Andrea’s flash fiction, Banshee, published by Jersey Devil Press

Andrea: I'm super excited to finally have a piece accepted by Jersey Devil Press.

My flash fiction, Banshee, was published in Issue #132 April 2026 on May 17, 2026.

The Editor’s Note on this issue strikes a chord with me. Laura Garrison says “This combination of unexpected proportions and angles infuses the space with a slight uncanniness, a sense of being someplace that is an imperfect imitation of reality.”

Folklore, Mythology and Horror tend to be the subjects I write about and try sometimes to apply to modern life. I visualize it as an Otherhere, some place (or places really) that is near our reality but not quite right and perhaps unsettling.

In this short piece, a banshee is a singer in an indie rock band. I mean what could be more fitting?

“Woman,” by Enrique Meseguer.

A little background on the evolution of my story, Banshee:

I’ve been submitting to Jersey Devil Press since 2013. I had submitted 6 other pieces before getting Banshee accepted there.

I have been submitting and working on Banshee since 2014 and have submitted it 15 times with the 15th time being the charm as well as multiple revisions. It's a flash fiction piece although it's on the shorter side, being under 500 words (487 words).

It used to be a much shorter piece hovering under 300 words for a long time as recently as May 2025. By submitting and re-reading, I found a way in to expand the protagonist's story. And this last revision was the one that succeeded.

I write this to let you know and remind myself to never give up. The road is long but the "finished" piece is worth it.

(I put "finished" in quotes because who knows if anything is ever truly finished. :)

Additional note:

With the acceleration of people using AI to write and obtain writing prizes, it is all the more pressing to support and read actual human created stories. It saddens (and perplexes) me that anyone would discard revising and even the creation of their stories, poems, etc. in favor of AI writing /revising something for them. What is the point of writing if you’re not the one doing it? Where is the joy of completion if you did not complete it? Weird.

I’m so thrilled to be in this issue with these amazing writers. The extraordinary cover art for this issue is “Woman,” by Enrique Meseguer.

Thank you Jersey Devil Press for accepting my little story.

Archive copy for posterity.

A giraffe person. :)

Andrea is reading at LIC Arts Open Poetry Festival, Sunday, May 17th noon to 2pm

I’m reading this Sunday, May 17th at the LIC Arts Open 13 - Poetry Festival from 12 to 2pm along with other poets.

The Poetry Festival will be curated by Queens Poet Laureate, 2015-2019, Academy of American Poets Fellow, Maria Lisella.

It will be held at The Local NY located at 13-02 44th Avenue in Long Island City (Queens, baby). It’s free!

I will be reading my poem Rape Kits.

I am so excited! Or are those nerves? I can never tell the difference.

Directions for those in need from the Local NY website. (Mark is my GPS because I’m directionally distraught)

E/M/G Subways – Get off at Court Sq- 23rd St subway stop. Exit the train and follow signs in the subway for 44th Drive/21st St NE Corner. You will exit outside of Palace Chicken restaurant. Cross the street in front of you but then head to your right heading north on 21st St. You should see the beautiful Manhattan skyline at your left. You will take the second left which will be 44th Avenue (so first you will cross 44th Road, then take your next left on 44th Avenue). There’s a new gray building on the corner where you turn onto 44th Avenue. Walk approximately 150 feet down 44th Avenue and you’ll see our entrance with an awning about halfway down the block on the left. 

7 Subway – get off at the stop Court Sq. Exit the train and walk down the stairs. After the turnstile, turn right and go down the stairs. Walk down the stairs (the Court Square diner will be on your left) and at the bottom of the stairs continue straight ahead on 45th Road, walking away from the train tracks. Take your first right on 21 Street. Pass 45th Ave, 44th Drive and 44th Road. Take your fourth left on 44th Avenue (in our neighborhood the street names sometimes use the same number so keep your eyes peeled for AVENUE, not road, not drive). There’s a new gray building on the corner where you turn onto 44th Avenue. Walk approximately 150 feet down 44th Avenue and you’ll see our entrance with an awning about halfway down the block on the left.

Hope to see you there!

Andrea

Please check out https://www.endthebacklog.org/ and the important work they do.

Andrea’s story Eye Maggot made it into Molotov Cocktail’s Flash Monster 2025 Contest Top 10!

November 13, 2025

Andrea: On Halloween I found out that my story Eye Maggot made it into Molotov Cocktail’s Flash Monster 2025 Contest Top 10! At No. 8.

The submission trenches are a strange and unpredictable place. I just wrote this story and was dragging heels on getting it done in time. When I pressed submit during their slacker special, I honestly had no confidence it would even make the short list never mind getting accepted. This just goes to show you that you never know. All I know is that I didn’t want to miss this contest deadline, that feeling of losing an opportunity usually eggs me on. Regardless of the outcome, I’m happy to have written a new story. So don’t let inspiration pass you by.

In conclusion, you can have a piece (like my ghost story Desmond) you’ve submitted and revised over and over again and it only gets accepted after 16 times and you can have a piece that is accepted on the first go.

Please read the entire issue. I love it you should too.

PS: It’s funny I often write about body horror but I can’t really watch it. I also can’t watch pretty mundane things like the spitting in the Yeah Yeah Yeah’s video or the gross eating in INXS’ The One Thing and especially can’t watch people gross eating in The Flaming Lips - Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots Pt. 1 but I write about those things. Weird?

Andrea’s ghost story Desmond was published in Rawhead’s Bloody Bones Special Issue #1 on 10/22/25

Andrea’s ghost story Desmond was published last week in Rawhead’s Bloody Bones Special Issue #1.

She will be reading a portion of this tale on zoom (Sunday, November 2nd from 12 – 2 PM ET) during The Launch Party for Rawhead’s Fall 2025 releases, Issue One and Special Issue One: Bloody Bones

It will take place via Zoom on Sunday, November 2nd from 12 – 2 PM ET. You can register for the event here: https://us06web.zoom.us/meeting/register/UUxsrgltTmCKMrSu_7w8tA

“alien? where did you come from?”, by gryffyn m, Unsplash, 2020

Andrea’s back story on this piece

This story started out as a poem called French House Shadows about a haunting at Oberlin back in the nineties. Or was it mass psychosis? Who knows?

I personally experienced some of the more innocuous bits of this haunting but it was the former RA of the dorm who relayed his tale to us impressionable sophomores that has remained with me after all these years.

One of the older students in the dorm was friends with him. She started to tell him about all the weird occurrences happening over winter term. He immediately demanded to speak to us all. He wanted to know who told us about the ghost and Desmond. But honestly no one did. (Or no one did to me). He had just returned to campus from taking off a year for his health. He rationalized that the dorm experienced mass psychosis and it wasn’t a haunting at all. He had also been very sick during the first haunting with pneumonia. But it wasn’t all explainable.

I first completed the fiction version of this story in June 2021 submitting it to The Molotov Cocktail’s Flash Vision Contest. Contests often inspire me to finish a story and even write a new one. If you’re ever uninspired, submit to a contest.

This story of madness and/or ghosts took submitting to 19 places and many revisions to get accepted. It was rejected 16 times (withdrawn twice).

It has been almost 2 years since I’ve gotten a piece accepted. To be fair, I wasn’t submitting enough but this year I set a goal of submitting to 100 places. I’ve made it to 59. In 2024, I only submitted to 22 places and 2023 (when I was last published) to 56.

My point is don’t give up, keep working, revising, reading and submitting. The very process of submitting makes one a better writer.

I wanted to post about this sooner but I’ve been recovering from surgery and contracted food poisoning. Desmond’s revenge, maybe?

Please check out the two first issues from Rawhead.

Videos of past readings

Finally got to videoing (is that a word?) again and here are readings that both Mark and I gave in the recent years. Spoken Word if you’re fancy and we know you’re fancy.

We are also reading again at First Floor Walk Up Reading Series on Monday, April 21st at 7pm at One and One LES (76 E 1st Street, New York, NY 10009). It’s free. FB event link

Videos of us speaking in public below

First Floor Walk Up Reading Series - Monday, April 21st

Mark and I will be reading fiction at the First Floor Walk Up Reading Series on Monday, April 21st at 7pm at One and One LES (76 E 1st Street, New York, NY 10009)

All the deets below:

First Floor Walk Up Presents Bi-Weekly Readings of
Poetry and Prose at

One and One
76 E. 1st St. @ 1st Ave
F Train to 2nd Ave Station

FREE 

Monday, April 21st, 7 PM
FB event link

Featured writers/poets/creatives’ bios below: 

MEGHAN GRUPPOSO

Originally from the gorgeous woods of southern New Hampshire, Meghan Grupposo holds a BFA in Dance from The Juilliard School. She is a co-founder, former COO and co-editor of NeuroNautic Institute Presents and Press. Meghan’s work can be found in her handbound chapbook, Bouquet (NeuroNautic Press), & in various anthologies, including NYC From the Inside (Blue Light Press), arriving at a shoreline and Escape Wheel (great weather for MEDIA), the Dada Journal Maintenant, Issues 14-17 (Three Rooms Press), Love Love Magazine, Polarity, & Rucksack a Global Poetry Patchwork’s multimedia project, Hair in the Wind. She’s a 2020 Pushcart Prize nominee. Meghan happily resides in New York City with her two cats.

ANDREA DeANGELIS

Andrea DeAngelis is at times a poet, writer, shutterbug and musician living in New York City. Her writing has recently appeared in Carmina Magazine, Corvus Review, HauntedMTL and Bowery Gothic. Andrea also sings and plays guitar in the indie rock band MAKAR (www.makarmusic.com)  who are currently recording their fourth album, Exit Earth. She tries not to disturb her neighbors by putting her guitar amp in the closet.

MARK PURNELL

Mark Purnell is a writer, investor and musician living in New York City. His writing has recently appeared in The Molotov Cocktail and he is currently working on his debut novel. Mark sings, writes and plays piano in the indie rock band MAKAR (www.makarmusic.com).


JEFFERY BERG

Jeffery Berg is a writer who lives in Jersey City. He received an MFA from NYU. His poetry has appeared in various journals, including most recently in Pine Hills Review. His film criticism can be found at Film-Forward. His debut poetry collection, RE-ANIMATOR, is forthcoming in 2026 from Indolent Books.


VIRGINIA RANDALL

Virginia Randall grew up on the Lower East Side and her work has appeared in Narratively, Italian-Americana, Straus Newspapers and various blogs. She is a freelance culture writer and former UPI reporter.  This reading takes place where she bought her comics as a kid.

Please note that we’re not necessarily reading in the above order and that the event starts promptly at 7pm and ends around 8pm.

I’m also going to be uploading the past reading we did to YouTube here in the next week or so.

Hope to see you there!

First Floor Walk Up Presents Bi-Weekly Readings of Poetry and Prose

Both Mark and Andrea are very excited to be reading at First Floor Walk Up Presents Bi-Weekly Readings of Poetry and Prose at One and One, 76 E. 1st St. at 1st Ave on Monday, February 26th.

The event starts at 7:00 pm and goes to 8pm – See the line-up below – more info on our fellow writers and poets closer to the event as well as the Facebook event link

First Floor Walk Up Presents Bi-Weekly Readings of

Poetry and Prose at

One and One

76 E. 1st St. @ 1st Ave

F Train to 2nd Ave Station

FREE

Monday, February 26th, 7 PM

WAH MOHN

ANDREA DeANGELIS

Andrea DeAngelis is at times a poet, writer, shutterbug and musician living in New York City. Her writing has recently appeared in Carmina Magazine, Corvus Review, HauntedMTL and Bowery Gothic. Andrea also sings and plays guitar in the indie rock band MAKAR (www.makarmusic.com) who recently released their third album, Fancy Hercules. She tries not to disturb her neighbors by putting her guitar amp in the closet.

MARK PURNELL

Mark Purnell is a writer, investor and musician living in New York City. His writing has recently appeared in The Molotov Cocktail and he is currently working on his debut novel. Mark sings, writes and plays piano in the indie rock band MAKAR (www.makarmusic.com).

ALLAN  GRAUBARD

Allan Graubard -- poet, writer and critic -- (just published!): SUN STEP BLACK LAKE (Broken Sleep Books, Wales, UK). In 2022, he appeared as editor and contributor to the international anthology Nigredo. 2020/2019 saw the publication of three books: Western Terrace (Exstasis Editions, Victoria, BC), Language of Birds (Anon Editions, NY/LA), and Into the Mylar Chamber: Ira Cohen (Fulgur, UK).

Andrea still has to make a decision on what to read…muahahaha. She will make it weird because she’s a weirdo lol (Andrea wrote this btw)

Halloween Reading at Von Bar - Sunday, October 30th (for Bowery Gothic)

Calling all Creepy Literati!
A Hallow’s Eve reading!

Andrea will be reading her short story Mara along with the other Bowery Gothic contributors on Sunday, October 30th at Von Bar located at 3 Bleecker in NYC. The event starts at 6pm.