gain to showcase incredible writers from all over the state of Connecticut. The 2024 Connecticut Literary Anthology features new writers, old pros, and writers that fit somewhere in between. Returning editor and prize-winning author Victoria Buitron and guest editors Summer Tate and Christine Kandic Torres have constellated together the best poetry, nonfiction, and prose from Connecticut writers.

I have laughed and cried reading all the featured work, which is a testament of the fruitful and praiseworthy work that the Nutmeg State continues to churn out. I did not merely examine these pieces or collaborate with the wonderful contributors throughout the editing process. My stomach did leaps after a cartwheel gone wrong; I cupped my heart along the trails of backwoods, and I withstood the cold of rainy mornings. I did not read these pieces-- I felt them in a visceral way. May you take flight with each of them, and I hope you enjoy the journey as much as I did.

-- Victoria Buitron, Series and Nonfiction Editor

Connecticut is home. It is where we return after finding stories in other people's neighborhoods and countryside. It is where we build our nests.

-- Summer Tate, Poetry Editor

The stories in this year's anthology demonstrate commitment to community in all its complexity: from a working-class school auditorium in Waterbury, to the power-hungry Foxtail Condo Homeowners Association; from the crack-haunted streets of Fair Haven, to the highly manicured lawns of Darien, to London, to the Vineyard, and beyond. So many tackle the question of home-- that is, wanting to escape home; to control it; to protect, to renovate; even to seek unlikely refuge in an abandoned one. These short stories captured different, though perhaps uniquely Connecticut perspectives from across the state.

-- Christine Kandic Torres, Fiction Editor