A Message from our Guest Editor

Come this way. Take a walk into the Imaginarium.

A place of peculiarities, of surprises, of worlds turned inside out. This is our Imaginarium – a place where witches exist alongside preachers. On this journey, time and place are not always as they seem.

This issue of StepAway has been a joy to edit. I enjoyed reading every submission. Every single one. At times truly creative, innovative, and evocative – experiencing such a wide scope of fantasy worlds in a short time was like sitting in on a focus group discussing the human psyche. Why do we love to create fantasy lands as much as we do, and why do we like to lose ourselves in the alien worlds of others? Could it be that these lands help us to explore untapped parts of ourselves – effectively shining a light on the secrets under darkness? Or is it the opposite – allowing us a place to hide amongst the gorse and greenery?

This issue begins with a fire and ends in a chamber below the streets of New Orleans. Where you’ll go in the middle, is a surprise.

The stories, poems, and tales that sit between both compliment and contradict each other, both in narrative and form. Sometimes, the fantasy world is a literal one, and at other times, it’s all in the interpretation of very everyday things.  After all, who doesn’t feel wonder and awe when they look up at the stars that hang above our heads every night?

Thank you to all our contributors: Ash Clifton, Liana Kapelke-Dale, Holly Day, Anthony Gayle, André Geleynse, Nels Hanson, Tim Hildebrandt, David Lawrie, Ilona Martonfi, Fiona Mossman, W. T. Paterson, John Sullivan, Rekha Valliappan, Lenore Weiss & Elinora Westfall. You’ve made this issue spectacular.

Yours,

Caroline Hardaker
Guest Editor, StepAway Magazine