Mermaid Monthly Originals, Short Stories
The Space Mermaid’s Garden
“A space garden needs minerals, bright spots of cosmic dust, the light of millions of distant stars. A space garden needs hope, for it is an impossibility, this growth from barrenness, this a miracle of green.”
by Beth Goder
Keep readingMermaid Care
“Mermaids are solitary creatures that have little need for social contact with one another, much less with human beings. They prefer to avoid human contact. Humans, for their part, bewitched by centuries of myth and fairy tales, do not share that aversion. It is important to emphasize this fact: mermaids are wild animals.”
by Jonathan…
Keep readingWhat to Do After Receiving a Starlit Pearl
“When the starlit pearl arrives, place it against your skin immediately.
Do not take it off, for any reason.”
by Mari Ness
Keep readingCupid Under the Sea
“He smiles and cocks his head like I’m an endearing child. “I suppose I can ask you my question now.”
“Does it involve you, me, and a bucket of edible glitter?” I say, proving I’m no child.”
by Debra Goelz
Keep readingLove Unlike Us
“When my father returned from work one day, he brought a bag of mermaid tears sewn into his sleeve so no one could steal it.”
by Beata Garrett
Keep readingIfe’s Ride
“Some come to our waters for healing. Others come to catch a glimpse of our fins as we dive. Whatever they come for, we are here.”
by Tracy Ramey
Keep readingHow to Give Your Toddler a Tail
“You sag against the cabinets while your heart still thuds in your chest, hard, and stare blankly at your daughter while she glares at you with the impotent rage of a thwarted three-year-old. ‘Mommy! I’m being a mermaid!’”
By Amanda Helms
Keep readingThis Is You
“Your fingers are long, your belly is soft, your laugh is loud so you don’t laugh often. You find it a bit embarrassing. You don’t like attention. From the waist up, you are “normal” but from there down, you are a mermaid.”
by Kathryn Kania
Keep readingMermaidsong
“Can you hear it?” he repeated.
“What? The sea? Sure.”
“Not the sea. Them. Their song.”
“Them – you mean the whales?”
“The mermaids.”
by Csilla Kleinheincz and Bogi Takács
Keep readingThis is Your Home
“We started going to house showings as soon as the scales began to shimmer under your skin like oil on water.”
by Stefan Slater
Keep readingThe Ghosts of Mermaids & The Answer Atop Mermaid’s Rest
“The ghosts of mermaids can not sing to the sea.”
by Coral Alejandra Moore & Cathin Yang
Keep readingElemental
“The wildness overtook her, a wildness of tides and the pull of the ravening moon, the eerie recklessness of ebb and flow, wax and wane, storms on the waters. She reveled in the rawness of it and gave herself over to it. The depths called to her, teeming with life and destruction.”
by Marlane Quade…
Keep readingI Swim Up From Below
“Blood was falling out of the boy as fast as the ocean could drink it in. That’s why I came and I won’t pretend otherwise.”
by Sarah Gailey
Keep readingWater Bites Back
“Only a fool tests the depth of the water by stepping in with both feet.”
by Yvette Lisa Ndlovu
Keep readingMermaids of Alabama: An Environmental Assessment
“The Alabama Mermaid Conservatorship Association (AMCA) seeks permission and funding to further local creek reclamation by removing two dams that were damaged by flooding, along Little Tallaseehatchee Creek, located outside Jacksonville, Calhoun County, Alabama. This project has the ultimate goal of restoring the conditions of the Alabama mermaid habitat.”
By Ellie Campbell
Keep readingSend Feet Pics
“Her dating profile says she is a mermaid and she is merely 9 km away from me.”
by Nelly Geraldine García-Rosas
Keep readingwildgirls
“We had long since dropped any formalities between us; as Nereids, we were sisters even if she had married a mortal.”
by Cislyn Smith
Keep readingMystery of the Deep
“The goddess smelled of salt water and fresh fish. She stopped in front of me and smiled.”
by Nina Kiriki Hoffman
Keep readingTwenty Thousand Last Meals on an Exploding Station
“Riles Yalten has approximately thirty minutes before she dies, and that’s just enough time to try the new gravlax place on level sixteen.”
by Ann LeBlanc
Keep readingA Nereid’s Guide to the Underworld
“We had long since dropped any formalities between us; as Nereids, we were sisters even if she had married a mortal.”
by E. Catherine Tobler
Keep readingGirlfriend Jacket
“I wake up in a cave, wearing Bos’ coat. Most humans would be concerned about the cave part, but as a selkie, I was befuddled that I was wearing my best friend’s skin instead of my own.”
by Benny Kim
Keep readingBelow Salt-Heavy Tides
“The waves are crashing gently on the shore. To my right is the beach, all blue and silver sand, where we walk, where our children play, where we barbeque and eat together. Where we stood, all of us together, that night when the last of us arrived, shuttled down from the ship in orbit, and…
Keep readingOcean’s 6
by Elsa Sjunneson I dream of oceans. The gray green water of the Irish Sea is cold. It’s the frozen waters of home, the cold means nothing to me, personally – welcoming instead of a brush with death. The Baltic is a steel blue that will freeze a human in seconds. The cold still doesn’t…
Keep readingClutch. Stick. Shift.
“There’s a story about the truck with an empty driver’s seat that they say patrols the East Coast.”
by Tehnuka
Keep readingThis is How You Make Selkie Skins
“Set your prices upfront, and ask for a deposit. You can do charity if you like—and I will not judge you if you do—but never accept a life debt from a selkie.”
by Priya Sridhar
Keep readingRiparian
““Being a mermaid is for everyone,” she’d replied, over and over again, always trying to sound calm, always trying to sound like the reasonable, rational one, and not like this was what she wanted more than anything.”
by Seanan McGuire
Keep readingAt the Mouth of the Sea
“l themselves mermaids, but that is what we call them. I hope the one I’ve fallen in love with will stay even though I know she won’t. None of them ever do. “
by Tamara Jerée
Keep readingNot the Brightest Starfish in the Sea
“Water sluiced off the form’s powerful muscles and iridescent scales, and when it shook itself, the sunlight turned the droplets into sprays of diamonds. Hector gasped.
A mermaid!
No! A mer-man!”
by Rod M. Santos
Keep readingPersonal Histories Surrounding La Rive Gauche, Paris: 1995-2015
I lost Lynne to the Seine. That’s what I told authorities and the doctors and my friends twenty years ago after she disappeared, “I lost her.”
by Jordan Kurella
Keep readingThe Incident at Veniaminov
“The summer had finally reached our island. We shed layers of knitted wool and sinew-sewn fur and let the wind move across our bare arms and legs — a vulnerable feeling after being perpetually covered for most of the year.”
by Mathilda Zeller
Keep readingThe Donkey and the Mermaid
““You shouldn’t swim through there,” I say, growing tired of having to repeat myself.”
by Panchita Otaño
Keep readingSirens of the South
“She had found something that would mean she’d never be poor again – but there was a catch – she would never step foot on dry land again. ”
by Gee Pascal
Keep readingHow to Bind a Sailor’s Heart
“So you’ve fallen in love with a sailor. If you asked me for advice – which you are emphatically not doing – I’d tell you to find yourself another sweetheart.”
By Jelena Dunato
Keep readingFisherman’s Soup
“The rusalka rose from the murky broth, bits of parsley and bay leaf tangled in her hair. She scrunched her nose, sneezed again, then swam to the side of the pot, swatting the occasional potato chunk out of her path.”
by Kristina Ten
Keep readingA Minnow, or Perhaps a Colossal Squid
“They are gigantic. We could not see sirenas because they are gigantic!”
by Carlos Hernandez and C. S. E. Cooney
Keep readingHow to Eat a Mermaid
by K. Garcia Ley
“We hadn’t meant to kill the first one in a boating accident, but then the kill turned into curiosity, and curiosity turned into our only source of food.”
Keep readingSurinla
by Amanda Saville
“The night the fireball crashed into the sea, the stars were dazzling.”
Keep readingFrom Witch to Queen and God
by L. D. Lewis
“This is not altruism. This is an exchange.”
Keep readingPep and Luna’s
by Patty Templeton
“You ain’t gonna find a better dive than Pep and Luna’s on Rural Route 2.”
Keep reading
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