Disabled voices matter. More importantly, disabled writers deserve a chance to be celebrated, not tokenized. In opening submissions specifically for writers with disabilities for this anthology, we want to give these authors the space to flourish while we continue to fight for change in the publishing landscape. We want fiction, nonfiction, and poetry about living with a disability, and we want to see this perspective explored from every facet writers are willing to share with us.
Read moreRemembering Carmen Gillespie
It is with great sadness that we here at Stillhouse Press mourn the loss of poet and professor Carmen Gillespie.
Kyle Dargan & Carmen Gillespie celebrating the release of The Ghosts of Monticello, Oct. 2017
We are proud to have had the opportunity to publish Carmen’s final collection of poetry, The Ghosts of Monticello: A Recitatif, which was selected for the 2016 Stillhouse Press Prize for Poetry by guest judge, Kyle Dargan. In probing the relationship between the half-sisters, Martha Wayles Jefferson and Sally Hemings, the collection was an example of Carmen’s lifelong dedication to her own craft as a poet, as well as to lifting up the voices of marginalized women, especially those of the African diaspora. Unfortunately, Carmen passed in the same year as one of her own heroes and a subject of much of her scholarship, Toni Morrison. The subtitle, “A Recitatif,” is an allusion to Morrison’s well-known short story of the same title, meant to provide a frame of reference for the intercultural dialogue that The Ghosts of Monticello explores and aims to inspire.
In working closely with Carmen, we found her intense, intelligent, and insistent in all the best ways. She was a passionate writer, teacher and mother. The vision and compassion that she brought to her work and to the world will be sorely missed.
Read Carmen’s obituary here.
So you have a manuscript...
by Stefan Lopez
What does Stillhouse Press look for in a manuscript? What’s the common thread running through space age romance, paternal combustion, plantation poetry, and disability care reform?
“We want something unpredictable, bringing a new experience to the table.”
In celebration of four productive years of publishing, we’re releasing a series of interviews with members of Stillhouse Press, from submissions and acquisition, from cover design to release, all to shine a light on the publication process.
Aryelle Young is Stillhouse Press’ current submissions editor, and one of the first to have a say about what gets published. She works with all the submissions, assigning them to teams of readers, reading through reader reviews, going back to the manuscripts themselves, and sending promising pieces up the editorial ladder.
Marcos L. Martínez is the next link in the manuscript chain. An alumnus of George Mason University’s MFA Creative Writing program, Martínez is one of the founding members of Stillhouse Press, and serves as the acquisitions editor.
Choosing a manuscript is a daunting task. Even small publishers get a sizeable amount of submissions. “We had contest submissions open for a couple hours, and we got five manuscripts in that time alone. I haven’t been here that long but I’d guess that we get well over a hundred manuscripts a year,” says Young.
It’s an especially formidable number, when considering that Stillhouse publishes an average of two titles annually. The judging process must therefore be thorough.
“A lot of what I’m doing right now is outreach at things like conferences and readings, to keep an eye on authors we are interested in. I also work with our other editors on manuscripts that we think have potential,” Martínez says of his role.
Each manuscript sees multiple rounds of vetting from teams of volunteer readers—largely sources from George Mason’s MFA , BFA, and English programs—who read the manuscripts on a deadline, give each one an individual score, and then discuss the assigned manuscripts together, comparing reactions.
For prose, Stillhouse asks its readers to look for the classic staples of good writing, such as dynamic characters, interesting subject matter, and powerful language. The factor they most heavily weigh is the author’s competence and voice: “We look for strength of writing and a good clear voice,” Young says. “A few mistakes aren’t a big deal as long as we can see a writer’s vision coming through in the manuscript.”
“Strong voice can mean a variety of things,” says Martínez. “Think of it as having a distinct personality and a unique sense of writing. A narrative that’s distinct or unique, or a unique type of storytelling, like hybrid works.”
He uses Mark Polanzak’s POP! as an example: “What really fascinated us was that it was a memoir that included moments that were obviously fiction. The opening was really eye-catching. Polanzak’s father disappears in a literal puff of smoke.”
As for Poetry, Stillhouse wants something that can’t be easily fit into a simple stylistic label.
“We’re looking for something that pushes the envelope, not just transcendentalism or romanticism or love poetry," Young says. At the same time, it can’t be completely divorced from developments in the wider world of poetry. Quite the opposite: “We want something that’s part of the contemporary conversation.”
“Our most recent poetry publication, [Carmen Gillespie's] The Ghosts of Monticello was actually submitted in our nonfiction contest,” says Martínez.
Once Aryelle and her team find a prospective manuscript, it is then opened up for discussion by all of Stillhouse’s editors.
“Generally, we all get together at a big table. We talk about what we think are the manuscript’s pros and cons. Does it fit our vision? What kind of marketability does it have? What are some of the challenges does it present? The decision to publish has always been unanimous,” says Young.
Even after the unanimous vote is received, the process is not over. A proposal is sent to board members.
"If they give the okay, we talk to the author and see if they’re willing to work with us."
It’s a complex process, which takes plenty of time and effort, and according to Martínez, “in the best circumstances, the timeframe from submission to acquisition takes six to 12 months. From acquisition to publishing it takes, at the very least, a year.”
So what should prospective authors aim for?
Aside from writing well, don’t put too much in the cover letter. “It isn’t a make or break factor.” Young says, “The shorter and more concise it is, the more likely it’ll make an impact. Don’t take the mystery out of reading your manuscript. We want it to grab us as we read, not have it laid out before we even start.“
Martínez suggests expanding your efforts outside of your writing. “It’s really important for authors to engage with their community, and find a base with other authors and peers… Often we write in isolation, and that’s an important process, but you need to build a network of people already interested in your work.”
In the end, they both suggest patience and perseverance. “The publishing process normally takes a long time. Just because you didn’t get a response, or got rejected, doesn’t necessarily mean that your work is bad. Keep writing, and keep submitting.”
"Keep writing, and keep submitting."
Stefan Lopez has an internship with Stillhouse Press,
a Bachelor’s Degree in English from George Mason University,
and a head full of empty.
Hope, Grit, and Resilience: The Inspiration Behind Dan Tomasulos' American Snake Pit
By Tyrell Jordan
"American Snake Pit" will be released May 1 by Stillhouse Press.
Daniel Tomasulo is a man of many degrees, from his MFA in creative writing—which helped him write his way through his forthcoming memoir, American Snake Pit —to his work in the field of positive psychology.
But while his knowledge and experiece are captivating, it’s the stories of his patients that show the true value of his work.
I was nervous at the start of our phone call, but the tone of Tomasulo’s voice is friendly and warm, and my feeling quickly changed. He is, after all, a psychologist by trade. His job involves setting people at ease.
American Snake Pit is the story of the disregarded souls who ended up in his care after Staten Island's Willowbrook State School for people with intellectual disabilities closed its doors for good in 1987. The book details his struggle to give voices to those who could not advocate for themselves.
Tomasulo’s voice is friendly and warm... He is, after all, a psychologist by trade. His job involves setting people at ease.
I was curious about who he would like to meet with again, if he had the chance.
"Jake," he answered easily.
Jake was an austistic savant, who Tomasulo worked with during his time at Walden House, an experimental, community-based home for the intellectually and mentally handicapped that he helped established in the 1980s, and one of the first of its kind. Jake's ability to memorize information systems—most notably the Manhattan phone book—and recall it from memory at will made his intellectual disabilities difficult for the state to classify.
“He was fascinating person," Tomasulo told me. "He had many abilities, as well as disabilities."
The way he described Jake made it seem like his disabilities, while handicaps, were also the underlying foundation for his remarkable abilities.
Tomasulo’s purpose for writing this book is something I haven’t encountered with other authors: “I’d like [people] to have more compassion for [those] with disabilities… and to have more hope in their own lives,” he said. “I’d want people to realize that despite the situation, the people of Willowbrook have lived meaningful lives. They are exemplars of hope—and inspiration for us all.”
This compassion and understanding is the driving force behind his work—giving a voice to those who otherwise did not have the ability to tell their stories.
“Unlike the Women's Liberation Movement, or the Vietnam War, or the Civil Rights Movement, this group didn’t have an author," he said. "This became my mission—to help tell their story.”
Unlike the Women's Liberation Movement, or the Vietnam War, or the Civil Rights Movement, this group didn’t have an author. This became my mission —
to help tell their story.
But Tomasulo couldn’t tell his patients’ stories without first telling his own. While Walden House helped save many living with severe handicaps from a life of institutionalization, in many ways, it also saved Tomasulo, giving his early life as a psychologist its focus.
Tomasulo, reading from his collection in early March at The Association of Writers and Writing Programs Conference in Tampa, Fl.
As a writer myself, I have chapters of my novel that I enjoyed writing, and those that were difficult for me to write. This was true for Tomasulo, as well.
“The chapter on my moving into the boarding house was difficult because it was the end of my relationship and I had run out of money—a very low spot in my life,” he said. “But maybe because of the difficulty, it was also the chapter that had the most humor.”
It took him the better part of ten years to write his reflection on his time at Walden House, but while some of it was painful, much of his writing is infused with humor. “The chapter back with Jake was really fun to write because I was able to recall all of his antics,” Tomasulo said.
He acknowledges that helping people communicate beyond their disabilities takes a certain resilience of spirit, and he hopes that’s something more people will understand by reading his memoir.
“I’d like [people] to have more compassion for people with disabilities—especially with intellectual and psychological disabilities,” he told me.
Thirty years after the closure of Willowbrook State School, there is still much the general public doesn’t understand about the treatment of those with severe intellectual disabilities, but Tomasulo’s American Snake Pit is a step in the right direction.
Tyrell Jordan is a freshman at George Mason University,
seeking his BFA in Creative Writing. He has written a novel and is currently at work on its sequel, both of which he hopes to have published.
Maybe We Can't Live Without Amazon
By Meghan McNamara
I say it a lot these days: Amazon is taking over the world.
We buy our gadgets from Amazon, our groceries—some might even say our news, if you count the fact that Amazon's president and CEO, Jeff Bezos, also owns the nationally syndicated Washington Post. Soon, we may even buy our healthcare from this behemoth online retailer. Often, our dollars support Amazon in ways we aren't even cognizant of.
Amazon's influence isn't hyperbolic; this company is redefining the way we purchase and pay for almost everything these days.
What started out as an online book retailer has quickly, in the span of just twenty years, spiraled into a nationwide dealer of goods and services. And there’s plenty about that which might give government regulators cause for concern. But what most of the Amazon-consuming public likely isn’t privy to, is the complete lack of regard (or seeming disdain) that the company continues to show the publishing community.
It’s no small secret that independent publishers get short shrift with big box stores, but these days, Amazon is extending their indifference as far as big publishing houses, distributors, and authors.
For Stillhouse Press, this is hardly surprising. In 2017, we had two titles listed as “Unavailable” on their publication date, despite showing up for presale for months leading up to their release. What’s more, warehouses showed the titles as "in stock," but after several hours on the phone with out-of-country call centers, Amazon unapologetically told us there had been a “glitch in the system,” and we needed to be patient while it worked itself out.
Source: Twitter, @kellyforsythe_
In the end, our distributor couldn’t force Amazon's hand on the matter any more than we could and the books continued to show up as unavailable for the better part of the week that followed. As a result, we ended up returning to Ingram’s distribution arm, for little reason except that they had more pull with Amazon than the smaller distributor we had been using.
Stories like this are a dime a dozen—and hardly the only thing Amazon is doing to undermine small presses. Last November, Goodreads.com—one of the many businesses owned by Amazon—took their previously free book “Giveaway” option to market. What had once functioned as a grassroots marketing tool for indie publishers and self-published authors is now a $119/book marketing investment.*
Why offer something for free when you have the power and visibility to charge for it? seems to be the modus operandi here. And sure, it seems like an excellent way to pull in even more in profit, but some are dubious about whether or not the program will stick around. As an indie press or self-published author, often times the funds just simply aren’t available.
Source: Swenson Book Development
Perhaps one of the most palpable areas where publishers are starting to feel the impact of Amazon’s capitalist ways, however, is with the company’s [in]famous "buy button."
Amazon's "Buy Button," now available to the highest bidder.
With the exception of books, Amazon has historically offered their buy buttons to the highest bidder—the party that could offer a new good at the best (read: cheapest) price, regardless of who had brick and mortar rights to distribute the product. The emphasis on new is important here, because with booksellers, it should—in theory—be the publisher who holds the only new copies of a just-published or forthcoming book.
Not only does allowing third parties the right to a book's buy button undercut publishers, distributors, and authors (who see no dividends from books sold by third parties), but it ultimately begs the question: Where are these third parties sourcing their "new" books from? Some publishers have attempted to stand up to Amazon, but it doesn’t look like the company has any intention of changing its policy.
So... where do we go from here?
If my bookshelf and the recent Association of Writing and Writing Professionals conference (AWP) are any indication, the independent literary community is as ebullient and self-supportive as ever. But, if it is to continuing flourishing while the most popular platform for sales continues to re-write the rules, we in the book-buying community have to adapt our habits.
I get it : it's simply easier to buy your books from Amazon. It's faster, often even slightly cheaper. But lately I've thinking about how important ease really is in the book buying process.
Last week, while surfing the web and drinking my morning coffee, I came across a book that gave me that "I have to have this" feeling. I get it often, sometimes twice a week (to my partner's dismay). I navigated easily to the Amazon site. As a Prime customer, it could be on my doorstep in two days.
But I didn't end up adding the book to my cart. Instead, I called my local bookstore, One More Page, and spoke to a human (terrifying, I know). It took five minutes. I chatted with the woman on the other end of the line, exchanged pleasantries, told her I'd see her in a week. It will take about five days for my book to reach the store. But that's fine. I can wait. In fact, I am already looking forward to the trip, to the inky goodness of freshly-printed pages and colorful rows of un-cracked spines.
Maybe we can’t live without Amazon — where would I buy my fancy French sea salt, or those perfectly sized tension rods at a moments notice?— but we can change what we depend on it for, and I would argue that books should not be one. #BuyBetter
* As of press time.
The perfect pairing for all your stillhouse reads
THE HOLIDAY SEASON IS UPON US!
As 2018 steadily approaches, we've go a few drink recommendations
to pair with your favorite Stillhouse Press selections.
Carmen Gillespie’s latest collection interrupts the everyday to bring us the spiritual visitations of Sally Hemings, her half-sister Martha Wayles Jefferson, and other famed and forgotten residents of the Monticello plantation. These poems reach into the distant past to unearth songs of pain and longing, weighty with the long history of American silence that continues to circumscribe our lives today.
Monticello Spiced Rum Punch
History is a tough pill to swallow. For this, we'll need plenty of rum. Adapted from this Bon Appétit recipe, this rum punchis made to satiate partygoers and historical ghosts alike.
Ingredients
1 cup George Bowman rum
1 cup fresh grapefruit juice
1 cup meyer lemon juice
1/3 cup Luxardo maraschino liqueur
1/4 cup simple syrup, 2 teaspoons bitters (Angostura works well)
1 cup sliced mangoes
1 cup of assorted citrus fruits, sliced into rounds
Directions
Add all ingredients to bowl. Mix well.
Chill.
Serve with ice.
Maybe mermaids and robots are lonely. Maybe stargazing dinosaurs escape extinction, and ‘80s icons share their secrets and scams. A boardwalk Elvis impersonator declines in a Graceland of his own, Bigfoot works as a temp, families fall apart and come back together.
The Elvis Peach
Rumor has it, Elvis once reportedly drank so much peach brandy it nearly killed him. Adapted from Food & Wine, this brandy-based brew will take you from fabulist faraway worlds to Great Recession realism in a single sip.
Directions
Add the rum, peach brandy, black tea, simple syrup and lemon juice to a large pitcher.
Stir, add the water and stir again.
Refrigerate until cold.
Serve in collins glasses with citrus garnish.
Ingredients
4 ounces Mt. Defiance dark rum
5 tablespoons simple syrup
4 ounces brewed black tea
4 ounces lemon juice
Splash of water
When Mark Polanzak was seventeen, his father spontaneously combusted on the tennis court, vanishing forever. It is also entirely possible that he died of a heart attack.
The Gin Fiz Wallop
Like Polanzak's hybrid memoir, each slurp of this fizzy little number is scarcely what you might expect.
Ingredients
Combine 2 ounces Catoctin Creek Watershed Gin
Juice from 1/2 a lemon
2 teaspoons of simple syrup
Club soda
1/2 package of Pop Rocks
Pinch of granulated sugar
Directions
On a small plate, combine Pop Rocks and sugar
Wet rim of highball glass with a slice of lemon
Add gin, simple syrup, and lemon juice to cocktail shaker and shake well.
Strain into glass, careful not to disrupt the rim.
Top with club soda and serve.
Bryan Borland’s third poetry collection examines what it means to dig—to undertake the intense labor of unearthing the personal/political/artistic self and embracing the consequences of that knowledge.
The "DIG This" Manhattan
We're craving bourbon for this sexy love story, the way readers crave
their next Stillhouse fix. Adapted from this Ted Allen cocktail, you need this Manhattan like you need blood in the throat.
Directions
Add ingredients to cocktail shaker.
Shake well.
Rub an orange pee along the rim of your martini glass.
Strain drink into glass.
Garnish with one (or two!) cherries.
Ingredients
2 ounces Bowman Brothers bourbon
1 ounce Mt. Defiance sweet vermouth
1 dash of bitters
1 orange peel
Luxardo cherries.
For poet Anna Leahy and scientist Douglas R. Dechow, quintessential children of the Space Age, love for each other and love of space are inseparable. The moon landings, the shuttle program, the prospect of manned travel to Mars: each stop in humanity’s journey to space has marked a step in their ongoing love affair with each other and the cosmos.
[Generation] Space Punch
Adapted from the Belle Isle Craft Sprits recipe, this spacey brew will have you reaching for your dearest... or maybe just another mug of this stellar concoction.
Directions
Combine ingredients in punch bowl.
Add ice.
Garnish with rosemary and serve immediately.
Ingredients
1 bottle Belle Isle Ruby Red Grapefruit
2 bottle sparkling wine (try Virginia's Horton Sparkling Viognier)
5 ounces St. Germain elderflower liquer
5 ounces white grapefruit juice
3 ounces lemon juice
Lindley Estes is a first-year fiction student in
George Mason University's Master's of Fine Arts program
and an editor for the Moonshine Murmurs blog.
She's partial to bourbon.
Questioning the Past: An Interview with Carmen Gillespie
By Caitlin Herron
Carmen Gillespie’s The Ghosts of Monticello, the third book of poetry from Stillhouse Press.
Carmen Gillespie gladly finds time to discuss the importance of questions and [re]creation of historical figures. These ideas are central to the evolution of her latest poetry collection, "The Ghosts of Monticello: A Recitatif" (October 2017), winner of Stillhouse Press' 2016 Poetry Contest.
Despite a busy week taking care of her 10-year-old and the close of George Mason's annual Fall for the Book festival, Gillespie found some time to speak with me about her inspiration for her new book and what brought her to this moment in her writing career.
Although she has always written poetry, and can’t imagine her life without it, Gillespie says her love of the form has been deeply intertwined with her academic pursuits over the last 15 years. “In academics, I tend to focus on black female writers. There is so much that is still covered that needs to be excavated,” says Gillespie, English professor and director of the Griot Institute of Africana Studies at Bucknell University and the author of several books of poetry and critical works.
Part of what motivates her work in both poetry and Africana studies are questions, she says. “Sometimes poetry and academics have the same questions but not the same answers, and sometimes poetry is more effective at answering them.”
This was certainly the case while attempting to answer some of the central inquiries about the life of Sally Hemings, Thomas Jefferson, Martha Jefferson, and others featured in her collection. Primarily, Gillespie wanted to explore the idea of whether or not Hemings had any agency in her story, especially in her relationship with Jefferson, the third president of the United States, with whom Hemings was thought to have had six children. “I can’t believe that every encounter she had with Jefferson was about violence. My understanding of human beings is much more complicated than that, so that is what I wanted to explore,” Gillespie explains.
Stillhouse authors Douglas R. Dechow, Carmen Gillespie, and Anna Leahy, with Acquisitions Editor, Marcos L. Martínez at George Mason University's 2017 Fall for the Book festival.
But she did not stop with Jefferson. Gillespie also wanted to expand upon what Hemings' relationships might have been like with others on the plantation, given her position as both a slave and the lover of such a powerful character. “So many people have said so much about Jefferson, but it was interesting to me to focus on her other relationships with her mother, Martha Jefferson, and her half sister, and how that dynamic would work if they were to have a conversation,” says Gillespie.
She sees her collection as a dynamic story, and one which she hopes “makes the link between our contemporary situation and the paradoxes of the past.”
Interestingly, this questioning of the past in Gillespie's collection is formed by language that was originally written to be sung on-stage. "The Ghosts of Monticello" got its beginning as a libretto for an opera performed at Bucknell University, where Gillespie enjoyed engaging with the actors and musicians. “I am inspired, energized, and sustained by theater, dance, and music performances,” she says, noting that when composing something for people to sing versus developing the structure of a collection, the writing can be quite different.
For those thinking about writing fictionally or poetically about history, Gillespie offers some choice advice. First, she says, research is critical. “If you are going to write about something that actually happened, it is really important to know your subject well... People are often afraid to do that research, and think it will inhibit the imaginative experience, but I don't find that to be the case.” Second, she emphasizes how important it is to be “an observer of human experience and understand how people interact.” Says Gillespie, “Ask the questions: what does it mean to experience grief or lose a child? Once you start thinking about these things, the characters speak to you rather than you having to create them.”
Caitlin Herron is the events intern for Stillhouse Press.
She will graduate with a BA in Writing and Rhetoric in December 2017. She also works part time in Parks and Recreation for Fairfax County.
Dear Friends of Stillhouse Press
We're offering free shipping on all of our titles for the indefinite future, when you buy our books directly from www.stillhousepress.org. Allow us to explain why.
These are tumultuous times for small indie publishers. Like most small presses, Stillhouse has spent the past few months attempting to adjust to a set of sudden policy changes at Amazon, which have dramatically affected all publishers, but especially very small presses, like Stillhouse. Here are links to a few good explanations and discussions of this change:
When Stillhouse Press published its first book, Wendi Kaufman's wonderful Helen on 86th Street and Other Stories, in the fall of 2014, Amazon stocked the book regularly and made it available on the usual shipping schedules. Our next five books were also listed this way. But starting in January of this year, that reliability came to an end. If a book wasn't "temporarily out of stock," it was listed as available in "1-4 weeks," or even "1-2 months."
This is patently false. Both Stillhouse Press and its distributor, Ingram, have an ample stock of books.
If you visit Amazon to purchase one of our books and they are telling you it will take more than a day or two to ship, or that it is "temporarily out of stock," please consider purchasing from Stillhouse directly. Or, if you are lucky enough to have an independent bookseller nearby, consider ordering our books from them. It may take a few days, but you'll be supporting a local business that provides jobs to your neighbors, and helps to strengthen your local economy.
And, as always, from all of us at Stillhouse Press, we thank you for your support!
Sincerely,
Stillhouse Press
Better Together: Anna Leahy and Douglas R. Dechow on Co-Authoring & Space
By Evan Roberts
“Hers, mine, and ours,” says Douglas R. Dechow, co-author of Stillhouse Press’ "Generation Space," a memoir that follows the beginning and end of NASA’s space shuttle program. These are three distinct writing methods that exist between Dechow and his co-author and poet, Anna Leahy. Both together and apart, the couple has a long and prolific history of space exploration coverage and authorship, including Leahy’s book "Constituents of Matter" (Kent State University Press 2007) and Dechow’s "SQUEAK: A Quick Trip to Objectland" (Addison-Wesley Professional 2001).
“Anna writes to learn and her writing process is overtly one of discovery,” Dechow says. “I could contrast that with my own process, which is more an attempt to codify something that I already know or believe, to see what I know or to test what I believe.” But together they are greater than the sum of their parts, explains Dechow. In the process of their joint authorship, a “deep intermingling” of their writing methods occurs and produces new, collaborative writing intentions.
But apart, the writers are just as different as their methods. "Generation Space" alternates between their disparate perspectives: Leahy has the mind and experience of a poet, and Dechow of a scientist. But Leahy claims their perspectives are not irrevocably different. “Our differences emphasize each other’s strengths, which may be why we were attracted to each other in the first place. As a scientist, Doug keeps a lot of detail organized in his head. For instance, he recognizes technological objects—aircraft, rockets—at a glance and often can rattle off the historical or engineering contexts of artifacts. Over the years, I’ve let myself off the hook a bit for doing that sort of work, knowing that I could count on Doug.”
Much like their shared passion for space exploration, their passion for writing provides a firm foundation for the couple’s personal lives. “We disagree regularly and sometimes irritate each other, but we rarely argue—writing together has strengthened our ability to disagree and keep moving forward. Being able to revise a sentence together—to treat something external to ourselves as the most important task—probably helps us keep the rest of our relationship in perspective," Dechow says.
There’s a certain proof of compatibility that can be found in the co-authoring process, he explains. “We have grown to know each other’s voices so well that there are undoubtedly sentences that I suggested to Anna that wound up in her chapters and vice versa. Of course, every so often, I would catch a sentence and say, ‘I can’t believe you wrote that. But, it’s your chapter, so you can say it the way you want.”’
“Our first conversations, when we were getting to know each other, were about writing,” says Leahy, who admits that the writing process can sometimes be strenuous on a relationship. “If we had tried writing together early on in our relationship... I think we would have botched both the writing and the relationship. For us, the relationship had become strong before we became co-authors.”
Regarding future space exploration, particularly commercial space’s part in that future, Leahy says their interest has always been predominantly with the government-funded NASA. "In a competition between NASA and capitalist ventures, our hearts were with NASA, its rich history, and the importance of its programs to science. In Generation Space, we talk about our initial resentment of commercial space and a conversation with Garrett Reisman, a former Shuttle astronaut who now directs crew operations for SpaceX."
But commercial ventures certainly have their place, Leahy says. "As we looked more deeply into commercial space, we understood its potential to pick up the technology that NASA had developed and run with it — NASA had taken the risks, and NASA’s work belongs to all of us. Commercial space is set to complement NASA’s ongoing efforts.”
From the dawn of human civilization, we have always had our eyes set on the constellations. The cause of our enduring fascination with the stars, according to Leahy, “Humans are a curious bunch, in both senses of the word curious. We want to know the unknown. We want to understand what’s out there. When we explore what surrounds us—the universe—we push our thinking to its limits... In Generation Space, we grapple with what that really means—with what it means to be here because there exists an out there of space.”
Anna Leahy and Douglas R. Dechow work and teach at Chapman University in Orange, California. Anna's first book, "Constituents of Matter" (Kent State University Press, 2007) won the Wick Poetry Prize. They have written the Lofty Ambitions blog together since 2010. Anna is the author of the chapbook, "Sharp Miracles" (Blue Lyra Press, 2016), and her nonfiction book Tumor is forthcoming from Bloomsbury in 2017. Doug is the co-author of "SQEAK: A Quick Trip to Objectland" (Addison-Wesley Professional, 2001) and "Intertwingled: The Work and Influence of Ted Nelson" (Springer, 2015).
Evan Roberts is the former editor of Moonshine Murmurs and has worked as an editorial assistant, reader, and media contributor for Stillhouse Press. He graduated from George Mason in the fall of 2016 with his Bachelors of Art in English.
2017 Spring Conference Review
By Caitlin Herron
It’s spring conference season in the DMV, and it’s a great opportunity to connect with your literary community, grow your skills, and network with other local writers. Regardless of your writing experience or genre, there are several upcoming events where you can hear some fantastic readings, socialize, and expand your knowledge of the writing world (and even catch some of our authors in the process!) These are events you won’t want to miss!
2017 NEW LEAVES WRITERS' CONFERENCE
Hosted by Fall For The Book, in coordination with George Mason University's Creative Writing Program.
George Mason University, Fairfax Campus
Monday, April 3 - Friday, April 7
Registration: Free
With no registration fee and no sign-up required, this conference is great for writers with changing schedules. This years’ conference highlights its first “Day of Translation” on Wednesday, April 5, presented by our friends at The Alan Cheuse International Writers Center and The Center for the Art of Translation. The day features acclaimed translators and writers presenting on “Translation as a Political Act,” “The Art of Translation,” and other topics. The rest of the week includes readings from established writers Laura van den Berg, Spencer Reece, Helon Habila, and the Loud Fire reading by Mason’s MFA students. (Several Stillhouse Press staff members past and present will be there, so don’t miss it!) On Tuesday evening, Mason MFA alum Mike Scalise will be reading from his memoir "The Brand New Catastrophe "(Sarabande Books, 2017). And on Wednesday night, be sure to check out Linda Chavers reading from her chapbook "(This Fucking Body Is) Never Yours," from our friends at Gazing Grain Press.
ARTOMATIC
Crystal City, Arlington, VA
March 24 - May 6
Entry: Free
Artomatic is a fun way to experience all of the performing and visual arts the D.C. area has to offer - in an old laundry building! That’s right, this space has been converted into a venue for writers and visual and performing artists to showcase and sell their work. With so many weeks to visit, there is plenty of time to get a taste of this unique event. Come April 1 for a reading by Stillhouse's Andrew Gifford, author of "We All Scream: The Fall of the Gifford's Ice Cream Empire" (forthcoming May 1, 2017), and get your hands on his exciting memoir a full month before its official release.
CONVERSATIONS & CONNECTIONS: PRACTICAL ADVICE ON WRITING
Hosted by Barrelhouse
George Mason University, Arlington Campus
Saturday, April 22, 9am-6pm
Registration: $70
This conference is the premier way to connect with writers and editors through a day packed with workshops, panels, and ending in a legendary boxed wine reception! Panel discussions include flash fiction, point of view, handling grief, and a myriad other topics. There will even be a panel with Barrelhouse Magazine editors giving advice on how to get your work out of the slush pile and into a lit mag. This year's conference will feature our very own editorial director Marcos L. Martínez, Stillhouse friend and Editor of Smokelong Quarterly, Tara Laskowski, and Rion Almicar Scott, author of "Insurrections" (The University Press of Kentucky 2016), a 2016 Pen/Faulkner finalist. A highlight of this conference is its speed dating event, where attendees can bring their poetry, short fiction, or first few pages of an essay or story for a 10 minute critique with an editor. Lit mags attending include Barrelhouse, Smokelong Quarterly, Potomac Review, Gettysburg Review, and many more. This conference offers a great way to get feedback on your work from a range of editors in your genre. The best part? Your registration gets you a book by a featured writer and a subscription to a participating lit mag. At $70, you get a lot of bang for your buck!
KENSINGTON DAY OF THE BOOK FESTIVAL
Kensington, MD
Sunday, April 23, 11am-4pm
Registration: Free
The Kensington Day of the Book Festival is a lively outdoor literary festival for every reader in your family. Over 100 authors, poets, and artists will be lining the streets of this charming downtown for book sales, readings, and more! There will be tents with an on-the-spot poetry competition, an outdoor kid’s show, and even demonstrations from cookbook authors. Stillhouse's Andrew Gifford, ("We All Scream," May 2017) is a special guest speaker, so you won’t want to miss this event, rain or shine!
BOOKS ALIVE! 5th ANNUAL WASHINGTON WRITERS CONFERENCE
Hosted by Washington Independent Review of Books
College Park Marriott Hotel & Conference Center
Hyattsville, MD
Friday, April 28 – Saturday, April 29
Registration:
Mar. 2 – Mar. 31 $250
Apr. 1 – Apr. 29 $260
Student Discount rate: $130
If you have a novel, story collection, or idea that’s itching to be pitched, this is this conference to hit this spring! After Friday’s “How to Pitch an Agent” session, participants will have the opportunity on Saturday to meet face to face with up to three agents for five minutes apiece. Agents are looking for work in all genres: YA novels, memoir, sci-fi, fantasy and more. Not looking to pitch? There are still plenty of panels from publishing industry experts to attend, including the keynote address from Judith Viorst, best known the children's classic, "Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day." This is a great event to meet established authors in your genre and get advice from industry experts!
Caitlin Herron is the events intern for Stillhouse Press and a copy editor for George Mason's student newspaper, Fourth Estate. She will graduate with a BA in Writing and Rhetoric in December 2017. She also works part time in Parks and Recreation for Fairfax County.
#PowerOfThePen at AWP
Hello, from the other side of AWP! It was a long and amazing weekend of running between panels, readings, off-site events and the Stillhouse Press booth at the Bookfair. The Stillhouse team is thrilled to have had the opportunity to connect with so many great writers, readers, publications, and organizations—not to mention all the opportunities we had to show off our authors and their books! (We’ll take this one last chance to say: if you missed your opportunity to snag a book at the Bookfair, you can order online.)
In honor of the 50th anniversary of AWP and its presence in the nation’s capital this year, we wanted to do something special. If you were at AWP and stopped by, you might have noticed us hanging out with a whiteboard and asking people to participate in our social media project. (Maybe you even stopped by!) We collected all the photos and selected our favorites.
We asked, “What is writing’s role in 2017?”
Here’s what you had to say:
1. “To remember who we/you are, remember who we/you were.”
"To remember who we/you are, remember who we/you were." -anonymous #PowerOfThePen #AWP17 pic.twitter.com/H7H3RsAJg2
— Stillhouse Press (@StillhousePress) February 11, 2017
2. “Bear witness and document history.”
#PowerOfThePen #AWP17
— Stillhouse Press (@StillhousePress) February 11, 2017
Come see us and bear witness at booth 503! @VitaLusty pic.twitter.com/5BjGFbHIuR
3. “To remind us of the scientific facts!”
"To remind us of the scientific facts!" @MsMarieKelly #PowerOfThePen #AWP17 pic.twitter.com/JhjAhWqk78
— Stillhouse Press (@StillhousePress) February 10, 2017
4. “RESIST.”
"RESIST" @idazlei #PowerofthePen #AWP17 #Resist by attending the Candlelight Vigil tmrw @ 6PM across from the White House! pic.twitter.com/6a5in6Gre5
— Stillhouse Press (@StillhousePress) February 10, 2017
5. “To fight the tyranny of ignorance.”
"To fight the tyranny of ignorance" @Mikhail_Iossel#PowerOfThePen #AWP17 pic.twitter.com/adZNJ78RP5
— Stillhouse Press (@StillhousePress) February 9, 2017
6. “To tell the stories from the perspective of the lion. #resist #minorityrepresentation”
"To tell the stories from the perspective of the lion #resist #minorityrepresentation " @KenyaAsInAfrica #PowerthePen #AWP17 pic.twitter.com/BJ6KsczLIS
— Stillhouse Press (@StillhousePress) February 9, 2017
7. “Speaking truth to power.”
"Speaking truth to power" @MaryLovesBooks @RoanokeReview #PowerofthePen #AWP17 pic.twitter.com/VnjTEcdHMQ
— Stillhouse Press (@StillhousePress) February 10, 2017
8. “Be ever-moving forward and amplify those that have been/will be silenced. #resist #queeraf”
"Be ever-moving forward and amplify those that have been/will be silenced #resist #queeraf " @koscojo #PowerofthePen #AWP17 pic.twitter.com/R8sV47koVf
— Stillhouse Press (@StillhousePress) February 9, 2017
9. “To be not alone.”
"To be not alone." @ThatMattFogarty #PowerOfThePen #AWP17 pic.twitter.com/6xNgr3LlRD
— Stillhouse Press (@StillhousePress) February 11, 2017
10. “‘To reflect the times’ - Nina Simone + speak out against the sh*t!”
To reflect the times!#PowerOfThePen #AWP17 @MissEuniLee
— Stillhouse Press (@StillhousePress) February 11, 2017
Come show your stuff at booth 503! pic.twitter.com/AokpekkXHh
11. “Truth and beauty as always, and now...more than ever the will and grace to fight for it.”
"Truth and beauty, as always, and now...more than ever the will and the grace to fight for it." -Marc Harshman #PowerOfThePen #AWP17 pic.twitter.com/w4s5ztqxaD
— Stillhouse Press (@StillhousePress) February 10, 2017
There were so many more folks who participated and gave us their two cents. You can check out the other photos on our Twitter page, @StillhousePress, or search #PowerOfThePen. We had a fantastic time talking with everyone who stopped by to tell us what they thought. As writers and poets, we all have a lot of work to do in 2017. And we at Stillhouse Press look forward to working alongside you.
Want to participate? It’s never too late! Tweet @StillhousePress with your answer or comment on this post!
Alexandria Petrassi is the editor of Moonshine Murmurs, a reader for Stillhouse Press, Phoebe, and So to Speak, the Lead Editor at Floodmark (a blog devoted to providing eclectic inspiration for writers), and a first-year poetry student in the MFA program at George Mason University. She also has a day job in health care, where she works in Digital Communications.
Conference Networking: A Newcomer's Guide
With conference season just around the corner, it’s time to prepare for all of the exciting networking and development opportunities ahead. The AWP (Association of Writers & Writing Programs) Conference is in Washington, D.C. this year, which means that many local writers and students in the DMV will have the opportunity to attend the biggest literary conference in the world for the first time. What’s the best way to use the conference to expand your network? How do you avoid imposter syndrome as a first timer? Michelle Webber, Communications Director at Stillhouse Press and resident conference guru, has some helpful hints about how to grow your network and get the most out of the experience.
Know Before You Go: Do Your Research
Spend some time investigating what writers and organizations will be there. This may sound simple and intuitive, but it can be more work than you think! One scan of the list of 2017 exhibitors will show you just how overwhelming your “to do” list could be, but don’t freak out! Print out the list, grab a highlighter, and start annotating. Once you’ve done that, prioritize based on your individual needs. If you’re an author looking to make a personal connection with the editors of a literary magazine that you love, flag them. If you’re an undergraduate looking into MFA programs, make sure they are high on your list. This cheat sheet will help you craft a schedule that will take you everywhere you want to be.
The book fair floor at the 2016 AWP Conference in L.A.
Plan a Loose Schedule That Includes Breaks
Do the same thing you did with the exhibitor list with the conference schedule. Pick out the events that sound interesting, then the ones that you cannot miss. Prepared to be disappointed: the two panels you want to see most will almost certainly be at the same time. You’ll have to make a choice, but that’s okay: the conference is long and there’s always something just around the corner. Scheduling breaks (even if it’s just thirty minutes for coffee) is absolutely essential. If you’re a first-timer, you will be tempted to fill every single time slot in your day. DON’T DO IT! It’s really easy to burn out, and if you over-schedule yourself, you’ll miss out on one of the most important parts of conferences: being there! It’s also a good time to make some notes for yourself and reflect on what you’ve seen.
Take Notes
Don’t be afraid of looking rude if you scribble notes in the middle of a presentation or panel. Write down quotes from authors you love, pieces of advice that you find particularly helpful, any books that you want to add to your “to read” list. After each day of the conference, go back to your hotel and do a little journaling. Write down your impressions from the day; make lists of the people you met and how they fit into your network. You’ll collect a lot of free swag and pieces of paper—write on these too! Write deadlines on bookmarks, notes about the conversation you had on the back of business cards, throw away any fliers or inserts that you don’t need. Culling one day at a time is much easier than trying to remember the details of a conversation you had three days ago.
Don’t Be Shy — Say Hi!
Introduce yourself to one person at every panel you attend. You may be surprised at how few degrees of separation there are between writers, especially at a big conference like AWP. If you’re a member of a lit organization, invite them to swing by your table or come to your offsite event. Every face-to-face conversation is an opportunity to grow your network!
The same goes for presenters. Attend a panel that was helpful? Watch a keynote that really unlocked something for you? See a reading of an emerging writer you really admire? Stay behind afterwards and interact with them. Introduce yourself, ask questions, tell them what you enjoyed about their lecture. This may be difficult for the bigger events, but many presenters expect and even enjoy interacting with audience members after their events. The same goes for the bookfair!
Authors, Agents, and Publishers are People, Too!
Last year, without meaning to and without even knowing who he was until he said it, I met Chuck Palahniuk’s agent at the LitReactor booth. I also had drinks with the Poet Laureate of New York at my hotel bar. These experiences taught me a valuable lesson: the best way to make meaningful connections is putting your respective literary positions behind and focus on the person standing in front of you. At AWP, you’re all on even footing. You’re writers attending an event to listen to and meet other writers. When you meet your literary hero at an after party or shake hands with the editor of your favorite literary magazine, remember that they’re people just like you. Conversations lead to connections; fangirling leads to restraining orders.
BONUS ADVICE: Don’t forget to keep in mind the context in which you’re meeting these people. If you’re at a panel and the agent mentions she’s taking pitches, go ahead and do it. But don’t be that guy who shoves his manuscript under the stall door or gets too drunk and pukes on Sherman Alexie’s shoes (true story from a friend of a friend—seriously, don’t do it).
Follow Up
After you’ve done all the networking legwork at the conference, meeting people, shaking hands, and exchanging cards, it’s absolutely essential to follow-up when the event is over. Believe it or not, most people who say, “I’ll shoot you an email,” never do. Pursue the leads you worked so hard to attain. If you said you’d send that editor a query letter, do it! If you talked to another literary organization about throwing a joint event, get in touch! Making a connection without follow through isn’t really making a connection. Once you’ve made contact, you have to maintain it. If you don’t have anything immediate that you need to address with someone, but your work may bring you to their doorstep later, send them a “nice to meet you, hope we get to work together” note. If you got an emerging author’s contact information, send them an email saying how much you loved their reading. We all like a little affirmation that we made a difference. Going the extra mile is what will take these casual interactions from isolated incidents to nodes on your personal and professional network.
We want to know: what’s your best piece of conference advice? Leave a comment or ask a question on our blog through February 8 and you will be automatically entered to win a signed copy of Christina Olson’s "Terminal Human Velocity."
Michelle Webber has worked as a reader, an Editorial Assistant, and Social Media Editor for Stillhouse Press and currently serves as the Director of Marketing and Communications. She is currently working on a collection of linked short stories and will graduate with a BFA in Fiction from George Mason University in May.
Poetic Narrative: A Conversation with Christina Olson
By Alexandria Petrassi
The sky outside my building in Chicago is slate-gray, heavy with a promise of snow, as I settle into a coffee shop booth for my phone interview with Christina Olson, author of the forthcoming book of poetry from Stillhouse Press, "Terminal Human Velocity." She is calling from Kentucky, where she teaches at the low residency MFA program at Murray State University. Of course, the weather is at least a little better there in January, but nonetheless our conversation starts with winter. I learn that winter is one of the many images threaded throughout her latest collection. “When I was writing the early poems, it was the coldest winter on record, so one of the things that happened after I moved to Georgia is that I started romanticizing winter,” she says. Despite our talk about winter and the miles between our phone lines, our conversation is warm and engaging; a welcome break to my Monday afternoon.
As we begin our introductions, it becomes apparent that Christina Olson has a different background than most poets. “This is a bit of an over-simplification, but I always introduce myself as a poet who comes from a family of engineers,” she tells me. She found poetry in college, though she originally intended to study Interpersonal Communication. “Surprisingly—even to myself—I’ve fallen into a pretty traditional academic path,” she says, “but there has been a couple little detours here and there.”
One such detour? After graduating with her MFA from Minnesota State, she found herself working in healthcare marketing. It’s here that the earliest poems from Olson's collection and some of the mindset behind "Terminal Human Velocity" took root. “Two things happened in that job: even though I enjoyed the problem-solving aspect of the work, I realized I had to do something more creative. And my head was filling with this random flotsam about death and disease and things that will kill you,” she remembers. “It got me thinking...how do we reconcile the big fallible machine that is the human body? And then how do we make sense of it? What can we learn about what it means to be human when we look at science and the natural world?” These questions manifest themselves throughout her latest book, though she didn’t set out to write a collection on the topic. She says her approach was more: “How do I feel about my life? Complicated! Let’s write a poem. Do you want to write it about you? No! Let’s write about Ernest Shackleton.”
"Terminal Human Velocity: the book for the person in your life who doesn’t know they like poetry,” she jokes. “And who also maybe wanted to know something about horseshoe crabs." - Christina Olson
So figures from history, both large (like Ernest Shackleton, an eighteenth century Antarctic explorer) and small (Elvita Adams, who jumped from the Empire State Building only to be blown back inside after falling one floor in 1979) grace the pages of her collection, along with what Olson calls “last love” poems (poems written to dead people) and poems that recognize the beauty in the scientific. “Fact is not inherently interesting; stories are,” Olson says. “Even when I think I’m not telling a story, I realize it is a story.” Her skill with narrative in poetry is showcased in "Terminal Human Velocity," which looks at both macro and micro narratives, working to tell the story of everything in between. These poems are interested in what it means to be human, and approaches their questions through narratives of other people discovering the grand scale of our world. It’s a collection where the mind is firmly grounded in the body; it’s equal parts wonder and fear of what it finds.
As we move on from "Terminal Human Velocity," I ask Olson about the best writing advice she has for other writers. Her best advice is to remember patience: “You need to practice craft, but you also have to respect the amount of time that process takes. I don’t think a writer should be project driven, I think they should be process driven. Process takes time. Craft takes time.”
Before we wrap up our conversation, I ask her if there’s anything else she wants readers to know. We spend a minute talking about the at-times seemingly elusive accessibility of poetry for some readers, and how she hopes the narrative in her poems offer an access point. “'Terminal Human Velocity': the book for the person in your life who doesn’t know they like poetry,” she jokes. “And who also maybe wanted to know something about horseshoe crabs.”
Alexandria Petrassi is Stillhouse Press's Moonshine Murmurs Blog Editor and a first year MFA student at George Mason University. She's also the founder of Floodmark, a poetry blog that focuses on prompts, craft features, and interviews.
Revise and Conquer: Advice From Our Authors
Revision can be one of the most difficult parts of writing. Creating a story, essay, or poem has its own challenges, but revision requires patience, persistence, and flexibility. Whether you're revising your NaNoWriMo project or gearing up for the spring submission season, we're here to help! We asked our authors to give us their best in revision advice. Don't forget to share yours in the comments!
“A story should be exciting to read. It should pull us in and not let go. It shouldn't meander unless meandering is its thing. It shouldn't bore unless boring is its thing. And if boring is its thing, it should bore with intensity. What I mean is that stories should be bright and fresh. They should be something we've never read before and that we're compelled to read now. They should make us lean in, lean closer. They should make us want to explore. In revision, this often means cleaning. Wipe away needless words, sentences, images. Knock the dust off old phrases. Heighten contrasts between characters, between images, between emotions. Make the world of the story more vivid and interesting. Make a story that's never been read before and that must be read now.”
— Matthew Fogarty, Maybe Mermaids & Robots are Lonely (Sept. 2016)
“I was recently discussing revision with my husband, Seth, and he said that the act of revision is the act of removing oneself from the poem, which is absolutely true. Early drafts are so often so close to the poet, too close, which is why we often love those early drafts to the point of craft being obscured. Revision is the act of standing outside oneself to make the best choices for the work.”
- Bryan Borland, DIG (Sept. 2016)
“I’ve (perhaps sadly) come to see writing from the publisher’s POV. I think so many people keep their writing too close to them. They fear revision, they struggle with criticism, they’re exhausted by the process, they lack the patience to refine and hone their voices. To commit something that comes from such a secret, private place to the editor’s pen can be horrifying, yes, but necessary. My advice has always been to let go. Most instructors will tell you that 'writing is revision.' It’s also a business.”
- Andrew Gifford, We All Scream (Forthcoming May 2017)
“I tell students to open their journals and start salvaging. Pick over the writing, find the bits worth saving. Don’t think of them as poems, not as even drafts. But as piles of scrap, something to sift through. Scrap it for parts, I tell them. Salvage the images and the metaphors. I use the language of labor because it is labor. Their journals are workshops, places to tinker. Take the line worth saving, plug it into some other failing poem. Pump the pedal a few times, try the engine. Every once in a while, something will suddenly roar to life.”
- Christina Olson, Terminal Human Velocity (Forthcoming Jan. 2017)
Now that you've read our advice, we want to hear yours! What's the best revision advice you ever received? Tell us in the comments below or Tweet at us using the hashtag #RevisionAdvice.
A Letter From The Editor
Hello Moonshine Murmurs Readers!
My name is Alexandria Petrassi, the new blog editor. I’m a poet and first-year graduate student in the MFA program at George Mason University. Although I focus primarily on poetry, I also dabble in nonfiction, fiction, and the hybrid forms between genres. I am a reader for Stillhouse Press and GMU's literary journals, Phoebe and So to Speak—all of which I highly recommend you check out. I’m also the Lead Editor over at Floodmark, a blog devoted to providing eclectic inspiration for creative writers via writing prompts, think pieces, and humor. I’ve been in Digital Media for almost three years, both professionally and through personal projects. I’m a constant traveller, and while I love adventure, there’s nothing like curling up on your couch with a good book. (Perhaps even a book from Stillhouse Press if I may be so bold?)
I’m excited to join the team and I’m ready to work behind the scenes here to bring you the latest and greatest on issues in craft publishing, perspectives from our authors and poets, and the happenings in the D.C. literary community. I’d like to take this moment to talk about what you can look forward to in the coming months, but first I want to say a huge thank you to the previous editor, Evan Roberts, for his commitment and hard work on Moonshine Murmurs.
So, what can you expect in the future from Moonshine Murmurs? We’ll continue our work exploring the D.C. literary scene and providing you with reviews of bookshops, events, and features on visiting and local writers. We’re also going to open up a dialogue on the craft of writing and publishing: there’s so much hard work that goes in on both ends of the process, and we’re committed to supporting both aspiring authors and committed readers. You can look forward to interviews with our authors, Andrew Gifford (We All Scream, May 2017) and Anna Leahy and Douglas Dechow (Generation Space, April 2017) and frequent updates on the happenings at Stillhouse Press. We also want to hear from our readers about issues that are important to you. If there’s something you want us to talk about, feel free to send me an email (moonshinemurmurs@gmail.com). Let’s keep the conversation going!
Of course, there will be so many other surprises along the way, especially as we head into AWP 2016 in D.C.. I hope you’ll join us in what’s sure to be an eventful year at Moonshine Murmurs. And if you’re looking for something in the meantime, don’t forget about our latest post about NaNoWriMo.
All the best and brightest,
Alexandria Petrassi
After working for a year as a marketing and editorial intern, Evan Roberts took over Moonshine Murmurs in June and worked through the summer months to develop and manage a robust calendar of content, including our independent bookstore series and our publishing process series, "From Still To Shelf." He will graduate in December, and while we’re sad to lose him, we are so grateful for all of the work he’s done and wish him the best on his future endeavors.
A Veteran’s Guide to NaNoWriMo
It’s finally November and change is in the air. In addition to the cooler weather and falling leaves, thousands of people across the globe have begun a writing challenge of epic proportions: to write 50,000 words of a novel during the 30 days of November. National Novel Writing Month (or NaNoWriMo, for short) began as a challenge between five friends with frustrated writing aspirations, but has become a major creative campaign for writers all over the world. Why do people subject themselves to this writing frenzy? What is the point of just churning out 50,000 words? Check out this realist writer’s guide to what NaNoWriMo can bring to your writing life.
Revitalize Your Writing
To keep on pace, participants must write 1,667 words a day. For many of us with jobs, kids, and school, this is probably more than we write creatively in an entire month. But having a formal challenge can be a great motivation to finally tell that story that’s been sitting in the back of your mind for months. Participating in NaNoWriMo is a tangible way to “write every day,” and even gamifies the process with fun infographics. Knowing that there are thousands of others undertaking this challenge with you (and reading the weekly pep talks from authors and the program staff) can help, too. This is an opportunity to write experimentally, to become Betty S. Flower’s madman and steep yourself in the primordial ooze of pure creative energy. It’s low risk and the work is yours alone—there’s no impending workshop, no prying eyes, no concern for continuity or perfection. It’s an excuse to write what you want, not what you should. What sticks might just surprise you!
Start Something Awesome
On average, the standard novel is between 60,000 – 100,000 words, give or take a few thousand. NaNoWriMo likely won’t give you a full manuscript, but that’s okay! What it does give you is a start, one you can revise, tweak, extrapolate, explode, deconstruct, and reassemble. Your NaNoWriMo project doesn’t even have to be a novel; it can be a short story collection, a memoir, or a series of linked essays. Even if you don’t make it across the 50,000-word finish line, you will have more words than you did at the beginning of the month, and that is a victory.
Sara Gruen's Water for Elephants began as a NaNoWriMo project (photo courtesy of Workman Publishing).
Quality vs. Completion
NaNoWriMo critics complain that writing 50,000 words in frenzy mode will only create bad content. The sheer amount of published books that began as NaNoWriMo projects (including Erin Morgenstern's "The Night Circus" and Sara Gruen's "Water for Elephants") have proven them wrong, but the criticism is a valid one. Some of the content you make will be filler: there will be flat characters, plot holes, and plenty of unnecessary dialogue. The good news is you have 11 months to sift through that content and decide what fits your project, what doesn’t, and what might make another, even more compelling story. For every component you find that doesn’t work, there will be one that does—but that’s not a question for NaNoWriMo. December through October is for revising. November is for writing.
The Value of a Minute
One of the best lessons NaNoWriMo teaches writers is just how valuable those “transition” times of the day can be. Sitting in a lecture hall waiting for class to start? Bang out a couple hundred words while the professor sets up. Commercial break during your favorite show? Challenge yourself to see how many words you can churn out in those seven minutes. Waiting for your kids to get out of practice? Pull up the Notes App on your phone and get to work. This anytime writing practice may just stick with you for the rest of the year.
You’re the Only One That Can Tell Your Story
Chris Baty, NaNoWriMo founder and former program director, gives a pep talk every year in the first week of November, and one pearl of wisdom is always the same: no matter what you’re writing, the only person that can tell your story is you. Every writer has received a critique that claims a work is “derivative,” that it’s “too close” to what already exists. Well, guess what? We all live on the same planet, and the realms of human experience are not infinite. Narratives are culturally ingrained, perhaps even tied directly to our identity as a species. But nobody is going to tell that story the way you will. Nobody will choose the language that you choose or create the characters that you create. The only person that can tell your story is you. So go out and write it.
New to National Novel Writing Month? Ready to write a novel? You can participate on your own, or by creating an account on the NaNoWriMo website, where you’ll also find forums, pep talks, a way to track your progress, and more.
Michelle Webber has worked as a reader, an Editorial Assistant, and Social Media Editor for Stillhouse Press and currently serves as the Director of Marketing and Communications. She is working on a collection of linked short stories and is a fiction candidate in George Mason University's Creative Writing BFA Program.
Adventures on the Indie Bookstore Route, Pt. 4
It's fall and like any true book lover knows, it's time to cozy up with your favorite blanket and relax with a good book. Whether you're picking up the latest book of the season or a classic from the canon, we're here to show your the best places throughout the D.M.V. for scoring fresh reads—our fantastic indie book shops, of course!
Kramerbooks and Afterwords Café
DUPONT CIRCLE, WASHINGTON, DC
Photo courtesy of Drink DC
By Madeline Dell'Aria
Wedged in like the keystone of the Dupont Circle arch, Kramerbooks and Afterwords Café is an amalgamation of culinary and literary worlds. Restaurant, bar, and bookshop, Kramerbooks is not your standard independent bookstore. It has been a fixture of the community since 1976 and offers more than most other bookstores, with a large café peering out onto 19th St. NW that provides an impressive diversity of items and a full-service bar with literary-themed cocktails like “Catcher in the Rye.”
Bookshelves showcase the usual suspects: the bestsellers, the trending authors, and a whole lot more. The small store doesn’t offer used books, its new titles so densely packed into different sections that they seem almost to blend together. Proud of its local heritage, Kramerbooks devotes a large selection to the city that hosts it, which no doubt pleases history fans and tourists alike.
Wanderlust is not lost on the inhabitants of the bustling Dupont Circle and certainly not on Kramerbooks clientele. The Circle is surrounded by embassies from all over the world and gazing upon the brightly colored spines of travel books will have you pining for adventure, from a cheese tour of Vermont to the tropical beaches of Phuket. Like many independent bookstores, Kramerbooks also stays quite busy. Few event calendars can rival the raw frequency of Kramerbooks’ lineup, with an author reading, wine tasting, or music event nearly every night.
Because the bookstore is also café and bar, its hours range from early morning to the very early morning. In other words: it caters to early birds and night owls alike and is easily accessible via metro. Take a gander at the clientele and you’ll see architects scribbling down drawings, lobbyists making friends, and the [rare] government official perusing a government docket. For those seeking respite from the hurry of D.C., you won’t find it here. From the bustle to the price of beer, it's clear you're in the city.
Madeline Dell’Aria, a Northern Virginia native, is a graduate of George Mason University's BFA Creative Writing program. Growing up she wanted to become a tree, a witch, or an explorer; so she became a writer.
Flash Magic: An Interview with Matthew Fogarty
By Evan Roberts
“I've always wanted to write and I've always written,” says Matthew Fogarty, author of Stillhouse Press’ forthcoming Maybe Mermaids & Robots Are Lonely. More than half a decade ago Fogarty practiced law during the day and squeezed writing into his schedule in the wee hours of the night, though writing proved far more fulfilling and enjoyable; eventually this manifested in his decision to leave his job and pursue an MFA in creative writing. “It was the hardest, riskiest choice I've ever made, to go from a comfortable living in a promising career to earning next to nothing devoting my time to trying this thing I could only hope I'd get good at.”
Fogarty says he didn’t consciously develop his writing style. “As a writer, you're the product of what and who you read, [and eventually] you reach some kind of critical mass when you stop emulating individual writers and you feel the freedom to just start writing like yourself.” He praises George Saunders’ preface to Civilwarland in Bad Decline (Random House, 1996) for instilling in him this sense of freedom and individuality, for granting him permission to write what he personally loved to write, and not what he was expected to.
On the topic of other influential works, Fogarty credits Annie Dillard’s Holy the Firm (Harper & Row, 1977)—and later her other stories—with refining his approach to story-making. “[It's] the way she plays with words and sounds and constructs sentences and rhythms and how she teases out meaning, how she builds characters out of these things, how everything feeds the work as a whole,” says Fogarty, who clings to his own storytelling dogma, a complementary dichotomy formed from the works of Stuart Dybek and Etgar Keret: where Dybek said “anything can be a story,” Etgar Keret said “a story can be anything.” To Fogarty, they’re both right.
The very beginning, the first five or so minutes upon sitting down to start or resume a story, this is the moment Fogarty finds the most difficult, the most precarious. But sometimes, even after he’s worked up a rhythm, there’s an even greater challenge to overcome. Fogarty says there are times “when [writing] feels silly or unnecessary or wrong, or when words don't feel strong enough or when I don't feel strong enough. It's not failure I'm afraid of in those times. I don't know what it is. Maybe something scary about laying the world bare.”
Fogarty is a unusual writer. He believes that traditional realist stories have been written before, and the genre is without—for lack of a better word—magic. “I just refuse to believe there's no magic in the world. To me, there's something very real about the magic in my stories and the magic in the stories of writers like Amelia Gray and Etgar Keret. Stories are opportunities to explore and to dream and to be wowed and to feel new emotions, to think new thoughts, to meet new people or animals or aliens or what have you.”
But for Fogarty the goal of writing isn’t necessarily to write a superb story. Instead, he suggests “the idea is to get something unrecognizable onto the page—something that's bigger than the sum of whatever parts I can collect. I know I’ve done something right when I start to feel some emotion from the story, when it hits me in a place I didn't expect.” In his debut collection, filled with stories containing magical realism, characters like Elvis, Bigfoot, and Zelda exist in our collective unconscious. “These characters are all already created in our minds, and we can all experience these stories in whatever way we want, and while whoever may read these stories can also make these characters their own, there’s something about them that is shared, and in this way we can be bonded." And that, says Fogarty, "is the fun of it all."
Matthew Fogarty is a Co-Publisher of Jellyfish Highway and author of Maybe Mermaids & Robots are Lonely: Stories (forthcoming from Stillhouse Press Sept. 16, 2016). His work has appeared in Passages North, Fourteen Hills, PANK, The Rumpus, Midwestern Gothic, and elsewhere. He has twice been a finalist for the Write-a-House residency, and has received scholarships from the New Harmony Writers Workshop, the Wesleyan Writers Conference, and the Squaw Valley Community of Writers.
Evan Roberts is Moonshine Murmurs Blog Editor. He has worked as an Editorial Assistant, Reader, and Media Intern for Stillhouse Press. He will graduate from George Mason in the fall of 2016 with a B.A. in English.
From Still to Shelf, Pt. 3: The Ins and Outs of Book Design
When a manuscript has finished its journey through developmental editing, substantive editing, and copyediting, it’s still just a text document. The actual process from manuscript to book involves more than just slapping on a copyright page and cover. Hundreds of tiny choices must be made along the way: what font should be used for chapter titles, body text, the epigraph? What kind of symbol or image should provide scene divisions? How much white space should the book contain? What should the color scheme of this book be? Artistic and highly specialized professionals guide Stillhouse Press in these decisions, making up the core of our design team.
We rely primarily on two people for the bulk of our design work: Kady Dennell, a freelance designer develops our interior layout and design, while our Art Director, Doug Luman handles cover design and brand development. Like each aspect of Stillhouse, book design is a collaborative process between. It’s important to us to not only develop an aesthetic and marketable product, but also to create a book that serves as a visual archetype to its literary content. For this post, we invited Kady to share some of the intricacies of this process.
Interior
Kady Dennell
The interior design process begins with design inspirations (interior layout and font choices used in other books that are either market matches for the current project or just well-designed products) from the author, the book's managing editor, and Stillhouse's Editor in Chief, Marcos L. Martínez. After the team decides on a direction, I browse through my library of fonts or research online for typefaces that will achieve the desired look. There are many aesthetic “families” that exist in typography, each with its own aesthetic consequences. The style of a font and its placement on the page, while it seems a simple thing, can completely alter the meaning of the content. Consider a sign for a hardcore workout bootcamp written in delicate cursive, or an entire novel presented in bolded comic sans. Neither of these properly evokes the genre, purpose, or central aesthetic of the content that the physical language is meant to represent.
A mid-process design mock-up for the cover element of POP!
Once I’ve found a set of typefaces that match our intended aesthetic, I then propose two or three layout concepts to the publishing team for their input. These concepts will consist of ideas for page number placement, text size, font, headline placement, and body copy font and leading (the actual justification and margin work of copy on the page). From there, I adjust the layout design and prepare style guides and master pages in Adobe InDesign, an industry staple for publication design. The next step is styling the text for the whole manuscript, which is usually done with two main fonts (one for chapter titles and another for body copy). After all of the type is stylized, I adjust spacing to minimize orphans and widows—the design term for words left dangling across lines or left on lines by themselves. Once the manuscript is laid out in its entirety, I submit the file to the editorial team and they do a comprehensive review of the now fully designed book. Once their comments return, I implement any final changes and design edits, and then the final is ready for print.
Interior
Michelle Webber
The cover is the face of the book. It is the first and often only chance to grab the attention of readers and encourage them to investigate what’s inside. A bad cover—one that is ugly, busy, or confusing to its audience—can lose sales, regardless of the quality of the content within. Alternatively, a good cover aims to convey key elements of that content and inspires the reader to take a closer look.
Our design process varies from book to book. Some manuscripts immediately suggest a strong design direction. For example, the design concept for Matt Fogarty’s Maybe Mermaids and Robots are Lonely emerged more or less as soon as our editorial team began discussing it (for a detailed look, read designer Alex Walsh’s post).
While the exterior design process is constantly evolving, it always begins with a conversation between our art director, Doug; the book's managing editor; the author; and the marketing team. Some authors are more opinionated about the content of their cover than others. Many come to the table with a list of things they absolutely do not want, which gives Doug a good place to start, though the beginning mock-ups are usually born from the manuscript itself. Once a general aesthetic for the cover has been developed, it's up to the designer to produce three or four concepts, which are then presented to the editorial and marketing staff for fine-tuning. The concepts are the narrowed down to one or two options. Usually, the agreed upon cover concept goes through three or four drafts before reaching its final state, which includes the placement of our logo and branding, the cover copy, and the final spine design. At that point, the marketing team signs off on the cover and it returns to Doug for final adjustments and rendering.
Once the interior and exterior designs have been finalized, the manuscript is then submitted it to our printer and a proof is ordered. If everything looks as it should, advance review copies (ARCs) or "galleys" are ordered. These are sent to media and used to proof the book before it is sent out for final printing.
Kady Dennell is a freelance designer living in Portland, OR. She enjoys working with typography, (loads of) color, and photography. You can find her work at kdennell.com.
Michelle Webber has worked as a reader, an Editorial Assistant, and Social Media Editor for Stillhouse Press and currently serves as the Director of Marketing and Communications. She is working on a science fiction novel and will graduate with a BFA in Fiction from George Mason University in the spring of 2017.
Adventures on the Indie Bookstore Route, Pt. 3
by Madeline Dell'Aria
It's summertime and like any true book lover knows, it's time to kick up your feet, soak up the sun, and relax with a good book. Whether you're picking up the latest book of the season or a classic from the canon, we're here to show your the best places throughout the D.M.V. for scoring fresh reads—our fantastic indie book shops, of course!
IDLE TIME BOOKS
Adam’s Morgan, Washington, DC
Along a street of hookah bars, dives, head shops, tattoo parlors, and boutique restaurants, Idle Time Books seems an incongruous addition, yet it resides harmoniously. Just three doors down from the prominent hot spot Madam’s Organ, Idle Time Books quenches the community’s literary thirst.
Outside the bookstore, the sidewalk is littered with carts full of one dollar books, discounted due to overstock or light wear. Visitors are first greeted by unique event cards (Hallmark doesn’t stock these) and stacks of vintage magazines spanning several decades. Beyond, the meticulously organized collection of used books rise not just one, but two and a half stories tall. Fiction occupies a large swath of the first floor, but there is so much more tucked away in this unassuming store. A glass case of first editions sits by the stairs: The Hobbit for the fantasy collector, The Fountainhead for the libertarian, an antique copy of the now out-of-print music magazine Creem with rock and roll supernova David Bowie emblazoned on the cover.
The well- kept landing carries biographies and other non-fiction. And upwards, on the second floor, section after section of non-fiction is featured; women’s studies, queer studies, racial studies, and the sciences, whittled down to subsections of biology, technology, chemistry and the like, military and foreign history divided by country. And then there is the fiction: sci-fi, fantasy, and vintage pulp books wrapped in cellophane like candy.
The most appealing aspect of Idle Time Books is that it invites its guests to linger. Folk music plays softly from the speakers. Hand-written signs like “YES WE CAN! Put Books Back Where We Found Them” and other vintage posters are cozily appropriate for a bookstore nestled amongst the politically savvy, witty populations of northwest DC. As the name suggests, visitors will want to have ample time to visit Idle Time Books and let their minds and attentions wander.
Madeline Dell’Aria, a Northern Virginia native, recently graduated from George Mason University with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Creative Writing. Growing up she wanted to become a tree, a witch, or an explorer; so she became a writer.
