JoSelle Vanderhooft

The Desert in the North

You may not see me for myself at first, with my green-glass glaciers and the northern lights. But beneath this, I am as deadly-pale as ever, a desert still. In [...]

Ganymede of the Thames

Of course, I teach him everything he knows. But being a thing, as it stands, of flesh, and twine, and dust, he turns his pride a little to the meat [...]

The Dybbuk in Love, by Sonya Taaffe

An elegantly written chapbook.

The Tragedy of Ferdinand

(Loosely based on John Webster’s play The Duchess of Malfi.)
It’s raining nails tonight, and hammers. They smash roofs into crystal powder, pop wet roads like champagne corks. All through the [...]

Yume No Hon: The Book of Dreams, by Catherynne M. Valente

JoSelle Vanderhooft reviews Valente’s Yume No Hon: The Book of Dreams.

Galatea Revisited

He wore diamonds to bed, the lover you chiseled from the plaster of Paris you bought at the church bazaar. It was fifty cents and you thought, why not? If [...]

The Tale of the Scorpion Prince

The desert has a way of holding you.
The sands are treacherous, each a little weight bound to my ankles with cords of stratus clouds and cactus needles. They cling to [...]