Innehållsförteckning för May 2017 från The Writer

Self-publishing. If I catch even one of you wrinkling your nose as you read that, I’m marching over and rapping your knuckles with a ruler. I am so very tired of all this snobbery surrounding how one chooses to publish their work. It is now possible to make a lucrative career as a self-published author – sometimes, in fact, more lucrative than being a traditionally published author, especially in genre or other niche markets. To be fair, I’m not ignoring the power of gatekeepers: I believe there is undeniable value in having an expert in the field champion a manuscript as extraordinary. But to pretend self-publishing is never the right option, and that all writers who self-publish are talentless hacks who slap a book together and call it art? Friends,…

What makes this sentence great? In my book How to Write Short: Word Craft for Fast Times, I use the aphorism as an enduring example of effective short writing. An aphorism is a pithy statement that is sure of itself. Even if it is not true, or not always true, you believe it anyway, as when Samuel Johnson noted that “Second marriages are the triumph of hope over experience.” Alice Hoffman gets close to that effect with this sentence. I would argue that if she, or someone else, deleted the qualifying first word, it would leave us with an actual aphorism: “The right thing feels all wrong until it is over and done with.” Yeah, that’s true. —Roy Peter Clark has taught writing at the Poynter Institute since 1977. He…

Robert Olen Butler stopped by the Ringling College of Art and Design this past November to read in our Visiting Writers Forum speaker series; he then headed down to the Miami Book Fair International to read with National Book Award winner Ha Jin. And that’s before heading to Europe to finish off the 80-day book tour to promote his new novel, Perfume River, which he describes as the “best book I’ve ever written” – something he’s never said about any of his books before, including his Pulitzer Prize-winning collection of short stories, A Good Scent from a Strange Mountain. Despite Butler suffering from an increasingly severe bout of laryngitis – he was on day 54 of the tour, and he did a large-venue gig in Tallahassee the night before without…

“I queried probably a year before I should have and got a few nice rejections. Then I said, ’OK. Back at it,’ and revised and worked really hard for another year and then queried again and signed with Carrie Howland. I was in too much of a rush and should have taken it a little slower, but that’s one of those lessons. I got a couple nice specific [revision suggestion] things that I can’t remember now, but probably finding ways to make the voice more active, to make the clue-finding more active. Before I found Carrie, I spent five years, maybe four and a half, revising. I wrote the first draft in a year, revised for three more years, found Carrie. We revised together for a few months, brought it…

Flash fiction goes by many names: microfiction, sudden fiction, short-short, postcard fiction, etc. Its word count runs anywhere from 140 characters to over a thousand words, generally capping out at 1500. Any number of famous writers have written flash, including Langston Hughes, Raymond Carver, David Foster Wallace, Jamaica Kincaid, John Updike, Joyce Carol Oates, Amy Hempel, and Margaret Atwood, to name only a few. Since the 1986 appearance of the landmark Sudden Fiction, an anthology edited by Robert Shepard and James Thomas, flash fiction has become a special genre for many fiction writers, with quite a few magazines and journals as well as small presses open to the form. While commercial presses aren’t generally receptive to single-authored flash fiction collections, W.W. Norton published Flash Fiction in 1992; Flash Fiction Forward…

“There's a lot more to publishing a book than writing it and slapping a cover on it.” —Vince Flynn In 1986, visitors to the Spanish Steps in Rome encountered a gastronomic dilemma: They could enjoy a burger from the new McDonald’s that had just opened, or they could accept a bowl of penne from Carlo Petrini. A writer and political activist, Petrini’s goal was to protest the standardization of the world’s food. In doing so, he sparked a movement that has, for the last 30 years, aimed to promote culinary diversity. Since it was formed to protest a McDonald’s, the movement’s name was a fait accompli: Slow Food. Cooking and writing are similar professions; I know, because I’ve been doing both professionally for years. A good book, like a good…

To what extent does a manuscript evolve between the first draft and the published novel? After reading Carmiel Banasky’s critically acclaimed debut novel, The Suicide of Claire Bishop, I asked the author about her revision process. What she shared during our extended conversation at the LA County Museum of Art may benefit you in your own revision process. EXCERPT 1A: FIRST DRAFT Prologue 2004 I am a lie. But I am not a liar. What I am is a good enough man, which is why I’m telling you, dear listeners, starting right now, every truth I have ever known. Here is your first truth: My name is West Butler and I am the thief in the gallery, stealing the painting. Always. My face sweats behind my ski mask (pink, not…

“My friends told me all about their experiences when they were happening in the years prior. I was someone that they called in the middle of episodes, so it was a bit of a trauma on my end. I’ve had many friends who had psychotic breaks who are just the most brilliant, capable, ‘with-it’ people I’ve ever known. Having that be so close, the line was no longer existent. There was no longer ‘Othering’ possible between us and them; ‘crazy’ and ‘insane-insane.’ It can happen to anybody, especially writers. “There’s no way to get it right. I had to let go of getting the representation of mental illness perfect. As long as people without mental illness could relate to West in some way, and as long as my friends who…

INSIDE LITERARY MAGAZINES Whenever editors at Barrelhouse interview a literary figure for the pages of their biannual print magazine, they conclude with the question, “What’s your favorite Patrick Swayze movie?” Swayze, the mulleted actor who starred in The Outsiders, Roadhouse, and Dirty Dancing, occupies a significant place in the hearts and imaginations of the editors who run both the magazine and the Washington, D.C., nonprofit literary organization of the same name. They’ve asked “The Swayze Question” of everyone from Malcolm Gladwell to Emmylou Harris to Chuck Klosterman. “Part of this whole Barrelhouse enterprise, as evidenced in our tagline [fiction. nonfiction. poetry. pop flotsam. cultural jetsam.], is the celebration of low culture along with more traditional ‘art,’” reads an editor’s note on the organization’s website. “And there are no movies that…

By the rules Some rules are made to be broken, but in the world of writing contests, that’s not the case. Here are common elements to double check before you submit your work. You don’t want to be disqualified for a clerical error. 1. Blind submissions are called such for a reason. If the contest you enter is one of them, make sure your name and other vital details don’t appear anywhere in the submission file. This includes: cover page, title line, and header/footer. Online submission managers have their own ways of identifying you – trust that they will work. 2. Be sure your submission is within the specified word count. Judges may be willing to let 10 or 20 extra words slide, but if you’re more than that, definitely…

How can I write a captivating short story? Whether a successful published novelist or a creative writing student, all writers should try their hand at short stories at least a few times in their lives. Writing a successful short story – which I’ll define as executing a captivating, engaging narrative arc in roughly 3,000 to 5,000 words – is a great way to hone your skills in narrative structure, character development, and setting, all rendered in elegant prose. So where to begin? Well…with the story, of course. Short fiction is an art form that differs from, say, telling a story at a dinner party, but it starts from the same seed: the story. So sit down and, in one sitting, write out the story. Don’t worry if it sounds terrible…

Always do X. Never do Y. Nearly all writing teachers have a version of these kinds of tips – the “Rules of Good Writing,” the “10 Commandments on Writing Like Shakespeare,” the “How Hemingway Did It” adages. Following rules keeps student writers on track because they haven’t got it all figured out yet. For them, having a list of clear, actionable tips is great, because it helps them feel like they’re clearly on the path to good writing. But most writers reach a point where following the rules feels like being trapped in a cage. What then? Break the rules. Smash them into smithereens. Obliterate each last axiom, tip, and must-do...so long as the end product is effective writing! Here are eight commonly repeated rules of writing that ultimately might…

» Has been published in Glimmer Train, Slice, Guernica, and The Rumpus, among others. » Received her MFA from Hunter College in NYC, where she later taught undergraduate creative writing. » The Suicide of Claire Bishop is her first novel. In a starred review, Library Journal calls it “a brilliantly, sleekly told puzzle piece that snares readers to the end.” » Currently lives in Los Angeles and teaches at the LA Writers Group. » Past recipient of a Bread Loaf scholarship and numerous other fellowships and residencies.…

Gregg Hurwitz is the true definition of a renaissance author, working in almost every aspect of writing, from film and TV to novels and comics – or even academic articles about William Shakespeare. A New York Times best-selling author of 16 novels, Hurwitz started writing at a young age and hasn’t stopped since. He’s been nominated for numerous awards and has a noted habit of going the extra mile to get his story: Hurwitz has gone swimming with sharks and posed undercover as a cultist in the name of research. Really, the question is: What hasn’t Gregg Hurwitz done? When asked about Hurwitz, his publicist, Dana Kaye, says, “I’ve read nearly all of Gregg’s books, and one thing is consistent: He is committed to giving readers a real front-row seat…

We’ve examined Masters of Fine Arts degrees from various angles in this column, but one thing all of the programs we’ve looked at have in common is that they certainly aren’t cheap. For many prospective students, the high cost of attaining an MFA is daunting – and often prohibitive. That’s why Robin Tung, who received her own MFA from Johns Hopkins University, started the blog “Affording the MFA” (affordingthemfa.wordpress.com) in 2012, with the intent of helping others navigate the difficult and stressful waters of applying for – and affording – the MFA. Her site contains a full list of schools Tung considers to be “fully funded,” which the site defines as “one that provides both tuition remission and a stipend to EVERY admitted student.” Tung has taught creative writing at…

There is something truly special about a great short story. Done well, it is a selfcontained little gem to be savored. A talented short story writer has the ability to create characters and dialogue that grab the reader and create a connection within a limited space. Without a doubt, Anthony Varallo is one of those writers. This author of three short story collections is known for his innate talent for transforming the everyday stuff of life into compelling narrative. He is also the fiction editor of the literary journal Crazyhorse, as well as a professor in the English department at the College of Charleston. Later this year, Varallo’s newest story collection, Everyone Was There, will be released. In a slight departure, the book will focus on works of flash fiction.…