© Still Here Magazine
Still Here Magazine has just published its fourth issue, which is subtitled Moments That Hold Us and contains 56 poems, 25 prose-items and 17 artworks inspired by the themes of precious experiences and memories. I’m pleased to say that I have a 1000-word short story included in this issue. It’s called Flawless and it appears under one of my pseudonyms, Steve Cashel.
Flawless is the tale of a naïve and somewhat pretentious young backpacker making his way through Sri Lanka in the early 2000s. He has an experience that seems to him both a moment of perfect happiness and an epiphany. But then he discovers he’ll have to make a sacrifice if his memory of it is to be preserved – to be kept ‘flawless’. The story isn’t autobiographical but, remembering what I was like as a youth traipsing around Europe in the early 1980s, being adventurous but also taking myself far too seriously, it feels like it could be.
Steve Cashel is the penname I usually attach to non-fantastical stories set in Scotland. Though Flawless is set in Sri Lanka, it contains a few references to Edinburgh and so feels like a Cashel story.
With photography and occasional paintings interspersed among the poetry and prose, and with each page literally abloom with pale but luxuriant shades of green, Still Here Magazine’s fourth edition is a visual as well as a textual treat. It can be downloaded for free here.