The cult section of the literary world
International takes on Bizarro always make me happy. Oddly enough, America is not the only place whose strangeness is destroying consensus reality as we know it. Ronaldo Lages comes out of Brazil and has for you a piece that feels grandiose while still being quiet and poetic. I quite like […]
Garrett Cook here. I breathed a sigh of relief on this first week of open subs when I got someone I knew. Ben Arzate writes hip, transgressive plays and novellas influenced by Battaille and the like, along with stuff on Japanese noise bands you’ve never heard of. It’s a truly […]
Garrett Cook here. Alaina Hammond is dear to me; she is a friend from college who has become a sister to me, a vestige of family instrumental to rebuilding my life. She is smart, determined, funny, and as giving as a person can be. For years, I’ve been in a […]
I don’t know Matt Henshaw all too well, so am sad to report I can’t accompany this piece with one of my sincere, heartfelt compliments. What I can say is that Matthew was quick to respond when I said I wanted a couple more pieces before we open to unsolicited […]
Luciana Centeno does work that is really hard to categorize, even for Bizarro. It seems on the surface like it’s dark fantasy until you look at the transgressive elements and the meditations on queer selfhood at the core of it. This piece and the novel whose world it comes from […]
Shelly Lyons comes out of screenwriting. It’s a specific, draconian, and hard-to-develop skillset that can sometimes hamper writers trying their hand at fiction. Shelly has no such issue. She takes the scenemaking skills and the eyes of a screenwriter and brings that to fiction. Shelly is an impressive voice, and […]
I have been working with Madeleine Swann for years. She has a gift for combining wonder, horror, and beauty into some of the most distinctive and unusual fiction you have ever read. A new piece from Madeleine is always a pleasure and one I am grateful to share. Making Memories […]
Garrett Cook here. I have known Michael Allen Rose since BizarroCon 2 where we found each other to be staunch defenders of each other’s pitches in the pitch workshop, which is notable because mine was otherwise universally disliked. He is now President of the Bizarro Writer’s Association as well as […]
Garrett Cook here. Jonathan Gensler impresses the hell out of me. Everything from his in your face performance style to the meticulous intensity of his prose show that he’s going places. He’s doing great stuff for the Bizarro community and I think you’ll dig the work . Tattoorovka by Jonathan […]
Garrett Cook here. Yeah, that’s two fish people in a row. To quote Marge Simpson, “I just think they’re neat”. Matthew Gleason is also neat. Matthew has a gleeful nihilism, a strong hustle, and a passion for everything grotesque that makes them one to watch. False Hopes by Matthew J. […]
by: S.E. Casey It was during the limbo contest that I knew something was horribly wrong. I wasn’t being ageist in noting the winner was a sixty year old man. As the captain of the cruise ship, he certainly had a lifetime of practice. But when the bar was lowered […]
by Alex S. Johnson Durwood peered down, his toes itching, the rash spreading across his choirboy features like the trail of a strawberry torch. He gasped. Grandpa was in the sidewalk once again. How did he get there? What perfidious psychopaths had made him stand still for the bucket, the […]
by Chris Meekings The curtain opens. The fairies in the audience rustle restless in their seats. They eat sticks of marzipan, noisily. Lights up. Enter an announcer. He’s dressed in a full black suit. His hair is immaculate and plastered down to his skull with soup. “Ladies and gentlemen,” he […]
by Eric LaRocca The soles of his custom-made patent leather Oxfords click anxiously on the tiled floor of the doctor’s exam room. Jonathan McCoy can scarcely contain his delight. His hand rests on his wife’s thigh as he sits beside her, rubbing her leg, his fingers occasionally harassing the hem […]
by Frank J. Edler To dream that you are inflating something represents intellect, awareness, knowledge and a higher power. Alternatively, it may symbolize your inflated ego or inflated sense of self. The yogi cradled my lifeless vessel in his arms. He was gentle and caring like a guardian; tender and […]
by John Wayne Comunale I lost my keys after I slept in a bed cursed by an Inuit witch doctor and woke up with what looked like giant snow-crabs dangling from my balls. I figured the reason I got snow-crabs was because my dazzlingly white pubes sparkled like the light […]
by Shawn Milazzo In public, we wear masks. I’m walking the dense roads of society. The world around me only becomes more populated. They removed our faces, our personalities. It is unknown to us who they are. All we know is they came to our planet, many years ago. They came from […]
by Nicholaus Patnaude Lorna clicked on the link in the anonymous email directing her to Juglicious.com and fought back the urge to vomit – Gerald had promised never to show the photos to anyone, unless their exposure would help give clues to the whereabouts of her missing daughter, Hannah. Somebody […]
by John Wayne Comunale “Your suffering will be legendary . . . if you eat this and happen to be lactose intolerant.” The child, not more than four years old, stared up blank-faced at the former Cenobite as he added the third and final scoop of fudge-ripple to a large […]
by G. Arthur Brown ACT I (An average family American 1960 sits at an average family table for an average dinner. Eugene Ionesco is not among them. FATHER sits at one side of the table dressed like an American father 1960. MOTHER sits at another side of the table dressed […]
by Pedro Proença There is a problem with language. In itself, it’s just a way of communicating uselessness. What we are are mere specks of something on a big beach. The beach is connected to a desert, and beyond that, we can’t even imagine. Once I swallowed a car. It […]
by Scott Unfried Garda Ruth O’Gruagain, stood reticent and radiant, at the edge of a cliff overlooking the calm waters. She was not an ordinary officer, her skin clearer than most, her eyebrows more pleasingly plucked, her brown hair shinier, and brown eyes that made a beautifully beefy gaze. Those […]
by Cade Michael Quinn Chucky was a dragon. A big, scary dragon. That’s what Momma told him. “Am I big ‘n’ scary?” Chuck asked Momma. He stretched his wings and dug his claws into the wood-panel floor and growled as big as he could. “Am I big ‘n’ scary, Momma?” […]
by Brian Auspice I argue with a stranger about something insane. I walk away. I drive to a pet shop. I go inside. It smells like a pet shop. All sorts of exotic-looking fish swim in tanks of deep blue, except for one, which has gone belly-up from lack of […]
by John Wayne Comunale You know that old Elvis song, Guitar Man? I guess if I had to blame this all on something, anything; I would blame it on that. The moment after I heard that song I knew what I was supposed to do. It was like a blueprint […]
by Bradley Sands a deleted scene from Dodgeball High, available ONLY on the Belgian import PRINCIPAL’S OFFICE I go in, and Burt Reynolds says, “Hey, there, little fella. Ha ha ha ha!” This is so not fair! Why isn’t Principal Tug in his office? Principal offices are for principals, not guys who […]
by Julia Long I filled my face with life, like, all day. Cool. I get home from school and see my roommate in the bathroom wiping something down. I fill my face with life when she sees me back. She fills her face with life and there is some shared […]
by Cornell R. Nichols I’m not quite sure how it happened but, at the age of thirty, I found myself stuck in a dead-end job, with virtually no prospects for my dead-end life. I guess my ideas were to blame. I have foolishly dared to dream of becoming a journalist, […]
by Craig A. Buckley The good Rev. Johnny Elwood loosened his tie. His black Sunday jacket lay draped over the chair behind his desk. His wife would have been in a tizzy if she’d seen it. That’s what hangers were invented for, Johnny, she’d say, to keep out the wrinkles. […]
by Brian Auspice Hamstring lies in a hospital bed. Tubes feed out of his right arm into a large 1970’s mainframe computer. He watches his blood slowly get sucked through the plastic. The computer beeps. A nurse walks in. She places a stereo on a nearby table. “The doctor will […]
by Jeremy Maddux It was about midday when all the commotion started out on Brightway Boulevard. A man in pinstripe business attire was coming back from lunch with the routine sugar buzz of his franchised coffee kicking in when he noticed something on the ground. He went to his knees […]
That’s right. No FFF this week. We here at Bizarro Central are in dire need of content! If you have a bizarro story, 2000 words or less, attach it as a .doc or .rtf and send it to garthurbrown@hotmail.com. Please include a brief, single paragraph bio. Here’s a fun gif:
by Harbor Rungwarty The vet’s waiting room was carpeted in a color that would hide poop and vomit stains easily. It clashed noticeably with my shoes, but I did not let this disturb me. Chim-cham, my faithful Senegalese, had been off his feed for nearly a week. I was getting […]
by Bob Freville They’re spilling out on to the rickety termite-ridden runway. Woo daddy! We can see them lumbering out now! Oh yes! Those adorable little gals! Our bright shining stars of the tomorrows that may never come! Yep, ladies and gentlemen! They’re a sight for sore, empty eye sockets […]
by Justin Grimbol Gwen saw two beached whales and became so excited she started jumping up and down. “Mom? Dad?” she called out to them. The whales looked at her. “You’ve come back for me!” she yelled. She ran up to them. She tried to hug them but they were […]
