What does “Wanderlust” mean to Apparition Lit?

Greetings and salutations, readers!

It is that time again, folks! It’s a new year, filled with optimism and promise. The end of winter and spring is in the air. You have made your writing resolutions and you are ready to tackle a whole new range of markets and submissions. Well luckily for you, Wanderlust is officially open and we are ready to see what you bring to our door! 

This issue, we are exceptionally privileged to have the venerable M.L. Krishnan as our guest editor. If you aren’t familiar with M.L.’s work, you are once again in luck. One of her most talked about works from this last year was published by none other than Apparition Literature! Feast your eyes on Bride, Knife, and Flaming Horse and be inspired!

Once you’re finished enjoying this much lauded story, you will be pleased to find that in anticipation of her tenure with us as a Guest Editor, M.L. has created not just a detailed thread of what she hopes to see in our submission stack but also wrote a fantastic blog post detailing her heart’s desires! There is great detail, nuance, and examples of the exact works she’s hoping to see and also, there are so many stories you can add to your reading list. 

Always looking to be more and more helpful, we also did an editors roundtable and I now present to you the latest edition of “What does Wanderlust mean to Apparition Lit?”:

Clarke Doty, Owner/Senior Editor: More than one of us here at Apparition Lit love a good tearjerker, and Clarke is looking for something that truly makes her cry (read: I wear my spiders, but bring tissues!). In addition to deep feels, Clarke would be happy to see horror. Perhaps even horror that shows a truly twisted take on our theme…something different, something bold! That’s not too much to ask, is it?

Tamoha Sengupta, Submissions Reader: Always great at thinking expansively, Tamoha is hoping to find characters, searching diverse universes and tying their wandering stories together with symbols and objects. Perhaps a single unifying object brings together many planes of existence, and perhaps, most importantly, wanderlust represents the growth and transformation these characters experience while out exploring…

Tacoma Tomilson, Owner/Senior Editor: Tacoma is thinking of something beyond your usual roadtrip story. What’s coming to mind for her is “Little Miss Sunshine”, which it’s not just about the destination, but also a thoughtful and eccentric family road trip. She’s looking for heartfelt stories wrapped in an eccentric road trip vehicle (excuse the pun!) set someplace unique or unusual! 

Maria Schrater, Assistant Poetry & Fiction Editor, Submissions Reader: For Maria, wanderlust is about a yearning of sorts; a hard to capture feeling that is different for everyone…so show her what you’ve got! When you have a theme that can mean so much to so many, she knows that means we are looking for stories that really mean something to you, that can resonate with all. She’s also down for some hard fantasy this round, including that good old fashioned middle-earth goodness! 

Rebecca Bennett, Owner/Senior Editor and Cover Art Director: Rebecca is looking for explorers of days long gone, and hoping to take a peak into some interstellar travel logs filled with those old-timey feels. What might this mean, you ask? Rebecca defined it as something similar to “the burgeoning sense of wonder you have for something new, before it’s been soiled with everyone’s knowledge of what it is…” In short, she’s looking for stories that have within them a sense of newness and discovery, and she is not opposed to a little romance. None of the editors are, just so you know! 

Amy Henry Robinson, Owner/Senior Editor, Poetry Editor: Amy is hoping humor finds its way into this stack. If you’re interested in talking literally, talking about travel, she thinks Wanderlust is ripe for stories of travel being interrupted; or travel that is truncated, with our characters being unable to travel to their destination. Perhaps some creative caravans making their way across vast universes, with family and character driven stories. And it’s always okay if death is in the mix…

To wrap us up, in addition to her thoughtful thread and blog, M.L. had some parting thoughts…

She believes this issue is ready for the most creative explorations of all. A departure from the usual interpretation of the theme. Wanderlust is a feeling, and that feeling is every aspect of travel expanded to its conceptual limits, beyond the physical, beyond conventional understanding…

Characters rooted in place, but still moving through diverse realities. Those same realities fragmented, with some pieces found still, but even more pieces being moved along by light and speed. She offered us one of her favorite novels as an example: Changing Planes by Ursula K. Le Guin. In this story we find a character sitting still, and yet, she’s falling through space and time…

Well there you have it, folks! Never say we have never done nothing for you! 

Until next time, friends!

Blog Photo by Joshua Earle on Unsplash