. So many of our fellow bookstore employees are writers, illustrators, or comic artists. We wanted to give them and ourselves a venue to explore new work – and self-imposed deadlines are good motivators as well.

Within the sexy pages of issue three you’ll find content inspired by one of the most overlooked and derided sections in a bookstore: Paranormal Romance. Often tucked away in a dark, smelly aisle like a werewolf’s tail tucked between his legs as he asks his beloved for her tentacle in marriage, Paranormal Romance offers a rich field of untapped potential of pleasures of the guiltiest kinds.

You took our ears and put your ancient tongues in them! You took our eyes for blood-vision sacrifice! You stole our hearts and brains from our graves and made new bodies made of air!

We will be forever grateful, palpitating, cursing your very name.

We begged you, ‘No! Not furry love!’ But oh we’ve come to love it. We begged you, ‘No! Not sex-ghosts from days past!’ But, baby, we’ve got chills all over. ‘No! Not Bacteria of Love!’ But we’re so infected we’re levitating above our beds. We begged you, ‘Yes, unicorns! Yes, Robert Pattinson!’ …and you gave them to us. Again and again.

In short: We are undeadly graveful for your sexy submissions.

We hope that you will fall in love equally with our next theme, that theme being…



(Cover art by Ariel Kusby)

Kummam Al-MaadeedThe Lost Rose (excerpt)
Andy AndersonUntitled
Glen ArmstrongThe Woman with a Thousand Heads #18 & Year of the Sea Monkey VIII & Bedside Book of Narrow Escapes
Hannah BroadbentThe Monster
Brady Brockman’s The RuckusPome Sweet
Michael CalkinsThe Tribe of Amalfia & Vampire’s Lament
Mickey CollinsThe Hunter
Cosima Bee ConcordiaThe Pitcher Plant
L. FidThe Parable of the Three-Legged Stool
Desmond Everest FullerIs There Anyone Awake
Joe GalvánA Country Visitation
Stephen KellyTips for Dating a Minotaur
Ariel KusbyGhost Hotel
T.m. LawsonTo the Shadow That Watches Me Sleep, Breathes on My Neck, Lives in the Corner of My Eye
Kellye McBrideGhostfuckers
Maya McOmieYou Think Your Tendrils Kicked In,
Timothy MerrittSun and Her Shadow
Leanna MoxleyThe Honey Locust Tree
OakteaMy Girlfriend is a Unicorn
Kimberly OwenLove Hate Relationship
Piers RippeyGhost Bustin’
Jason SquamataParliament of Babies (episode one) & “Incubatorium”
Ben TalleyThe Moon & the Wolf
Ayşe Tekşen – Stars in a Pudding
Jonathan van BelleMater Dei



Editorial

Editor-In-Chief: Bobby Eversmann
Managing Editor: Ariel Kusby
Prose: Mickey Collins & Bobby Eversmann
Poetry: Ariel Kusby
Social Media: Ariel Kusby & Piers Rippey
Web Design: Robert Eversmann
Interior Design: Mickey Collins
Cover Design: Ariel Kusby