William Rubel

Do you want your drawing, painting, or photograph on the cover of Stone Soup? We are offering a $25 Amazon gift certificate to the winner of our first ever Stone Soup Cover Contest! The rules are simple: create a visual response to one (or all) of the following excerpts from stories that will be published in a future issue of Stone Soup and submit it via Submittable. The winning image must be a complete picture, with no white space left on the page. Just as when you look out at the world, so your art should fill the whole page with detail. Each of the passages we’ve chosen are rich with visual detail. Your job is to choose the part of the visual image that appeals to you the most, and that you feel confident you can represent in art. You may make a painting, a drawing, or a photograph. If taking a photograph interests you, one approach might be to recreate a scene from the story, using friends, family, or even a pet, as your models. The contest will close September 1, 2017. June 2017 Cover Contest Passages “The Man on the Bench,”  by Ella Glodeck As she skipped across the sidewalk to catch up to Maggie, she saw the old, blind man sitting on the dirty, tattered bench outside the Rite Aid.  His ripped wool hat was lying upside down in front of him.  His pursed lips slid the side of a harmonica in his hands, a beautiful tune. Helen couldn’t help but wonder why he decided to sit on that old, dirty bench, getting the remains of his clothes all muddy.  She looked inside the upside down hat and saw one penny laying there, almost lonesome.  Helen reached her hand down to the bottom of her back pocket and slowly pulled out the fifty cents that she planned on using for her blueberry Pop Rocks, and dropped it into the almost empty hat. “We No Longer Go Outside,” by Stella Lin Sunrays pour into the old slider window, illuminating the white-washed walls of the bedroom; posters and certificates are plastered on the opposite wall, their color faded from years of sun. A little girl is curled up in bed, clutching the blankets in fitful sleep. I sigh and gaze through the window at the pale blue sky, which is undisturbed by occasional clouds. Outside, the leaves of the cherry blossom tree slowly wave in the breeze, and the birds continue their constant chatter. “Let’s go play,” I whimper as I lick Sarah’s face. “Oh, Hua Hua, you want to go play?” Sarah asks; her face reveals a solemn expression. “Play!” I bark, wagging my tail. “I’m sorry,” she replies, and lies back down. I rest my chin on my paws, and Sarah pulls me close to her chest as she lazily strokes my white fur. “Paradise?,” by Kaya Simcoe As I look around me, surveying my surroundings, everything seems different. The sunlight that is spilling onto the ocean sparkles like a thousand gems, and I’m lead to wonder if there actually are a thousand gems floating on the clear surface. The palm trees sweep over me, like protectors, never tiring of providing me shade. A seagull whooshes over me, bringing freedom to my body, also. The sand softly crunches under my feet, a million grains smushed per footprint. Yet, the tide washes them away, so I’m here, but there is no proof that I ever came.