Small Wonders
@smallwondersmag.com
An online monthly magazine for speculative poetry and flash fiction! Edited by @cislyn.bsky.social and @granades.com.
If you're a good little child, maybe Grandpa Argle will rise from the swamp on Arglemas and bring you what you truly need. If so, you'd best read "Grandpa and the Ghosts", by @ray-is-writing.bsky.social, in this month's issue.
Grandpa and the Ghosts - Small Wonders
There was no Grandpa Argle waiting at the end of the pier to listen to eager children’s dreams. No one tunneled through the planet's crust with magic Drill Moles on Arglemas Night. It didn’t matter how well she behaved; no one was going to grant her wish.
smallwondersmag.com
November 10, 2025 at 4:07 PM
If you're a good little child, maybe Grandpa Argle will rise from the swamp on Arglemas and bring you what you truly need. If so, you'd best read "Grandpa and the Ghosts", by @ray-is-writing.bsky.social, in this month's issue.
Reposted by Small Wonders
Omg no wot.
Read this.
Read this.
Author Rachael K. Jones is known for writing stories that are so knife-sharp that you cut yourself when you pick them up. Her story "Five Functions of Your Binosaur," from Issue 4, is a gentler story, though still bittersweet.
Five Functions of Your Bionosaur - Small Wonders
The bionosaur was a baby shower gift from your mom's favorite aunt. They were nervous about its size, the stainless steel maw, the retractable razorclaws inside its stubby little arms, but the aunt had insisted.
smallwondersmag.com
November 7, 2025 at 6:46 PM
Omg no wot.
Read this.
Read this.
"Choosing" by Susan Taitel is a different take on The Little Mermaid. Check it out in our issue 5:
Choosing - Small Wonders
The silent girl concerns you. You’re told she materialized from the sea, naked and speechless. She follows your betrothed like a besotted puppy and dances with a grace that makes your chest constrict.
smallwondersmag.com
November 8, 2025 at 7:00 PM
"Choosing" by Susan Taitel is a different take on The Little Mermaid. Check it out in our issue 5:
Meet the 800 year old thirty-year old man in Timothy Quinn's "The Warfighter":
The Warfighter - Small Wonders
Cadence noticed the warfighter on her way to school, and then later walking home along Sixth Avenue he was still in the tiny fenced park and there was a pigeon watching him, which the police had thought at one time was a good way to disguise a camera.
smallwondersmag.com
November 8, 2025 at 4:00 PM
Meet the 800 year old thirty-year old man in Timothy Quinn's "The Warfighter":
Brace yourself for all the feelings with today's reprint, "With Nothing Left" by @slashnburnett.bsky.social :
With Nothing Left - Small Wonders
I buy us some printed burgers. One for you, two for me, because you like me soft, for comfort, and this body needs to eat to keep the padding fed, all wrapped around and through the metal subframe.
smallwondersmag.com
November 7, 2025 at 4:07 PM
Brace yourself for all the feelings with today's reprint, "With Nothing Left" by @slashnburnett.bsky.social :
"Your pictures are nice: also, unmistakably, / of death." Kodakromen by Elizabeth R. McClellan in our issue 5 starts strong and keeps going:
Kodakromen - Small Wonders
Your pictures are nice: also, unmistakably, / of death.
smallwondersmag.com
November 6, 2025 at 7:00 PM
"Your pictures are nice: also, unmistakably, / of death." Kodakromen by Elizabeth R. McClellan in our issue 5 starts strong and keeps going:
It's all about location, location, location in "skeletal arms will sprout" by Isabel Cañas:
skeletal arms will sprout - Small Wonders
air ripples hot over the parched valley. the roads / buckle with it.
smallwondersmag.com
November 6, 2025 at 4:00 PM
It's all about location, location, location in "skeletal arms will sprout" by Isabel Cañas:
The cards flip and then slip out the door in "Between Shuffles" by M.C. Childs. Read on to discover what happens in the in-between:
Between Shuffles - Small Wonders
Ensconced in the granite-walled sub-basement, deeper than the oldest strata of ruins, in the wee hours before the cold death of the universe, the Fates and Furies’ poker game smoldered.
smallwondersmag.com
November 5, 2025 at 4:07 PM
The cards flip and then slip out the door in "Between Shuffles" by M.C. Childs. Read on to discover what happens in the in-between:
The professor in "Imagine Yourself Happy" by Premee Mohamed takes just four minutes to record a message. Take a few to read it and a few more to have a cry afterward:
Imagine Yourself Happy - Small Wonders
Isn't that interesting? I will die in perhaps two minutes because of something I couldn't even see.
smallwondersmag.com
November 4, 2025 at 7:00 PM
The professor in "Imagine Yourself Happy" by Premee Mohamed takes just four minutes to record a message. Take a few to read it and a few more to have a cry afterward:
What scents speak to you of home? Especially when home is in flux?
Take a journey today with "The Scent of a Thousand Homeless Footsteps" by Carol Scheina:
Take a journey today with "The Scent of a Thousand Homeless Footsteps" by Carol Scheina:
The Scent of a Thousand Homeless Footsteps - Small Wonders
We couldn’t take our land with us when we escaped the demon infestation, so I bottled up our familiar aromas.
smallwondersmag.com
November 4, 2025 at 4:00 PM
What scents speak to you of home? Especially when home is in flux?
Take a journey today with "The Scent of a Thousand Homeless Footsteps" by Carol Scheina:
Take a journey today with "The Scent of a Thousand Homeless Footsteps" by Carol Scheina:
Reposted by Small Wonders
One of the great joys of publishing @smallwondersmag.com is getting to read, edit, and publish the work of individual minds seeking to connect with other individual minds. Slop fiction is a fundamental betrayal of our compact. I want no part of it.
Due to the high number of AI submissions and general life things, we are still processing short story submissions from the last open submission period. If you haven't heard anything from us yet, this is why. We hope to have everything processed over the next 2 weeks. Thanks for your patience!
November 1, 2025 at 11:13 PM
One of the great joys of publishing @smallwondersmag.com is getting to read, edit, and publish the work of individual minds seeking to connect with other individual minds. Slop fiction is a fundamental betrayal of our compact. I want no part of it.
Let's spin a little pink magic today, with "Pink Witches" by @melissajorndwrites.bsky.social :
Pink Witches - Small Wonders
Things I want: a house big enough to swallow the sky; Grandma growing an entire jungle in her backyard; Grandma.
smallwondersmag.com
November 3, 2025 at 4:07 PM
Let's spin a little pink magic today, with "Pink Witches" by @melissajorndwrites.bsky.social :
Oh hey, did someone say SPOOKY? We've got spooky!
Not gonna lie, the entire issue for October was pretty dang spooky. It features monsters and ghosts, revenge, eyeballs, curses, and so much more. Read all these fabulous stories right here:
smallwondersmag.com/...
1/6
Not gonna lie, the entire issue for October was pretty dang spooky. It features monsters and ghosts, revenge, eyeballs, curses, and so much more. Read all these fabulous stories right here:
smallwondersmag.com/...
1/6
October 31, 2025 at 2:43 PM
Oh hey, did someone say SPOOKY? We've got spooky!
Not gonna lie, the entire issue for October was pretty dang spooky. It features monsters and ghosts, revenge, eyeballs, curses, and so much more. Read all these fabulous stories right here:
smallwondersmag.com/...
1/6
Not gonna lie, the entire issue for October was pretty dang spooky. It features monsters and ghosts, revenge, eyeballs, curses, and so much more. Read all these fabulous stories right here:
smallwondersmag.com/...
1/6
Reposted by Small Wonders
Awww @rachaelkjones.bsky.social ! Where can I get a bionosaur to bring home?? 🥹💖
Author Rachael K. Jones is known for writing stories that are so knife-sharp that you cut yourself when you pick them up. Her story "Five Functions of Your Binosaur," from Issue 4, is a gentler story, though still bittersweet.
Five Functions of Your Bionosaur - Small Wonders
The bionosaur was a baby shower gift from your mom's favorite aunt. They were nervous about its size, the stainless steel maw, the retractable razorclaws inside its stubby little arms, but the aunt had insisted.
smallwondersmag.com
October 26, 2025 at 8:42 AM
Awww @rachaelkjones.bsky.social ! Where can I get a bionosaur to bring home?? 🥹💖
Author Rachael K. Jones is known for writing stories that are so knife-sharp that you cut yourself when you pick them up. Her story "Five Functions of Your Binosaur," from Issue 4, is a gentler story, though still bittersweet.
Five Functions of Your Bionosaur - Small Wonders
The bionosaur was a baby shower gift from your mom's favorite aunt. They were nervous about its size, the stainless steel maw, the retractable razorclaws inside its stubby little arms, but the aunt had insisted.
smallwondersmag.com
October 25, 2025 at 7:00 PM
Author Rachael K. Jones is known for writing stories that are so knife-sharp that you cut yourself when you pick them up. Her story "Five Functions of Your Binosaur," from Issue 4, is a gentler story, though still bittersweet.
The narrator of Addison Smith's "I GROW," from Issue 22, is coming to grips with their transformation and what it means for them and the world around them.
I GROW - Small Wonders
I grew roots today. My body clings to the reef, latching onto budding polyps and the castoff shells of crustaceans by the seaside fish market.
smallwondersmag.com
October 25, 2025 at 4:00 PM
The narrator of Addison Smith's "I GROW," from Issue 22, is coming to grips with their transformation and what it means for them and the world around them.
Reposted by Small Wonders
I have some September short science fiction, fantasy, and horror picks for you on this fine October day. reactormag.com/must-read-sh...
Must Read Short Speculative Fiction: September 2025 - Reactor
What a fall, huh? Lemon, it’s October. This season has both flown by and trickled by at a glacial pace. I’m already exhausted and there’s still so much left to go. Fortunately, reading a bunch of shor...
reactormag.com
October 23, 2025 at 3:34 PM
I have some September short science fiction, fantasy, and horror picks for you on this fine October day. reactormag.com/must-read-sh...
We close out Issue 28 with an honest-to-goodness ghost story, albeit one that's set in the depths of space. But this space ghost is "The Poltergeist of Fastini Crater," and it's not in a good mood, as we learn in @karldandenell.bsky.social's story.
The Poltergeist of Fastini Crater - Small Wonders
I, Balius Economou, became both an engineer and the first Greek to set foot on the Moon. And now I’m a ghost, thanks to you, Misha Pasternak. You bastard.
smallwondersmag.com
October 24, 2025 at 4:17 PM
We close out Issue 28 with an honest-to-goodness ghost story, albeit one that's set in the depths of space. But this space ghost is "The Poltergeist of Fastini Crater," and it's not in a good mood, as we learn in @karldandenell.bsky.social's story.
Lora Gray's poem "Sever" is a _lot_, from pregnancy to violence to love to defiance.
Sever - Small Wonders
As my sternum elongates, / as my torso bulges, / as you / pry / your way out of me, / my flesh pulled taffy long, / I see you
smallwondersmag.com
October 23, 2025 at 7:00 PM
Lora Gray's poem "Sever" is a _lot_, from pregnancy to violence to love to defiance.
Ali Trotta's poem "Let It Be Your Call" is love and anger and a defiant shout against the small world that some would force us back into.
Let It Be Your Call - Small Wonders
This is what I know of magick, / word after word, / this is the spell
smallwondersmag.com
October 23, 2025 at 4:01 PM
Ali Trotta's poem "Let It Be Your Call" is love and anger and a defiant shout against the small world that some would force us back into.
Death comes for us all, even AIs adrift in space. But death doesn't have to be the end, as we learn in "An Aging AI Tries to Remember Its Life," by @caseyaimer.bsky.social.
An Aging AI Tries to Remember Its Life - Small Wonders
Please—don’t let my fading / algorithms forget a life that was / more than fear mixing with hope.
smallwondersmag.com
October 22, 2025 at 4:17 PM
Death comes for us all, even AIs adrift in space. But death doesn't have to be the end, as we learn in "An Aging AI Tries to Remember Its Life," by @caseyaimer.bsky.social.
Even lousy monks can do great work, as we learn in Eric A. Clayton's "Faith That Builds Worlds," from Issue 4.
Faith That Builds Worlds - Small Wonders
Let’s be clear: I’m a lousy monk. Doesn’t mean I can’t see the big picture. I believe in the work we do. I’m just poorly cast.
smallwondersmag.com
October 21, 2025 at 7:00 PM
Even lousy monks can do great work, as we learn in Eric A. Clayton's "Faith That Builds Worlds," from Issue 4.
How much story can you pack into two sentences? If you're Bree Wernicke, and the story is "Jack of All Faces," the answer is "so much story, more story than you can dream of, and with an amazing arc to boot."
Jack of All Faces - Small Wonders
She told the press all about her narrow vanquishment of the dread magician John Coe and his apprentice Ruby.
smallwondersmag.com
October 21, 2025 at 4:00 PM
How much story can you pack into two sentences? If you're Bree Wernicke, and the story is "Jack of All Faces," the answer is "so much story, more story than you can dream of, and with an amazing arc to boot."
Reposted by Small Wonders
New story day!
I finally got to put my fountain pen habits to good use.
I finally got to put my fountain pen habits to good use.
"Ink Reviews", by @rachelgutin.bsky.social, indeed reviews the ink, but there's more revealed than just how well the ink writes.
Ink Reviews - Small Wonders
This ink is perfect for making lists. Use it to jot down what groceries you need, or all the heinous ways your former boss continues to harm his employees.
smallwondersmag.com
October 20, 2025 at 6:33 PM
New story day!
I finally got to put my fountain pen habits to good use.
I finally got to put my fountain pen habits to good use.
"Ink Reviews", by @rachelgutin.bsky.social, indeed reviews the ink, but there's more revealed than just how well the ink writes.
Ink Reviews - Small Wonders
This ink is perfect for making lists. Use it to jot down what groceries you need, or all the heinous ways your former boss continues to harm his employees.
smallwondersmag.com
October 20, 2025 at 4:17 PM
"Ink Reviews", by @rachelgutin.bsky.social, indeed reviews the ink, but there's more revealed than just how well the ink writes.