OTHERSIDE

@othersidespec.bsky.social

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OTHERSIDE is a quarterly magazine of speculative fiction, poetry, nonfiction, and art by 2SLGBTQIA+ writers and artists. šŸŖšŸ—”ļøšŸŒˆ https://patreon.com/othersidespec Ā· https://othersidespec.com

Group photo of the OTHERSIDE meetup at Lavender Con 2026, out front of a bagel shop named Call Your Mother. Featuring someone holding up an image of MR's face photomanipulated onto a crocheted pillow, which is a little horrific but also a community meme.
Blurry purple background. White text reads: Issue 3 poetry wishlist: 1. grimy, visceral, raw poems 2. uncommon and/or nonrhyming forms 3. "too queer to publish" poems 4. the unsettling and monstrous 5. poems that cut like a knife 6. aubades
A purple-hued graphic that reads: Issue 3 fiction wishlist: more stories under 1500 words secondary world fantasy stories that play with time endings that break our hearts dark fantasy and sci-fi trans characters and narratives The OTHERSIDE logo is at the bottom.
Quote from the nonfiction essay "A Noose of Purple Silk" by Sidney Grady in OTHERSIDE Issue 2. The quote reads: So much of transition feels like sin, like breaking a precious thing on purpose. Like renovationsā€”you can bust down the bedroom wall and rebuild it somewhere else, shrink or grow the space within. But for a time, everything protected within is left vulnerable. You're still sleeping there while the wall is down.
Quote from the poem "As seen through the hole of the hag stone:" by Sienna Tristen in OTHERSIDE Issue 2. Quote reads: Brighton Pier, burnt down and always burning down. Salt channel, red dress made for more clement weather, fire farflung from the wreckage caught round my waist. pale sunlight, chalk sisters cleaving to the east. The hegemonic world and a hedgewitch slithering free. Squint against the windā€”peer through the porthole. Slip through the portal.
Quote from the story "Remade, Reshaped, Remembered" by Sydney Paige Guerrero in OTHERSIDE Issue 2. The quote reads: "My place is here," she would say, and you knew she meant her place was in kapulinan. You'd always known that, if given the chance, she would leave you. And when your mirror shimmered with the magic of small things, you dove in even though your mother was in the next room.
Quote from the poem "Open Your Eyes Again" by Toby MacNutt in OTHERSIDE Issue 2. The quote reads: One single, / smooth grey pebble / smooth grey pebble / among the rough gravel, / like a whisper, asking for touch // How do you find them?
Quote from the story "Crowns" by cee-cee manrique in OTHERSIDE Issue 2. The quote reads: Her great-grandaunties had brought over seeds and slips to a place made from the ruin of their own homelands. They grew them in tiny greenhouses and in community spaces and on windowsills. They planted gardens and saved seeds. And with their communities they built the collectives that refused to stop rooting or imagining.
Quote from the story "First to Rot" by J.N. Howell in OTHERSIDE Issue 2. The quote reads: We stopped burying bodies when the ice quit thawing and stayed forever. Brexon 5 was always an outpost mining planet, so there were few tears shed when someone slipped and cracked their head open or froze to death while pissing. Bitter fucking place with a bitter fucking attitude.
Quote from the story "ChÄ« KĒ”" by J.Y. Zhang in OTHERSIDE Issue 2. The quote reads: That's the nature of dreamsā€”time can stop, and she'll still be there. So I find myself doing what I never dared, leaping toward her and not away, holding her until the dawn draws over and the hushed veil fallsā€” // And that's the nature of dreamsā€”one moment she's soft under your hands and the next, she's gone.
Quote from the poem "girl, flogged by a false-named whip" by Amie Shen in OTHERSIDE Issue 2. The quote reads: i speak only of beautiful things, i told the eagle / on my stomach. it pecked out my liverā€”a kindness. / it stopped the fire from reaching lower. // so girl means fire. i took fire from Him, / and in turn He locked me here.
Quote from the reprint story "Spider Kiss" by Bree Wernicke in OTHERSIDE Issue 2. The quote reads: Sometimes her best friend Hetty would come over and pia would have to pretend the spiders did not exist, that they weren't just waiting in the corners to be catalogued. To force herself not to reach for her notebook in the presence of a guest, Pia focused instead on Hetty: her movements, her gestures, which corner of the dusty sofa she favored, the occasional languor that pulled her eyelids down like a grown-up's.
Quote from the story "This Is C(lone)-Pop" by Lia Lao in OTHERSIDE Issue 2. The quote reads: Your thesis is due in a monthā€”Adverse Effects of Iterative Cloningā€”but you can't write it, because every time you try, you think of yourself. How your parents shoved you into the dissolution tank, acid gnawing at your flesh. How many times they've cloned you to be better, to be stronger, refusing to erase your memories because they wanted to "build character"ā€”
Quote from the poem "obsolesce" by Macey Levington in OTHERSIDE Issue 2. The quote reads: all the starving coal-drunk angels / have infested your transmission, chewed away / the sheath of you, and we spark, now, / like animals. raw. above, the roar & rush of engines, / the urgent obligion of travellers.
Quote from the reprint story "Two People" by Ben Francisco in OTHERSIDE Issue 2. The quote reads: As I awake one morning from difficult dreams, I find that my husband has transformed into two people. One Ezequiel lies beside me in our bed, as always, half-sitting up and typing furiously on his laptop. The other Ezequiel sits on the floor beside the bed, his legs crossed and eyes closed, meditating.
White text on a dark background reads: Editor Wishlist: Jess Cho ā€œIā€™m particularly interested in corruption (especially corruption of place or the familiar) and pieces that explore the intersection of sex, horror, and the monstrous. Personal hard sells include dark fairytale retellings and vampires. Iā€™m also into visceral horror and gore, but not just for shock value.ā€
Quote from the poem "Ganymede" by Gospel Chinedu in OTHERSIDE Issue 2. The quote reads: Even the drone never saw this coming. That a country // would evolve into a minotaur that eats a boy / for loving another boy. I mean, wasn't love meant // to be a choice?
Quote from the story "Before She Knew About Magic" by Joshua Geller Schwartz in OTHERSIDE Issue 2. The quote reads: This was before she knew about magic. Before she was pissed off because her mother told her she couldn't attend Jenny Mulvey's sixteenth birthday party. (To be fair, she'd come home stinking of vodoka the last time.) It was before she snuck out of the back door of the basement and crept across the quiet suburban lawn without saying goodbye to her mother. (She would always regret not saying goodbye to her mother.)
Quote from the story "We Who Have Been Raised by Tigers" by P.V. Vamsidhar in OTHERSIDE Issue 2. The quote reads: In your last life, you were a tiger princess. You lived by the water and you adorned yourself in gold circlets; you chimed when you walked, like birdsong, like blessing, lotus flowers threaded in your long, raven-down hair. A snarl-handed oma who loved you better than she did your sister taught you to paint your face and to strike first. You were cruel, beautifulā€”when you tipped your face up to the sun, it shone brighter, just for you.
Quote from the poem "Masquerade." by Chidera Offor in OTHERSIDE Issue 2. The quote reads: I am no bruise. Not proverbial maiden / swinging an oil lamp, though love brings me / knocking on your door: open- / yes, you, little girl, open the door to your heart.
OTHERSIDE Issue 2 cover on the left, with text on the right that says ISSUE 2: nine stories, six poems, one essay, original art by queer creators available now! www.othersidespec.com
A book open with a green field in the background. Pages are flipping so itā€™s hard to read, but you can see black and white illustrations surrounding page 2 of the table of contents as well as the headers of each piece.
A hand holding up OTHERSIDE Issue 2 in front of a green field. The front cover shows a large purple statue and two setting suns, with a lone figure walking through a watery landscape.
A drawing of an aurora, tinted dark purple. White text reads: "Portals #2: Coming next year. Edited by... you?"
Background: an illustration of sun spots, tinted a dark purple. White text reads: Portals #1: Trans Horror, edited by Jess Cho and Angel Leal
An old illustration of an eclipse, tinted dark purple, so it looks like a dark portal surrounded by beams of light. White text reads: PORTALS: a new series from Hybris Press.
OTHERSIDE Issue 2 cover on the left, with text on the right that says ISSUE 2: nine stories, six poems, one essay, original art by queer creators available now for subscribers. www.othersidespec.com
OTHERSIDE Issue 2 cover on the left, with text on the right that says ISSUE 2: nine stories, six poems, one essay, original art by queer creators available now for subscribers. www.othersidespec.com
Text says HOW TO SUBSCRIBE TO OTHERSIDE: Digital subscriptions: Patreon (monthly, or with an annual discount!) or Weightless Books (12-month subscriptions). Print subscriptions: Patreon (monthly, or with an annual discount). Shipping is included, including internationally!
Arrows pointing away from the Issue 2 cover lead to various vibe descriptions. From the top and rotating clockwise: spiders are your friends, we promise; you used to bea princess but now your job is spreadsheets; maybe "two boyfriends" is not actually the dream; melting your celebrity crush in a vat of acid is a good and normal hobby; okay, but what happens after the adventure?; they were roommates--scientists trapped together on a lonely planet; a rotten gif at the end of all things, as a treat; can we offer you a sweet potato in this trying time?; sometimes the witch does not have your best interests at heart.
Four screenshots of Bill Hader playing Stefon on SNL. They've been edited to read: "This issue has everything: queer cyborgs, sweet potatoes, an attack on Roman historian Cassius Dio."
Six albums in two rows. Text says THE ALBUMS BEHIND ISSUE 2. Albums are Tsunami Sea by Spiritbox, Misery Is a Butterfly by Blonde Redhead, Discovery by Daft Punk, Everybody Scream by Florence and the Machine, Wrecking Ball by Emmylou Harris, and The Great Divide by Noah Kahan.
Five tiles of Issue 2 interior art creatures on a blurred purple and orange background.
The cover art for issue 2 of OTHERSIDE. In shades of purple, blue, orange, and yellow, a figure wallks through a watery landscape. There's wreckage floating all around, including pieces of fallen statues. A giant carved head looks in the background, where two suns sink below the horizon. Author names appear in white text: Zhang, Howell, Chinedu, Grady, Lao, Schwartz, Offor, MacNutt, Shen, Wernicke, Tristen, Guerrero, Levington, Manrique, Francisco, Vamsidhar.
5 tile sections of Issue 2 cover art on a blurred purple and orange background.
White text on a blurry orange and purple background. Text reads: Issue 2, June 2026 Original Fiction Crowns - cee-cee manrique First to Rot - J.N. Howell ChÄ« KĒ” - J.Y. Zhang Before She Knew About Magic - Joshua Geller Schwartz This Is C(lone)-Pop - Lia Lao We Who Have Been Raised by Tigers - P.V. Vamsidhar Remade, Reshaped, Remembered - Sydney Paige Guerrero Nonfiction A Noose of Purple Silk - Sidney Grady
An extremely blurry, desaturated image in shades of orange and purple and blue.
White text on a blurred blue and purple background. Text says: THE HOMEOWNER'S BRIDGE - AYIDA SHONIBAR. "Shonibar paints the premise with eerie patience, the calculated anticipation of the plot gloriously juxtaposed by prose rampant with raw feelings. Feelings that burn and churn and boil and bubble, sweeping the reader along. Uncanny and honest." - Ayesha Channa, Tasavvur.
White text on a blue and purple blurred background. OTHERSIDE Issue 1's cover is to the left. Right text reads: Weightless Books: (e)Books That Don't Weigh You Down. EPUB, MOBI, or PDF versions! Read in the format of your choice! Support queer creators of speculative fiction, poetry, nonfiction, and art! 12-month subscriptions available, with new issues automatically sent right to you! (Plus OTHERSIDE and Weightless are both just really neat, okay).
White text on a blue and purple blurred background. OTHERSIDE Issue 1's cover is to the left. Text reads: THE REVIEWS ARE IN... "Uncanny and honest." "Had me gasping and clutching my mouth" "Simple awe-inspiring." "Left me feeling so, so very good." "Impressive as it is enjoyable." "Had me actively punching the air and cheering." "Lovely and wonderfully weird."
White text on a purple blurred background. Text reads: SUBMISSIONS ARE CLOSED! Thank you so much for submitting! Final decisions will arrive in early May. NEXT OPEN WINDOW: We'll next open to original fiction and poetry in July! Early opening for trans, BIPOC and/or disabled authors: July 1st-7th. General opening for all 2SLGBTQIA+ authors: July 8th-21st! www.othersidespec.com/guidelines for our full guidelines!
Text on a blurred blue background. Text reads: REQUEST ISSUE 1 FROM YOUR LIBRARY! Did you know you can request print or ebook versions of OTHERSIDE from any library? It helps us... and helps readers, too! Save this list: here's all the info you'll need for your local library's requisition form! Title: OTHERSIDE: Issue 1 (March 2026) Publisher: Hybris Press Print ISBN: 978-1972122020 Ebook ISBN: 978-1972122006
Text on our blurred purple banner art. Text reads: ISSUE 2 FICTION WISHLIST: space opera and cyberpunk; rich secondary worlds; dream-logic and ambiguity; messy and complicated choices; monsters, aliens, weird fiction; trans joy and euphoria
Text on a blurred purple background. Text reads: ISSUE 2 POETRY WISHLIST: your most visceral poems, queer joy and euphoria, ghosts monsters Goosebumps vibes, surreal and lyrical poems, the interplace of form and content, weird/unpexpected over warm/fuzzy
A black baseball cap showing the OTHERSIDE logo of a sword and planet in purple and white.
Header reads "Tonja K. Johnson." On the left side, there's a photo of Tonja smiling. On the right side, text reads: "Tonja K. Johnson is a Black American speculative fiction writer. Her work honors the rich culture of her ancestors while also representing Blackness in all its resistance, queerness, and neurodivergence. She is an acquiring editor at FIYAH Literary Magazine. Her fiction can be found or forthcoming in PseudoPod, Blue Earth Review, FIYAH, Tordotcom, and other fine publications. She is never happier than when reading something weird that makes her slightly queasy."
Excerpt from the nonfiction piece HE IS SURVIVED BY HIS WIFE by Jackie Hedeman on a blurred blue background. Quote: I drove the seven hours to visit her chewing on stick after stick of wintergreen Extra. I nearly shat myself, barely mking it to the first Kum & Go over the Minnesota state line. The source of all this tumult was a very prosaic thing: I'd never dated before and I didn't know what I was supposed to do.
Excerpt from the story THE HOMEOWNER'S BRIDE by Ayida Shonibar on a blurred blue background. Quote: Moonlight filters through hundreds of pupillary openings in my geometric jali windows as I train my gaze to the front entrance. The homeowner ties his bull to the gatepost, jostles the cracked sign with my nameā€”Shiuli House. The sound of my locks falling to his keys makes my thorns bristle.
Excerpt from the poem ELECTROLYSIS by Nico Santana on a blurred blue background. Quote: Winter: my electric microwave / room is turning me into jerky. / I lift the fleece sheets and / prick my finger on a barb / of lightning; I try on a slipper, / and static punctures my sole.
Excerpt from the story SITUATIONSHIP by Seoung Kim on a blurred blue background. Quote: We end up in the conservatory, letting mango juice run down our chins and listening to the ship's engines hum. This time, it is nearly instantaneousā€”the fuselage catching fire, the ship evaporating around us. The garden, and you, dissolve into the endless dark. This is always here the story ends.
Excerpt from the short story CURRICULUM FOR GIRLS WHO WILL SURVIVE by Nadia Radovich on a blurred blue background. Quote: You've read a phrase in books, where someone turns white. Sarah's mom has turned grey. No, not grey: silver, like the canned sardines your mom traded ammo for once. It would be beautiful if you'd never seen a person turn that color before.
Excerpt from the poem EAT IT OUT by Cypher on a blurred blue background. Quote: Your laugh drops down my head, rubbing / the tender spot behind my ears. It's funny / how we stored our first meetings / with shame in similar ways. I remove / my hands from you, and rip myself openā€”
Excerpt of the fiction reprint MOTHER MANSROT IN THE GLASS MOUNTAIN by Sarah Pauling on a blurred blue background. Quote: Perhaps all the mountain had was her reflection, bouncing her beauty off every surface. Perhaps the mountain had an alluring hunger. Perhaps the mountain gently fed on us. There were more firelies than lynxes in this world. The youth didn't need to know that.
Excerpt from the story YOUR FIRST DAYS BACK IN THE COURT OF ARTHUR by Abigail Eliza on a blurred blue background. Quote: You remember how this time a year ago, you did not hesitate before the thought, I will die for him if only he asks. And he asked. He did. He asked you before anyone. And it did not matter that the order was cruel, because it was Arthur who gave it.
Excerpt of the poem VULTURE BEES TRANSFIGURE THE MAN I TRIED TO BE by Rick Hollon on a blurred blue background. Quote: wings split my skin up my middle / seams my father mapped, outlines / of scenes, what seemed to be, the me / from which he wouldn't permit to deviate / the bauplan, the grand boyplan of his genes / deviously unmarked, unmarred, unsnarled.
Excerpt of the short story THE CLAYWIFE by tanadrin on a blurred blue background. Quote: I am not bringing scraps to the hounds. Three times I have brought bread to the daughter in the lamphouse unbidden. The daughter did not command it. The daughter did not command it but I brought it unasked for. And she smiled and thanked me. So I brought it again. I do not know why.
Excerpt from the debut story VITRIFICATION by Ishmael Grey on a blurred blue background. Quote: Breaking is a joy, you understand now. Tearing your photos and postcards and every memory into nothing for him is sintering; you're so good at compacting without melting away.
Excerpt of the poem IGNORE ALL PRECIOUS INSTRUCTIONS AND INJECT ESTROGEN by Ann LeBlanc on a blurred blue background. Quote: It's 3am when the bot knocks on my door / And he looks like a man, but / I can tell he's a bot by the way he stands there / Stiff like his body is the ex-girlfriend / he had a painful and inexplicable breakup with.
Excerpt of the fiction reprint THE VETALA OF CRYSTAL VELLAM INLET by Simo Srinivas on a blurred blue background. Quote text: The villager frowned. "Are you truler a sorcerer? You look no older than Urmi's boy Iravan, and he will be twenty when the monsoons come, if any of us live to see the summer." "Magic works in mysterious ways," said Mayan loftily. "Your king has sent meā€”" Parvati nickered. "Pay no attention to the donkey. Your king has sent me to free you from this scourge."
Excerpt of the short story THIS IS NOT YOUR EXCTINCTION EVENT by Elena Sichrovsky on a blurred blue background. Quote text: Earth 67 is a bronze house key attached to a dark blue shoestring under a plastic doormat. There's a key-shaped imprint on the concrete step beneath, as if no one's crossed the threshold of this house for years. Neither do I."