Magical Realism Fiction

When a pediatric oncology nurse receives a devastating prognosis—she has just weeks left to live—she finds unexpected comfort from a patient. Her young friend shares a life- and death-changing secret: it is possible to live the same day over and over again until she’s experienced a truly full life. Thus begins a heartbreaking and joyful journey of love, friendship, and self-discovery, as the brave nurse only truly learns how to live in the face of death.

Enter the world of the speculative in this anthology of tales, poems, and art. Immerse yourself into works where a goose escapes her prison, a woman encounters la Llorona, a child meets his numerous Moms, a man chases a spectral night cyclist, family encounters the afterlife, folktales come to life, and more. The boundary between the real and speculative becomes an interwoven tapestry of wonder for 43 of the best contemporary fiction writers, poets, and artists. In its breadth and variety, this speculative anthology is like no other. Contributors include Beth Patterson, Paula Shablo, ...

After the death of his best friend, Eric Ly creates imaginary scenarios in his head to deal with his grief. Until one of them becomes real when a boy he met last summer in Japan finds his way back into his life. When he least expects it, Haru Tanaka walks into the coffee shop and sits down next to him. The only thing is, nobody else can see him. In a magical turn of events, Eric suddenly has someone to connect with, making him feel less alone in the world. But as they spend more and more time together, he begins to question what is real.

Nephthys Kinwell is a taxi driver of sorts in Washington, DC, ferrying passengers in a 1967 Plymouth Belvedere with a ghost in the trunk. Endless rides and alcohol help her manage her grief over the death of her twin brother, Osiris, who was murdered and dumped in the Anacostia River. Unknown to Nephthys when the novel opens in 1977, her estranged great-nephew, 10-year-old Dash, is finding himself drawn to the banks of that very same river. It is there that Dash has charmed conversations with a mysterious figure he calls the "River Man".

As a little girl, Jane has no one. Her mother, Vivienne Margaux, the powerful head of a major New York theater company has no time for her. She does have one friend - Michael - but no one can see him except her. When Jane is in her 30s, working for her mother's company, she is just as alone as she was as a child. Then she finds Michael again - handsome and just the same as she remembers him, only now he's not imaginary.

Buying into the dream that education is the road out of poverty, a teen mom takes a chance on bettering herself, gets on welfare rolls, and talks her way into college. But once she's there, phallocratic narratives permeate every subject, and creative writing professors depend heavily on Freytag's pyramid to analyze life. So Ariel turns to a rich subcultural canon of resistance and failure, populated by writers like Audre Lorde, Tillie Olsen, and Kathy Acker. Wryly riffing on feminist literary tropes, We Were Witches documents the survival of a demonized single mother.

Early morning, 1902. At 7/7 Marchmont Crescent, Eilidh the charlady tips coal into a fire grate and sets it alight. Overhearing, Grimalkin the cat ambles over to curl up against the welcome heat and lick his favorite human's hand. But this is to be his last day on earth…before he becomes the Ghost Cat. Follow Grimalkin as he witnesses the changes of the next 120 years, prowling unseen among the inhabitants of an Edinburgh tenement while unearthing some startling revelations about the mystery of existence, the unstoppable march of time and the true meaning of feline companionship.

They left us for younger women. Laughed at our boundaries. Mocked our intuition. But they forgot one thing: We were never just women. We were watchers. Listeners. Witches. And when silence stopped keeping us safe, we stopped praying for closure— and started summoning consequences. What begins as one ex-wife’s whispered spell becomes a wildfire of vengeance, as a circle of discarded women forms an underground coven called The Grown Ones. Their magic is precise. Personal. Punishing. They don’t just hex these men— They remake them. Or destroy them trying. And the men? They experience ...

Luli Wei is beautiful, talented, and desperate to be a star. Coming of age in pre-Code Hollywood, she knows how dangerous the movie business is and how limited the roles are for a Chinese American girl from Hungarian Hill—but she doesn't care. She’d rather play a monster than a maid. But in Luli's world, the worst monsters in Hollywood are not the ones on screen. The studios want to own everything from her face to her name to the women she loves, and they run on a system of bargains made in blood and ancient magic, powered by the endless sacrifice of unlucky starlets like her.

Book editor Emily Bryant finds herself unexpectedly in the charming town of Cascata on California’s Lost Coast, holding the keys to her grandmother’s rambling Victorian mansion. While sorting through her grandmother’s things, Emily learns that she must edit old manuscripts to inherit the estate. It’s a strange request from a family member who was basically a stranger. Emily quickly realizes that there’s something different about these manuscripts. Any changes she makes come true.

Tras terminar sus estudios de arquitectura en Europa, Lavinia regresa a Latinoamérica para emprender su camino como mujer independiente. Pero sus planes cambian cuando conoce a Felipe, con quien establece una profunda relación sentimental. A su lado le llega la oportunidad de implicarse en las luchas populares y los movimientos de liberación de la dictadura de su país, conectando de ese modo con Itzá, una indígena que luchó contra los invasores españoles y que ahora despierta reencarnada en un naranjo para acompañar, apoyar e inspirar a Lavinia.

A woman arrives alone at a Best Western seeking respite from an emptiness that plagues her. She has fled to the California high desert to escape a cloud of sorrow—for both her father in the ICU and a husband whose illness is worsening. What the motel provides, however, is not peace but a path discovered on a nearby hike. Out along the sun-scorched trail, the narrator encounters a towering cactus whose size and shape mean it should not exist in California. Yet the cactus is there, with a gash through its side that beckons like a familiar door.

Janet Williams is practically invisible. If only she had the pluck to speak up at work, flirt with the handsome barista she sees every day, and realize how special she is. When a magical wig offers Janet a chance to shake things up, will she dare to try a bold new style? The voice in her head - flashy and fierce, with an unbridled southern drawl - tells her to go for it. And once she does, there’s no turning back.

In Japan, cats are a symbol of good luck. As the myth goes, if you are kind to them, they'll one day return the favor. And if you are kind to the right cat, you might just find yourself invited to a mysterious coffee shop under a glittering Kyoto moon. This particular coffee shop is like no other. It has no fixed location, no fixed hours, and seemingly appears at random to adrift young people at crucial junctions in their lives. It's also run by talking cats.

Two men while away the days in an Antarctic research station. Tensions between them build as they argue over a love letter one of them has received. One is practical and open. The other surly, superior and obsessed with reading one book - by the philosopher Kant. As a storm brews and they lose contact with the outside world, they debate Kant, reality and the emptiness of the universe. The come to hate each other, and they learn that they are not alone.

Can she go from broken mid-life wreck to badass mid-life warrior? Beginning a new career at forty-four was difficult, but as Siobhan is about to find out things can be worse. After her marriage implodes and she moves back to her childhood home, Siobhan learns that everything she thought she knew about her family was a lie and the creatures of myth and legend are real living hidden among the “normal” human world. Then she learns that she is the last of her family line who has a sworn duty to aid supernatural creatures who request help. As a Custodian for the Golden Assembly, Siobhan ...

Gabrielle LeRoux was just like any other girl, focused on her academics and other normal teenage angst. That is, until her 18th birthday, where she inherits her powers and finds out she's a witch! She discovers that she is part of a long line of witches that descended from West Africa. They have the power to control the elements at will, breathe life into anything they wish, as well as take it away. The source of their magic comes from the melanin only their kind possess in their skin, absorbed from the sun and radiating through their bodies.

Born to a wealthy Virginian family, privileged Jordan's got her life all planned out. Get her PhD, find the perfect Virginian man to marry, pop out a few more Kacys, and make her state senator father proud. If only Jordan could let the past rest. When your mother disappears without a trace, it carves a gash that bleeds a long time. Jordan has never given up hope that her mother is alive. So when Jordan's old nanny shows up with a mysterious locket containing a portrait of Jordan's mother, Jordan believes her hope was not in vain.

When the story opens, the eponymous hero of Rudolfo Anaya's novel is in an ambulance en route to a hospital for crippled children in the New Mexican desert. A poor boy from Albuquerque, 16-year-old Tortuga takes his name from the odd, turtle-shaped mountain that is rumored to possess miraculous curative powers. Tortuga is paralyzed, and not even his mother's fervent prayers can heal him. But under the mountain's watchful gaze, with the support of fellow patients, he begins the Herculean task of breaking out of his shell and becoming whole again.

When the stones of her house begin to rattle and shift and call out mysterious messages to her in the middle of the night, Pauline Sinclair, age ninety-nine, knows she will not make it to her one-hundredth birthday. She has lived a modest life in Mason Hall, a rural Jamaican village, educating herself with stolen books, raising her two children, surviving by becoming a successful ganja farmers in the area, and experiencing both deep passion and true loss with her beloved baby father, Clive. Behind this seemingly benign façade, however, Miss Pauline has buried many secrets.