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— Everything BLR —
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BLR 25th anniversary ~~ Issue 40 highlights
Our earliest Covid-inspired writing, plus much more as we continue to share issue highlights throughout our 25th anniversary year. // continue reading
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BLR 25th Anniversary Celebration
Celebrate BLR’s 25th Anniversary with us on November 12 at The Century Club in New York City! // continue reading
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Bellevue Literary Review: 2026 Fall Reading
Join us on October 22 to celebrate the launch of BLR’s special 25th anniversary issue; hear from the issue’s contributors live as they read from their work. // continue reading
— See what’s new with us at BLR —
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Applications are open for the new BLR Editorial Fellowship
BLR’s new Editorial Fellowship is a year-long mentorship program designed to introduce writers to editorial pathways and support literary engagement and citizenship. // continue reading
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Call for Submissions: Theme Issue on Migrations
From September 1 to December 31, 2026, we are accepting submissions for a special theme issue on Migrations. // continue reading
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Coming soon! BLR’s 25th anniversary issue
Along with a stellar mix of fiction, nonfiction, and poetry, the anniversary issue of BLR includes special features including an art insert and roundtable about writing and healing. // continue reading
— Come join us, online, or in person —
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BLR 25th Anniversary Celebration
Celebrate BLR’s 25th Anniversary with us on November 12 at The Century Club in New York City! // continue reading
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Bellevue Literary Review: 2026 Fall Reading
Join us on October 22 to celebrate the launch of BLR’s special 25th anniversary issue; hear from the issue’s contributors live as they read from their work. // continue reading
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The One-Breath Poem: A BLR Haiku Workshop
In this special BLR workshop, explore haiku as a practice of presence and attention. // continue reading
— Read interviews with BLR authors, editors, readers, and more —
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Interview: Laura E. Garrard
“I found capturing moments through poetry, rather than summarizing the entire cancer experience, to be therapeutic rather than draining.” // continue reading
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Interview: Lara Palmqvist
“The very idea that no story is final—be it the story of one’s own self, or the story of a nation—is ultimately something in which I find great hope.” // continue reading
— A new set of great reads with each click —
- fiction
- nonfiction
- poetry
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Coulrophobia
by Jacob M. Appel. “My father fancied himself a shrewd landlord—he refused to rent to lawyers, the children of lawyers, even a college girl who “had law school written all over her”—but he probably bit off too much when he… // continue reading
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My Uncle Deserves Chekhov
by Robert Treu. “’Every family has one,’ my sister Joyce liked to say. ‘One crazy uncle or aunt they can’t hide or forget.’” // continue reading
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A Big Empty
by Rhonda Browning White. “We hadn’t talked since we left our West Virginia homeplace over two hours ago, both of us teary-eyed…” // continue reading
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No One Thing
by Laura LeMoon. “The things I’ve had to do to survive were part of the price I paid to be seen…Freedom in one moment became bondage in the next. Chains exploded into power. No one thing is any one thing.” // continue reading
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In Between Time
by Eric Jones. “Pain made me a precocious student of time, each middle ear infection a new lesson on the uncatchable instant.” // continue reading
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Mental Health Days
by Sakena Jwan Washington. “With practiced pain, I delivered an Oscar-worthy performance of smiles and congratulations, and then escaped to the bathroom and sobbed until my eyes were bloodshot.” // continue reading
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Alprazolam, 0.5mg
by Teo Mungaray. “After the explosion, you choke, / Oxygen depleted, orbiting a planet / Red as rust and too far from earth / To call for help.” // continue reading
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Socks
by Meg Kearney. “My father’s body has ceased to shock me. / His skin runs over his bones like a slow / river, rippling where belly meets hip.” // continue reading
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When Fire Arrives
by Sharon Pretti. “It’s all wrong, today’s sun, / a welt in the fire-smoke sky.” // continue reading
As featured on PBS News Hour’s CANVAS Series
Watch PBS News Hour’s Jeffrey Brown report on BLR’s 25th Anniversary, featuring BLR Editor Danielle Ofri and past BLR writers reflecting on why poetry, storytelling, and writing matter, especially in moments of illness.
Whiting Award Winner
BLR was awarded a Whiting Literary Magazine Prize for “excellence in publishing, advocacy for writers, and a unique contribution to the strength of the overall literary community.”
Praise & Recognition
``With every issue, Bellevue Literary Review probes our understanding of the human body and mind in new ways. It is essential reading for anyone who deals with sickness and health, anyone interested in narrative medicine, anyone who simply needs a dose of deep grace and humanity.”
“The editors have produced a journal of uncommon literary quality.”
“I subscribe and receive literally hundreds of magazines every year. Of all those magazines, none stands out more than Bellevue Literary Review.”
“These two non-fiction pieces in BLR are powerful, honest, and heartrending. They lifted me up because of the truths released onto the pages. Both deal with problems our family is suffering through, so on a personal level, the authors are helping me grapple.”
“BLR's contents are at once practically instructive, and yet intangibly inspiring and utterly gripping. I can’t imagine my work as a writer, or a doctor, without it.”
“After reading it cover to cover, I came away walloped by the breadth and depth of the pain it highlights.”
“No human thing is more universal than illness, in all its permutations, and no literary publication holds more credibility on the subject than Bellevue Literary Review.”
“A kaleidoscope of creativity. . . The selections are unsentimental and often unpredictable.”
“What is most impressive about BLR, though, is how the editors can stretch their own boundaries.”
“Ask any healthcare worker, ask any patient who has come back from illness and fear, and you will hear stories that might change your life. That's what BLR offers.”
“BLR is loyal to its theme but never constrained by it, uncovering boundless tonal and narrative possibilities as it contemplates the body as a physical entity, probes the manifestation of mental illness, or reckons with how the racialized and gendered body is perceived.”
“BLR is open to many modes and styles of work; it has no house style except humanity (though excellent editing doesn't hurt either).”





















