As an editor, sometimes the way writers value an acceptance into the print issue over an acceptance into the online version of the magazine is frustrating. As an academic, I understand why many writers value print publications. I also respect the desire for a physical artifact, something you can hold in your hands and leave on your coffee table and pass around with friends and loved ones. For many readers, longer work translates better on the page. I respect print. I get it. I also respect online publishing. I find it as valuable as print publication, I love the exposure it provides as well as the accessibility. We print 750 copies of our print issue. Our online magazine gets 7,500 or more unique visitors a month. Now, there are all sorts of factors that will dilute online traffic figures but I know without a doubt that more people can and do read the magazine online than the print version. This week a writer stated in his cover letter, “This story is only for print consideration.” I advised him we consider all work for both print and online publication and if that were a problem, he should withdraw his submission. He withdrew his submission. Sometimes when writers learn their work has been accepted for online publication they express disappointment, ask if there’s something they can do to get their story into the print version like it’s a back room casino in Manhattan. Twice, writers have declined publication. That is their right.

I am on a mission to eliminate the word that, whenever possible, from my writing. It is such an empty word. More often than not the that is not needed. I’m also getting ruthless with just and the excessive use of it as an empty signifier. I keep telling myself, say what something really is. Are there little words you try to eliminate from your writing or tics you try to overcome?

The Rumpus is doing a one off book club for Jonathan Franzen’s Freedom. I signed up for it.

The literary magazine club is actually going to happen! I will pull together some more coherent details early next week for you all. If you would like to join you can watch this space where many of the discussions will take place or you can join the Google Group I’ve created for other discussions and top secret club communiques. NY Tyrant sells out so you might want to get your copy of NY Tyrant 8 (Vol. 3.2) pretty soon!

Have you read the new issue of The Collagist? Mary Miller, who never ever disappoints, has a story called The Cedars of Lebanon that I just love.

Here is a pretty thorough story on the very sad affairs at VQR.

I have an extra copy of Mary Hamilton’s We Know What We Are. If you’re interested, comment with a little story about what you know you are. I’ll pick my favorite on Friday at 5 and you’ll get this book and some other good reads.

THE FREE COPIES ARE ALL GONE BUT YOU SHOULD STILL JOIN THE CLUB BECAUSE IT IS AWESOME THANK YOU.

The logistics are still being worked out but the first magazine we’ll read for the Literary Magazine Club is New York Tyrant 8. Editor Gian DiTrappano has generously agreed to donate 30 copies of the magazine to the first 30 people who join the club. If you’re interested, e-mail me at roxane at roxanegay dot com with your name and mailing address. If you do not e-mail me your mailing address I will not chase you down or hold your place in the queue for the free copies. I’ll update this post when all 30 copies have been spoken for. You might consider paying it forward and sending someone a subscription to New York Tyrant, I’m just saying, but we hope this contribution allows more people to participate regardless of their financial circumstances. If you were one of the people who joined yesterday, e-mail me your mailing address, please.

In early October, Gian will chat with us online about this latest issue of New York Tyrant and we’ll have other activities planned to make the most of the tyrannical reading experience.

For November, we will be reading an online magazine to be chosen by a club member. Each month a new member will choose the magazine we read for the following month, alternating each month between online and print magazines so we can best appreciate the range of literary publications doing such great work.

And really, it makes perfect sense. The pseudo-anonymity of virtual interactions and the anarchic vibe the Internet has going makes it easy to be angry online. Venting about any number of subjects, finely tuning our snark in a witticism dicksizing competition is the perfect panacea for the impotence of quotidian life. I don’t mind anger. It often amuses me, the way people froth at the fingertips to rail against the end of, well, everything. Today, the Internet is angry about Justin Bieber, the 16 year old with the bowl head haircut. I like to think of myself as pop culture savvy but I don’t know much about the Bieber. I know he’s young and cute. I know he sings though I’ve not heard one of his songs. I know tween girls lose their minds over him because he’s just so dreamy. He’s their Ralph Macchio. I swooned over Ralph. I had a Tiger Beat poster of the original (and one true) karate kid on my wall.

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I have been really enjoying the interesting and insightful blog posts being written by the editors of Uncanny Valley. In a recent post, frequent HTMLGIANT commenter and Uncanny Valley co-editor Mike Meginnis offered notes on teaching an introductory creative writing class. He says really smart, practical things about teaching creative writing but I’ve been mulling over his first note quite a bit. He says, “1. Intro to CW should be more about ways of reading than ways of writing.” The more I think about this statement, the more I wonder if we rely too heavily on the notion that the best writers are the best readers. I think we offer this kind of advice more out of reflex than anything else. Hear me out. There is ample evidence that to write well, one must read well. Reading and learning how to read critically, exposes us to different writing styles, voices, and techniques. We can study styles we want to emulate. We can be challenged. We can see examples of how we want not to write. I cannot deny that some of my best writing instruction has come from reading everything I can get my hands on.

That said, I firmly believe while reading is important, it is not more important than writing and increasingly I worry we are sacrificing the practice of writing for young writers at the altar of reading. Without fail, almost every writer who is asked about what writers need to do to improve their craft states, first and foremost, that writers need to read. I’ve stated this myself, quite a few times, but either we’re teaching writing or we’re teaching reading and to have a creative writing class where writing is not foregrounded gets me thinking. Why isn’t it writing that is most important? Why don’t we say that to be a great writer, you need to, well, write?

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The 28th outing of Smokelong Quarterly is a massive double issue you’re going to want to read.

The Summer 2010 issue of Frigg is really outstanding. There is fiction from Daphne Butler, Thomas Cooper, Jessica Hollander, Billy Middleton, and Ethel Rohan. There’s poetry from Laurel Blossom, Neil de la Flor and Maureen Seaton, Donora Hillard, Sam Rasnake, Tim Tomlinson, and Jeanan Verlee. The issue is consistently strong and beautifully designed. Check it out this weekend.

I am not a fan of the outdoors, camping, nature, or the wilderness even though for the past five years I lived, basically, in a forested wilderness and now I live, literally, in a cornfield. It was with a bit of trepidation that I approached Hobart 11: The Great Outdoors for no reason other than that because I don’t love the outdoors, I am not likely to want to read about the outdoors. Then a trusted friend said you have to read this story, “Evitative” and so I found renewed enthusiasm for the issue, which, conveniently, happened to be next on my To Read list. I’m glad she gave me a kick in the ass because Hobart 11: The Great Outdoors issue is so damn good. (So is the movie starring John Candy.) I never cease to be impressed by how meticulously Hobart is edited.

Evitative by B.C. Edwards is a post-apocalyptic story that isn’t annoying as such stories are sometimes wont to be. There’s a man (JoJo) and a woman living in the trees and the man has lost his words and she has lost her food memories and they are being menaced by men in canoes and she’s pregnant and there is a whole lot going on in this dense and incredible story. What I found even more interesting than the story was how the narrative voice felt very true to the circumstances and made everything that much more believable. Throughout the story there is a yearning for a different life, for food, for normalcy that is tangible.

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First I read this and then I read this, and then as we know there is the Tin House thing and Brevity is considering a reading fee to help fund honorariums and, perhaps, dissuade inappropriate submissions, which is certainly their right and I do understand where they are coming from, and finally, I read this. I’m frustrated. I can’t speak for the big fancy magazines, but for the smaller magazines such as PANK, we live and die by the slushpile. With no slushpile we would have no magazine and frankly, it would take way more time and effort to solicit writers for twelve monthly issues and a 240 page annual than it does to read submissions. Save for a handful of writers, literally, a handful, we have published the magazine exclusively via work from the slushpile or as we simply call it, the submission queue. Let me go on record as stating that even on the most frustrating days, I love reading submissions. It is what I get to do to relax and step out of my “real” life. I actually feel fucking lucky to be able to co-edit a magazine. Even when I’m reading something terrible I think, “well this is just awesomely bad,” and I feel a little thrill. I literally feel a thrill. When I stop feeling that thrill, I will take a break.

The slushpile fatigue being lamented here and there and everywhere tires me. It bores me. Please, let’s just shut up about it already. If you don’t want to deal with the slushpile, don’t have open reading periods. It really is that simple. Listening to your dissatisfaction with having to deal with the bad writers and new writers and mediocre writers who dare to submit to your magazine that is willfully accepting unsolicited submissions is about as interesting as listening to someone talk about their diet. I don’t care what you had for breakfast.

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When I was younger, I used to read Dear Abby and Ask Ann Landers. Those advice columns offered brief glimpses into the troubled lives of others. Sometimes, the columns were lighthearted and humorous with advice on how to deal with inlaws or children who refused to move out at the age of 31. There were more serious columns that dealt with addiction, or the death of a loved one, or a crumbling marriage. The advice of Ann and Abby was always sage, albeit a bit tame. In a few sentences they applied down home wisdom and common sense but more than anything their advice felt like a brief reminder that we are not alone.

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1. If you like zombies, and really, who doesn’t, check out Zombie Summer at xTx’s blog, where you will find zombie tales from many familiar writers.

2. Dark Sky Magazine is holding a chapbook contest. Each entry is only $5 which seems quite reasonable.

3. Necessary Fiction has launched a Writer in Residence program. This month, it is William Walsh who is posting these amazing fictions. Last month, was my month, and you can find writing from Giant contributors like Ryan Call, Amy McDaniel and Ken Baumann among others.

4. Janet Fitch offers Ten Rules for Writers.

5. Brevity Magazine asks if they should charge for submissions.

6. Our Island of Epidemics by Matthew Salesses is available for pre-order with gorgeous cover art by Luca DiPierro to be unveiled very soon.

7. Forthcoming from me, here, once I finish unpacking: two posts on sex, one on learning to love submissions, and a love letter to depressing literary fiction.

The Chicago Underground Library celebrates the return of the “Science of Obscurity,” featuring new, unpublished, and in-progress works presented as science fair experiments. The night will also feature a public “book launch” via catapult, scientist speed dating, and digital readings to warm your hardened techie heart. Left and right brains come together, print <3s digital, everyone wins when the laws of physics and literature collide.

Join an awesome line up of writers, designers, and publishers as they intricately explain the scientific principles underlying their work, real or imagined. Reading experiments with Jen Karmin! Storigami with Zach Dodson! Distress charts with A D Jameson! Teenage taxonomies with Mairead Case! Curmudgeonly cuttlefish with Libby Walker! Hand-cranked projector mad libs with Two With Water! All participants will also have work for sale.

Special projects from the Society of Furthering Truth (SOFT), The Book Bike, readings from Featherproof Books’ iPhone application TripleQuick, surprise musical guests, video interviews with the CUL crew about your favorite forgotten and under-recognized Chicago publishers and writers, and Scientist Speed Dating! Yes! We said Scientist Speed Dating. You’ll have two minutes to ask real honest-to-goodness scientists any burning questions of your choice like why recycled paper tastes better and how quickly to induce vomiting after consuming The Christmas Sweater.

This event is free and for all ages.

Logistics
Saturday, 10 July 2010, 7–10pm
Jupiter Outpost (1139 W. Fulton Market, Chicago)
Food and drink will be available for sale

If you’re in Chicago tonight and looking for something to do, there’s this: