THEMA literary
journal was born in a Chinese restaurant in 1988 as the result of a
conversation over how different writers would respond to a single quirky
theme—specifically, stories involving the fortune cookies received
that day. Our curiosity evolved into a mental exercise among friends—a
challenge. What we didn’t expect was how much fun we would have.
As we
wrote about fortune cookies, we began to ponder other topics. Soon,
it was like eating peanuts—we couldn’t stop. Strange themes
kept popping into our heads; how would various imaginations react to
them? We had to know!
So now
we had a list of quirky themes in one hand, a fistful of diverse but
homeless fortune-cookie manuscripts in the other, and heads buzzing
with potential theme-based plots. What should we do with the themes?
What would we do with the resulting stories and poems? Start a literary
journal and send the challenge across the country—of course! Why
not??
Virginia Howard, Editor, THEMA
Note: Under
the pseudonym H. O. Ward, the
editors of THEMA wrote two murder mysteries, Death by Unches (Hilliard and
Harris, 2003) and its sequel, Death by the Reel (Hilliard and
Harris, 2005), both currently out of print. A picture book,
Timothy Hubble and the King Cake Party (Pelican Publishing,
2009), written by Anita Prieto, was illustrated by Virginia Howard.
She has two true, life-altering stories in the anthology,
Serendipity, edited by Madonna Dries Christensen, and two short stories published in the
middle-grade anthology,
The Bayou Bogeyman Presents: Hoodoo and Voodoo. A picture book,
The Wind Plays Tricks, was written by Virginia Howard and
illustrated by Charlene Chua. Her most recent book,
Seeing the Elephant: The 1920 Frank Reaugh Sketch Trip to the Grand
Canyon (Sunstone Press, 2021), was based on her aunt's diary of
the trip.
On a personal note,
Editor V. Howard moved home post-Katrina on January 20, 2007. Many thanks to all who
expressed concern. And many thanks to the Andressens at Seven Oaks
Plantation Bed & Breakfast for making her feel so at home while in
exile.
