Working on the 20th issue of Jenny this past year has introduced me to a diverse pool of writers whose future work I intend to follow with close interest. The pieces featured in this issue come from writers of all ages, from as close as northeast Ohio and southwest Pennsylvania to as far as Delhi and Singapore. Each is unique and powerful in their own way.

Several of our featured fiction pieces are coming-of-age stories. “Fishing Around in the Dog Days of August” by Victoria Smith follows the complex relationship between two young sisters. In “Swamp Legacy” by Jacob McElligott, a grandson and his ailing grandfather confront a fearsome alligator and an even fiercer illness. Frances Koziar explores homelessness and found family in “By the Creek.”

Our nonfiction essays are all thought provoking and poignant. Carrie George blends genre with her hybrid micro-essays/prose poems “The First Dream, Pre-Surgery” and “False Memory and I am Choked.” In “How to Become a (Failed) Vegetarian” Hannah Chen is by turns humorous and somber as she navigates family, cultural differences, and (failing) vegetarianism.

The imagery in our selection of poems will stick with you long after reading, from the haunting decay of home and family in Milo Wolverton’s “the pennsylvania death rattle” to the kitchen contemplations of mortality in Deepti Ramesh’s “It’s January Again.”

This issue also features an interview with award-winning editor Ellen Datlow, “the venerable queen of horror anthologies” (New York Times). Datlow has worked with famous authors such as Dan Simmons, Clive Barker, Karen Joy Fowler, Joyce Carol Oates, and many more. Writers and editors of all genres have something to learn from her.

Lastly, the work of our featured artist, Federico Federici’s “Investigations (of empirical tendencies),” most simply be seen to be believed. We hope you enjoy.

Steven Caumo, Head Editor