Two Fic Tuesday for February 10th

Hi, hello and welcome!

This week I'm bringing you two stories from The Dark. I try and vary up where I recommend stories from, but this issue was great, and both of these drew me in so much. So here we are, a couple of horror bits to keep you occupied this week.

Recs

Three on a Match - Joanne Anderton - The Dark
This story struck a very particular chord with me. As a queer AFAB person, parts of this echoed strongly. Being tangled up with people who you had so many feelings for and willing to do anything it would take to have them felt so real as a teenager. This story's not entirely about that, but rather the consequences, but it still took me back to those days. I can't say I enjoyed the memory trip exactly, but I definitely enjoyed this.

The (Mis)Fortunes of Saint Ilia’s School for Gifted Girls, In No Particular Order - Catherine Tavares - The Dark
I love when stories play with formatting so much and this was a great example of that. This was such a fun little story to explore and made me remember those little fortune tellers and the weird nonsense you could get up to with them. I actually think that if you're someone who's been wanting to dip your toe into more things that do weird or offbeat things with structure and format, this is a great gateway for that.

I wish all of you many good stories,

• Vale

PS: If you want to find me elsewhere, I'm on Bluesky at @howsweetthewords and I have a Ko-fi and Patreon where I post prompts, more personal/writing updates, microfiction, and miscellany. Tiers start at $1, but there is the occasional free post as well.