The HTMLGIANT 20 Under 40 Pick ‘Em Contest
Last week The New York Observer reported that on June 7th The New Yorker will name the top twenty American writers under forty, and we’d like to celebrate this really incredibly important event in the history of American letters by running a free March Madness-style Pick ‘Em contest for you HTMLGIANT readers. If you’d like to enter, all you have to do is email to htmlgiant [at] htmlgiant [dot] com your list of the twenty authors you think The New Yorker will select as “the key writers of this generation.” Then we all wait with baited breath until The New Yorker publishes their list! The top three entrants who have the most picks that correctly match the names on The New Yorker list will each receive a prize package. Should you wish to pay an ‘entry fee,’ please consider making a donation to any of the presses/publishers/people who have put up swag for the prize package; however, there is no requirement for an entry fee.
Details after the jump.
Let’s Get That City Good and Opened
Three pieces of news from our friends at the other O.C (above, not left).
First, from the Department of How Time Flies- has it really been a year since the last Open City benefit? Well, judging by the fact that the linked-to post is from exactly a year ago tomorrow, I would say “yes.” Last year’s event, at the National Arts Club, featured (among other things) an open bar and a reading by Billy Collins–the two went very well together. This year the benefit is being held in a private residence (wanna bet it’s a nice one?), and will feature a reading by Walter Kirn, author most recently of Up in the Air, which you might remember that Hollywood liked so much they Clooneyed it. (Aside: anyone other than me remember (read= “love”) Kirn’s first book, My Hard Bargain, a taut, brutal little collection of stories edited by some guy named Gordon Lish?) Anyway, it ought to be clear to you by this point that whether it is publishing books and the magazine, or whether it’s fund-raising, the one thing Open City does not do is screw around. These guys define what it means to be indie without being small-time, by which I mean to simply say that I think they are great, but the casual reader may wish to steel her reserve before clicking through to check out all the details and price tickets. If it’s a bit out of your range (dollars-wise or distance-wise), no shame in treating yourself to a shiny new subscription, and/or a couple of books, and calling it a day.
Second, from the Department of Education. The First Annual Open City Summer Writing Workshop will be held at the NYU Writers House over a long weekend in high July. The core faculty is Thomas Beller, Jason Brown, Martha McPhee and Said Sayrafiezadeh. Visiting writers include Mary Gaitskill, Sam Lipsyte, Edmund White, David Goodwillie, and the great David Berman–plus a whole lot more; interested parties should avail themselves of the full details, which live here. Good times!
Last but not least, the 2010 RRofihe Trophy is currently accepting submissions, and will be through October 15. At first I thought (read=”hoped”) that this somehow had something to do with Katie Roiphe, but it turns out to really about short fiction, which is pretty good, too. It’s a contest, to be judged by Rick Rofihe of anderbo.com, and the winner gets $500, an actual trophy, and publication in Open City.
And that’s pretty much everything I can possibly tell you about Open City, short of the colors of their underwears. Reader–would that I could.
Will the Open City benefit look like the above? Mischa Barton wonders, but is sad because she knows that she will probably never find out.
Win Robert Lopez’s Part of the World
In one of my favorite books last year, Robert Lopez’s Kamby Bolongo Mean River, a man is locked in a room with a telephone and a bed. He spends a lot of time answering phone calls from strangers, and a lot of time drawing stick men and masturbating, and rummaging through his brain contents of growing up in a place called Injury, Alaska.
The book’s title comes out of the narrator’s remembrance of his brother repeating the phrase from the TV miniseries Roots. The phrase, along with other odd small ideas, indented moments, phrases looped, present themselves so seared on the narrator’s head it is as if he’s not in this single tiny room at all. If you’ve ever wanted a perfect book to teach or observe voice as character, setting, etc., Rob is the one, both here in Kamby, and in his first book Part of the World. Few maintain such control line by line of what, where, and when while managing to keep you hypnotized in tone.
Rob has offered to give away a few copies of a rare purple-covered edition of Part of the World, never before available. To enter, just comment here with a memory of your own childhood related to some looming repetition of phrase or sound or image from TV or film.
Three winners will be selected late Thursday night.
lokes in damp 3 hotos
1. Neil from ESPN has been emailing me. And he says, “In short: We’re inviting folks to submit (to fictioncontest@espnthemag.com) sports-themed short stories of up to 3,000 words, and the best story (as picked by me and the editor of Stymie) will run in a future issue of ESPN. Then comes the fame and fortune, naturally.”
If you have a sports story, send it. Deadline is June 1st.
2. I just got an iPhone. Why should writers care? What can I do now besides take notes and commit “Douche baggery in a mesmerizing false flame.”
3. This invisible bookshelf is like emo-in-a-seatbelt badass.
Light Boxes Giveaway
To enter to win the original PG version of Light Boxes, together with the new Penguin version, buy a book from an independent press and forward the receipt to lightboxescontest at gmail dot com. If you buy a book from an indie press at a brick and mortar store, scan the receipt or take a good photo of it and email that. Your name will be entered once for every book you buy. Then I will conduct a fair drawing. ENTRIES ARE DUE BY MIDNIGHT MAY 24th. Penguin will officially release their version on May 25, and I’ll do the drawing then.
winner winner hot sauce dinner
Ok, for the “Wink Wink” contest, the 2010 results are in!
It was tough, very tough–like counting lilies in a pond or bicycling on a bowling lane tough–to reach a decision.
I want to thank everyone including the various ANONs who turned in the usual crudely sexual themes. The internet could not exist without you, ANONs of the world.
The winner is “twice, never again” by Tom.
I found it ambiguous in a satisfying way, as opposed to confusing. I found I could read off-the-page and feel personal (I’ve felt this way with drugs, diet sodas, noodle shops, certain bedroom follies, etc.) but also universal (forgiveness of_____, themes of relationships, guilt, etc.). I thought it worthy of a late-night ponder. It generated momentum. It did not teach or preach. It appealed to my deeper self.
Congratulations, Tom. Send me an email (leapsloth14@hotmail.com) with address for your book, hot sauce, and deck of cards.
Finalists include:
“spooning in church” by Ben Brooks and “Corby trouser press” by Donald.
Look out in 2011 for Wink Wink 2.
Ken Baumann—
In celebration of Mr. Kimball’s & Mr. Devine’s appearance tonight, I’m giving two copies of WORDS away. Make a sentence out of these words: a, and, it, dog, runs, mother, blood, diamond, tired, heavy, wall, takes, glimpses, eats, burnt, opaque, crams, the, him, her, dead, fall, yes, their. Add your email. I’ll pick two favorites by the 9pm PST.
79
Evelyn Hampton—
To celebrate the release of Harold Abramowitz’s book, Not Blessed, Les Figues is having a contest that involves remixing selections from the book. The deadline is April 30. Guidelines are on the Les Figues site. I read Not Blessed recently and it’s good. It works by what feels like a literary equivalent of persistence of vision.
I Helped Girls Write Now and You Can Too
Do you people know about Significant Objects, the ebay-based web-journal that raises money for worthy causes by getting writers to write flash fiction about the random items they put up for auction? If not, why not? Blake told you about this a month ago! Anyway, at present SO is in a five-part partnership with The Believer, and yours truly is one of the writers who was asked to write an original piece of flash-fic re a SIGNIFICANT OBJECT, in this case a pair of metal flowers (see left). You can read my story, and bid on the FLOWERS OF INSPIRATION here. You can also see the complete history of the experiment, with tons of data, including sales rankings, here. I hope you will consider bidding on the metal flowers, to help raise money for GIRLS WRITE NOW, which is a very fantastic organization that does this:
Girls Write Now provide guidance, support, and opportunities for New York City’s underserved or at-risk high school girls, enabling them to develop their creative, independent voices, explore careers in professional writing, and learn how to make healthy choices in school, career, and life.
To potentially sweeten this deal, I’m offering the winning bidder a copy of my story collection. AND, if that bid is over $76 (the Doty-Lethem Threshold), I will go all-out CARE PACKAGE on you, and also include copies of The Agriculture Reader #3, the so-new-it’s-not-on-our-website-yet (though it might be by the time you win this auction) Agriculture Reader #4, plus something else that I don’t know what it is yet–maybe a McSweeney’s #24 if I have any of those left, or something else cool if I don’t. So okay, head on over there and raise these girls some money. And hey, while you’re at it, check out the incredible wealth of short-shorts in the SO archive. Start with Padgett Powell on a Mickey Mouse nametag, maybe; onward to Jenny Offill on a miniature turkey dinner; then how about Pulitzer Prize finalist Lydia Millet and her chili cat? The list is nearly endless, as is the joy.
A Hint Fiction Contest + A Flatmancrooked Launch
Last year the term “hint fiction” was introduced in the essay “Hint Fiction: When Flash Fiction Becomes Just Too Flashy” by Robert Swartwood, published at Flash Fiction Chronicles. To commemorate the occasion, a retrospective essay by the same author , “Hint Fiction: One Year Later” appears at FFC today. To celebrate Hint Fiction’s birthday, Robert is having another contest.
What is Hint Fiction? Inspired by Ernest Hemingway’s infamous six-word story — “For sale: Baby shoes, never worn” — Hint Fiction is a story of 25 words or fewer that suggests a larger, more complex story. These are complete stories that hint at a larger story, not a first sentence or random sentence plucked from a larger work thinly disguised as a story. To see examples, look at last year’s winners and finalists.