 welcome to issue 2 read issue 2 here here we are already with our second issue i must say being an editor is fantastic each morning the puffin inboxes are packed with submissions from so many countries in so many genres and in so many styles already we have enough quality writing to pack out months and months of the magazine but keep them coming we are constantly on the lookout for new submissions in this month s issue we have the usual mix of fiction and nonfiction there s a healthy smattering of travel journalism too with rachael pells giving another punchy take on life in mexico whilst we welcome a new contributor f harvey anderson who has written a very vivid and thoughtful article on life in nepal we also welcome back sarah taylorfergusson who wrote so beautifully about love in her poem in issue 1 that we couldn t help but invite her back with another packed full of imagery joining her in representing poetry in this issue is another new contributor from ireland michael ray we d never forget flash fiction how could we this month s pieces come from samuel best who edits a magazine of his own for young writers and from patricia duffaud also we publish our first novel excerpt this month and it s from alistair roberts let us know what you think we have short stories by nici west and ellie stewart and a very lyrical nonfiction story about the struggles of young writers to get established the latter being from james bruce may whom we re glad to have back after he appeared in our first edition finally rachel macgregor writes an article on why the book is always better than the film a sentiment i agree with except for the shawshank redemption we ll also be introducing a book review section shortly our team have received plenty of review copies of forthcoming fiction such as kate atkinson s life after life and margaret forster s the unknown bridesmaid  the reviews will be published soon and writers and publishers are always welcome to send their books to us for review finally we have two upcoming author interviews but we ll tell you more about that later keep reading and please do spread the word about the puffin review 