illustration - eric fortune

Eric's bio describes his work as characters in our world with a touch of
surrealism.  He fits the paintings with emotion through soft lighting and
atmosphere, along with specific and masterful color choices.  They are
tone and emotion, otherworldly portraits even, and while other artists may
paint specific moments, Eric paints the big picture, the essence.

There is no exquisite beauty… without some strangeness in the proportion.
- Edgar Allan Poe

the well written - angela carter

She gained entry into the world by a mysterious loophole in its metaphysics
and, during her kiss, she sucked his breath from his lungs so that her own
bosom heaved with it.

She sank her teeth into his throat and drained him.  He did not have the time
to make a sound.  When he was empty, he slipped straight out of her embrace
down to her feet with a dry rustle, as of a cast armful of dead leaves, and there
he sprawled on the floorboards, as empty, useless and bereft of meaning as his
own tumbled shawl.

She tugged impatiently at the strings which moored her and out they came in
bunches from her head, her arms and her legs.  She stripped them off her
fingertips and stretched out her long, white hands, flexing and unflexing them
again and again.  She stamped her elegant feet to make the new blood flow
more freely there.

- Angela Carter, "The Loves of Lady Purple"

Pop S/S 2007, Mert & Marcus

illustration - a pod of mermaids

I recently read Millhauser's short story "Mermaid Fever," found here
at Harper's Magazine for free.  "The Little Mermaid" has been retold many
times (Midnight Pearls by Debbie Viguie, Mermaid by Carolyn Turgeon),
and then there was the rumor that Stephanie Meyer was writing a book
on the topic of mermaids.  Anyway, it's interesting to see different authors'
takes on the creatures (Sur La Lune has a list of modern literary
interpretations, short or long, for any who are interested), as it is wonderful
to see different illustrators' treatments below.  Enjoy.

At 5:06 a.m. the body was discovered by George Caldwell, a forty-year-old
postal worker who lived two blocks from the water and was fond of his early-
morning swim. Caldwell found her lying just below the tide line; he thought
she was a teenager who had drowned. The body lay on its side among strings
of seaweed and scattered mussel shells. Caldwell stepped back. He did not
want trouble.  “I thought she was a high school girl,” Caldwell later told a
reporter; we read it in the Listener. “It was still dark out there. I thought she
was wearing some sort of a dress with the top torn off. I could tell she didn’t
look right. I didn’t want to get too close.

- Steven Millhauser, "Mermaid Fever"

There are people all over the world who carry the mermaid inside them, that
otherworldly beauty and longing and desire that made her reach for heaven
when she lived in the darkness of the sea.

- Carolyn Turgeon, Mermaid: A Twist on the Classic Tale

By Steph Holmes

By Sophie Blackall

a dreamer's wisdom - virgil

Fortune sides with him who dares.

- Virgil

By Mara

on writing - neil gaiman

 Neil Gaiman's writing advice via Brain Pickings:

1. Write

2. Put one word after another. Find the right word, put it down.

3. Finish what you’re writing. Whatever you have to do to finish it, finish it.

4. Put it aside. Read it pretending you’ve never read it before. Show it to
friends whose opinion you respect and who like the kind of thing that this is.

5. Remember: when people tell you something’s wrong or doesn’t work for
them, they are almost always right. When they tell you exactly what they
think is wrong and how to fix it, they are almost always wrong.

6. Fix it. Remember that, sooner or later, before it ever reaches perfection,
you will have to let it go and move on and start to write the next thing.
Perfection is like chasing the horizon. Keep moving.

7. Laugh at your own jokes.

8. The main rule of writing is that if you do it with enough assurance and
confidence, you’re allowed to do whatever you like. (That may be a rule for
life as well as for writing. But it’s definitely true for writing.) So write your
story as it needs to be written. Write it ­honestly, and tell it as best you can. 
I’m not sure that there are any other rules. Not ones that matter.

By Stacey Jane

photo stories - polaroids

There are some really great groups on Flickr for polaroid photographers,
which is where I found these.  Polaroids are great because they're often
blurred enough, vague enough, that there's much mystery to what's
actually going on in the photos.  Vague lines offer vague imaginings
to jump off of into a hundred different stories.  What do you see?

The bridge will only take you halfway there, to those mysterious lands
you long to see. Through gypsy camps and swirling Arab fair, and moonlit
woods where unicorns run free. So come and walk awhile with me and
share the twisting trails and wondrous worlds I've known. But this bridge
will only take you halfway there. The last few steps you have to take alone.

- Shel Silverstein

By Alison Garnet

By Enrico

the well written - jerry spinelli

"Did you know there's a country with officially designated 'enchanted places'?"

"No," I said.  "Where would that be?  Oz?"

"Iceland."

"Imagine that."

"I'm ignoring your sarcasm.  I think it would be neat if we had that here.
You'd be walking or riding along, and there would be this stone marker
with a brass plate: 'Enchanted Site.  U.S. Department of Interior.'"

"We'd litter it up," I said.

She stared at me, her smile gone.  "Would we?"

I felt bad, as if I had ruined something.

-Jerry Spinelli, Stargirl

By Megan Adelaide