O, it turns out, is also for Oddness, and oddness is the prevailing theme of the month.

“You know an odd feeling?” said comedian George Carlin. “Sitting on the toilet eating a chocolate bar.”

What? Where did that come from? Why is that funny? Because it’s odd. Because it surprises you with some ordinary experiences that are tossed together, making them both strange beyond reason.

These last few months as we stirred through the slush pile the odd kept bobbing to the surface like Halloween party apples. Must be that October Oddness. The oddness that gave birth to not only Halloween but Oktoberfest. So we put a virtual paperclip on them and saved them for October.

First up is “Columbidae” by returning FFO author Nathaniel Lee. I can’t sum up this story any better than our publisher, Anna Yeatts, did when she read it. She said, “Huey (our hero) is such an unreliable narrator. And he took me places that I didn’t expect. I don’t remember the last time that happened in a story. They tend to run on rails. And this one not only pulled up the rails but twisted them into knots and blew them up.”

Odd isn’t always humorous as you’ll find in our next story, “The Liar” by David Austin. An odd and touching look at last moments.

In our submission guidelines it states that we’re not big fans of second-person narrative. Occasionally, though, we find a story in which a second person is done too well to ignore. “If You Want,” by Luc Reid is one of those occasional stories, which is odd in and of itself. Even more odd that me, as a woman, was able to slip seamlessly into the head of a male character who is odd, in an odd story that weaves plenty of emotional impact into all that oddness.

Enjoy!

Suzanne Vincent

Editor-in-Chief