The Seaboard Review of Books, October 22, 2025
Volume 2, Issue 45 of The Seaboard Review of Books, October 22, 2025
*Editor’s note: the Monday October 20th issue contained a review of Ship Moms that had an error. It has since been rectified, and we regret the oversight.
In this issue:
Speculative Shorts: Stories That Fell Out of My Brain by Cait Gordon (Short Fiction)
Reverse Ripples by M.E. Strautmanis (Fiction)
Ham’s Heaven by Ori Gersht (Fiction)
Driven: The Secret Life of Taxi Drivers by Marcello Di Cintio (Non-Fiction)
Robert Priest’s Accidents After Happening (Poetry)
Thanks for reading this issue of The Seaboard Review of Books!
James M. Fisher, editor-in-chief
Fiction
Speculative Shorts: Stories That Fell Out ofMy Brain by Cait Gordon
An opera diva with tentacles, an unlikely superhero, and a hacker who is forced to do community time are some of the characters readers will encounter in Cait Gordon’s Speculative Shorts: Stories that fell out of my brain.
Reverse Ripples by M.E. Strautmanis
As I sit wrapped in a blanket, the morning sun streaming through the window, and an electric heater on full blast, I close my eyes and dream about Vieques. A few weeks ago, I had no idea that an island called Vieques even existed but now, since reading Reverse Ripples, the magic of that place calls to me. In
Ham’s Heaven by Ori Gersht
Early in her career, Jane Goodall (1934-2025) attended a conference about chimpanzees. It was a life changer for the English primatologist: “I went to that conference as a scientist. I left four days later as an activist.” Goodall began a long, determined effort to free chimps from the horrors inflicted on them by medical research.
Non-Fiction
Driven: The Secret Life of Taxi Drivers by Marcello Di Cintio
Part historical reference, this book details and identifies the challenges that taxi drivers face in their pursuit of what we all want – to make a living. The process by which a person ends up driving a cab is varied and interesting. Many people are familiar with the idea of highly educated immigrants being unable to find work in their field (or having …
Poetry
Robert Priest’s Accidents After Happening
Robert Priest is a heck of a guy. Popular spoken-word poet, author of 23 books and counting, he’s also co-writer of a hit song, and can be seen on his Instagram playing guitar apparently nude in a field of horses. This is a man who is living his best life.
Brief Notes on Books Present & Past
(Note: clicking on the underlined link takes you to the book’s publisher page or Amazon.ca for more information or for purchasing purposes. Support your local bookseller or independent publisher if you can.)
Maggie Stiefvater’s The Listeners is the author’s adult debut.
June Porter Hudson is the general manager of the Avallon Hotel in West Virginia when the US enters WWII and is blind sided by the owner’s decision to offer the hotel to the government as a place to house foreign nationals (read Axis diplomats and their families) until they can safely return them to their home countries. Tucker Minnick is an FBI agent on a quest for redemption. This diplomatic mission may be his last. Complicating matters is the hotel’s sweetwater, which bubbles up in hot and cold springs and is pumped throughout the hotel. It takes on the emotions of the hotel’s patrons, which is why June strives to ensure everyone’s happiness. But with the Avallon’s current occupants, the sweetwater is taking on a lot of negativity. And when the sweetwater is unhappy, bad things happen.
June is the Avallon. Tucker is the Agency. Can they come together to save what they love? (Contributed by Melanie Marttila)
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