As published in THE HONG KONG REVIEW, Volume III, No. 3, Fall 2022

I was struck speechless that afternoon in 1932 when I first saw Mr. Herbert’s Stromboli’s Nights of Wonder Carnival in a trampled corn field in Toledo, Ohio.

Even a dumb twelve-year old like me could see it was all fake, a jerry-rigged assortment of broken-down kiddy rides and game booths with worthless prizes. But at night, when the twinkling fairy lights were lit, the canned music blared, and popcorn and cotton-candy machines spewed enchanting aromas, I was bewitched, and I lived there that summer.  

“Who’s Stromboli?” I asked Mr. Herbert, a childhood friend of my father.

“Some guy I met in a bar. Sounds classy, right, Bernard?” he said.

https://www.sledgehammerlit.com/post/takeout-by-suzanne-martinez

Published by Sledgehammer Literary Journal, February 8, 2022. Click on link to read and hear author read the story.

https://gonelawn.net/journal/issue43/Martinez.php

Published by Gone Lawn, Issue 43, January 31, 2022. Click on link to read story.

Published in The Best Short Stories from The Saturday Evening Post Great American Fiction Contest 2022 Anthology Honorable Mention (https://www.amazon.com/Stories-Saturday-Evening-American-Fiction-ebook/dp/B09PGPJ934)

Ben and Celeste had fallen in love in Brooklyn at art school where they’d bonded over their passion for making art, printmaking, and personal reinvention after bad first marriages. They looked like brother and sister, compact and dark haired in their twenties. The previous spring, when Celeste discovered there were no college teaching jobs available despite her brand-new MFA, Ben suggested they start their own fine art printshop. 

“We’d own the presses and can make art whenever we want,” Ben said. “Artists and publishers will pay us to print their editions and we won’t have to rent press time. Everything would be under our control.”

“Sounds like a great plan, Ben. You think I’ll have time to make my own prints?”

“We both will. I promise.” 

Mind the Babies

Published by the Vestal Review, Issue 59, December 2021. Click on title to read the story on the Vestal Review website.

https://citronreview.com/2021/09/23/how-to-make-fire-prints-with-john-cage/

Nominated for Best Small Fictions Anthology 2022

http://www.activemuse.org/2021_Collections/Vasant_2021/Stories/Suzanne_Martinez.html

Published by Active Muse, Crime Issue, Spring 2021. Click on the link above to read the story. [WARNING: The narrator is a sociopath whose actions may be offensive to some readers.]

Quitters

Published by Dovetail Diaries, Quarantine Issue, Fall 2020. Click on title to read story.

Suzanne C. Martinez

Promises

Click on title to read story.

Published by Flash Fiction Magazine, November 4, 2020. Nominated by Flash Fiction Magazine for a 2020 Pushcart Prize. Chosen as Honorable Mention for the 2020 Flash Fiction Magazine Editor’s Choice Award.