Out of the Window (iPhone 11) By Ohad Harosh, 8 (New York, NY), published in the February 2022 issue of Stone Soup A note from Laura Mired in February’s deep winter snow and cold, like many of you may also be, and stuck at home for much of the time during this current Covid surge, my awareness of a sense of place is at its peak! As our Editor, Emma, reminds us in her opening note of the profound influence of our surroundings on our experience in the world, I invite you to consider, as you read the February edition of Stone Soup, the role of setting as a literary device. Consider Ava Cai’s piece, “Honey Dipped in Celery,” in which we are provided with a thick description of a brief slice of time spent inside a classroom during silent reading period. I love the rich detail in which the author describes the classroom setting and the playful way in which she reveals herself through these surroundings. Like, I imagine, many of you, I can relate to the sense of captivity while willing a clock to tick during silent reading time, as well as the sweet feeling of freedom the moment your hand touches the doorknob to leave. Part of what illuminates these experiences and makes them so relatable, is the detailed description of setting the author provides: the dim light with the broken bulb flickering above, the tree beyond the window whose leaves blur together with distance, the clock hanging on the wall whose red arm ticks rhythmically while its black hands crawl ever so slowly, the stale, sterile smell of the bathroom. Now consider how the author utilizes all this rich detail to reveal something of themselves. What do we learn about the author through her experience in this particular setting? Through her description of a stagnant, quiet room, we learn that the author doesn’t like to sit still for long periods of time, that she craves movement, fresh air, stimulation. Setting, in this piece, is used as a literary device to reveal something we didn’t know, in this case, about the author herself. I invite you to pay particular attention to setting in your next piece of writing. See if you can manipulate your depiction of place to point to some kind of broader meaning, idea, or thematic element of your work. For example, what might a description of a home reveal about the family who has resided there for generations? How might the early morning sun, slowly creeping along the wooden floorboards of an empty kitchen, point to the excitement or restlessness of a main character? As always, if you’ve written something you’re proud of, please share it and submit it to us via Submittable! With warm winter wishes, Congratulations to our most recent Flash Contest winners! Our February Flash Contest was based on Prompt #190 (provided by intern Sage Millen), which asked that participants write a story about a character who falls into a bowl of tomato soup and into a magical land. The whimsical yet specific prompt served as the perfect vehicle of creativity for our participants as we received more submissions—43!—than we ever had before! While every story was naturally based upon the same premise, these stories could not have had more variety. Submissions ranged from an epistolary story addressing a corrupt king to the origin story for a pet rabbit to a story surrounding the subsequent events of the eerie, dystopian “Orange Day.” As we received a record number of submissions, we found it extra difficult to choose only ten stories worthy of mention, so we added a sixth story to our honorable mentions. As always, thank you to all who submitted, and please submit again next month! In particular, we congratulate our Winners and our Honorable Mentions, whose work you can appreciate below. Winners “The Magic of Tomato Soup” by Ananya Cronin, 9 (Fishers, IN) “Dear King Solanum” by Sophie Li, 11 (Palo Alto, CA) “Tomato Island” by Nova Macknik-Conde, 10 (Brooklyn, NY) “The King Who Fell into a Bowl of Tomato Soup” by David Yu, 11 (Hong Kong) “Ten Times” by Natalie Yue, 10 (San Carlos, CA) Honorable Mentions “It Started with the Tomatoes” by Lui Lung, 12 (Danville, CA) To”Clara and Whiskers” by Elizabeth Sabaev, 11 (Forest Hills, NY) “Reality or Subconsciousness?” by Emily Tang, 12 (Winterville, NC) “Colors” by Liyue Sally Wang, 11 (Newton, MA) “Wish upon a Dream” by Eliya Wee, 11 (Menlo Park, CA) “Gone Tomatoes” by Savarna Yang, 13 (Outram, NZ) Ava Cai, 12(San Jose, CA) From Stone Soup February 2022 Honey Dipped in Celery By Ava Cai, 12 (San Jose, CA) The quiet classroom was like a prison. The lights were dim, and a broken bulb flickered softly above me. I had never liked the dullness of this room, nor did I like the quietness of reading time. I sat in my assigned seat and flipped through a book about spaceships. The cover was slightly dented, and some of the pages were half torn. I managed to make out only the picture of the Apollo lunar module. I closed the book and placed it on my desk. I leaned back in my seat and let my head dangle off the tip of the blue plastic. I stretched, making all my muscles bunch up, then relax again. I let out a satisfied sigh and sat up, looking around the room. Everyone was still reading besides my teacher, who was swiping furiously at his phone. I shifted into a more comfortable position and began trying to count the leaves of a tree out the window. It was not too far away, but I could only make out the size and shape of it. It looked like a green cloud with two ears on top. I rocked impatiently in my chair, waiting for the teacher to signal that class had ended. I looked up at the clock and then leaned back in surprise. It was only 2:06!
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Saturday Newsletter: February 12, 2022
Midnight Buck (Watercolor) By Aspen Clayon, 11 (Lisle, IL), published in the February 2022 issue of Stone Soup A note from Caleb Happy Saturday! First off, I’d like to congratulate members of the Stone Soup team Emma Wood and Conner Bassett on the birth of their child, Sawyer Cruz Bassett-Wood! On the business side, if you or anyone you know is a writing teacher up to eighth grade, you may be interested in a Stone Soup site license. In order for Stone Soup to succeed, we need to get back in the classroom! If you or a teacher you know might be interested in a site license, then please, with their permission, send us the teacher’s name, grade, and email address. You can write to us at education@stonesoup.com. This week, I’d like to shine a light on the Stone Soup blog. While there is no comparison to the brilliant issues compiled monthly by Emma Wood with the outstanding work of our contributors—for example Aspen Clayton’s stunning, impressionistic February cover art Midnight Buck—the Stone Soup blog provides a platform for a greater breadth of writers and artists. For those who haven’t yet found success within the magazine and for those who have, the blog offers a space to express themselves on a more regular basis and with more freedom of topic. For example, Emma Hoff, 9—one of our regular bloggers—recently wrote and published a hybrid book review/critical essay entitled “Conservatives Want to Ban All my Favorite Books.” While the magazine is the perfect medium for poetry, prose, and art, this type of writing is not often featured—though no less important! With the recent banning of books like Art Spiegelman’s Maus—a graphic novel about the Holocaust—Emma’s message has never been more relevant. Writing with more nuance and with a sharper eye than most of those I worked with in college, Emma dismantles the argument that “young people don’t have the ability to read difficult texts and think about their meaning,” arguing that “if [people] are concerned that young people will struggle with understanding these books on their own, all the more reason to teach them in schools.” As blog editor, I want to foster and empower voices like Emma’s. I am always looking for new contributors in all realms: poetry, prose, art, reviews, sports, videography, gaming, business, history, music—anything that you are passionate about and feel needs to be said. So please, don’t hesitate to submit your work via our Submittable to the standard blog, or our COVID blog. If you are interested in becoming a regular blogger, write a short paragraph explaining the type of work you’d like to contribute in the corresponding field. Sticking with the theme, for this week’s weekend project I’d like you to write about (or draw) whatever it is you are most passionate about, without thinking about if it is relevant or worth saying. Remember, anything you believe in is worth articulating. More than the “quality” of the writing, a reader will recognize passion and find themselves compelled. If you like what you’ve written, please send it to me or Emma for the blog or the magazine! Until next time, Emma Hoff, 9 (Bronx, NY) From the Stone Soup Blog Conservatives Want to Ban All My Favorite Books By Emma Hoff, 9 (Bronx, NY) Something I know from personal experience is that Melissa, by Alex Gino, is an amazing book that has been praised widely for its inclusion of the LGBTQ community. In 2016, it was awarded the Stonewall Children’s Book award. The book is about a transgender girl who wants to be Charlotte in her class production of Charlotte’s Web, but is not allowed to because her teacher says she is a “boy.” The novel used to be called George, but people complained that Alex Gino was deadnaming their character, and the title was changed to Melissa. While a lot of people think that Melissa is a great book that addresses the problems that transgender kids face, it has been banned by many school districts. The book has been moved up and down the American Library Association’s Top Ten Most Challenged Book list, from number three to number five to number one on the list, before becoming the first most banned book ever. The Wichita, Kansas public school system banned the book from its district libraries, and when the book was included in the Oregon Battle of the Books, two school districts removed their students from the competition in retaliation. Those critical of the novel said the book had “sexual content,” of which there is none whatsoever, thereby mixing up sex with gender identity. Some critics went as far as to say that Melissa just did not go with or reflect “community values.” However, it is important to learn about real issues like this in the world, and these “community values” should be expanded to include all people. Some people simply disliked the novel because they thought a book about a transgender girl was not appropriate for children. Children should know about the real world, and they shouldn’t be banned from learning about what actually happens. Insisting that young people shouldn’t read these books signifies that transgender people or members of the broader LGBTQ community are somehow “wrong” and that their existence should be hidden. ../MORE Stone Soup is published by Children’s Art Foundation-Stone Soup Inc., a 501(c)(3) educational nonprofit organization registered in the United States of America, EIN: 23-7317498. Stone Soup’s advisors: Abby Austin, Mike Axelrod, Annabelle Baird, Jem Burch, Evelyn Chen, Juliet Fraser, Zoe Hall, Montanna Harling, Alicia & Joe Havilland, Lara Katz, Rebecca Kilroy, Christine Leishman, Julie Minnis, Jessica Opolko, Tara Prakash, Denise Prata, Logan Roberts, Emily Tarco, Rebecca Ramos Velasquez, Susan Wilky.
Saturday Newsletter: February 5, 2022
Vibrance | Fujifilm XP Astrid Young, 12 (Brookline, MA), published in Stone Soup February 2022 A note from Emma This is the last newsletter I’m going to write for a few months—soon I’ll be on maternity leave with our second child, a boy! Since first becoming a mother not-quite two years ago, I have found myself especially attuned to the way parents, and particularly mothers, are portrayed in the writing I read for Stone Soup. So I was naturally intrigued by the very complex character of “Ma” in Fiona Clare Altschuler’s short story, “A Time to Run.” “A Time to Run” reads like a fairytale: it takes place in some alternate world, one where magic exists and there’s a city called “Izak,” but, unlike in sci-fi or fantasy–which work hard to “build” worlds–the world is not the focus of this story–it is simply matter of factly presented. As it would be in a fairytale. Hans loves his Ma, but he becomes aware of a darkness in her–she is angry at her brother, and vindictive, and though he loves her, he fears what she will do to his uncle. So, he helps his uncle run away, running away from his own mother to do so. I don’t want to spoil the ending, but I love that this story avoids falling into the black-and-white morality we often see in fairy tales: this character, this character is bad. Instead, each character, Ma included, is allowed to feel full, complicated, conflicted. Following Fiona’s lead, try to write your own fairy tale this weekend or this month, but with real, complex, human characters. Lastly, before I sign off, I want to also share that we have been feverishly preparing for a big relaunch and marketing push to schools: the way we can make Stone Soup sustainable again is by getting back in the schools, as schools never “age” out of us. If you are a parent of a middle schooler, or a middle school teacher yourself, please consider discussing a Stone Soup subscription with your school. Until later this year – Fiona Clare Altschuler, 11 Parkton, MD From Stone Soup February 2022 A Time to Run By Fiona Clare Altschuler, 11 (Parkton, MD) I was five years old when it happened, but I remember it well. I wish I could forget it, but that is not to be. The story begins before I was born, when my ma was a girl. My ma had a brother, Ferdinand, who one day disappeared. Then my ma’s parents died and my ma married my da and had me, Hans. I was like any boy, except that I had magic. One day when I was playing, a clear image of a man flashed through my head, hovered a moment, and flew away, leaving me wobbly and light-headed. I ran inside the cottage, calling. My ma looked up from her knitting. Her dark eyes softened. “My uncle’s at the gate. He’s wondering if his sister Thea is alive!” As always with the magic, the words tumbled out without me knowing what they meant. My ma blanched. “Find your uncle, and bring him here.” “Yes, Ma,” I said, turning, and dashed to the gate where our land ended, my sandals sinking into the sand, my tunic swishing around my legs. There I saw a man, cheeks hollow. I trotted up and said, “You’re Uncle Ferdinand—Ma’s brother?” He reeled back. “You are Thea’s son?” he whispered. “Yes.” I said. “I’m Hans.” Continue reading here… Stone Soup is published by Children’s Art Foundation-Stone Soup Inc., a 501(c)(3) educational nonprofit organization registered in the United States of America, EIN: 23-7317498. Stone Soup’s advisors: Abby Austin, Mike Axelrod, Annabelle Baird, Jem Burch, Evelyn Chen, Juliet Fraser, Zoe Hall, Montanna Harling, Alicia & Joe Havilland, Lara Katz, Rebecca Kilroy, Christine Leishman, Julie Minnis, Jessica Opolko, Tara Prakash, Denise Prata, Logan Roberts, Emily Tarco, Rebecca Ramos Velasquez, Susan Wilky.
