Letter from the Editors

The light of autumn reveals what the heavy green of summer hid from our eyes.
–Virginia Woolf

After months immersed in submissions, we’re delighted to welcome you to the inaugural issue of Unbound Ink!

Bringing this journal to life began with the desire to create a space where every submission would receive the same careful consideration, without knowledge of the writer’s publication history, credentials, or identity. While reading each piece on its own terms, we’ve been surprised, unsettled, amused, and deeply moved by the voices that emerged from our queue. Although our first issue isn’t curated around a particular theme, we often returned to work that wrestles with the complexity of parent-child bonds, and what home means — not merely as a place, but as memory, inheritance, and what we long for.

Within these pages, you’ll meet a wanderer in search of home. A cat who offers her human acceptance without judgment. You’ll encounter a woman absorbed in a coworker’s life choices while struggling to confront choices of her own. A daughter who recounts her father’s obsession with teaching her to fight — and a father and daughter who end up stranded on their rooftop on an otherwise ordinary day. You’ll witness a mother who, after reflecting on the trip of a lifetime with her daughter, becomes consumed with thoughts of her mortality.

While every voice in this issue is entirely distinct, we found them speaking to one another in ways we couldn’t have predicted. We hope that Unbound Ink becomes a place where you can linger, where you find something unexpected to keep.

Step right in. You belong here. No matter who you are.

With unbound gratitude,

Allison Creighton and Rosanne Tolin
Co-editors