When we launched SHARK REEF in June of 2001, we saw it as a new millenium online zine from a rural grassroots community. We had no thought of how it might evolve or grow up but simply wanted to give serious local writers a place where they could see their work in print. Over the years, we have fulfilled that mission. To date, eighty-four writers and fifteen visual artists have seen their work published in these pages. Most of them live in the islands; some are visitors who, perhaps, wish they lived here.

In our fifteenth issue, we’re pleased to bring you both names that might be familiar to regular readers as well as some new voices. You’ll find fiction from Stephen Adams and Rita Larom; memoir from Barbara Lewis, Alie Smaalders and Julie Van Camp; and poetry from Maya Borhani, Eleanor Burke, Elizabeth Landrum, Jill McCabe Johnson, Kim Secunda, Susan Slapin, Meredith Griffith, David Huddle and Paul S. Walsh.

The poetry in this issue is especially wonderful. From Maya Borhani’s elegiac reverie on net worth to Eleanor Burke’s elegant and elliptical look at life on the farm to Kim Secunda’s self-assured modern epic, there are new perspectives on how we live and what’s important to us today. Such riches!

Write on!