What We’re About

This is a journal committed to diverse voices, an accessible journal, a journal for everyone. We’re interested in the work you’re producing--not where you’ve been published before. Our passion lies in giving readers a place to find exciting new work that inspires, stirs, surprises, and sparks the empathetic imagination.

Our origin story

Wendy Wallace and Bess Cooley met at the MFA program at Purdue University and bonded over Scotch and good writing. They both worked on Sycamore Review, Wendy as fiction editor and Bess as managing editor. In the summer of 2018, they decided to work together to create an online journal full of fresh and exciting poetry and prose.

Other stuff we’re proud of

Work that has appeared in Peatsmoke has been chosen for Best Small Fictions, the PEN/Robert J. Dau Short Story Award for Emerging Writers, and The Slowdown podcast. Several pieces have also been chosen as finalists for Best of the Net. And, even if a piece hasn’t been honored, we love it, believe in it completely, and are grateful to be able to give it a home with us.

about the people

Editors

Wendy Elizabeth Wallace (she/they) is a queer disabled writer. She grew up in Buffalo, New York, and has now landed in Connecticut by way of Pennsylvania, Berlin, Heidelberg, and Indiana. Their work has appeared in The Rumpus, Willow Springs, Brevity, Pithead Chapel, The Los Angeles Review, and elsewhere. She holds an MFA in Fiction from Purdue University. Find Wendy on Twitter @WendyEWallace1

Bess Cooley (she/her) won the 2017 Mississippi Review Poetry Prize, and her work has also appeared or is forthcoming in Prairie Schooner, Western Humanities Review, American Literary Review, and Verse Daily among other journals. Educated at Knox College and Purdue University’s MFA program, she currently  lives in Knoxville and teaches at the University of Tennessee.

art editor

Shagufta Mulla is an artist, poet, and a veterinarian-turned-writer/editor for TIME Stamped. Her art has appeared or is forthcoming in phoebe, The Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association, Five on the Fifth, and elsewhere. Her poetry has appeared or is forthcoming in Stoneboat, Crab Creek Review, Santa Fe Literary Review, Blood Orange Review, the anthology NOMBONO by Sundress Publications, and elsewhere. She holds a DVM from Colorado State University and a BS from the University of Arizona. Shagufta and her work can be found on Instagram @s.mulla.dvm.

assistant fiction editor

Sunny Lee (she/her) is a Brooklyn-based writer who has attended VONA, Tin House, and One Story Summer Conference. She is one of the outreach coordinators at MFA App Review and is currently working on a short story collection about badly behaved Korean American women through Lighthouse's Book Project fellowship.

Assistant poetry Editor

Brooke Schifano is a writer and visual artist based in Boston, MA, where she splits her time between a tabby cat and a vining Pothos. She holds an MFA in poetry from UMass Boston, and her recent work can be found in Peatsmoke, Hayden’s Ferry Review, Salt Hill, and elsewhere.

Social media manager

Lauren Cassani Davis is a high school English teacher and writer based in NYC. Her fiction and nonfiction have appeared in No Contact, Monkeybicycle, and The Atlantic. Her work has been nominated for Best Small Fictions and she attended the One Story Summer Conference in 2021. Twitter: @laurenhcd

web editor

Brittany Claytor is a freelance editor in the humanities and sciences, working on all things prose: scholarly articles, dissertations, fiction, non-fiction, grant applications, job documents, etc. Her publications include a performance review in Le Cygne, two book reviews for on-line journals, and a collection of shape poems she wrote and illustrated in second grade. She has a PhD in medieval literature from Purdue University, where she focused on the intersection of physical spaces, literature, and culture.

Fiction Readers

Sofia T. Romero is a writer and editor who lives in the Boston area. Her writing has appeared in several publications, including Necessary Fiction, Rigorous, and Waterwheel Review. She is the author of the forthcoming story collection, We Have Always Been Who We Are (Blackstone, 2023). On Twitter/IG: @sofiatromero

Crystal Morales Coto is a queer writer from New England. Over the last decade, she has worked as a chief of staff, writer, editor, and novelist’s assistant. She’s an Assistant Copy Editor for Washington Square Review, and she has edited and written for Bennington Magazine, Ghost Proposal, and plain china: Best Undergraduate Writing. She holds a BA from Bennington College and is pursuing an MFA in Fiction from NYU.