Lady Churchill’s Rosebud Wristlet (LCRW) is a ‘zine that Small Beer Press has published for ages now (in ‘zine time at least, the first issue is dated November 1996), and has a reputation for strange, original fiction that bulges well out of the corset of genre. For a long time it was a quarterly. Now it is, alas, biannual, but for a happy reason. Editors Gavin Grant and Kelly Link now have a baby girl. LCRW is a founding publication in the variously-named zone known as slipstream or interstitial fiction. Both editors are writers as well, Kelly Link being the more widely known, and both are former co-editors of the Datlow fantasy and horror annual Best-Of collections. Readers of the Datlow anthologies might recognize some elements in the ‘zine’s fiction, but LCRW focuses on shorter work and is freer in the style and tone of pieces it publishes. Since LCRW is their own, Gavin and Kelly can publish whatever the hell they want, and they do, and it’s great (usually). The unpredictability is part of what makes LCRW a ‘zine, and not something more commercial. In the larger context of the field, the editors have built a reputation for knowing quality when they see it, and for encouraging new talent. Those who publish in LCRW know they will be read by the Best Of editors, for example. At the same time, as a reader, you can expect to find gems by people you’ve never heard of, because that has been a part of the soul of LCRW since the beginning.
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