Issue Number 2

(We decided to change the cover for issue 2, see below for explanation)*

NOW AVAILABLE!

An excerpt from The 101st Michael, by K. Osias:
He was exhausted. All the battles that he had fought and won seemed inconsequential now, as if in the final reckoning they did not matter. As if all that did was the one battle he had run away from.

Ignacio snuffed out his tobacco as the Challenger began to whir to life. Around him, men and women began to shuffle in, buckle up and settle down. He could almost hear the blood pumping from their hearts, through their veins, to their limbs, as they impatiently waited for their chance to grasp life by the collar and demand their due.

Ridiculous. Life owed them nothing but what they had. And even those could be taken away.

An excerpt from Beacon, by Nikki Alfar:
I don’t know, Serai, I said to you once, when you asked after the scars that cross my back, chest, and limbs, intertwined like jagged lacework and white with age. I think you must have thought it a lie, a pallid attempt to conceal my name and nature, when in truth I do not know whence the scars came. I am a stranger to my self; I cannot read the secrets on my skin.

I had hoped, unfairly, that you might know how.

An excerpt from The Scent of Spice, by Crystal Gail Shangkuan Koo:
She was everywhere when he returned to his home in the city. When he went riding in his hansom, he found her seated beside him, and as they drove across the streets, he pointed out to her every bookshop he had visited as a child. She was sewing on the armchair as he sat down to write his poetry after supper, she stood with him when he visited his mother's grave, until Griande could no longer stand the speculations of what he would do were she really there.

An excerpt from Beneath The Acacia, by Celestine Marie G. Trinidad:
"I believe it is not your place to be so familiar, being a stranger here," she said. "Who are you, young man?"

Juan looked up to meet her gaze. "My name is Juan," he said. "I came here to marry you, Maria."

The Lady Sinukuan stepped back, and after a few moments of staring incredulously at him, began to laugh imperiously. "Marry me?" she said, looking at him with a mixture of pity and scorn. "I believe I never gave you any permission to do so--"

"But there are other matters at hand," Juan continued as if he did not hear her. "We shall discuss this some other time, Maria. For now there is the death of Mang Andres' daughter. Could you take us to your home then, Mang Andres?" The man nodded blankly. "Straight ahead? All right, let's go."

An excerpt from The Final Interview, by Sean Uy:
Sarah jumped at the sound of the closing metal door, the folder and its contents almost spilling from her arms. She stumbled in the darkness and almost cried out, but at the last second, her sense of propriety stopped her from screaming.

She steadied herself. This was a test, she nervously concluded. A professional banking firm wouldn't have locked her in an empty room for no reason at all. Some HR representative somewhere probably had a warped sense of humor. Or maybe it was Mr. Hazhenaas who had the warped sense of humor, if he existed at all.

Slowly she regained her composure. It was most likely a test, yes. They wanted to see if she would panic. They wanted to see what she was going to do.

An excerpt from The Saint of Elsewhere, by chiles samaniego:
I never felt safe in that City, only knew lately the touch of its warmth, and even then it was not enough. I never knew the place she had known, and where, I knew, she was still.

But now I knew, I had a chance. I knew where to look. How to look.

I laughed defiantly into the breeze that was slowly building into a stiff wind, whipping spray into my eyes, brine into my mouth. I laughed at the thick, endless blanket of clouds that had started to creep from the far horizon of the sea, looming over me and threatening to smother the island.

And I stretched my hands out before me, flexing my fingers, preparing them for the moment when I would once more be able to close them about her beautiful, fragile throat.

cover artwork by: Andre Medina
cover concept by: Jenny Penas
interior design and layout by: Elbert Or

*Note: Regular visitors to this blog are sure to notice that the cover for Issue 2 has been changed. Outside of "witness street" (who gave a positive reaction to the old cover--see the comments section) and a few others, many PGS readers didn't particularly like the first version. Mea culpa, mea maxima culpa. We were trying to go for an "old" feel, something pulpy, from the 60's and 70's. But even if we liked it, it's obvious that many didn't. We pride ourselves in listening, and so, this change. It's a more modern look now, and it's a format that we're going to adopt for a while. The landscape format of the cover will set it apart from other publications (don't worry, inside it'll still be in portrait form, but there'll be some changes there too). Bear with us. We're learning as we go and doing our best to make PGS better over time.

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