Making the Connection: Liesl Schillinger Reviews Your Stories

The “Connected” Contest” (run in collaboration with The European Magazine) was a huge success, with PenTales storytellers from around the world exploring what it means to be connected in the 21st century. The eight winning submissions were reviewed by Liesl Schillinger of the New York Times Book Review. Some contributors saw new technologies as isolating: Miriam Zolin “hints at the sterility of a life that privileges virtual life over actual. Other stories show how technology brings people together: Anna Huddleston tells of two friends divided by geography but united by Skype, man trouble and two bowls of chicken soup.” Submissions confronted new modes of connection and the way “technologies are changing the way people live —and die— before any of us has had the time to process what these new kinds of interaction mean emotionally” as in Noah Wunsch’s Disconnected Pen; and also engaged the timeless connections between people which “don’t necessarily change, century to century, on every part of the globe….and don’t require wifi,” as in Michael Brown’s Timor Highway.

Here, for you Enjoy tales by Michael Brown – Timor Highway; Noah Wunsch – Disconnected Pen (New York, NY); Anna Huddleston – Pho Therapy; KL Frank To Connect (Odessa MO), Helen Roberts – brb g2g do stufs irl (Perth, Australia) – Toby Heaton – Deja Voodoo (Asheville NC) – Pauline Masurel – From My Nigerian Connection (Bristol, UK).