Columns

UPDATED WITH WINNER - LitReactor's Flash Fiction Smackdown: March Edition

March 31st, 2014

Flash fiction: A style of fictional literature marked by extreme brevity. Welcome to LitReactor's Flash Fiction Smackdown, a monthly bout of writing prowess. How It Works We give you inspiration in the form of a picture, poem, video, or similar. You write a flash fiction piece using the inspiration we gave you. Put your entry in the comments section. One winner will be picked and awarded a prize.

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Incest Is Best: A Look at One of Society's Greatest Taboos as Presented in Fiction

March 31st, 2014

Alright, sports fans. It's time to get ready! The return of the Game of Thrones series on HBO is nigh upon us. Season 4 is set to take flight (like a dragon - get it??) April 6, and based on the trailers (and the fourth book in Martin's series), it's set to be a good one. There will be battles fought, undead creatures slain, and plenty of mayhem. We'll see Tyrion, Joffrey, Sansa, Jon Snow, and...and...and... ...Oh, yeah. Cersei and Jaime Lannister, too.  Ugggghhhh...

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5 Good Comics That Leveled Up To Greatness

March 28th, 2014

The titles on this list all got the basics of great comics-making down with ease. They’re all well written and have stunning art. They also all have that perfect synergy between writing and art that makes for the best comics. They tell compelling stories and manage to engage and entertain in a scant 22 (or so) pages. But each of these books also have something else. Something unique that helps them level up and become unforgettable.

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Who Is The Winter Soldier?

March 28th, 2014

The next villain Captain America will be facing on the silver screen is so badass they named the movie after him. Even though he’s a relative newcomer and mostly unknown outside of comics, Marvel could not have picked a better second-movie antagonist. The mysterious Winter Soldier has everything we love in a bad guy—he’s a powerful killer cyborg with pale skin, dead hollow eyes and a black facemask.

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How to Judge Books (Real or Imaginary) by Their Covers

March 27th, 2014

Everyone knows you’re not supposed to judge a book by its cover… What this column presupposes (to borrow a favorite movie line – itself associated with a pretty rad book cover) is, maybe you should?

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Culling the Classics: A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man

March 26th, 2014

I must still be high on that St. Patrick's Day excitement, because I couldn't think of anything I'd rather read this month than James Joyce. However, one does not simply read Ulysses or Finnegans Wake, so I decided to start with something that you (and I) would be more likely to pick up and finish.

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It's Made Of SCIENCE: The Vacuum Of Space

March 26th, 2014

Look up. That's space. Maybe that doesn't floor you quite the same way it does me, but all the same, space has been a mysterious ocean for humanity since we figured out there was something higher up than the sky. Here on Earth, we're tethered and limited, and have explored almost everywhere that was once secret. But space? That will always be a place worth investigating.

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Why The F*ck Aren’t You Reading Victor LaValle?

March 25th, 2014

Image by E. Raboteau Why The F*ck Aren't You Reading? is a feature where the columnist spotlights a writer who has a dedicated following and is well known within the writing community, but hasn't achieved the elephant-in-the-room style success of a Stephen King or Gillian Flynn—But they deserve to, dammit! Hopefully the column will help gain the author featured a few more well deserved readers.

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In Defence of Snark: Why Dark Humour Can Save Your Life

March 24th, 2014

A few days ago, one of my Facebook friends posted a meme. It consists of a stock photo from the TV show Gilligan’s Island. In the background some wag has photoshopped an image of Malaysia Airlines flight 370. ‘Too soon?’ asked my friend. Some people thought so. Some people thought the image was disrespectful to the missing passengers, or might be painful to the relatives of the missing. Some felt it was making light of a terrible situation.

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Game On! Ten Awesome Word and Lit-Based Apps

March 24th, 2014

image courtesy GameFly Games In the past, I've written about mobile productivity apps that make the job of writing easier. But how can we writers also waste time on our phones/tablets and still pretend we're busy getting work done? Easy, just play some word or literary-based games, many of which are at least marginally educational.

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