Writers are always talking about symbols in their work—and it’s one of the things that everyone is taught about in their high school English classes. But in the September/October issue, I mentioned the symbol of the Fireflies in Max’s “The Last of Us,” and that got me thinking … what about actual symbols in genre writing? Not the way we usually talk about symbols in lit classes, where symbolism is how we discuss abstract ideas, but the literal images that appear in our writing that can be replicated for cover designs, artworks, T-shirts, and more.
For example, I’m at the grocery store and see someone with an antipossession symbol on their shirt,
