Posted By admin - 21st May 2013
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In this new interview series, Monkeybicycle intern David Cotrone will be introducing you to a variety of independent booksellers and store owners.
The Elliott Bay Book Company is located in Seattle, WA. This interview was conducted with Casey O’Neil of the Elliott Bay staff.
Monkeybicycle: When was your bookstore founded? What prompted you to want to sell books?
Casey O’Neil: Elliott Bay was founded in 1973, so we are honored and grateful to be celebrating our 40th anniversary this June. Starting as a single room shop in Pioneer Square with just one employee, it expanded to over 20,000 sq. ft and over thirty employees. In April 2010 we moved up to the Capitol Hill neighborhood, to a great old timber-framed building with roughly the same square footage. It immediately felt like home, and our customers—old and new—have made the move a huge success.
When I was hired in 2008, I had been working construction for three years, and though I had become fairly adept at installing glass in buildings while being called a wide variety of derogatory names, I longed to be engaged in a very different kind of labor. I moved up to Seattle from California with the hope of getting a job at Elliott Bay. I knew I wanted to spend my days with books, and I was also hungry for more caring interaction with people. When I got the call that I didn’t get the job after my first interview, I threw my cellphone in a tree. But another position opened up a few weeks later, and when they offered it to me, I was ecstatic. Being a part of Elliott Bay has been an honor, an education, and a greater pleasure than I ever could have imagined.
Mb: What about your bookstore are you most proud of?
CON: Personally, I’m most proud of our customers. We get to stock the very best, under-appreciated, most intelligent books being published today, and people come in every day and buy them. Nothing better.
Mb: Does your location influence your store? If so, how?
CO: Seattle is a city that greatly values books, with one of the best public library systems in the country and several great independent bookstores. Our store is a reflection of the literary-minded community we live in, and our new neighborhood has been great for business—one of the best places in the world to see how many people still crave a physical place in their community where they can find the books they’re looking for, as well as the books they didn’t know they were looking for.
Mb: What’s your favorite part of your job?
CO: My favorite part of the job is being able to highlight those absolutely essential and remarkable books that can too easily be overlooked.
Mb: Personally, why do you read?
CO: Reading is the best way to travel into someone else’s mind, and also to let someone else into mine.
Mb: Do you host readings at your bookstore? If so, who’s given your most memorable one?
CO: We’ve hosted authors since the 1980′s, when Rick Simonson started our readings series. We average over ten readings a week, ranging from smaller, more intimate gatherings where amazing new voices are found, to events with world renown authors packing the house with hundreds of people.
The most remarkable recent event that comes to mind is the midnight release party for Sherman Alexie’s Blasphemy, complete with stories from Sherman, fry bread, balloon spirit animals, and music, including the One Gun Singers from the Colville reservation singing Sherman’s original song John Wayne’s Teeth—a memorable night and a mesmerizing song to have stuck in your head for a few weeks.
Another reading I will always remember was given a few years ago by Joseph McElroy. He’s written nine incredible novels over the last forty years (with one older novel Ancient History and his new novel Cannonball both forthcoming from Dzanc Books in June), and his work combines inexhaustible intelligence with immediate human warmth. His profound presence is inseparable from his work, and the evening was the perfect example of how a live reading encourages deep and meaningful connections between authors and their readers.
Mb: What and who are some of your favorite titles and authors?
CO: The book I can’t stop talking about is The Story of My Assassins by Tarun Tejpal (Melville House), an exceptional novel that sprawls over and through the contours and depths of modern India as it follows the five men implicated in a plot to assassinate a journalist in Delhi.
Mb: Another recent favorite is a collection of stories by the Irish writer Kevin Barry called There Are Little Kingdoms (Stinging Fly Press) Very funny, not afraid to get a little rough, but with this very beautiful and generous undercurrent that just makes you fall in love with every single one of his characters.
CO: And I can’t leave out one of my all-time favorites, Notes From No Man’s Land by Eula Biss (Graywolf), quite simply the most perfect collection of essays I have ever read.
Mb: Do you have hope for the future of books?
CO: Yes, I do…and you should too. With changes in the publishing industry, it’s easy to see how the bottom line can exert extraordinary pressure on the people who devote their labor to writing, publishing, and selling great books. I will always remember attending a panel on the future of publishing in which no one said anything about any actual books, but had plenty to say about “content consumption” and “digestion.” My favorite quote of the event was something to the effect of, “Books are products, just like shoes or toothpaste…except books are more content driven.” It would make a great t-shirt, “BOOKS: MORE CONTENT DRIVEN THAN TOOTHPASTE!”
My hope for the future of books comes from looking in a very different direction. On the same evening after that panel, I was given some much needed perspective by Mikhail Shishkin (author of Maidenhair, a sublime novel published by Open Letter) at his reading at McNally Jackson. In answering a similar question to the one I am answering now, he referred to a scene in which a prisoner chalks a picture of a boat on his cell wall. Every day the guard brings him his meal, and every day he finds the prisoner sitting there, patiently watching this boat. After many weeks of this, the guard opens the door again, but this time he finds that the boat is no longer on the wall, and the prisoner is gone as well. “This is what books can do,” Shishkin said.
It is in this vein that I continue to have immense hope that books will continue to do what they have always done…the impossible.
David Cotrone is from Plymouth, MA. His writing appears in Fifty-Two Stories, The Rumpus, PANK, Paper Darts, Necessary Fiction, Thought Catalog, Vol. 1 Brooklyn, and elsewhere. You can find him at www.davidcotrone.com.
Posted By admin - 7th May 2013
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In this interview series, Monkeybicycle intern David Cotrone will introduce you to a variety of small press editors and publishers.
This interview was conducted with Carrie Olivia Adams of Black Ocean Press.
Monkeybicycle: When was Black Ocean founded? What prompted you to want to start it?
Carrie Olivia Adams: Black Oceayn published its first books in 2006. Founder Janaka Stucky and I met while in the low-residency MFA Program at the Vermont College of Fine Arts. It was something we would half-seriously chat about during residencies in that wouldn’t it be awesome if sort of way. I’d already been working in publishing for several years (as I still am today outside of Black Ocean) and had professional knowledge of the publishing industry. And Janaka had the charisma and the courageous sense to say—let’s just do this—and then find a real way to make it work. The population bloom of indie presses was only just beginning at the time, and I feel like we were at the cusp of that movement.
Mb: At the time, why was Black Ocean–and why is it still–necessary?
COA: We truly believed—and still believe—that there is an audience for poetry even bigger than the insular world of other poets—and it was simply a matter of finding poetry to deliver and poets who were willing to deliver it to that audience. From the very beginning, we have stressed the importance of author tours (which is actually something we contractually require). And we have been eager to find ways to engage with other artistic genres and audiences through poetry. For example, Zachary Schomburg’s Fjords Volume 1 was turned into a touring shadow puppet play with a live string quartet, which was performed to sold out audiences in bars around the country and even the Poetry Foundation itself last year.
Mb: What about Black Ocean are you most proud of?
COA: I know that I’m often humbled and amazed by how quickly we’ve achieved this level of success. When we first launched books at AWP in 2006, we had less than ten attendees at our reading. Now, we can pack a bar in Chicago with a line out the door. What was just a dream of some graduate students has become a real and viable publisher, making books that outsell many of the mainstream academic presses. And we’ve been able to achieve that while staying true to the poems and authors that excite and inspire us. Black Ocean is completely run as a volunteer effort—we all have day jobs—and thus to achieve this level of success, it has required an essential amount of devotion. I am proud that day after day we are making something we believe in; otherwise, there is absolutely no reason for us to make it.
Mb: What do you look for when you’re open for submissions? What makes a project or manuscript worth taking on?
COA: As the poetry editor, I encounter and read each and every submission that arrives. It is a daunting and inspiring task each year. And as an actively publishing poet myself, I have such an enormous sympathy for everyone who sends work our way. And yet, I will admit that I am a very ruthless editor when it gets down to it. Janaka and I have similar, but unique aesthetics, so the work that is published must fall in the overlap between our tastes. As such, it is in keeping with the overall Black Ocean aesthetic—but never too similar to books we’ve already published—there has to be something new about the voice, it really has to engage me with something familiar but overlooked or completely strange with an underlying current of something known and unnamed. Black Ocean is respected for its careful editing of the text—we rarely publish something as is, but work with each author to bring out the strengths of his/her work and style. So we have taken manuscripts that are full of promise, but not yet “perfect,” if the author is willing to work with us in a dialogue about the poems.
Mb: What does “indie” or “small press” mean to you? What do you think of such classifications and distinctions?
COA: This is a hard one for me, since my monthly paycheck comes from a distinguished university press, which to me seems to occupy a middle ground. It’s not a trade publisher like Random House, but it still has a cache and intellectually mainstream acceptance and esteem. Where as with Black Ocean, I think we still like to fancy ourselves as a bit more rebellious. It’s a business, and it’s a huge time commitment, but it’s a press run for the poems and poets alone. I think that’s’ what indie about, we are independent of anything but the poems. And we are definitely slaves to the poems.
Mb: What sets your books apart from the rest?
COA: Besides expanding the readership of poetry, one of the other driving desires when we founded the press was to make beautiful objects. We started the press just as the e-book was becoming a common idea, and I think we have been committed all along to making beautiful objects—we want you to want to not just read our books but behold and hold them. And I think, as a result, people look to us as much for the physical aesthetics of our books as the poems contained within.
Mb: What’s your favorite part of your job?
COA: Because I often spend so much time closely editing the books, I think I feel most rewarded when the poet feels like we have come to the place where the poems are at their best. I don’t ever want to infect someone else’s poems with my own voice or approach, but I try to attune myself with what a poet’s works are trying to do on their own and help make this consistent and clear. I want help the poet guide the reader in how to read the poems. Reading poetry is always an intuitive process for me—I don’t believe they are riddles to be solved or composed of evasive wording that has to be paraphrased (and I disdain the attitudes of the very people who teach these things)—but poems are much more akin to a fascinating stranger that you are curious to get to know. That entire process of getting to know the poems and what makes them work, what obsesses them, and how they want to be built, is my true favorite.
Mb: For you, why are books so important?
COA: I am a shy, solipsistic only child and books have always been the building blocks of my world. And I’ve always been entranced by the ability of books to actually speak, to be more than just read. How many of us have fantasized that Emily Dickinson is our best friend, sending these precise telegrams to us? I reread Proust every August before my birthday because I love aging together with Marcel. Language has never ceased to be an object of infinite curiosity for me—how is that there is a word for this—but I must use many words to describe that to you? How is it that you have any sense of what I feel? Or maybe you don’t, and these words invoke an entirely intense feeling in you that is something else nonetheless. In the beginning there was the word—and there has never been anything quite that amazing. Yes, there has been love, desire, and violent hate, but how else could I truly tell you about them?
Mb: What other small presses do you admire? Why?
COA: Goodness, I feel like there are new small presses every month. And the burgeoning and bursting AWP bookfair is a testament to their unstoppable reproduction. Janaka and I both have work on Ahsahta’s list and our authors are behind Octopus, Action Books, Letter Machine, and more. The small press scene is alive and thriving without a doubt.
Mb: Do you have hope for the future of books?
COA: Dear god, if I didn’t I’d be screwed. I have no hope for us (all of us) if there’s no hope for books.
David Cotrone is from Plymouth, MA. His writing appears in Fifty-Two Stories, The Rumpus, PANK, Paper Darts, Necessary Fiction, Thought Catalog, Vol. 1 Brooklyn, and elsewhere. You can find him at www.davidcotrone.com.
Posted By admin - 30th April 2013
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In this interview series, Monkeybicycle intern David Cotrone will introduce you to a variety of small press editors and publishers.
This interview was conducted with Jeremy Spencer of Scrambler Books.
Monkeybicycle: When was Scrambler Books founded? What prompted you to want to start it?
Jeremy Spencer: I started Scrambler Books in 2008. But before, I started The Scrambler zine in 2002 and originally the first 5 issues were just that- a print zine that I handmade about twice a year. I really enjoyed doing that- getting contributors and cover art together, laying each issue out, printing it and then binding it. I probably did about 50-100 of each issue and then I just gave them away for free. In 2006, I moved it to an online only format and started to do monthly issues. By 2008, my desire to want to work with print again kicked in and I decided to start Scrambler Books to be focused on publishing poetry and short fiction books. I started with a book of poetry by Bay Area poet Trevor Calvert and each year since 2008, I have been able to publish more and more.
Mb: At the time, why was Scrambler–and why is it still–necessary?
JS: I don’t think necessary is a good word to use to describe it. I think of Scrambler Books more as something that I started because I wanted to. If I did not like doing the things associated with running a micro press, then I would stop doing it.
Mb: What about Scrambler Books are you most proud of?
JS: Probably when a reader or reviewer gets in touch with me or shares something somewhere regarding one of our books that has made them glad that they read that particular book. I know when I read a book that I like, or even a sentence that I like, it can give me a feeling of enjoyment. Sentences can be exciting. Books can be exciting. And when someone shares that experience with others, when a sentence or story or poem can impact positively how the next hour of your afternoon goes, then that is a pretty cool thing.
Mb: What do you look for when you’re open for submissions? What makes a project or manuscript worth taking on?
JS: Submissions for Scrambler Books are always open. And I try to respond as quickly as possible but the last year and a half has seen my response time slow way down for various reasons- increase in submissions, computer virus, etc… As for what I look for in a manuscript submission, I am not really sure. I think I have pretty eclectic tastes regarding style and types of writing with what we publish. I wish I could say, “A, B and C are what I like and I will not look at anything that does not fall into those categories.” But I can’t because I like so many different types of writing and writers. I know that doesn’t really answer the question, but I don’t want to start limiting or only receiving certain types of manuscripts in the future.
Mb: What does “indie” or “small press” mean to you? What do you think of such classifications and distinctions?
JS: I consider Scrambler Books an “indie” micro press. I think “indie” in regards to micro or “small” presses at its most basic level means that it is run independently of anything else. An “indie” press is something that is independent of any other kind of business or corporation. I think I call Scrambler Books a micro press because the most books we have published in one year is 4. As compared to New Directions which I would consider a small press and that publishes about 30 titles a year according to their website. But it all depends on your definition of “small” in “small press” I guess. “Indie” and “small presses” and micro presses have usually been started and continue to be run by one person or a small group of people that maybe sort of just started doing it because they wanted to do it and/or because they like books or are writers themselves. I think usually with “indie” presses, the majority of the time they start out as a labor of love. I think the classifications “indie” and “small press” are fine and probably even useful.
Mb: What sets your books apart from the rest?
JS: I like to think that the books that we publish are considered interesting, innovative and unique.
Mb: What’s your favorite part of your job?
JS: Working on a book with a writer. Most times the writer and I will be interacting constantly and daily at least during the last 1-2 months before the book is published. And it has been a pleasure to get to know and work with the writers that I have published so far. I would consider all of them friends and some of them good friends after having worked together on a book. The process of publishing a book is fun and creative. Working with the writer and taking all of these related elements- manuscript, cover, design, layout, etc… and putting them together to make the finished product is the best part of running Scrambler Books.
Mb: For you, why are books so important?
JS: For many reasons. As a means to disseminate information. As a tradition. The way a book feels in a hand. How a cover looks. The idea that something you are about to read will possibly make you think about life, about your own private world a little differently than you did before you read it.
Mb: What other small presses do you admire? Why?
JS: There are a lot. There are some that were started a long time ago and are no longer around at least in the small independent press way that they were when they started. And there are some others that were started more recently and are going strong. Some presses that I admire in no particular order are:
Hogarth Press. Started by Virginia Woolf and her husband, it allowed Ms. Woolf to publish her own work worry free. And they first published Eliot’s The Waste Land in the UK within a few months of it first being printed in the USA. Started as a micro press then sold to a bigger press many years later. But those first 15 years are pretty impressive.
City Lights Publishing. Most everyone knows this story of Mr. Ferlinghetti and how valuable he and City Lights have been to independent publishing. Standing up for Ginsberg’s Howl and helping the writers known as and associated with the Beats get published. He basically helped them become more legitimate to the literary and larger world. But they also publish many other American and International writers that are very good.
Black Sparrow. John Martin started this press in 1966 by selling all of his first editions of modernist writers and then using that money to dedicating this press to publishing Charles Bukowski. How many publishers would do that today? Sell off their most valuable possessions and then say I am going to sink or swim with this one writer. Even though Bukowski was pretty well known in 1966 in the underground literary scene, he had not ever had published and or tried to sell full length books before, so this was a definite risk back then.
New Directions. Started by James Laughlin as a small press and is still considered one today. Started because Ezra Pound told Mr. Laughlin that he should “do ‘something’ useful” after he graduated from college. They still publish great American and International writers, most recently with the new translations into English of the great Brazilian writer Clarice Lispector.
Grove Press. When Barney Rossett bought it in 1951 and for the next 35 years made it one of the most respected independent small publishers in the world.
The rest of the presses that I will mention were all started in the twenty first century and continue to publish and distribute high quality writers following in the footsteps of the 5 presses mentioned previously. They also are innovative and publish writing that adds to the culture in a good way. They are finding new ways to publish books. They are (also in no particular order): Publishing Genius Press, Mud Luscious Press, Wave Books, Dancing Girl Press, Octopus Books, No Tell Books, Melville House, Magic Helicopter Press, MuuMuu House, Tiny Hardcore Press, Two Dollar Radio, Emily Books, Featherproof Books, Dalkey Archive Press, Black Ocean Press.
Mb: Do you have hope for the future of books?
JS: Definitely. Although everyone knows that the book industry is changing, I think that independent small presses are actually in a very good position to fill in the holes from all of these big publishers merging together. Scrambler Books has gotten more popular in every year of its existence since 2008. We plan to publish in 2013 more books than we ever have in any other of our years. Also, the way that independent small publishers are approaching publishing is definitely looking good for the future of books. By which I mean we are all thinking about e-content yes, but also there are more special print editions, or limited print editions and other types of the book as an art object going on. Look at Featherproof Books and what they do with the design of their books. It is amazing. I think that books even for the younger “Digital Native” generation(s) still hold importance and relevance and will continue to do so. Although I really enjoy thinking about the future of books and coming up with new ideas for the books that Scrambler Books publishes, I also enjoy the tradition associated with books and think that it is definitely still respected. And the headache of digital provenance and storing digital data with so many changing systems and formats has yet to be solved to a satisfactory level in libraries and archives. At the moment, books and paper are still a stronger way to keep information alive for a long time. I am a book optimist.
Mb: Please share anything else you would like to say.
JS: Use a library once in a while.
David Cotrone is from Plymouth, MA. His writing appears in Fifty-Two Stories, The Rumpus, PANK, Paper Darts, Necessary Fiction, Thought Catalog, Vol. 1 Brooklyn, and elsewhere. You can find him at www.davidcotrone.com.
Posted By admin - 23rd April 2013
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In this new interview series, Monkeybicycle intern David Cotrone will be introducing you to a variety of independent booksellers and store owners.
Parnassus Books is located in Nashville, TN. This interview was conducted with Karen Hayes of the Parnassus Books staff.
Monkeybicycle: When was your bookstore founded? What prompted you to want to sell books?
Karen Hayes: We opened November 16th, 2011. I fell into the book business by accident, when I started working at a book distributor in 1978. I could not have found a better career. Before opening the store, I worked at Random House as a sales rep for 18 years, most of that time calling on independent bookstores. When the main bookstore in town, Davis-Kidd announced they were declaring chapter 11 bankruptcy and closing, I started exploring the idea of opening a store. I knew that part of the problem Davis-Kidd had was that it gotten too big for today market, 30,000 square feet. I had seen that the majority of independents that have survived for decades did so by staying small and grounded in their local neighborhood. So that is what I set out to do. Two months into formulating a plan for the opening a store, my employer Random House offered early retirement to employees over 50, which I took advantage of, allowing me to not have to draw a salary from the store until well into the first year. Then a couple months later I met Ann Patchett, who became my business partner in the bookstore. I know that I was extremely lucky on both these counts and that the store may not have happened without them.
Mb: What about your bookstore are you most proud of?
KH: That we concentrate on the printed book. We have very few sidelines. The book inventory is what matters. It reflects the reading habits of our customers and features the local authors in our community.
Mb: Does your location influence your store? If so, how?
KH: It does. We are in what is considered the best shopping district in town. Because of that we get a lot of people into the store that are in the area visiting other shops, restaurants, Trader Joe’s and Whole Foods. The rents in this popular shopping area are naturally high, so we have to be careful about the size of the store. We need to make sure the sales per square foot are healthy when compared to the rent per square foot. We still have a few customers that would like to see us in a space bigger than our 3100 square feet. We are doing our best to explain that we cannot compete with Amazon on breadth of selection and that this is the size that will hopefully allow us to be around for a long time.
Mb: What sets your bookstore apart from the rest?
KH: (see: what we are most proud of) Also we have a piano in the store and we have regular music events. We are in Music City after all.
Mb: What’s your favorite part of your job?
KH: Seeing happy kids, customers, authors and booksellers in the store. The store is a very positive place to spend time in.
Mb: For you, why are books so important?
KH: They open up avenues for seeing the world in new ways.
Mb: Personally, why do you read?
KH: Ditto on above, and then there is also just pure escapism.
Mb: Do you host readings at your bookstore? If so, who’s given your most memorable one?
KH: We had around 200 events last year. Not all were at our store, because of size limitations. It is impossible to say which one was most memorable, so I will just mention one that we had last week with Luis Alberto Urrea. We had about sixty people who were thoroughly entertained by the stories of his family and how they influenced his books, Hummingbird’s Daughter and Queen of America. There are great writers and there are great oral storytellers, and it is such a pleasure when the two coincide.
Mb: What and who are some of your favorite titles and authors?
KH: Having been a reader for a few decades now, I know the answer to this question will change every few months, so I’ll just mention three authors and books from the past year. Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk by Ben Fountain, Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller and Round House by Louise Erdrich.
Mb: Do you have hope for the future of books?
KH: YES!
Mb: Please share anything else you would like to say.
KH: Support your local bookstore. It matters to your community.
David Cotrone is from Plymouth, MA. His writing appears in Fifty-Two Stories, The Rumpus, PANK, Paper Darts, Necessary Fiction, Thought Catalog, Vol. 1 Brooklyn, and elsewhere. You can find him at www.davidcotrone.com.
Posted By admin - 11th April 2013
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Hey everyone, Monkeybicycle7 contributor Aaron Gilbreath has a new digital essay out through the fine folks at Thought Catalog. It’s called The Stoned Age, and here’s the lowdown:
A story about being young and compulsive, “The Stoned Age” follows a twenty-something narrator’s attempt to quit smoking pot and clear his head. Living in funky Tucson, Arizona, his multiple attempts at sobriety fail, so he enrolls in a drug treatment group and discovers his other problem: cultural perceptions. As a fellow rehab patient tells Dave Chappelle’s character in the movie Half Baked: “You in here ’cuz of marijuana? …Man, this is some bullshit!” Which is exactly the author’s dilemma: if cannabis sativa is so harmless, why can’t he quit smoking it?
Sounds great, right? It is. And it’s only $2.99, so grab a copy now. You can get it here. And check out more of Aaron’s work on his website.
That’s it for now. If you’re a Monkeybicycle contributor and have a new project you’d like us to mention, drop us a line.
Posted By admin - 9th April 2013
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In this interview series, Monkeybicycle intern David Cotrone will introduce you to a variety of small press editors and publishers.
This interview was conducted with Cynthia Reeser of Aqueous Books.
Monkeybicycle: When was Aqueous Books founded? What prompted you to want to start it?
Cynthia Reeser: I started Aqueous Books in January 2010 in part as a response to the overflow of long-form fiction I received at Prick of the Spindle (at that time we were accepting up to novella-length work for the online edition of the journal), which made me realize how many deserving manuscripts go unpublished in part because of the publisher : manuscript ratio. There are only so many publishers, and so many, many more manuscripts. I was reading a lot about publishing at the time and where it was headed because I was intrigued by it and I was also writing a book on publishing, and I knew that literary agents and publishers were flooded with manuscripts, many of which they had to turn away, even though deserving, because one company or agent can only take on so much work. (Ironically, Aqueous Books closed to submissions rather quickly after opening its doors, and we are now booked out with manuscripts–publishing one book per month–through 2016.) Because Prick of the Spindle is founded on the principle that deserving work should be published regardless of its author’s credentials or experience or affiliation or prior publications, it seemed only natural to create a venue for those longer-form manuscripts. Aqueous Books publishes novellas, short stories, memoirs, essay collections, and novels. It is also true that the idea for Aqueous Books hit me out of the clear blue sky; I had considered before, in passing, starting a publishing company, but had no real plans to do so, but then the entire package of the idea for the company fell on me all at once, right down to the details of the logo, so I knew it was time to make it happen. I felt I had an obligation to myself and to others to do it.
Mb: At the time, why was Aqueous–and why is it still–necessary?
CR: For all the reasons I mention above; we provide an avenue of publication for any manuscript, regardless of whether its author is a high school dropout digging ditches for a living or an Ivy League graduate making six figures a year working for a Fortune 500 company. All we care about is the quality of the work. We also produce a high quality product for every one of our books and afford them all the same value.
Mb: What about Aqueous Books are you most proud of?
CR: The fact that I started it from absolutely nothing as a single mother of two during one of the hardest times of my life. I had a computer, an internet connection, and the balls of Annie Oakley. Not to mention some editing and graphic design know-how under my hat. So with that and little else, I made it work, and now, a lot of our books are being reviewed by Publishers Weekly and ForeWord Reviews. I couldn’t be prouder.
Mb: What do you look for when you’re open for submissions? What makes a project or manuscript worth taking on?
CR: My answer to both of those questions is simple: potential. That can mean that a book has potential but needs a little editing help, but in the end, the result is a quality piece of writing that lives up to its author’s vision.
Mb: What does “indie” or “small press” mean to you? What do you think of such classifications and distinctions?
CR: To many, “indie” and “small press” are one in the same. However, I think of indie as just what it means–independent. Someone or several running a press by their own hard work and dedication. We’re a small press too, but not all small presses are indie. Some small presses are affiliated with institutions like colleges or universities or writing centers or other programs, and receive their funding through those sources. As far as what I think about such classifications and distinctions, labels and categories will always be there, regardless, and to an extent, they are useful, like genus and species are useful in the naming of things.
Mb: What sets your books apart from the rest?
CR: All of our books are edited to be their very best, and all are literary. We produce quality literature. I don’t think every publisher of fiction can say that. I don’t take on anything that is too commercial or just because I think it will sell, only books that have strong literary value.
Mb: What’s your favorite part of your job?
CR: Probably the graphic/cover design. I love to make art…that’s the fun part. Editing is more of a chore, but I do it as my profession, so it feels like work, but it’s also second nature.
Mb: For you, why are books so important?
CR: Books are a record of humanity and the human experience. I like to think that they will still live on as a record of our present experiences for future generations. Whether those future generations are thousands of years apart from us, I like to picture people of a different time and cultural experience imagining themselves in our now, and also learning from their past, which is our present. Books in that sense are records, timekeepers. A collective cultural history.
Mb: What other small presses do you admire? Why?
CR: Graywolf for their dedication to literature, even though they may be more of a mid-sized publisher. Sunnyoutside for their production values and their beautiful books which are sometimes like art objects. There are others but those are the two that stand out.
Mb: Do you have hope for the future of books?
CR: Absolutely, insofar as I have hope for the human race.
David Cotrone is from Plymouth, MA. His writing appears in Fifty-Two Stories, The Rumpus, PANK, Paper Darts, Necessary Fiction, Thought Catalog, Vol. 1 Brooklyn, and elsewhere. You can find him at www.davidcotrone.com.
Posted By admin - 10th March 2013
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When we woke up this morning, it was already over. In line for coffee, we said a few pre-emptive goodbyes—“In case I don’t see you!” We made sure to stop by the bookfair to schmooze and snag free copies while we still could. Our Saturday panels told us to move on, move forward, move up.
My first panel was on best practices for submitting panel proposals—preparing, a full ten hours before this year’s closing keynote, to attend AWP 2014. For the erudite hopefuls among you, here’s what I gleaned:
1) Diverse participants! Gender, age, and ethnic diversity help—but think also about the geographic location of potential panelists, the stage of their careers, and whether they teach at 2-year, 4-year, or secondary programs (if they teach at all—students and amateurs are welcome!). Nobody on your panel should have the exact same thing to say.
2) Be sure to hew carefully to every single guideline. Copy edit your proposal just as you would a submission to a journal. Don’t forget to check with your participants to ensure they’re down with your idea! Phillip Lopate appeared in approximately 72 proposals this year—though even the most beloved writers can only apply for three and appear on two.
3) The justification portion of your proposal should be a bit creative and passionate, and it’s fine to be extensive. Make your case for why your panel should be included: Is this the same panel that’s at AWP every year, or is it something provocative and new? Are AWP members hungry for it?
4) They get too many poetry applications, people. And everyone wants to do a reading. But AWP doesn’t receive enough proposals for playwriting, translations, or the online sphere.
I left “Best Practices” thinking about AWPs to come, instead of this one. Though I attended a smart and generous talk about post-MFA life featuring Lori D’Angelo, Heather Frese, Sandra Marchetti, and Sarah Beth Childers, I just couldn’t cram any more knowledge into my brain. Ron Carlson moderated a discussion of flash fiction this afternoon. Ron Carlson? Flash fiction? Together? I can’t believe I’m telling you this, but I just couldn’t take another amazing panel.
Conference fatigue, man. Total bummer.
Saturday always seems like the best possible bookfair day, since you really need to spend a big chunk of time there. It’s perfect for when you’re absolutely burnt out on panels, since the bookfair’s sort of the opposite of a panel. It’s lively, tactile: You get to hold letterpressed broadsides up to the light, shake hands with today’s most vaunted editors, and munch on lots of free candy.
That is, unless it’s Saturday. At around 3:30, there were more loaded-up dollies and suitcases in the exhibition hall than books and magazines on display. By 4, the line at the convention center Fed Ex flowed out into the hall. Still, by 6, my AWP totebag had grown heavy with free copies of journals, buttons, stickers, and my most treasured purchase—a two-volume set of Ursula LeGuin’s The Unreal and the Real from Small Beer Press.
After a brief stop at a swanky reception for one of my favorite magazines—Prairie Schooner (an open bar and free earbuds!), I headed out for one last dinner with dear friends, shuffling half a mile along haphazardly salted sidewalks for tapas. It felt so good to be out of that convention center! We passed around the Spanish omelet, the chorizo, the pitcher of sangria. We gossiped. We laughed. We did what we did best: We told stories.
Earlier that day, someone had spotted a couple of burly men’s men in the hotel bar. Their unironic beards and Popeye-sized forearms led her to believe they weren’t writers, so she asked what they were here for.
“The fish conference,” they said.
Tomorrow’s the first day of the largest seafood expo in North America. They’re going to geek out for the next three days about lobsters, fishsticks, and something called the “prawnto shrimp machine.” There’re hundreds of exhibitors hawking their wares in booths, plus a variety of educational and entertaining events about prepping, serving, and distributing seafood.
The Hynes Convention Center & Sheraton Boston Hotel were never truly ours, AWP-ers. It’s time now for the fish.
Katie Wudel’s writing has appeared in Tin House, McSweeney’s, Prairie Schooner, Nerve, The Rumpus,and on the Ploughshares blog, and can be heard this spring on NPR’s Snap Judgment. Katie has taught creative writing at San Francisco’s School of the Arts and the University of Nebraska-Omaha Writer’s Workshop, and has been awarded scholarships and residencies from Hedgebrook, the Squaw Valley Community of Writers, and Summer Literary Seminars. In 2011, her story “Tongueless,” which first appeared in Monkeybicycle, was one of Wigleaf’s Top [Very] Short Fictions. katiewudel.com.
Posted By admin - 9th March 2013
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Want to survive AWP with your sanity intact? Take a little time for yourself—no panels, no bookfair, no small talk, no pressure.
. . . Especially if you danced right on past your bedtime the night before with a bunch of other gangly nerds. (At VIDA prom, the geeks are the cool kids! Bookish teenagers, take note: It gets better. It gets so much better.) I spent much of this morning cursing Daisy Buchanan’s too-cheap rum punch, munching a cold egg sandwich from the hotel Au Bon Pain.
Right around 10:40 a.m., a bunch of good literary citizens raved on Twitter about a session called “Whales & Wenches.” I flipped through my hefty program guide and found no such panel! There was one called “Sea Change: Writing Remade Off the New England Coast.” I dashed up the escalator and found it: standing room only, of course. I can only assume the room would’ve been more crowded had it been officially titled “Whales & Wenches,” though I suspect you’re not allowed to present a panel without at least one colon in the title.
In short? This panel was the bomb. Robin Beth Schaer, Amber Dermont, Elyssa East, and Amy Brill had swabbed actual decks (still unclear on what that entails) while thinking big thoughts about class, feminism, and spinning compasses as metaphors for existential crises. Do women have the right “credentials” to discuss a life spent sailing the treacherous Straits of Magellan? Hell yes, they do!
I left the panel with some awesome temporary tattoos, longing to devour Melville, re-watch Jaws, and sign up for a real nautical crew myself. What is life if not battening down hatches and charting adventurous courses by the stars?
My next stop was “Experimental Fiction Today.” (Hey, no colon! So cutting-edge!) It was another rich discussion. We started with a definition that makes this broad topic easier to take in: Experimental fiction pre-supposes an awareness that what one is reading is a work of artifice—the reader will never entirely “escape” into the story. That doesn’t mean, however, that there’s no passion or emotion—you just need to get used to the rules of the world first.
Lily Hoang’s first MFA critique from a professor, in its entirety: “You’re smart, I’m dumb, I’m not reading any more of this.” As an instructor today, Lily tries to make a space for her students to loosen up and try new things. She gives them office supplies and says, “You must build the world of your next fifteen weeks in class. The world can look just like ours, or it can be something entirely your own.” Some students made a mini-golf world and a worm world, in which the worms worshipped an oil king. Their writing came from that.
Alissa Nutting was utterly charming and inspiring. She’s very very pregnant, and said that in this extended period of sobriety, experimental fiction was the only drug at her disposal. Why not transgress, using devices like repetition or magic to induce a literary high in your reader? Our daily lives, she said, are so mundane—we’re doing taxes or waiting for turkey slices at the deli. These kinds of ordinary experiences, she believes, are toxic. Innovative fiction cleanses us.
M. Bartley Seigel, founding editor of [PANK], was a force of nature. Tall and angry (well, angry-ish), he addressed a question from the audience—what makes him a gatekeeper? Why does he decide what’s innovative? Seigel said that sometimes, he goes with his gut and publishes something that—once the issue’s out—makes him say, “Oh, God, Matt, why did you do that?!” But as opposed to more institutional journals that are always okay, with solid (if bland) work, his magazine does sometimes get it wrong. And he’s excited about those risks he takes because sometimes, “the work is really going to blow your head off.”
The population of AWP attendees is larger than the town I grew up in. This convention center is a labyrinth of unmissable seminars and readings—a dozen or more happening at a time. So, yeah, not everything’s perfect. Nearly every panel was full today—I’d estimate that I spent at least three hours on the floor, with one appendage or another utterly asleep. Plus, Alison Bechdel was snowed in! The panel starring Terry Gross turned out to be a panel starring Terry Gross—videoconferencing in from her studio.
But hell, what fun is it if everything goes according to plan? Cancellations and over-capacity rooms mean I had some downtime to explore the bookfair. I loved The Rumpus booth, with its ubiquitous “Write Like a Motherfucker” mugs. Brian Spears, poetry editor, told me that they’re doing this really amazing iBook poetry anthology with mixed media like readings and exclusive video. They’re just giving it away!
With all the false and sweaty bodies crammed into tiny rooms with unflattering fluorescent lights, it’s easy to forget that we’re all here because we love words. We’re so passionate about this stuff that we’re a fire hazard. Pretty awesome.
Katie Wudel’s writing has appeared in Tin House, McSweeney’s, Prairie Schooner, Nerve, The Rumpus,and on the Ploughshares blog, and can be heard this spring on NPR’s Snap Judgment. Katie has taught creative writing at San Francisco’s School of the Arts and the University of Nebraska-Omaha Writer’s Workshop, and has been awarded scholarships and residencies from Hedgebrook, the Squaw Valley Community of Writers, and Summer Literary Seminars. In 2011, her story “Tongueless,” which first appeared in Monkeybicycle, was one of Wigleaf’s Top [Very] Short Fictions. katiewudel.com.
Posted By admin - 7th March 2013
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The crowd filed in for that fairy tale panel, sleepy but very hungry for a discussion about why it is that The Golden Goose and its modern bastard children so endure. 20 minutes before the panel—the first of the day!—it was standing room only. From what I heard, folks crowded outside the door, tilting in their ears to hear what they could. I was lucky enough to score a seat in the front row.
Yes, that is a rubber chicken handbag.
Each of the brilliant panelists—Anjali Sachdeva, John Crowley, Jane Yolen and Kelly Link, in a fabulous pair of earrings made out of disembodied doll limbs, celebrated folklore’s grip on every story we write, even the most realistic. Everyone grew up with fairy tales and ghost stories, right? Yolen: “They’re protean and they’re protein—they fuel us.” Crowley: “You can’t not write fairy tales—they’re in our DNA.” Link particularly loved the bossy voice of fairy tales and how you can work with mythic patterns or retell old tales to create a very original story that operates on multiple levels.
Kate Bernheimer said that when she first started submitting stories, they were rejected because they weren’t logical, things needed to be fleshed out, there was no character motivation, and even that they were too imaginative. But today—as evidenced by the over-capacity crowd—it’s clear these are fundamental characteristics of a beloved and valid art form.
As the talk went on, we heard about why it’s both good and bad to sanitize the beautiful violence and sex of fairy tales for children; how tens of thousands of fairy tales remain untranslated and will never be heard; and what to do with un-PC narratives. It was a very rich and inspiring discussion, and apparently the audio will be posted on Unstuck Books’ website soon. Don’t miss it!
Another highlight of the day was a panel on literary citizenship, with Alan Heathcock, Matthew Specktor, Emma Straub, Julie Barer, and Rob Spillman. Essentially, it all comes down to having good manners and paying it forward. Buy debut novels. Subscribe to lit mags. Don’t be an asshole because people remember—the entire publishing industry is predicated on personal relationships.
The best part of the panel was when Alan Heathcock introduced himself and was promptly interrupted by a phone call. He answered. It was his mom. Into his microphone, he told her he was a little busy and would call her back. Spillman, ever witty: “A good citizen and a good son.”
I especially enjoyed the bit about using social media to network (but in a natural, not-slimy way). Spillman’s hilarious illustration: “[To the left] is Bret Easton Ellis. [To the right] is Emma Straub. Be on Emma’s side.” Emma: “And between us is a mountain of cocaine.” Some concrete take-aways just for you, Monkeybicycle friends!
1) Twitter is not a one-way street. You’ve got to engage with people. Don’t just toot your own horn—congratulate others, share things you like, and be a whole person, not just a writer person. You can talk about your cat, or Beyoncé, or even your cat named Beyoncé.
2) Be consistent with your social media use. Don’t get excited one day and do three blog posts and never do one again, or tweet about your great New York Times review once and subsequently forget your Twitter password. To be visible, try to be on the platform regularly—a good number to aim for is three to five tweets a day (or maybe even a week) so you’re not just disappearing into the ether. Though Matthew Specktor was once told by a social media consultant that a good number is 20 tweets a day! (Which, everyone agreed, is crazy.)
3) One thing the consultant seemed to get right though: Only one out of every 10 tweets should be about yourself.
I’ve dipped my toes into the bookfair, but it’s so vast I need to spend hours there. I’ve thus far encountered one awesome display: Grub Street, based right here in Boston. I’d share my literary fortune with you, but then it won’t come true.
By the way, the Beast from the East storm is more vicious every moment. We’re supposed to get 4-6 inches of “cement-like” snow. But tonight I’ve got three off-site parties to attend, including VIDA Prom—a dance and readings from Cheryl Strayed, Robert Pinsky, Pam Houston, Roxane Gay, and more. Prom attire is encouraged, but I couldn’t fit my ballgown on the bus to Beantown. At least I’ve got a more casual dress that doesn’t entirely clash with wellies. Maybe Kelly Link will lend me those sweet earrings?
Katie Wudel’s writing has appeared in Tin House, McSweeney’s, Prairie Schooner, Nerve, The Rumpus,and on the Ploughshares blog, and can be heard this spring on NPR’s Snap Judgment. Katie has taught creative writing at San Francisco’s School of the Arts and the University of Nebraska-Omaha Writer’s Workshop, and has been awarded scholarships and residencies from Hedgebrook, the Squaw Valley Community of Writers, and Summer Literary Seminars. In 2011, her story “Tongueless,” which first appeared in Monkeybicycle, was one of Wigleaf’s Top [Very] Short Fictions. katiewudel.com.
Posted By admin - 6th March 2013
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It’s dreary here in Boston. The AWP bigwigs must be partial to overcast skies, bone-chilling air—next year, we’re all headed to Seattle; the year after, Minneapolis. They’re calling this gross wintry mix “The Beast from the East.” A lot of folks who were supposed to arrive this morning have been stalled out at airports in St. Louis or Chicago for most of the day. We writers—who tend toward misanthropy even without slush pooling in our dress sneakers—are beating back the crankiness as best we can. Cocktails help. The hotel bar is already over capacity and friends, it’s still early.
(Bingo card courtesy of Daniel Nester)
I’ve kept my AWP bingo card handy today and already, I’ve got “N-G-O” (well, with the free space). Is it like this on the first day of Star Trek conventions? Comic-Con? To horribly misquote Buster Bluth: Man, it’s awkward in here. There are 11,000+ nerds in one place! Most of us are high on adrenaline and righteous anger at the TSA! We’ve prepared hand-outs for our panels and our 30-second book pitches are tight as hell. We. Are. Ready. But registration’s over—we’ve got nametags and this year’s spiffy new totebag, pre-packed with a hefty conference program that looks like—but is not—a phonebook. Now what?
Other than a few private gatherings, there’s a whole lot of nothing on the schedule for this evening. I’ve decided to use this spare time to wrestle with my inner demons: I am an introvert, yet I yearn so desperately to connect with my fellow man! I am accursed! I’ve donned my convention costume—unlike the Trekkies, it’s just a cardigan, a pair of specs, and a glass of wine. The first page of the schedule for tomorrow morning contains only 10 of the 17 events slotted for 9:00 AM, and already there are four I can’t miss.
But then—I spot it. The One. “Modern Fairy Tales and Retellings.” A panel! There’s a “need for fables in modern society and the literary marketplace,” it says! Kate Bernheimer! Kelly Link! Is it, like, super nerdy to get this excited about a seminar at nine in the morning? It is, right?
Katie Wudel’s writing has appeared in Tin House, McSweeney’s, Prairie Schooner, Nerve, The Rumpus,and on the Ploughshares blog, and can be heard this spring on NPR’s Snap Judgment. Katie has taught creative writing at San Francisco’s School of the Arts and the University of Nebraska-Omaha Writer’s Workshop, and has been awarded scholarships and residencies from Hedgebrook, the Squaw Valley Community of Writers, and Summer Literary Seminars. In 2011, her story “Tongueless,” which first appeared in Monkeybicycle, was one of Wigleaf’s Top [Very] Short Fictions. katiewudel.com.
