Editor / Writer / Graphic Designer
Julian's work has been published in CRAFT Literary, Huizache, The Acentos Review, Flash Fiction Online, Chestnut Review, Rumble Fish Quarterly, Blue Marble Review, F(r)iction Lit, and Teachers & Writers Magazine, among other places, and his favorite genres to write are contemporary fiction, magical realism, and historical fiction.
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Banner artwork previously published in The Acentos Review, October 2022.
Fiction: Hat Man Plays the Blues
You saw him once on the E train, during a moment of drowsiness. The Hat Man, or—as your abuela used to call him—El Silbón.
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It was 4 a.m. and you’d just finished your graveyard shift at the 24/7 pharmacy. (Isn’t it funny, how strange things always appear to you at this ungodly hour of the morning?) You’d started to nod off on the train, and with the gentle swaying of the subway car, your mind began to wander.
Fiction: Genesis
On the first day, God creates trains.
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Bachmann Trains. Walther Trains. Atlas Trains, you name it. Trains of all shapes and sizes, laser cut with the finest precision. Trains shipped from top-drawer German manufacturers, from the same sculptors that designed Miniatur Wunderland. Aren’t they beautiful, these trenes de Dios? Aren’t they perfect? And here they are, at God’s fingertips, just waiting to be assembled...
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Fiction: Café Negro
Barahona, the streets were paved with bones, but we walked them like they was nothing but brick. The church bells were dull. The walls white and pasty, como pastel de tres leche. We had come to witness our family history, me and Papi and Mami and Natalia. We had come to see for ourselves, the place where our bisabuelas had been whipped and chained and raped.
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In a way, it was kind of disappointing...
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Artwork by Julian Riccobon. Previously published in The Acentos Review, October 2022.
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Fiction: The Things You Learn Too Late
The barrio has been a whole lot quieter since Thiago offed himself.
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No more reggaeton blaring from Apartment Two. No more whir of the tattoo needle from his shop. No lonely guitar sounds twanging from his window at night. Even the birds have fallen silent. It’s like the entire barrio has lost its voice, and when the funeral procession begins its slow-march from Funeraria La Paz to Mt. Hope Cemetery, the clouds follow us like street dogs, hungry and patient.​..
Artwork by Julian Riccobon. Previously published in The Acentos Review, October 2023.
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Fiction: Ghetto Birds
I’d always thought that my sister Ramona was indestructible.
Even at age fifteen, she was twice my size, and built like a stack of bricks. She was the classic Chola, a black-lipstick rebel. The roller-derby-girl-turned-skateboarder, converted by the Z-boys to a brand new sport. Once she got her hands on a skateboard, it was impossible to separate her from it...
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Artwork by Julian Riccobon.
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Fiction: Zipperman
Sometimes the Zipperman likes to think that his job is sacred; so predictable in its routine, that it has become a solemn ritual. Every day like clockwork, he climbs into the driver’s cabin of his tram and sets the machinery in motion while San Diego still sleeps. And then, at a speed of 3.8 miles per hour, he rumbles his way along the arched spine of the Coronado Bridge, soaking up the world in slow-motion...
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Artwork by Julian Riccobon.
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Fiction: Paradise Pharmacy
Cashback, the magic word. Like wishing for more wishes.
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In Paradise Pharmacy, you buy yourself a toffee, thirty-three cents, and then you ask for twenty back; those bloody bloody Andrew Jacksons. You swipe Mama’s card, that blue plastic genie, and the cashier simply gives you the cash. No questions asked.
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It’s like stealing cajeta from a baby...
Artwork by Julian Riccobon. Previously published in The Acentos Review, October 2022.
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Fiction: Secondhand Smoke
When Mother Earth wakes up with a fever, she knows that something is wrong.
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She wakes in a cold sweat, her ice caps slipping into the sea. The heat swirls around her, thick with greenhouse gases. Her head swirls, too.
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“You’ve grown a cancerous tumor,” the doctor tells her when she arrives at the hospital. “It is called Mankind, and you don’t have long to live..."
Artwork by Julian Riccobon.
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Publication History
​​​Short Fiction
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2026​​​
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CRAFT Literary, January 2026 – Hat Man Plays the Blues
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2024​​​
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The Art of Chestnut Review Volume 1, Fall 2024 – Ghetto Birds
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The Art of Chestnut Review Volume 1, Fall 2024 – The Things You Learn Too Late
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2023​
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Blue Marble Review, June 2023 – Paradise Pharmacy
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Flash Fiction Online, July 2023 – Café Negro (reprint)
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Blue Marble Review, September 2023 – Zipperman
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Huizache #10, Fall 2023 – Genesis
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2022
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The Acentos Review, October 2022 – Café Negro
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2020
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Rumble Fish Quarterly, Summer + Fall 2020 – Wrong Side of the Tracks
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2019
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F(r)iction Lit's Dually Noted Series, June 2019 – Secondhand Smoke​​
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Poetry
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2025
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Polyphony Lit Poetry on Demand Program, August 2025 – Five bites into a Crimson Sweet, and dusk falls gradient over Gettysburg
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Polyphony Lit Poetry on Demand Program, August 2025 – 2.2 billion heartbeats (and counting)
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Polyphony Lit Poetry on Demand Program, December 2025 – Providence (in response to the 12-13-25 Brown University shooting)
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2022
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The Acentos Review, October 2022 – Chino's Got a Gun, Torpedoes, Jacinto Castillo
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Nonfiction
2024​​​​
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Teachers & Writers Magazine – Polyphony Lit: Teaching the Craft of Editing from Sea Level to Summit