ABOUT

An empty house is always full.

We are looking for writing that addresses the way narrative and presence adhere to place and the way they vanish. We encourage broad interpretations of what the idea or image of an empty house might evoke. This includes but is not limited to writing about home, landscape, place, memory, and of course, the atmosphere of previously inhabited spaces.

EDITORS’ THOUGHTS:

We envision Empty House Press as a collection of rooms. Behind its many doors the inhabitants pin to the wall their imprint for others to feel, always leaving behind residual dust to be captured and kept by the next visitor.

A house, as you must know by now, is never truly empty. There are always remnants and wreckage. Ancient echoes reverberating between walls, the past absorbed into paper and plaster, wood and brick.

Houses can be welcoming or forbidden. They can be inhabited or abandoned. Perhaps you know the lonely thrill of a house all to yourself. Or the grief of vacant chairs. Maybe you just like to walk down your street at night and wonder about what happens behind all the other windows punching yellow squares into the dark.

We want you to step across these thresholds with us and stay awhile. Help us explore these rooms and all the seen and unseen treasures conjured within four walls.

MastheaD:

Cara Downey lives on Maryland’s Eastern Shore among the loblolly pines and the terrapins. She works at a small museum where she spends her time caring for old books and transcribing 100-year-old handwriting.

Erin Calabria grew up on the edge of a field in rural Western Massachusetts and has since lived in Magdeburg, Germany and New York City where she writes and attempts to make friends with crows.