Skinny Tyranny
Skinny House
Kim Samek | Electric Lit | 18th October 2023
Satirical fiction about a housing shortage. In a busy city, demand exceeds supply so landlords start putting up partitions everywhere, until the average square footage of an apartment has shrunk to almost nothing. "Most of his neighbours have bigger houses. They moved in decades ago, before the subdivisions. He is stuck in an upright coffin, but he is proud of his home" (1,580 words)
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On The Tyranny Of Slush Piles
Samsun Knight | Millions | 18th October 2023
Nepotism has historically played an important part in the publishing of literary fiction — both Proust and Joyce were widely rejected before being rescued by friends. This isn't a good system, but is it any worse than what we have now? Digital "slush piles" proliferate everywhere and the same tropes keep rising to the top. This privileges the "simple at the expense of the complex" (1,400 words)