Top Stories
New stories you'll love, handpicked for you by our team and updated daily.
📢 Raise Your Voice Thread: 09/17/2026
Our “Raise Your Voice Threads” are hosted most alternating Thursdays at 12PM ET to offer creators more avenues to uncover exceptional stories on Vocal. As we are continuously searching for fresh creators and inspiring stories, this thread provides an opportunity to exchange and discuss the stories that have moved and motivated us on Vocal.
By Raise Your Voice by Vocalabout 9 hours ago in Resources
Aurelius Ascends. Top Story - September 2026.
Aurelius Ascends had spent the best part of fifteen years shifting from a single figment of a dream to a glossy digital image on a one-hundred-inch computer screen, eventually realized by SpaceCorp's head designer, Lisa Scanlon, and put on the drawing board.
By Jonathan Townend2 days ago in Fiction
She Flew Away. Top Story - September 2026.
Every spring there I have a visitor. She has a long slim neck, sharp facial features decorated with the softest edges you'll ever see, and she's a terrible singer. Though each summer, once she's gone, I do ache in the silence. For the most part she wanders the back edge of my too-large for me property, every now and then I take my morning walk a little too close and she lectures me and moves back farther.
By K.L. Grace3 days ago in Fiction
Love In Flames. Top Story - September 2026.
The background photo was taken when wildfires raged across Los Angeles in January 2025, killing 31 people and levelling thousands of buildings. The fires were caused by environmental factors like drought and severe wind gusts, compounded by human choices around water supplies, urban planning, and firefighting budget cuts. In contrast, the caption is an adaption of the classic “what if we kissed…” template from the deep-fried meme era of the late 2010s and the happy absurdity popular at the time. Together, the elements create a nostalgic sense of joyful irreverence juxtaposed with the disaster; finding a little whimsy in the face of desolation.
By I. D. Reevesa day ago in Writers
This Is the End. Top Story - September 2026.
This Is the End By Corey Harland She walked without much attention to where she was going. The sidewalk was familiar enough that her feet handled most of the work themselves. One hand held her phone while the other occasionally disappeared into her coat pocket as she moved beneath the streetlights.
By Corey W Harland3 days ago in Horror
The Rotting Wreaths of Winterveil. Top Story - September 2026.
It was a truly tacit place, Winterveil —with unpredictable, looping weather and calendars that barely rang true. You would think students had grown accustomed to living such a life, but most of them had no idea, no clue of what world they had been born into.
By K.H. Obergfoll2 days ago in Fiction
Last Call Challenge Winners
There were plenty of ringing phones and closing bars in Last Call , but the prompt took us to some unexpected places too. A fading birdsong, a goodbye that doesn't quite get finished, and people who don't suddenly become better versions of themselves just because time is running out. Some held on, some let go, and some missed their chance entirely. That's what made these stories stick.
By Vocal Curation Teama day ago in Resources
Writing Reflections: Echo Cries. Top Story - September 2026.
Happy Saturday once again, my friends! I’m back with another Writing Reflection. This week, I want to focus on a poem that falls under a category that I write quite often: poetry based on mythology. If you have followed my profile for a while, you have probably noticed that I like to write poetry based on Greek and Roman mythology. In particular, I like to write this kind of poetry using variations of the poem style of the nonet, but instead of nine lines, I use twelve or, sometimes, thirteen lines (although this is rare, and usually only because I have miscounted and don’t want to go through the work of rewriting the poem to be twelve lines).
By Stephanie Hoogstad5 days ago in Writers
Foggy Dreams. Top Story - September 2026.
I'm dreaming of something out of reach. Silver like the rhinestone smile of the stars. It's blue around the edges, bruised by intent. Black in the middle, an obsidian ink stain. It presses against my eyelids at midnight. Lingering there like a houseguest low on luck. I'll never be able to capture it like this. There's a crack in my foundation. Someone cut a corner in my construction. They knocked out a beam and laughed. Ah, but I can't forget the silver spit dangling From the lips some fox on the silver screen Waiting in the sliver of silver moonlight For her prey to wander just a little closer. The dream flutters away and I am hollow. I bask in the vacancy blooming in my chest. All signs point to ' full up. move out.' There's never anywhere to go when you dream. It's like navigating the fabric of a sweater. Such an impossible task it turns seductive. You see how the dream draws me away? It pulls me from the silver-toothed devils. Still, the soul wants what it wants, doesn't it? I suppose I must not want to dream, but live.
By Silver Daux3 days ago in Poets
The Fig Woman. Top Story - September 2026.
"The concept of fate is weird in that it implies twisted forms of time and causality that are alien to ordinary perception, but it is also eerie in that it raises questions about agency: who or what is the entity that has woven fate?"
By Tyler Clark3 days ago in Fiction
Love Struck. Top Story - September 2026.
You toss your pointy hat aside and tell me to come on in You pull out a box of little vials and start mixing stuff in 🧹 A flick of herbs, a dash of toad a pinch of sparkling mite You turn up the blazing heat and lock me in tonight 🧹 Your flowing velvet sleeves fall back your fingers smell of sage You pin me with your neon gaze reciting words right off your page 🧹 Drink deep you whisper in my ear I taste it, sweet and slow right down my ribs, the shivers come Your love spell starts to grow 🧹 Your black cat blinks from off the shelf your bubbling cauldron sighs you bind me with a luminous thread I'm lost inside your eyes 🧹 I don't need a counter spell I love it in your gloom you quickly swept me off my feet with your little witchy broom
By Sara Wilson3 days ago in Poets
Through the Eyes of Bill Bixby. Top Story - September 2026.
Link to the Challenge: Thank you for the Challenge, Annie. I may forgive you one day. I had quite a few fears as a child. It is not worth my time listing all of them here, but I count my father, the odd bully, death, and the possibility that I just did not belong to the family I was with as a large part of the list. It was so bad that I reached the point, when we moved to the suburbs, that I could watch any horror film by myself and barely feel any fear (my mother wondered how I could sit in our basement on a Friday night watching some of the best years of Wes Craven and John Carpenter). To me, they were just cartoonish fantasies after everything else I faced and thought of.
By Kendall Defoe 3 days ago in Writers
