Day 14 of 28 – Black History Month – C.I. Shelton

By: Aryanne Ferguson

Reader, remember when I mentioned I went to MFA school for writing short stories? The program was small and pretty White. My year started out with 12 people, 4 of whom were minorities. One of my classmates, C.I. Shelton, I still keep up with, and this is a shameless post which I hope prompts you to check out one of his pieces from The Paris Review called “The Disaster Year.” (For the record, I still keep up with a few other classmates, too. MFA programs are great for cultivate writing relationships.)

C.I. is one of many up and coming writers who publish in literary magazines, many of which post much of their content online. If you look, Reader, you’ll be able to find the magazines whose stories don’t require a subscription to read. Some of them, well they should pay you to read their material, but in most of them you’ll find pretty interesting stuff. If you have a favorite online lit mag, let us know – I’m always on the lookout for a good read.

Reader, if you liked C.I.’s first piece, feel free to check out this short story he wrote for Open City called “Say Please.” Happy reading!