Dear Weird Lit Readers,

 

Of all the yearly solar events we experience here on Earth, I have a particular fondness for the winter solstice. Perhaps to credit are my Scandinavian roots. On this darkest day of the year, I sense them reaching across the globe like tendrils, emerging from their enchanted source above the Arctic Circle and enticing me to explore the gloom.

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It’s a special type of darkness we experience on the winter solstice. A darkness that encourages us to tap into the illumination within. While there’s a popular pagan practice of keeping all the lights in one’s house on through the night—power conservation efforts be damned—there’s value in shadows, too. And further, in our interpretation of the shadows. 

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My family practices a longstanding winter tradition of shadow divination. Pieces of solder are melted over an open flame and dropped into a bucket of cold water. Once the pieces have hardened, they’re retrieved with a long-handled spoon. What emerges from the bucket is true alchemy: shimmering hunks of metal that take on curious shapes. 

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These transformational totems resemble various flora and fauna—perhaps a glorious, twisted tree or the face of a sneering troll. But the real magic happens when we hold them up to a candle and interpret the shadows they cast on the wall. Clumps of molten solder portend journeys overseas, artistic success, recovered health, the return of a long-lost love.

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Fiction casts its own shadows, character and theme flickering on the page or screen. What shadows do the tales in this, our third issue, cast? What interpretations do they offer and what inner hopes and desires do they reveal? Effectual writing leaves some of the storytelling up to readers; what better gift could we receive on this darkest day of the year than an interconnected activity? 

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My wish on the winter solstice is for our collective participation in these stories to remind us all that we’re never truly alone in the darkness. That our hopes and dreams are as luminous on this day as they are under the summer sun. Not only are there undiscovered wonders in the dark woods of winter, but friends and co-authors, too, abound. When we pick up a book or open up a digital mag, we’re lighting the proverbial candles of our imaginations, and what lies in the shadows they cast will carry us through to spring.

 

Happy Solstice, readers. And happy shadows.

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Weirdly yours,

 

September Herrin

Publisher & Editor in Chief

Weird Lit Magazine