Category: PUBLISHING

"I think it’s human nature to dream of what’s on the other side." Benjamin Woodard chats with Caleb Michael Sarvis about his debut collection, Dead Aquarium , out now from Mastodon Publishing. In his smart debut story collection, Dead Aquarium, or ( i don’t have the stamina for that kind of faith) , recently released by Mastodon Publishing, Caleb Michael Sarvis whisks the reader into a Florida both real and imagined. Over twelve stories and one novella, hurricanes decimate neighborhoods, aquatic rodents comfort a grieving daughter, a robotic dinosaur eats cigarettes, and a thumb detaches itself from a hand. Yet scenes of deep emotional resonance also lurk within these stories: one man looks for his lost brother; another inherits the ashes of his dead parents; a boy considers the mortality of his grandfather. Throughout, Sarvis toys with the strange in order to tap into feelings that make for memorable tales. I was lucky to publish one of Caleb’s stories, “Baby, It’s Cold Outside,” in my journal, Atlas and Alice , a couple years ago, so when I learned he was about to launch his first book, I jumped at the chance to talk with him about his process. Caleb [...]

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