Shifts, by Natalie DeVaull-Robichaud

Prose, chapbook, 32 pages, from Bottlecap Features.

A small college that is drowning – literally. An online order turns out to be alive. A trail of microplastics. In Shifts, Natalie DeVaull-Robichaud draws on images of the natural world to unfold the tensions and hidden darknesses we live with as consumers, mothers, children.

Written over a ten year period, Shifts uses clear, straightforward prose that moves in subtle rhythms and intensifies to striking depths. Venturing into the surreal, the strange, the nightmarish, or even the quiet moments of motherhood, this brilliant and unusual chapbook explores what it means to evolve from untenable situations into something new.

Natalie DeVaull-Robichaud lives in CT with rescued animals. (Perhaps she is one herself.) A 2026 Pushcart nominee, her prose has appeared in a number of journals, including Fiction Southeast, Unbroken Journal, Flash Fiction Magazine, The Prose Poem, and Gramarye. Her prose poem “Done” was chosen for Best Microfictions 2026. She holds an MFA from Sarah Lawrence College.