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BLR 25th anniversary ~~ Issue 37 highlights
Exploring a good life, plus much more as we continue to share issue highlights throughout our 25th anniversary year. // 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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BLR 25th anniversary ~~ Issue 36 highlights
Literature as refuge, plus much more as we continue to share issue highlights throughout our 25th anniversary year. // continue reading
— See what’s new with us at BLR —
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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
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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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Angela Tang-Tan Wins Pushcart Prize for “Two Thoracotomies”
BLR is thrilled to announce that “Two Thoracotomies” by Angela Tang-Tan has won a Pushcart Prize. // continue reading
— Come join us, online, or in person —
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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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Creativity in Medicine: Navigating Uncertainty through Art and Literature
Explore how poetry, stories, and visual art can help us make sense of medicine’s complexities in this new online workshop. // continue reading
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Art and Medicine: Supporting Compassion Through Creativity
Enjoy cocktails, conversation, and community, while supporting BLR’s Art in Medicine program. // 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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Periscope
by Anne Elliott. “Caroline listened to the bellows under her bed, drawing and blowing air. The room asserted itself, always, its rhythmic hiss and pop of machinery, the anti-lullaby of metal cocoons, rows of them, each containing a complicated person.” // continue reading
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Sisters of Mercy
by Joan Leegant. “The surgeon came into the O.R. chewing gum. This was how we knew there’d be a problem. God have mercy, we mutter under our breaths…” // continue reading
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Pale Unhappy Dog
by Angie Sijun Lou. “Li has never seen a kidney, but he imagines a flesh-colored ball the size of a fist. He wonders how he will transport it on his motorcycle, whether he will seal it inside a plastic bag… // continue reading
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Mending Petals
by Mary Arguelles. “I don’t even know why I want a tattoo. Maybe to commemorate the missing breast. Maybe to re-define beauty. Maybe just to cover the scar. All I know is something about the space screams canvas.” // continue reading
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Blood/Shed
by Alanna Weissman. “You know what they say—never trust anything that can bleed for a week without dying.” // continue reading
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Sisters
by Sheila Kohler. “For a moment my sister seemed to hesitate, standing in the ghostly light of the moon, as though she were considering going back.” // continue reading
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Moon-face
by Celeste Lipkes. “The doctor clicks his pen and says it’s just a phase. / My fat moon-face comes second to the x-rays // he pulls from a folder labeled with my room number.” // continue reading
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Power and Light
by Paula Sergi. “She’d toss a quilt made from our outgrown skirts / over the faded couch and lie there, / holding the ache, rocking it to sleep…” // continue reading
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Mood Swings
by Erica Funkhouser. “Sadness calls for inadequate outerwear. / Exhilaration for ultra violet. / All feelings are unhealthy.” // 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).”























