LitBlitz

Letter From a Famous Dude!

2008-11-11T21:25:00.002-05:00

Just kidding... not really. It was really a form letter signed Francis Ford Coppola -- just Zoetrope: All-Story looking for a subscription renewal. Unfortunately I'm behind in reading my issues, which seems to be an ongoing difficulty I have whenever I have a subscription to any kind of magazine (and I have several).

However, I can say the Spring 2008 issue had a story by Elizabeth McCracken -- "Something Amazing" -- that was definitely worth the price of admission. I loved it, it stuck with me, and that was the highlight of the issue for me.

It's an interesting magazine, considering it actually carries ads from places like Marc Jacobs, but at least with the Spring issue, I found the layout a bit confusing. Seeing how I need to catch up with Summer and Fall, I'll be interested to see if the layout is always confusing or if that's an anomaly.

One thing I have to say is cool is that Francis Ford Coppola backs a literary magazine. It's a tough industry and it's nice to know successful people in media and the arts are willing to lend a little help (and a paying venue for writers).

Obviously I need to get reading but of course this is just another in a monumental stack of reading material I've got here.

LLB

Back From Vacay

2008-10-26T18:31:00.002-05:00

I just got back from vacation in Maine with my parents. I had intended to both unplug from regular life and actually do a lot of fiction writing, but the writing part just didn't pan out. Even though we did stop by and snap some photos of Stephen King's supercool house. I want a Victorian house with a wrought-iron fence like his one day!

Still, as inspiring as Maine's coastal landscape and an unplugging from the usual day-to-day drudgery should have been, I just couldn't produce anything while I was away, although I did manage to write 1600 words of what I think is pure bile last night after getting home. I'm pretty sure some stream-of-consciousness that will probably never amount to an actual piece of fiction is better than nothing. There's probably something to be said for just writing through those dry spells.

More later... dreading a return to work and etc.!

Write on... and I guess write through the block if possible!

LLB

The Art of No

2008-10-07T19:39:00.003-05:00

Ah, the rejection letters. We writers dread them while expecting them, sometimes wish they'd come sooner (why have I been waiting a year, but maybe it's a good sign? Or maybe it's just lost) or wish they'd come later (you rejected me in ONE lousy day, you thought it was that bad?).

Here's a very good essay that speaks very eloquently on the topic, No, by Brian Doyle, featured in the Spring 2008 issue of Kenyon Review. (A particular highlight is Stefan Merkel's rejection letter of a rejection letter, which is brilliant, although the whole article is a very nice rumination on the subject of editing, accepting, and rejecting.) Check it out and keep your chin up.

Write on...

LLB

Scary Summer Reading

2008-10-04T17:38:00.002-05:00

Halloween's right around the corner, so I thought I'd talk about a couple chillers I read over the summer. I should probably admit that both book choices were actually motivated by having seen the movies. That might be a little bit sad, but hey, it's just the truth.

The Ruins by Scott Smith. OK, saw I saw the movie in the theater and for only the second time ever in my long history of horror movie fandom, thought I was going to be physically ill at one point. I also worried that somebody behind me might get ill, which would be really unpleasant, too. I couldn't believe I had a serious wave of nausea! (The other time was Blair Witch Project, which was mostly from the nauseating camera work and a full stomach from sushi dinner, as opposed to anything I saw, obviously.) Anyway, the movie didn't quite make a whole lot of sense -- like, what's up with these vines, anyway? -- and the book did a much better job of explaining, and also added some extras that they didn't bother to include in the movie, and also had far better character development. The movie seemed to me much more of an excuse for gore (no shocker, I know). I don't know, maybe the movie was just an ad for the book, although making you nauseous might not be a real selling point for too many people.

The Mist by Stephen King. I went through a major Stephen King phase in high school but eventually got burned out by his stuff, which I think I'm safe to say isn't the exception to the rule. However, I saw the movie -- which I liked -- but also thought, "Hmm, I don't remember the novella ending this way." So I went ahead and reread it. Sure enough, the ending was different (although the use of Dead Can Dance in The Mist's soundtrack was a nice touch). Anyway, I enjoyed it, and it reminded me that King on a good day is pretty good, in fact better than I recalled.

Unfortunately, I guess neither of these are strong Halloween choices, unless you take the tact that as long as it's scary, it fits. And both are more pop than high literature, but hey, again, it's Halloween time.

Keep on reading...

LLB

Great News!

2008-10-02T18:34:00.002-05:00

OK, there's been a whole lot of crazy news out there these days, but I have some great news, and that is that literary juggernaut JMWW has linked to LitBlitz. Little old me!

JMWW's Fall 2008 issue is live, so do check out all the good stuff there! JMWW also got a nice mention in the Baltimore Sun's blogs.

In other good news, the new Kelly Link collection of short stories I pre-ordered, Pretty Monsters, has arrived. I'm excited since I so adored Magic for Beginners and Stranger Things Happen. Of course given my weird and sporadic reading habits (and the fact that I have three books going at the moment, one of which is the dreaded "heavy reading" and completely non-literary), I can't crack it right away, but hopefully it won't be too long.

Read on and rock on!

LLB

Book Swapping

2008-09-17T19:42:00.003-05:00

Hey, the economy's pretty lame, so it's cool that there are tons of options to swap books or get books on the cheap, or even leave books on a bench or airport somewhere for somebody else to enjoy, according to this AP article.

Of course, there's always the library.

I hate to admit it, but I'm kind of a book collector. I like having the books on shelves to show my reading taste. Of course, the way digital media's going, I suppose that may one day be like collecting stamps -- something people do, but far less common.

Who knows. One thing I do know, though, speaking of digital media, is I really want one of those Amazon Kindles. Then again, I guess if I swapped more books, maybe I could save money faster for one!

Keep on reading...

LLB

Something We Forgot To Do

2008-09-11T19:35:00.003-05:00

Thanks to HarperCollins, I now know what many of us have forgotten to do all along in pursuing our goals to become published authors. We forgot to get on TV!

Okay, I don't watch The Hills but one might now think maybe it's a veritable breeding ground for publishing achievement. I ran across a Reuters article saying The Hills star Lauren Conrad is going to write a series of young adult books called -- get this -- L.A. Candy. (Ohhh... based on her own life, no less!)

Somebody please help me...

Maybe I'm being extremely unkind to Ms. Conrad, perhaps she's a great writer, although the name L.A. Candy doesn't really tempt me to believe we'll realize the missing Bronte sister was hiding in plain sight on prime-time TV. (Who knew?)

It's just another reminder that a lot of the old school media companies have a serious problem. I mean, wow, it might be a lot harder to find real talent so let's just find somebody with name recognition so the finished product may sell itself no matter what. Done! That was easy.

Oh well, I'm certainly no young adult so it goes without saying I'll be skipping this one. Acting lessons, anyone?

Keep on acting... (ahem!) writing!

LLB

Not So Literary

2008-09-09T18:19:00.004-05:00

This isn't literary at all. I was recently looking around for an e-card for a friend's birthday. (I'm bad with birthdays too, but occasionally remember them, sigh.) And I just recalled how so many e-greeting sites are just horrendously awful, insipid, so sweet your skin might exfoliate from even coming into contact with so much sugar, seeming to assume everybody in the world is perpetually 5 years old or something. I mean, I've been known to send them anyway, gritting my teeth and thinking, "It's the thought that counts. Right? Right?!? Is my friend going to think I'm that cheesy? I'm just trying to remember a birthday and of course, of COURSE I didn't go out and get a card!"

Come to think of it, most paper greeting cards are likely to put somebody in a diabetic coma too, so I guess there's precedent for the electronic versions to aspire to the same level of complete disconnect from reality. And maybe this is a semi-literary post; I guess some starving writers probably make some money by writing some of those rhyming poems with "so much heartfelt emotion" or whatever (and come on, it's never quite right). I'm not sure I've ever heard of somebody getting that gig, though.

But come on, there's a market, I'm sure, for things like, "Happy Birthday Dad, even though you really haven't been much of a dad to me, but I know you've been more of a dad to somebody..." (See, that even kind of rhymes, too, if you kind of emphasis the "ee" sound at the end of "somebody.")

Well anyway I stumbled across a site with much more edgy (and in some cases kinda mean) e-cards, called Some E-cards. Some of the "sentiments" (i.e., not very sentimental) made me laugh out loud. I wasn't crazy about the artwork, but I'm willing to forgive it for that, since the cutesy cartoons on some other e-card sites are just... so... awful.

Anyway I thought I'd pass it on, fwiw. (And I hope I haven't offended anybody out there who maybe does write sappy sentiments for greeting card companies... hey, we all do what we gotta do.)

Keep on reading, writing and greeting...

LLB

Short But Sweet

2008-09-08T19:20:00.002-05:00

Narrative magazine delivered a pleasant surprise to my email inbox recently; it's now sending out a Story of the Week. They're short shorts published every Wednesday, and meant to highlight new and emerging writers. That's pretty cool, since it can be difficult to keep up with all the different literary magazines and hey, might as well use technology to literary advantage and remind people what's out there and when.

Last week's Story of the Week gave me hope that maybe using second person is no longer literary taboo. (I have one story in my repertoire that's written in second person, and have pondered the fact that some editors likely consider that quite rude and uncalled for, and then realized I really didn't care.)

Also, Narrative opened up its Fall Fiction Contest, in case anybody's itching to shell out $20 for the reading fee and contend. (Hey, $3000 first prize sure would be nice for some starving writer out there, eh?)

As tempting as it may be not to care due to fears of some dire accident with that atom smasher thingie in Geneva (perhaps Wednesday I won't be reading the Story of the Week and instead will be regretting not embarking on some crazy bender tomorrow?), it's nice to see some venues are realizing email's an easy way to get people reading (and back on a site).

Keep on writing, don't fear the black holes...

LLB

A New York Minute?

2008-09-04T18:59:00.002-05:00

I think "a New York minute" means "fast." For The New Yorker, I think maybe there's no such thing when it comes to fiction submissions. In the horrifically long while since I last posted, I sent another submission to The New Yorker (I guess it's just a dumb habit I have when I have a new story I'm psyched about), and never received a response. When I queried, they simply responded they never received it (it was a canned response about receiving so many submissions, yadda yadda), and that I could send it again if I wanted to. You know, this was after, like, months and months and months and months.

I don't know, you'd think they'd at least use the wonders of technology to do a search for it, but no, you can resend it and get back in the queue (which apparently is a bit disorganized if stuff just goes missing). (Speaking of the wonders of technology, so many journals now have online submission systems, but last I knew, The New Yorker still uses old-fashioned email. Better than paper-only submissions, but it seems weird to me.)

That's so completely sub-optimal, which is ironic for a major magazine that publishes short stories and is considered one of the gold standard publications for fiction writers. Not that you can break in there anyway if you're a nobody, I guess, but at least they could keep up the illusion that they actually give some kind of a crap.

Oh well. Unfortunately The New Yorker is such a renowned publication (that actually pays, the exception to the rule) that I'm sure I will keep up with my strange little ritual (tic?) of throwing stuff their way, and probably get abused in that manner again, probably sometime soon. It's part of my philosophy that tenacity is the only way to get anywhere in this business, but that doesn't make it less irritating. I mean, respect might be nice, even in the slush pile.

LLB

Lost Time

2008-09-03T20:03:00.004-05:00

It looks like I've been out of the loop for, oh, a year and a half. That's terrible. Embarrassing. Laughably sad. And there's really not even a good excuse.

It's not like I've done anything shocking or depraved in the meantime. No binges, scandals, torrid love affairs to add fodder to my literary life. No alien abductions or any such reasonable excuse. Sad! I've still been writing... and reading... still toiling at the day job (which is time consuming)... still buying some literary magazine subscriptions to support the industry once in a while... sometimes even getting around to reading those literary magazines! (Although right now I have a major backlog of magazine reading of all stripes lying around here needing to be read.) And of course, I've still been writing (I've probably created about five or six new short stories over the last year and a half), sending out submissions, and getting rejected just as regularly as before.

I still love Duotrope's Digest for tracking my progress (or lack thereof) even though I often wonder about the folks who apparently report an unrealistic ratio of acceptances/rejections (Duotrope blocks them from their data). Losers (the people who don't accurately report, not Duotrope). Come on, tell it like it REALLY is! It's a rough life in the literary world, and I'm pretty sure you'd need to be some kind of Pulitzer Prize winner to have some kind of crazy 100% acceptance rate. Sorry, maybe I'm just cynical.

I believe I posted here ages ago about the site LibraryThing, but in the time that's passed it looks as if GoodReads is the social networking tool of choice for readers these days. I felt like LibraryThing had a better, more intuitive interface than GoodReads does now, but then again, GoodReads is a better name for the thing and seems to have taken off much more. Kind of reminds me of how everybody seemed to forget all about Friendster for MySpace (and maybe eventually will ditch MySpace for Facebook)? Ah, the fickle world of social networking tools. Maybe I'm wrong, but I have definitely had more friends invite me to GoodReads.

Anyway, I guess I've been going for the prize for lamest blogger ever (and this is a blog about writing, no less!), but I'm going to try to get this going again, and post a bit more often than every year and a half, and definitely add some comments about some of the stuff I've read/encountered recently. Quite a goal!! Let's see if I can handle it... baby steps... hopefully the next post won't be in 2010!!

LLB

Do Yourself a Favor...

2007-01-27T11:56:00.000-05:00

If you haven't yet, run out and get Kelly Link's short story collections Stranger Things Happen and Magic for Beginners (or run over to Amazon, that's where I got my copies). Man her stuff is sooo good...

Never mind the fact I bought these a year or two ago and didn't read them till now. Not sure how these things happen but I am pretty sure that judging by my blog's sporadic posts it's pretty clear my time management skills aren't so great.

That said, although I am still super excited about the site Duotrope's Digest, in some ways it makes waiting for responses from magazines even more like watching grass grow. Not that I look forward to getting rejections, but something about seeing in black and white how a submission has been out for like, 94 days or whatever makes it a bit more frustrating! Still, it's worth it, what a great tool.

LLB

Happy 2007!

2007-01-02T18:20:00.000-05:00

I find it a little bit amusing that my last post, back in September, was called "Sure is Quiet," and then I stopped posting for three months. LOL. The last couple months it's been hard to keep up with everything. But, let's get on with things, shall we...

However, in keeping with New Year's literary resolutions, I ran across a great (free) site, called Duotrope. If you're an aspiring writer, please check it out! It allows you to look up markets, according to a great many criteria, and just that part is cool. But even cooler, is, you can use its submission tracker to keep track of your submissions (duh) as well as easily ascertain if your pieces were accepted/rejected in, say, less than the average response time, or maybe more than the average response time, and it'll be alert you if maybe it's time to follow up with specific markets (due to your piece being there longer than average). Each market has great stats on acceptance vs. rejection ratios, the percentage that get personalized responses, etc.

This is an awesome tool that's long overdue what with all the community intelligence services out there -- and I have to say, the more of us who participate on the site, the smarter the Duotrope service will become. So let's all do it!

Here's to a successful 2007 in writing and all other endeavors!

LLB

Sure Is Quiet

2006-09-19T19:02:00.000-05:00

It sure is quiet around here. Then again, like I'm one to talk. Work's a little much right now so I haven't gotten much reading or fiction writing done.

Does anyone know of any literary magazines that are similar in tone and sensibility to Gargoyle? I'd appreciate any feedback if anyone has any.

Thanks for reading,

LLB

Food For Thought

2006-09-11T19:02:00.000-05:00

In one of my recent posts I was a little bit snarky about Poets & Writers magazine. However, on further reading I have to say I'm enjoying the most recent issue (the September/October issue).

One article I enjoyed was by Azita Osanloo, who discussed the recent interest in memoirs and autobiographical literature in the publishing world as well as the "pressure to be exotic" driving that interest as well. Should who you are and what you represent be seen as the most important element (and indeed, the most marketable element) of your writing endeavors? Osanloo provides a frank discussion of that idea, and also points out the sort of sensationalistic interest in memoirs as part of her article as well. Maybe the artist really should stay behind the scenes when it comes to literature. Osanloo addresses such issues as writers "selling themselves" as well as the recent scandal involving Kaavya Viswanathan. It's a good article and makes some excellent points as to the nature of literature and the artist.

I also enjoyed an article by Ken Gordon, called "The Posthumous Pickle." It deals with the sticky business of editors publishing famous artists' works posthumously. Maybe it's sort of morbid of me, but I have often thought that if I were to leave a will, I'd want to leave my unpublished works to some responsible, literary friend who would be kind of enough to take an interest in trying to get my finished stories published. However, the article discusses the ethics of publishing pieces that the artist might never have intended being published -- and that does seem a bit sticky. After all, we've all got crazy unfinished works or stories that maybe we finished but knew should never see the light of day. It really made me think about what we might innocently leave behind that we would never want others to see. It really made me think a lot (as well as think about how I'm a packrat with story drafts -- even though it's all digital, I can't bear to throw even the worst stuff away!). Of course this is probably not something I should worry about seeing how nobody's exactly beating down my door to publish my stuff now, but it's interesting food for thought for anybody who has set their sights on a literary career.

Anyway, I thought I'd mention the articles since they're both interesting reading and thought-provoking subjects that some of us would likely enjoy pondering, at the very least.

Thanks for reading and keep on writing,

LLB

Turning a New Page

2006-09-04T20:14:00.000-05:00

I haven't dug too deeply into the Web site NewPages, but I stumbled across a great tool for writers there -- a very thorough listing that links to many of the most well-known literary magazines' Web sites. Check it out... It's a great place to look around for any magazines you haven't hit with submissions.

Hey, it's September. That means a lot of literary magazines are open to submissions again after the summer doldrums (although I am also noticing a fair amount this year that aren't open to submissions until October). At any rate, it's time for us aspiring writers to get busy again, in terms of submitting, right? I just wish I had some inspiration for new stories, but at the moment the only ones I have kicking around in my head or on my desktop don't really have that "spark." I hope others are feeling more inspired right about now!

Thanks for reading and keep on writing,

LLB

Put on a Pedestal

2006-08-23T19:52:00.000-05:00

All right, last time around I was beating up on Poets & Writers a bit but I did run across what looked like an interesting online literary magazine in its pages, called The Pedestal Magazine.

I admit, I've never heard of it, and I didn't find a listing for it on the most recent Novel & Short Story Writer's Market. However, apparently it's been around since late 2000. It also pays writers it publishes.

I really enjoyed the introduction to the fiction section by Nathan Leslie. He discussed what has been a prominent literary trend for quite some time now (I actually am not crazy about it), confessional/self-expression in fiction, and compared it to intellectual detachment of the T.S. Eliot variety. I highly recommend reading the piece, it does give some good food for thought. (And of course, for those of us who aren't crazy about highly personal, confessional fiction, it seems like it's still pretty well ensconced, since it does segue well with the current fascination with reality TV, documentaries, and memoirs, as he points out in his exploration.) At any rate, I appreciated that he brought up the subject, it's a good one for writers to mull over.

Meanwhile, I did enjoy several of the stories I read there, in particular "The Real Story" by Jim O'Loughlin.

The Pedestal Magazine also publishes poetry, and has an online art gallery and bookstore (more specifically, it lists books by authors it has published that can be purchased from Amazon). It's well worth a look.

Thanks for reading and keep on writing,

LLB

Lorraine Has Left the Building Already

2006-08-22T20:30:00.000-05:00

I just got the latest issue of Poets & Writers in the mail, and as usual, flipped immediately to the back, to the call for submissions section. I was interested to see that they're still running the ad for Lorraine and James, despite the fact that that Internet publication has had a note up on their Web site for months, saying it's on hiatus for an unspecified amount of time, maybe even forever. (I posted about this recently, when ranting about submissions that go unanswered for months).

I have to wonder if Poets & Writers has enough people doing research and fact checking. I'd say many writers are mostly interested in the magazine as a resource for researching new markets, and for that reason I'd think they'd fact check those listings in the back to make sure they're still up and running. Maybe advertisers pay for ad space for large blocks of time, but regardless, I'd say a writer would be much better served not to run up against a lot of dead ends. Even if the advertiser paid for the ad in advance, if it no longer exists, couldn't there be some sort of notation across the ad that says the magazine is now on hiatus? It doesn't seem to me that it would be that difficult to do and would be a much better tool for writers to know not to even bother with that market.

Maybe I'm being a little harsh and ignoring the business elements here, and after all we do all have our own responsibilities to do our own research into literary markets, but when you pay for a subscription to a magazine like Poets & Writers, you want to find a lot of useful tools there. Situations like this remind me that I don't always feel I'm getting that experience.

Thanks for reading and keep on writing,

LLB

A Tale of Two Rejection Slips

2006-08-17T20:37:00.000-05:00

Okay, so most rejections aren't really rejection "slips" anymore. Over the course of the last year, I was rejected twice by The Missouri Review via email and I noted a subtle but possibly important difference between the two rejections.

The first rejection read like this: "Thank you for giving us the chance to consider [story name] for publication in The Missouri Review. Though it does not fit our current needs, we appreciate your interest in our magazine and your commitment to quality writing. We wish you the best of luck in publishing your work and hope you'll consider sending us more in the future."

It's obviously a form rejection, but it seems it's a form rejection with a difference. Consider a rejection I received from them about six months before: "Thank you for submitting [story name] to The Missouri Review. Though it doesn't meet our current needs, we appreciate the opportunity to consider it for publication. We wish you the best of luck in placing it elsewhere."

The extra line in the first rejection was reason to get excited. Even though it was obviously an impersonal rejection, it had that extra line that actually invited me to send more. Reading further between the lines, it also told me that it's likely they'd appreciate something more linear and narrative as opposed to experimental, judging by the two stories I sent and the responses I got.

I admit it, it's pretty lame and anal to compare different rejection emails on a line-by-line basis (I use a Gmail account for email and it makes it easy to tag and search old e-mailed rejections so I can do a comparison/contrast). It's also pretty lame to get excited about a "good" rejection but that's just the way it goes for those of us who are trying hard to get published. I was telling my friend J about the whole universe of types of rejections you can get, and I know it sounded weird to somebody who hasn't submitted fiction to magazines: impersonal ones (don't let the door hit you on the ass on the way out), "good" rejections (please send us more) or the best kinds of rejections, where the editors give a lot of feedback and give you the impression that something in your work moved them to comment. Getting warmer, right?

It is a strange pastime to have, though, when you find yourself obsessing over just what kind of rejection you receive from a magazine. It's definitely a labor of love when you have to soothe your ego in that way.

Thanks for reading and keep on writing,

LLB

Update

2006-08-16T18:36:00.000-05:00

Just a quick update -- I had said that Ploughshares was launching a beta test of an online submission system on Aug. 15 (I didn't make it up, it was on their Web site). I paid their site a visit tonight and I see that the beta launch has been pushed back to Aug. 17. Yes, that's tomorrow. I'll be curious to see how it works.

Keep on writing!

LLB

Life in the Grotto

2006-08-12T10:40:00.000-05:00

It occurred to me that it might be boring to hear a whole lot of talk magazine talk so I decided to do a little stream of consciousness. In March 2005, the tarot card reader I went to at Bottom of the Cup Tearoom in New Orleans told me I might not meet a lot of guys if I stayed in my writer's "grotto" all the time, but oh well. (She was a really good psychic, by the way.) What's more, now the grotto has one less person knocking around in it, since my roommate moved to India.

So, yeah, life in the grotto. Speaking of knocking around, now that I've moved my bedroom into what was my roommate's bedroom (and now I've got a bedroom that's only used for sleeping, which incidentally is a good tip for insomniacs) and converted my former bedroom into a library/office/study, I'm constantly wondering where I'm going for what. Wandering to and fro. Where are socks again? Where are my shoes? Most of my clothes are still in the closet in the library/office/study, because it's bigger and the closet in my bedroom is "open" -- it connects the bathroom to the bedroom. Anyway, I justify the disorganization as good exercise. It's also obviously spacious to be alone here, which is definitely not too convincing when it comes to the whole "writer's grotto" idea. I'd be closer to the concept if I lived in one room with the two cats, but I can't complain over the fact that I'm not fitting the stereotype at the moment. There's also the problem that my grotto is actually on the fourth floor of a garden apartment -- I think maybe a grotto is supposed to be subterranean, but I can't complain that I actually get some light unlike those creatures in the movie The Descent.

I haven't written a short story in a month or two -- and the last one I wrote was pretty much pilfered from an experience my friend J had. He knows I used him as inspiration for that story and he has no problem with that. However it must be kind of weird to see someone take a short vignette from your life and turn it into a short story complete with social commentary. I felt a little creepy about it and I was the one who wrote it. I'm hoping that having a whole room just for writing, reading and thinking will get the creative juices flowing but here lately all I've been doing is cleaning and organizing, it's never ending.

In other musings, I blame Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert for not getting more done. I think everybody should watch them, especially since our media isn't doing such a bang-up job these days. Who would have thought the most thought-provoking news coverage would come from Comedy Central? It's just like the old court jester idea. Only they don't tend to wear funny hats.

Okay, that's my stream of consciousness for the day.

Thanks for reading and keep on writing,

LLB

Welcome to the Future

2006-08-12T09:45:00.000-05:00

It's nice to see more and more of the traditional literary magazines allowing online submissions. I recently noticed that Kenyon Review has implemented an online submissions system. And Ploughshares, another long-standing literary magazine, says on its Web site that starting Aug. 15, it will have a beta version of an online submissions system in place.

When I first started this blog I felt a fair amount of frustration that some of the most venerated of literary journals didn't allow online submissions. It seemed that not only is it easier for writers (no need for a postage scale much less postage), it would be easier for the magazines themselves (easier tracking, less paperwork to shuffle or lose). Not to mention, many of us writers have wasted a lot of trees in the spirit of getting our work placed in a respected journal. (Computers have at least made it easier, but it's hard to imagine what it was like when a manuscript returned enough got a little too dog-eared after a while, requiring writers to fire up the computer and type up a new copy. What a labor of love.) I've gotten to the point where I rarely send my work to magazines that don't offer online or email options, just because it's kind of a pain to put together a hard-copy submission package and I get a little irritated on principle.

I'm betting that many such magazines are reluctant to offer electronic submissions because they fear a flood of submissions since there's not as much of a barrier to entry. Think of an old-fashioned mindset where a writer has to show his or her commitment by taking the time to put together the submission and pay the postage (and maybe even the sentiment that such a writer is more likely to be more "professional" in his or her craft). Some elements of that may be true, but there's something small minded in that idea; if you want to discover new, exciting voices, why would you install arbitrary barriers? A journal shouldn't feel put upon that many aspiring writers want to submit their work, but sometimes I wonder if with some of them, that's the case.

In the last year or so it does seem like things are picking up steam in terms of some of the best literary magazines allowing electronic submissions of some kind. I say, welcome to the future, folks.

Thanks for reading and keep on writing,

LLB

Contrary Talk

2006-08-09T15:40:00.000-05:00

Anybody have any experience with the online magazine Contrary? I'm finding them a little bit contrary considering the way they deal with submissions.

Okay so they pay $20, which is better than nothing, but man their submission guidelines are convoluted. Here goes: "The deadline for each issue is the first day of the month prior to that auspicious solar event. In Spring, for example, our deadline is March 1, and the issue appears with the vernal equinox on or about March 21."

Maybe it's just me, but that's tremendously confusing. So it would be nice if they responded to your submission in a timely manner, right? Wrong. You have to contact them. (The reason they don't just automatically respond to your submission is because so many writers "spam" them with submissions, at least that's what it says on its guidelines page.) However, they do say on their guidelines page that they're happy to respond if you email them to ask the status of your submission.

So yeah, the $20 swan song apparently lured me to submit. The solstice crap confused me so once summer started, I emailed them to ask what the status was. Response? Zilch.

Yep, this is one of my famous rants. I know it's annoying that the Internet has made it possible for writers to "spam" magazines (send to what, fifty publications at once? I guess that's what they refer to). But I get a little irritated when magazines are quick to note the shortcomings of writers and then don't follow up on their own promises (like, we'll email you back if you ask about your submission).

All righty, rant ended. Thanks for reading and keep on writing!

LLB

All About Vanity

2006-07-29T09:08:00.000-05:00

Having read a lot about publishing during the two decades I have been trying to get my own fiction published, I always dismissed vanity presses as wastes of money at best and scams at worst, but I'm wondering with the new forces at work if things are changing just a bit. Case in point: Lulu, which apparently allows authors to publish books more affordably (no set-up fees, no minimum orders). It also allows authors to retain rights of their books. Lulu does take a commission cut of any books sold, but authors get royalties as well on any books sold.

I don't know too much about the service, although I did notice it seems as if the books get sold through Lulu -- I would only imagine that's the case if Lulu takes a commission. It had occurred to me it would be nice to be able to get the added exposure through Amazon.com, for example, but I'm not sure if that's the way it works.

Anyway, it's just food for thought (and I'd be curious if anyone out there has used Lulu and can give more information about how useful it is to authors). I'd imagine that anybody who decided to use it would have to make a real grassroots effort to market their own work, but that's not very difficult in these days of blogging and word-of-mouth marketing that's happening on the Internet.

Another thought I've had is the publishing industry kind of deserves it if talent is starting to become more self directed. It seems to me that the publishing industry has become a marketing machine more than a literary one, eager to churn out blockbusters with little literary value (case in point: The Da Vinci Code). Then there's the story that infuriated me a few months ago: that of the Harvard student who got the book deal (without a book!) -- with an alleged half-million dollar advance from Little, Brown to write it. I'm not sure which was more insulting, the fact that her completed work turned up many instances of plagiarism, or the fact that a major publisher would give a half-million dollar advance to an untried teenager. It kind of disgusted me as a writer who has worked for years to hone my craft and has never made a red cent. Meanwhile, it made it obvious that in many cases, publishers are putting "marketability" ahead of talent and have every intention on throwing money into a huge marketing campaign -- that's the marketing machine element I mentioned above. The big, corporate publishers aren't doing literature any favors with stunts like that one. It makes you want to look at any "blockbuster" novel with a jaundiced eye.

Rant, anyone? I guess the good news is, big publishing houses aren't the only way to go these days. It's sort of sad, though, because us writers had also steered clear of self publishing because we sort of wanted to prove to ourselves that we had "talent" according to someone else's standards, I guess. Now that technology is changing the way that distribution (and marketing) works, I guess the new question might be: Who decides what is "good"? Maybe soon, the actual readers will hold exponentially more power, rather than the big publishers or ivory tower critics.

Thanks for reading and keep on writing,

LLB

Time to Rant

2006-07-25T20:33:00.000-05:00

All right, I guess this wouldn't be the same blog it used to be if I didn't rant a little about daily, monthly, yearly irritations of being an aspiring fiction writer. In my anal-retentive spreadsheet of submissions that I've been keeping for years now (okay, so it's not a spreadsheet, it's a Word document with columns and rows, I can't use Excel to save my life), I have a few no responders highlighted in red. Sending a fiction submission out, having it sit at a magazine or e-zine or what have you for months, and then never get the common decency of a reply... well, it's irritating.

Among the naughty is a magazine I ran across in Poets & Writers magazine, called Bucks County Review. Apparently at some point it was a "new venture" according to the editors' notes, but apparently it's also a slow venture or a "oh, never mind" venture. I submitted in November 2005 and still have received no response, and emailed queries about the status of my submission are bounced back. Oh, joy.

Another market I happened across in Poets & Writers was Lorraine & James. I had never heard of them until I saw their call for submissions in Poets & Writers in February. As of May, the magazine's Web site said it is already on hiatus. Easy come, easy go. (I'm sure there's a sad story behind this -- it said not only might this be a hiatus but they might call it a wrap -- but it's still a bit frustrating when you wait three months and never receive a reply and then come to find out the magazine's just gone.)

Well over a year ago I sent a story to storySouth. Don't ask me what's up with them, but I never got a response even with a few follow-up emails (that actually didn't get bounced back) so I say, um, get with it people. I was a little surprised because storySouth is behind the Million Writers Award every year, so I would have expected a bit more professionalism there.

And I do have one last question: does anyone know what's up with The Paumanok Review? I sent a submission there and got bouncebacks to my followup emails. However I have dealt with Katherine Arline before and she is very professional. So... I'm curious if anyone knows if that publication is on hiatus or what.

Okay, there are a few other rant-worthy publications out there when it comes to non-responders, but I guess I can save that for another day. This is getting a little long.

Ah, the writing life. It can be... awfully quiet sometimes. Truth is, I'd rather have somebody respond that they hate and despite a short story of mine (which has happened, well they didn't say that in that many words, but that was the gist), than just get silence. And of course, the dreaded email bounceback does make me worry whether everybody's okay over there, wherever they are.

Thanks for reading and keep on writing...

LLB

The Prodigal Blogger

2006-07-23T10:26:00.000-05:00

I was very touched to see that Maktaaq had posted about my return on her blog -- one of the best and most well written blogs out there. If you haven't already, be sure to check out her site -- here lately it has featured a very charming cutie named Lucian among many other interesting and fun posts.

I have had two short stories published in e-zines during my blogging hiatus. However I've started to think that my goal needs to go to the next level: to get published in a print publication or at least a publication that pays; many aspiring writers know that's easier said than done. I do appreciate any exposure my stories get through e-zines -- after all, when you've got a day job, you can write as a labor of love as opposed to just plain labor -- but with my roommate having moved to India and money being tight since I've decided to live alone, things are going to be a little bit sparse around here.

Of course, my new goals are subject to a lot of flexibility. After all, this summer it seems like everywhere I turn when I'm researching markets finds magazines that have gone on hiatus or aren't accepting new submissions until, say, October (which of course is getting closer all the time, come to think of it).

Then there are the non-responders -- magazines you submit to that never respond, nor do they respond to queries. That is a frequent subject of my rants because it really wastes a writer's time. But that's another post for another time.

Thanks for reading and keep on writing,

LLB

A New Chapter

2006-07-20T23:32:00.000-05:00

Well what has gone on in the last year? Quite a lot. I had that videogame addiction that did take up a whole lot of time. (I'm lucky nobody did an intervention, quite frankly -- it was so easy to lose time that I saw a few sunrises while I was playing it!) It was good because I met a really great person in there, and did have a lot of fun for many many months, but it got a little harrowing because I suddenly felt like I had a second job in this strange virtual world. I suppose there's a story in there somewhere for sure. I quit in November but have had lots of writing deadlines for work, so it was harder and harder to blog, but I think my time might be freeing up just a tad soon.

In other news, my roommate of about 8 years is moving to India for 2 years. That's going to be a pretty drastic shift in lifestyle, and it's sad although now I can definitely be the writer in a garret (haha). And since expenses will increase, well, what better excuse to sit around and read and write in my off hours! I certainly won't be out spending money. And I will convert her bedroom to an office/study/library, so that's really good news. Being crammed in my bedroom was at times a little bit like a garret.

Most of the reading I've been doing has been work-related, but one really excellent novel (given to me by the really great person mentioned above) was And the Ass Saw the Angel, by Nick Cave (of the Bad Seeds and Birthday Party). It's by no means easy fare -- it's a very dark novel with what I would describe as seriously southern Gothic overtones -- but it's got some beauty in some of the most amazing imagery I've ever encountered. He can make something ugly or frightening seem absolutely beautiful with his prose. I'm glad that I read it -- it inspired me to whip out the highlighter pen to highlight interesting passages -- and therefore, I am glad to be able to recommend it since I think it's probably fairly obscure. (I also recently saw the movie The Proposition -- he wrote the screenplay for that, and I also highly recommend that one, again, though, it's pretty heavy fare and certainly not comfortable, but I know many of you who have visited this blog in the past are not faint of heart!)

On that note I'll close for now. I do have plenty of ranting to do about literary markets -- I guess I've stored a lot of angst up in the last year, so I will try to post again soon. Thanks for reading and keep on writing!

LLB

Library Thing

2006-07-16T20:40:00.000-05:00

All right, so I haven't blogged in more than a year. That's really sad. Time is so short and while I have been reading, I haven't been blogging. (I have been plugging away writing short fiction though and still trying to get it published!).

Anyway the reason I was struck to blog once again is this really cool site called Library Thing , which allows folks to put their library books/reading lists online and rate them, tag them, and review them, as well as see what people with similar reading tastes have been reading. Cool stuff! I just had to share.

Maybe I will start blogging again a little bit more regularly -- sorry to all the folks in the literary blogosphere that I neglected. I will say I did ditch my terrible video game habit, which really did kind of get in the way. I hope all's well out there and everybody's reading some great stuff for the summer!

LLB

Neverland

2005-05-29T19:49:00.000-05:00

Was out of town for part of the weekend, and still addicted to the online video game... ah yes, so much constructive behavior, I know. I finally got a new DVD player so I was able to finally watch the movie "Finding Neverland," which has been sitting here unwatched for so long.

Great movie, quite the tearjerker, but I have to say one of the themes, having an inappropriate muse, hit close to home. I'm betting it's rather common. Life is so complicated...

So here we are on the brink of summer doldrums and I'm wondering about all those submissions I still have out. What happens to them? It's kind of frustrating knowing as I do that the summer period for fiction is always slow and agonizing. I guess it's just about time to send out some gentle reminders... of course at least one of the magazines I submitted to already was sent a gentle reminder, and, of course, never responded.

Perhaps it's time to just knock that one off the list and submit elsewhere. But to where?

Does anybody know of some good leads for magazines that continue to read during the summer? I know Gargoyle magazine is one of the few that solely reads during the summer, and they will be on my hit list this year. Other than that I'm going to have to do some serious research into the markets that read during summer.

Thanks for reading, and I hope you're all having a great Memorial Day weekend...

LLB

Life in Hell!

2005-05-27T18:37:00.000-05:00

Just kidding, it's not as bad as all that. I don't know if some of you who are more prolific bloggers than I manage to just have nothing to say sometimes for protracted periods of time. Even us writers need a break once in a while, and I do write every day for work... I suppose it's damn lucky that I even ever touch a keyboard when I get home.

I hope everybody has fun plans for Memorial Day. I'm actually staying pretty low key -- last couple weeks have been pretty busy although I am going to the mountains with my parental units.

Reading-wise, I haven't done much of it. I just recently finished Stiff and then I launched into Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. I don't think I ever read the whole thing, even though I knew I loved his writing style. But I'm pretty sure I have only read articles or snippets... There's also the fact that I had Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail and one of my ex-boyfriends absconded with it. I think I need to learn to read a book first before lending it to any boyfriends who are flight risks. Hahaha.

So anyway, yeah, I've gotten into a bit of a non-fiction phase at the moment... (if you can exactly call gonzo journalism non-fiction, but anyway...)

Anyway, I hope everybody's doing well, and happy writing,

LLB

The Stival

2005-05-17T15:53:00.000-05:00

HFStival, that is.

Hey guys -- I did survive it. Hebdomeros was right, Interpol is good live -- they were tight and didn't really diverge off of their studio sound. Except at the end of the set the guitarist slammed down his guitar and charged off. We wondered if there were technical difficulties because Echo and the Bunnymen only played for about 3 1/2 minutes.

The turnout was actually pretty good, considering the fact that the festival no longer has its own station on the FM dial to promote it. However, there were about 10,000 of the same girl there. Luckily, I did not see any of these girls showing their boobs to guys, as Miss L described from an HFStival past. Doesn't mean it wasn't happening.

So onto that idea that several of you have put forth... yep, I did feel kinda old looking around me. There were a lot of youngsters doing youngster things. However, I had a good time -- despite the fact that the sky opened up later and I got drenched. I haven't willingly gotten so drenched in years.

Meanwhile as an old-school (former) punk I had a hard time with the fact that there was moshing/pits/crowd surfing for EVERY band. Including They Might Be Giants, for example. I mean, what the hell? That's a travesty. Not to bust on that band, they're fun, but I file that under the category of "inappropriate moshing/crowd surfing" -- in fact I'm not sure any of the acts really deserved any slamming etc., you know?

Believe it or not, as much as I have been making fun of Billy Idol's presence on the roster (third to last act!), I have to admit -- he was very enjoyable. He looks good for a 50-year-old and it was rather endearing that while he is definitely trying to recreate his old persona, he seemed to genuinely get a kick out of the whole thing and put forth that persona with a sense of humor. What also weirded me out was I had no idea there was some sort of closeted Billy Idol following but apparently there is. The crowd ate him up. Surprises, surprises.

Good Charlotte bites. My friend and I observed that their singer was wearing a tee shirt for his own band, would entreat the crowd to cheer, and also entreated them to light up their lighters. (These really aren't things that any self-respecting band leader should do, IMHO.) Could have done without that act.

Anyhoo, despite the fact that I can be bitter and snarky about the things that have changed since I was a young punk, it was a good time. I am glad I went.

In other news, I finished Stiff by Mary Roach. It's a good read, interesting, informative, funny in parts -- though not for the squeamish. I felt it lost a little of its momentum or something towards the end, like all the really good topics were all at the beginning, but maybe that's just me. It was a good and quick read as long as you're not too bothered by the morbid or that taboo... some of it definitely makes some good fodder for horror writers, I would imagine.

LLB

Whoa

2005-05-12T20:36:00.000-05:00

Okay, I'm having a "whoa, what happened" moment. I blogged on 5/8 and now here it is, 5/12 and I am not sure where the time went.

Well there are the usual excuses and plans of action. Work (tough this week), gaming, working out, and reading, and I just haven't been on blogger. Not that I've had all that much compelling to say.

At any rate, I lied last time about diving into Black Clock. Instead, I'm reading Stiff by Mary Roach. I decided I needed a temporary break from fiction for the moment, and Stiff fits that bill. And boy, is it ever different than just about anything, so far. It's about the curious "lives" of human cadavers. (I'm sure you guys have heard of it.) I'm impressed so far that somebody could take such a taboo subject and actually write about it (not to mention have a sense of humor about it as well). It's a nice blend of history and investigative reporting, I guess, on a topic that most of us don't spend too much time contemplating. Disturbing? Yes. But it's definitely interesting and thought provoking.

I'm not done with it yet though, so this isn't exactly a full review.

This weekend I am going to HFStival. Mostly to see Interpol really, although an aging Billy Idol and New York Dolls might be interesting just for the weird factor. I'm thinking I'm far too old for the all-day festival sort of mayhem, but we'll see how it goes. I'm not sure what will happen if it rains. (Which also ties into the whole "being old" thing, I don't recall rain deterring me from much back as a young punk.)

Also interesting, how does a festival happen for an HFS that is actually not really itself any longer? Just a shadow of its former self, on Internet radio and sharing time with others on a different radio station. It should be interesting... I might be tempted to get souvenirs just because.

LLB

Gargoyles About

2005-05-08T18:47:00.000-05:00

Okay, I finally finished Gargoyle No. 48. Not that there was any reason why it took so long, but just that I've had so much else going on that I've been a slow reader. I suppose summer might be a continuation of that problem, given the usual uptick of social life in the summertime.

Anyway, as always, I totally enjoyed the issue of Gargoyle. It even had a couple relationship stories in it. (Sorry, couldn't resist that jab about a certain comment that I blogged about recently.) Just goes to show those pesky "relationship stories" can really knock one's socks off.

I guess my favorite story was Butterfly Barbecue Sauce by James Thompson. How can one not like a story where a lifeguard dummy is the protagonist, I ask? Seriously, it's one wacked-out story with a lot of truths about human nature as well as the nature of relationships.

Another story that blew me away was The Crime Museum by Suzanne Feldman, which brings a real sci-fi, speculative strain to the volume, as well as This Other Eden by Michael Hemmingson, which goes to realms of social dread and just nails it home. Other stories that stuck with me were Intimacy by Avital Gad-Cykman, Oppositions by Carolyn Osborn, In Memoriam to Identity by Doug Rice, Corrections by Lynda Schor, Transactions by Jon Swan, and A Simple Affair by Katherine Vaz. Okay, so that's just about all of the fiction in the volume, ha.

Also, maybe the piece that I won't forget was Verges by Reamy Jansen. I am not sure what the heck it is, to be honest (it's in the nonfiction section) but it's definitely one of the most striking pieces in the entire issue.

If anything struck me, it was that this issue struck me as just a tad less edgy than issues I have read in the past. Not that that's a bad thing, in the case of Gargoyle, which is always a totally satisfying read where the fiction really jumps out at you. So, I highly recommend it, and I hope that others will check it out. I'm looking forward to getting the next issue that's coming out in the summer, I believe (correct me if I'm wrong...). I'm also looking forward to the end of May so I can submit some work to them.

Next on the agenda is Black Clock -- well, truth is, I've got a huge stack of reading waiting to be done but can only get through it one at a time. There are a few detours coming up, seeing how I also have some work-related reading to do coming up as well as the fact that I ordered a Hunter S. Thompson book in memoriam of the man. I have read some of Thompson's stuff but lost one book to an ex-boyfriend (before I could even finish reading it) and borrowed the rest. Oh well...

Thanks for reading,

LLB

After the Muse Visits...

2005-05-05T20:05:00.000-05:00

Maktaaq asked a very good question about my last post, pertaining to the visit of the muse, where the story just comes out. What do I do next?

I know what the right answer is. I suppose if one takes advice like that offered up in Stephen King's On Writing -- he suggests that writers take a brand-new story and stick it in a desk drawer for a few months.

However, I'm usually a lot less disciplined than all that. Generally speaking, when I finish up a story, I submit it much too soon. Granted, I will look it over many, many times, to make sure there are no overt typos or bad sentences -- I always do a few editing sweeps before I send anything out. (And I think some of us suspect that some beginning writers actually skip that step -- which isn't cool, literary magazines aren't editing services.)

However, I am very guilty of sometimes sending something out when I should probably let it sit and simmer for a while and do more work on it later.

It's very hard to be disciplined... and I find that I'm a little less exciteable about the stories that are more difficult to write. Those are the ones that get a much more discerning eye when I am doing my editing process.

Does anybody here put stories away for a few months before revisiting and marketing them? I'm curious what everybody else's habits are in this regard.

Thanks for reading,

LLB

The Muse Visits

2005-05-03T21:42:00.000-05:00

So I had a thought for a short story and wonder of wonders, it just popped out tonight. Yep, just popped right out. It's nice and short too, so it might make a good submission for some of those Web markets.

I have to say, I love it when something comes out this easily. Nice and compact, and just lays right out on the page. It all falls into place, without any agonizing over what the right ending is. Yay, muse! Thanks for the wholly constructive and convenient visit... Well, hopefully the story doesn't suck, seeing how it's in its first blush and I always think those are great. ;)

Hope everybody's doing well and writing happily,

LLB

So Much...

2005-05-02T19:12:00.000-05:00

So much for the two things this weekend that I felt were justifying my writerliness -- I made a submission but neglected to notice their limits on word counts and so... it's already back to the drawing board!

However, I heartily recommend submitting to Pindeldyboz for their automated response, if nothing else. It's hilarious. (Just don't forget to check that limit on words for Web submissions!)

Over the weekend I saw my first IMAX movie, "Into the Deep." It's playing at the Smithsonian (if you're a DC type) and I have to say, I had NO IDEA these movies were so damn cool. It was in 3D and while they give you some goofy glasses that you can't take home, the 3D is awesome. I mean really. I wanted to put my hand out in parts, it was so realistic.

Anyhoo... hope everybody had great weekends! Watch out for the weather's crazed mood swings.

LLB

A D.C. State of Mind

2005-04-30T14:06:00.000-05:00

Yeah, I'm lame, I've been reading Gargoyle for months now. My reading rate is so slow between work, my iPod, and now some friends of mine have gotten me into a multiplayer game on the Internet... and I told you guys before that I'm trying to squeeze working out at the gym into my mostly sedentary regimen so I guess reading has fallen by the wayside. I know, for a writer, that's pretty awful.

But I have to say, on an overall level, one of the things that tickles me with Gargoyle is how these DCisms creep in. Mostly in terms of place -- like one story mentioned DC watering hole The Fox and Hounds, which is where my roommate spends most of her Friday afternoons/nights. (Happy hour? Bah! Hahaha.)

Anyway, it's nice that not only is Gargoyle such a grand lit mag, that it highlights the DC experience a little bit -- and not in that whole Beltway, politico type thing.

I mean, it's weird... DC is so well known for politics but I realized quite recently that I manage to stay really, really uninvolved in that aspect of things. Screw the Hill. Ha.

Anyway, it's just a thought for a rainy Saturday, where I am actually waiting directions for the events of the day. I feel like taking a nap, though. (Ugh, more sedentary behavior!)

P.S. I did submit a story this morning and work on one that's still being kicked around on my desktop, so I'm not a complete writing failure lately! Haha...

LLB

Bliss

2005-04-28T18:28:00.000-05:00

Well I know we have all manner of writers who stop by here either regularly or on occasion. So my question is, to reveal your best acceptance of a piece of fiction. I would love to hear any or all stories in that regard, but I am particularly curious to hear from those of you who have been published by some of the big names, like The New Yorker. Did they call you about the acceptance? Write to you? Were they timely in paying? How did it feel to get a nice big check for a piece of fiction?

Hoping to hear from some of you about that. So far, since all of my publications have been for online magazines, all of my communications have been via email. Which is, of course, great -- I would never complain. But I have yet to be sent a check... or even copies of a magazine I've been published in. So I'm curious for some stories!

Thanks for reading,

LLB

Oh, To Be a Poet

2005-04-26T19:07:00.000-05:00

It never ceases to amuse me the silly things I get in the mail because some lit mag I've subscribed to or ordered copies of has sold my name to a literary mailing list. it isn't altogether bad, as sometimes I get something halfway interesting that I consider, but yesteday I received a solicitation to be an associate member of The American Academy of Poets. It included an added letter from the poet laureate of the U.S., no less.

Small problem. I'm not a poet and never have been. Those of you who have been reading this blog for a while know that I'm not even a voracious reader of poetry.

Ah well, I can't help but laugh. Bark up another tree. At least it wasn't one of those pieces of junk mail that invites you to publish your work in an anthology as long as you pay for a copy of the volume.

Nah, this seems to be on the up and up, and says it's for the higher cause of advocating poetry and that's fine. So I have to limit my amount of snarkiness now. I read it a little closer and found myself feeling a little bad. But, still, not a poet. Maybe a version for writers would score higher with me, obviously.

In other news, though, a dear, dear friend of mine -- who was an excellent poet years ago but has not written anything in recent years -- told me yesterday she had written a poem for the first time in ages and sent it along. It was great! I am hoping that she will get back into the process of writing poetry -- and submitting it! I always thought she could do great things with that talent.

thanks for reading,

LLB

Great Article

2005-04-24T09:56:00.000-05:00

Please read this excellent article,, courtesy of Jen. It addresses a lot of the issues surrounding online publishing that we've kicked around, right here on this blog.

It features interviews with several editors of some prominent online literary magazines, and at times, the observations are mind blowing (and at other times, the observations reflect our own).

Despite all the admissions that online fiction is a great force for good, the money word (the c for career word) came up a few times. Although I am more than willing to get my fiction published my non-paying markets, I do have a fair amount of concern about the idea of payment becoming the exception to the rule (actually, it may already be that way, truth be told). As selfish as it sounds, I would like to see monetary compensation for my own fiction writing. But for the time being, it's good to know that online fiction is gaining more and more credibility with the literary world, regardless of what argument there is for whether writing fiction should be a career or simply a labor of love.

LLB

The SuperEgo

2005-04-21T22:26:00.000-05:00

So, this is just a funny factoid because I know a few of us have done this (and because it's late and I'm tired and going to bed soon, haha). But the act of "Googling yourself" can also be called "ego surfing."

I do it all the time (well, not all the time but probably more than I'd like to admit) and I know many of you do. I have also had a few writers and editors email me because they have also done it and found themselves on my blog. It's so funny, though, we all seem to admit to it sheepishly but I think it's part of the whole writers thing. If you're published you want to know what people are saying about you. It's a natural impulse but I always get nervous right before I hit that enter button.

Anyway, I thought that was funny, and with that, I will close. Happy surfing! :)

LLB

Double Header

2005-04-20T22:13:00.000-05:00

Oh hey look, two in a matter of two days, I haven't been this good in about a month. Phew, maybe I'm getting a bit back on track. Ha.

So, a few weeks ago, I saw through Barrelhouse's email notifier that they have gotten some press recognition, which is cool. Very cool. And I've already blogged about how I enjoyed the inaugural issue, and had wanted to go to the reading, but was out of town that weekend.

So anyway, back to those press mentions. Dave Housley, one of the editors, made a comment about the whole process of vetting submissions, and said that he got inundated with "relationship stories" and said something to the effect that he got to the point where he was so burnt out on them, that if Flannery O'Connor herself had risen from the grave with a relationship story he would have rejected it. (Total paraphrase but that's the gist.)

Maybe I got a little annoyed because I had sent a "relationship story" to them (and got rejected handily), but I kept thinking about that concept. Are there too many relationship stories? My mind raced. Should I stop writing stories that could be considered "relationship stories"? Actually I kind of chafe at even considering my stories to be "relationship stories," per se (God forbid chick lit of the Bridget Jones variety, although I know a lot of people are finding that term to be downright controversial these days) I still think they're more dysfunction stories, hahaha, but still. I just kept thinking about how relationships are one of the most common conflicts that humans face. And that in 2005, I am pretty sure that Gen X and Gen Y have very different versions of relationships, gender roles, commitment, and the like than previous generations. Relationships say a lot about our society -- and resonate with a lot of people. And some of the greatest pieces of literature of our time have been about something as elemental as, well, relationships. And of course, I could just go on and on about this, as you might imagine.

I guess it shouldn't have chafed at me so much and I can see how very similar stories submitted could get very tiresome. In the end, though, I still have to write what the spirit moves me to write or whatever. (I'm quite proud that one of my stories was rejected by an editor who said my characters were unlikeable characters doing unlikeable things -- I'm contrary that way. I've also had raves about that story, which reminds me of a recent Hebdomeros post about contests and the ultimate question of tastes.) I just thought it might be an interesting point to consider. I'd welcome any comments here -- the idea just got under my skin and I couldn't shake it, ha.

Thanks for reading (and sticking with me while I've been a bit dicey with the posts!),

LLB

Alive!

2005-04-19T18:25:00.000-05:00

Yes, I am alive, despite rumors to the contrary. In addition to the iPod addiction problem, my roommate and I had a party over the weekend, a bash as it were. Just kidding... we decided it was the most sedate party we've had in years, but the truth is there was a good selection of people and it was very, very enjoyable. Slightly disturbing was everyone had cleared out at 12:30... we have decided it seems people are leaving about a half hour earlier every year. hahaha. But it was good, and now it's back to real life!

Well, sorta. There is still the iPod addiction, ha... and the fact that I have made the resolution to start working out again, which is having varying levels of success. I haven't really made it to the gym more than once or twice a week so far, but let's hope I can start getting that going so it's more than that. I suddenly realized all the computer work is turning into a sedentary lifestyle and realized that I am also not feeling very well -- some combination of inactivity and a little weight gain. So I hope you guys will forgive me if I'm not quite as prolific as I once was!

In other news, I saw the ironic news report that The Atlantic won some awards for its fiction after having announced it will discontinue fiction.

In purely personal news, I have received another form rejection -- it appears I am on a roll, and needless to say, overdue to send some submissions back out. I've got to find some time to do a little market research sometime soon!

Hope you all are well and happy spring-like weather!

LLB

More Apologies

2005-04-15T22:49:00.000-05:00

All right, I really apologize for being such a no-show lately. My birthday was Wednesday, and I guess the last week and a half have been busy, what with birthday events. Lord, it just goes on and on, right?

Plus, I got a 20 GB iPod for my birthday. Loading up CDs and then loading them onto my iPod has been eating into my blogging time! So I'm sorry... it's ridiculous really.

I'll be back soon with some literary thoughts but just wanted to put up a post saying I am alive and all that good stuff...

Hope everybody's well!

LLB

The Lit Blog Movement's Moving

2005-04-08T21:27:00.000-05:00

Check out The Happy Booker if you get a chance... she's reported on a really cool innovation in the world of literary blogging. Which, it seems to me, is exploding, and with good reason... we are all writers and readers, and where better to express this than on the Internet? Cool stuff.

Meanwhile, the entire Internet is acting like a bitch lately. I don't know if anyone else has noticed it... but I am having a hard time posting, commenting, and even emailing people back through Yahoo! (Maktaaq, I'm trying!).

I'll be venturing down to Richmond (about an hour and a half south of here) tomorrow, so I wanted to extend happy weekend wishes to everybody before that happens.

Thanks for reading,

LLB

What Gives?

2005-04-06T22:04:00.000-05:00

First... kudos to Hebdomeros for scooping the story that Richard Peabody's poetry and article was in USA Today on Monday. That was such a cool achievement for one of our local literary notables -- a little national acclaim! That's great!

In other news, what gives? I saw a news article today that said The Atlantic will no longer publish fiction in its issues. It will have one August issue that is dedicated solely to fiction.

I don't know -- it's line about how quick, up-to-the-minute journalism is everywhere now but in-depth journalism like what it can offer will take up more pages sounds like a load. Or something. I mean, with all the current hoopla over the state of journalism now that bloggers are stealing some thunder, I guess this could theoretically be some weird knee-jerk reaction.

On the other hand, The Atlantic is one of the oldest and most venerated sources of fiction in a monthly magazine that gets more than your usual niche of readers. It's also one of the markets that pays the best. What happened to the feature in the most recent issue of Novel & Short Story Writer's Market that claimed that the main editor at least glanced at all the submissions?

Lame, lame, lame. I guess I haven't been too terribly impressed with a lot of the mainstream magazines but this isn't an improvement, it's a much worse turn of events.

Anyway... interested to hear what others have to say. I know that the chances of many of us struggling writers getting into The Atlantic is about the same as being hit by lightning, but still... it was one of those markets that you might hate, but you always kind of hoped to get into.

Here's to August... sigh.

Thanks for reading,

LLB

A Quick Minute

2005-04-04T22:41:00.000-05:00

All right, I can only make a very quick post. A friend took me to see David Sedaris read at the Lisner Auditorium. I can't say I was already a David Sedaris fan, I haven't read his stuff, but I guess I can say that I'm a fan now, because he was hilarious!

I also ran into an old friend of mine from college. I haven't seen her for 10+ years, but we have been in touch by email recently, and it was just soooo wild. She recognized me and I have to give her extreme kudos for that. I thought she looked familiar but literally thought, what are the chances, and then didn't give it a second thought. You know? Until of course she said my name, and I was like, huh? And then jumped up and hugged her in an explosive show of shocked surprise. (She probably immediately regretted having said anything, I made such a spectacle, ha.) What a strange and good night.

Anyway, interestingly, he did a Q&A at the end and someone asked the very good question about his writing habits. He said he writes every day -- gets up, writes, has lunch, answers mail, then writes more at night. Then he said that while he writes every day and does not give himself a break from that, that 80% of his writing he ditches. I'm sure that's quite the quick and dirty breakdown for how much of his writings he just slashes, but I thought it was interesting.

He also gave the impression that diary writings, while embarrassing, often log away some of the best bits of day to day life.

Thanks for reading,

LLB

Apologies

2005-04-03T17:26:00.000-05:00

Hi everybody,

I've been extremely remiss. Last week was a tough week with work, and I was pretty exhausted every day. It wasn't too conducive to blogging whatsoever. On Monday at work I found out that a monthly task was due this past week, and of course, it would have been nice to know it was coming the week before... but in a way I guess it's good because the knowledge would have sort of ruined my 3-day weekend because I would have been either stressing about it all weekend or working on it during my time off. But that also meant that this past week was overly busy.

In the interim, that issue of Black Clock I complained about did arrive, so that was good. Folio rejected the story I had in to them. Form rejection. I like it when they give you a subscription slip with your form rejection when they don't even sign a name to the thing. That's some killer marketing. Haha.

Next up, I found out on Matt Kirkpatrick's site that there will be a launch party for Barrelhouse at the Big Hunt in Dupont Circle in D.C. He will be reading along with other writers whose work appeared in the first issue of the magazine. Unfortunately, I will have to miss it, because I will be out of town that weekend. I'm visiting with some good friends who are about to have Newborn #2, and once Newborn #2 comes, of course it'll be a while before they can receive guests, so I can't really reschedule. But anybody in the D.C. area might want to consider checking it out.

Meanwhile, The Happy Booker has been having some great mystery guests recently -- unfortunately, I haven't been able to keep up with all my blog business too well recently. She also pointed me in the direction of yet another D.C.-based literary blog.

Okay, this is of course the sound of me trying to catch up. More to follow, but a friend of mine is taking me out Monday night for early birthday celebration, so it might be a day or two, but I'll try to be better!

Hope everybody is well,

LLB

The Black Clock's Ticking

2005-03-28T23:23:00.000-05:00

Okay, so waiting has definitely been the theme recently. And I know, I have to remember that patience is a virtue.

However, long, long ago, I sent a check to Black Clock for a copy of the magazine. (Kind of pointless since they only take solicited submissions -- meaning you lowly peons can't just send to them unless they ask, so it's not exactly great market research.) Anyway, I'm still waiting. Tick tock!

On a better note, Fiction Warehouse rejected me quite handily, with an extremely form rejection. Rock on! At least I'm not sitting around on tenterhooks about that one.

I sense sometime soon I am gonna come up with a great rant about something that isn't me waiting for stuff. ;) I'm kinda working my way into that kind of mood. Plus this other stuff is getting into broken record territory. I'd better actually start talking about records or something.

Write on,

LLB

Build It and They Will Come

2005-03-26T11:49:00.000-05:00

Well, I just spend some time staring at my spreadsheet of submissions, lamenting the fact that some are overdue and some I don't even know when the magazines report, and I haven't heard much lately. It seems like reporting times get longer and longer, and I know I have discussed with some of you that even if you have a guideline of a reporting time, it usually ends up meaning that you need to tack a few months onto that.

I was thinking of how we've already discussed that despite the advent of new markets, there seems to be a bit of a glut out there, and with the online markets, it's pretty sure that the editors have separate jobs, and lives, which of course probably tacks on the response time. It must be hard for them to keep up with everything since it isn't like their primary focus in life or something.

And then there's that idea of short story glut out there... with the subsequent backlogs involved. I remember Jen mentioning that the online markets likely have made people submit stuff that isn't even all the way done yet... Sigh. Adding more for the editors to slog through.

What's my point? Dunno. I was just sitting there thinking about all the short stories floating around out in the world, hoping to find homes, and came up with that old saying, "build it and they will come." Back in the old days, it did take a lot longer to put together a manuscript with the requisite paper copy, tyvek, SASE, and cover letter. (Lord knows I have complained to no end about how I hate to do it, myself.) The advent of online markets, it seems, has opened up the floodgates.

Ah well, this just means I've got to get cracking on my other pieces that are currently in the works instead of obsess about the ones that are already out there. So I can have an even longer list of submissions to watch in that spreadsheet!

Thanks for reading,

LLB

The Passing of the Stick

2005-03-25T17:38:00.000-05:00

Hey guys, Matt Kirkpatrick passed me the stick! So here we go!

You're stuck inside Fahrenheit 451, which book do you want to be? (Assuming this is the question about burning a book...)
Marquis de Sade's collection, I believe it's called Philosophy of the Bedroomand included stories like Justine. Burn, baby burn. I read it in college, and it was the only book I ever read that I wanted to burn. Generally I have a pretty open mind to all kinds of craziness, and I'm pretty sure (ha) that his stuff was really symbolic of other philosophical ideas and a reaction to the times, but damn, I just found it all incredibly unpleasant. Too unpleasant even for my own often misanthropic ways...

Have you ever had a crush on a fictional character?
Hmm. I suppose there was probably a time when I had a crush on Anne Rice's Lestat, as sad and obviously former goth THAT is. I can't think of a more recent fiction crush.

The last book you bought is:
Um, Ghosts of New Orleans. On my trip. Technically, that would be the last book! Other than that, there's my recent shipment from Amazon of Scar Tissue,, Gargoyle No. 48, and Stranger Things Happen by Kelly Link.

The last book you read:
Either Scar Tissue or Columbia, if you count it as a book and not a magazine.

What are you currently reading?
Gargoyle No. 48. I've got quite a little theme going here!

Five books you would take to a deserted island:

-- McSweeney's Mammoth Treasury of Thrilling Tales. I know I have some serious reservations about how McSweeney's treatment of writers but have to admit that anthology rocked.
-- Neuromancer by William Gibson. Love that book.
-- Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte. Twisted.
-- An issue of Gargoyle. A lot there to keep one entertained and sharp. Haha.
-- Life of Pi by Yann Martel. Of course, it would be a bit disturbing to have on a desert island, but...

Who are you going to pass this stick to (3 persons) and why?

Hebdomeros
Jen
Maktaaq

The reason why is the same for all three -- they're all three writers and readers!

Here Comes The Train

2005-03-24T23:38:00.000-05:00

Glimmer Train's shilling for its newest competition, they extended the deadline. I don't know why I always find myself tempted to enter these things, when I don't even like the magazine much, as I've made quite clear here on several occasions. I guess it's the smell of cold, hard cash prizes, as sad as that is.

Don't know if it has an entry fee... could be. However, I think it's one of those new writers open competitions.

Thanks for reading,

LLB

Ice, Fire

2005-03-23T23:06:00.000-05:00

Last night I finished Columbia: The Retrospective. I picked it up several months ago, thinking it would be a regular issue of Columbia and that it might be cool to see what kind of stuff they take. I didn't realize that it was a retrospect of the last 40 years till I got it home.

I slogged through it, and I can't say that I enjoyed it all that much. I mean, I have an appreciation for a lot of the stuff but I can't say it lit the world on fire. I guess it's just my tastes: it's that quiet feeling type of lit mag. It made me feel like I had been jettisoned back to college, this sort of feeling of someone telling me, "This is good," when I was just feeling like I was seeing form over function, or function over form, or something.

Among the stories I enjoyed were Children with Hangovers by Jonathan Lethem, The Bath, by Raymond Carver, Captain Thorazine, by Sam Lipsyte, and Broken, by Ha Jin. Tom Perrotta's The Wiener Man was highly readable but for some reason, here lately I have gotten a little sick of some flashback into a boy's childhood and his perspectives. I feel like I've seen several of these types of stories lately and generally it's the same "nostalgia" treatment or something. I don't know.

In the non-fiction category, Never Live Above Your Landlord by Phillip Lopate was pretty awesome -- although I didn't know that it was nonfiction until I looked at the table of contents. There's a poem by Lucille Clifton in there, and I liked that a lot, but I have a major soft spot for Lucille, since she worked at my college when I went there and was just a really super cool person -- and poet.

So anyway, yeah, the magazine was definitely competent and good and literary and all that good stuff, but when push came to shove, it just didn't get my blood pumping.

And despite the fact that I was already burning the midnight oil (naughty naughty, and yes, my little sleep disorder is, unfortunately, coming back, seeing how I didn't get to work till noon today), I picked up Gargoyle No. 48, read just a few pages, and went to bed with my brain on fire, feeling inspired and shook up and in just a few pages -- something Columbia in its entirety failed to do. I just love that. The dichotomy between the two is really pretty amazing.

Thanks for reading,

LLB

Scars

2005-03-22T00:01:00.000-05:00

I finished Anthony Kiedis's Scar Tissue last night. It was a really fascinating book in so many ways. But of course, I think the most interesting theme throughout is the constant, and I mean constant, drugging. He's clean at the end and that's heartening, but this is a guy who had soooo many relapses. It's pretty incredible really. Incredible, too, that he's still alive.

I found it interesting that he didn't quite get around to making the connection between substance abuse and relationships, though. He admitted that generally speaking, the big benders would come around after a relationship would break up. But his obsession with women (there was ALWAYS at least one woman around, it seemed) was another prevalent theme. With the last girlfriend who's mentioned, he also mentioned how he "relapsed" with her several times --- getting back together and then breaking up again -- so he was almost there. But never did he exactly liken the behavior with women to the same compulsion as the drugging.

I just find it interesting. On the one hand, he is a rock star so of course there is going to be a fair amount of womanizing (and relationships) on that alone. But I think that as a person who has quit drinking and drugs, I have found that guys can be yet another addiction just like substances. Sex can be quite a drug. His descriptions of a "dry drunk" -- somebody who no longer drinks but still has the same broken soul to exhibit the same behavior -- was fascinating to me as well.

Anyway, again, I have to give him credit for laying it all on the line. It's a thoroughly enjoyable book, on many levels, and while I did kind of criticize him above, that's not to say that he isn't very self aware, and willing to own up to his past in an incredibly frank way. I'd highly recommend it...

LLB

Nothing New Under the Sun

2005-03-20T10:57:00.000-05:00

Hey sorry I've been gone a few days... it was a tough week what with all the decision making (not that I was making the decision but I was definitely sort of involved in thinking it all through and definitely stressing about it) -- my roommate has decided NOT to move to India this year, but to wait till next year. Phew! That gives me another year to figure out my options. However, I have still been facing the aftermath of the stress all week... it hasn't been easy.

Saturday night I went out with coworkers for a birthday... a rare foray into the world of other people's drunkenness since we went down to Georgetown and had dinner and then went dancing. I guess the thing that struck me was the strange guy who commanded the dance floor by himself, drunk as all get out but definitely busting some moves. It was kind of funny b/c he really got the place started up and then never really got any credit for being the guy who went out there and started shaking his stuff and getting everybody out there. Like the ice breaker dancer. Too funny. I'm guessing he has a serious headache and is very sore now.

The musical taste was not my style but the company was good. However, I'm sure that my companions are feeling pretty rough at the moment. I'm feeling pretty rough and I didn't even drink! Just to say I had a rare foray into the outside world and now I'm feeling it. Ha. Not to mention, I seemed to spend all Saturday not doing much but somehow gearing myself up for the night -- and getting ready. I guess I do need to get out more when it becomes that much of a production to push myself out the door.

LLB

Happy St. Paddy's Day!

2005-03-17T22:29:00.000-05:00

Some holidays are difficult when you're a former drunk. I work in Old Town Alexandria, which has a few Irish bars/pubs and tends to go all out for the holiday. At 2pm there were folks carousing very near my building, and at 4 they were apparently lined up around the block to get into the other big Irish bar experience. So there it was, broad daylight, and I was catapulted back to memories of college, how nice it would be to be slamming beers in the middle of the day. I could almost taste it. Almost hear the din of friends all jazzed to get drunker.

But anyway, it's actually about 15 years later of course, and times are different. I finished my work feeling like I'd been run over by a steamroller and came home to load CDs on my computer and onto my iPod Shuffle. I still haven't even gotten halfway through my CDs. Many of those are pretty old school too.

Well, I hope everybody's having the luck o' the Irish... don't drink the funny beer, but the green beer is okay. And whatever you do, don't kiss the blarney stone!

Write on,

LLB

One More Time....

2005-03-16T22:03:00.000-05:00

So, I already blogged about Paumanok Review but I read a couple stories -- Nathan Leslie's "Cobblestones" and Stephen Gillis's "Aftercare" and enjoyed each one very much. Haven't gotten a chance to go through the whole issue, but wanted to point that there's some quality fiction there at the moment.

Thanks for reading,

LLB

Favorite Bookstores?

2005-03-15T22:20:00.000-05:00

I was just browsing Paumanok Review's Web site and saw on the news page that the editor is looking for pieces on favorite bookstores. I know some of you have favorite bookstores so I thought it might interest you guys.

I also have to recommend submitting there to anyone who's interested. Just because editor Katherine Arline always does such an amazing job with it, and she's a joy to work with. (I have had a piece published there, though it was last year.) I think she does a lot for new writers and I can't recommend the site highly enough.

Thanks for reading,

LLB

BTW...

2005-03-14T20:55:00.000-05:00

Got a nice email recently from the woman in charge of The Happy Booker. For us literary folk, she's a good pit stop, also obsessing about books, reading, and the literary life, so check it out if you get a chance.

Other than that I have had a great case of the Mondays. Just one of those days. More work up to my ears. And, my roomie is thinking of moving to India so I am just a wee bit preoccupied... considering the fact that one bedroom apartments are going for what we pay for our spacious 2 bedroom, 2 giant bath, fireplace, assigned parking, washer/dryer IN UNIT apartment. We lucked out that we locked into this place six years ago and by signing long leases somehow managed to be paying way below market value. Sucks, this whole adult life thing.

Thanks for reading, hopefully I'll be back to more literary commentary at some point soon,

LLB

Who, Me? Write?

2005-03-13T20:30:00.000-05:00

All right, this weekend has been some kind of escapist, consumer-spending-frenzy weekend. Sheesh. I was utterly tired -- I guess still coming down from last week's trip. I spent tons of money yesterday, then watched "Napoleon Dynamite" last night (catching up with my Netflix queue). Then today, I went to the movies and saw Wes Craven's newest, "Cursed." (Liked it! Perfectly predictable but it's like, you get what you ask for, in terms of a werewolf movie. Nothing less, even if it's nothing that you might not expect.) Also saw a trailer for a new Tim Burton piece, much like "Nightmare Before Christmas," called "Corpse Bride," with Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham Carter. Like, the goth dream team.

I have work I have to do for work that I've put off the entire time. It's not looking too promising that I might get any done tonight but I've got to at least start research... sigh.

I hope everybody had a great weekend and maybe got more constructive stuff done!

Thanks for reading,

LLB

House of Tears and Trauma

2005-03-12T00:17:00.000-05:00

Jen was right. A while back she posted about how sad House of Sand and Fog was. I watched it anyway. Damn, I was traumatized and I still am. I blubbered like a heartbroken child, tears soaking my face. And I like to think of myself as someone who just doesn't cry over movies. (Although here lately, it has been happening a bit more commonly, and recently, over a movie that wasn't even the least bit sad, I guess it's some weird effect of age. But that was just a small tear, I have to add. Not this kind of torrent of salty emotion.)

Anyway, I'm pretty sure Jen issued the same warning... do not watch this movie unless you want to be haunted with sadness and have a giant cry! It was intense. Really intense.

LLB

The Joys of Email

2005-03-11T23:53:00.000-05:00

All right, I don't bitch about my day job much. This isn't really bitching about it either, actually. It's more... bitching about people's ability to bitch other people out over the Internet.

Basically, two months ago I wrote an article that really seemed to resonate with people. I got about 100 reader emails about the article, and of those, about 98% were positive. Of the other 2%, this one guy just really railed me -- I did answer his email (I answer most of my email, even negative/argumentative ones) and then we kept going back and forth, obvious that neither of us was going to agree on this topic. (I guess I should also share that my writing for my day job is of such a nature that people WILL occasionally just flame you -- opinion stuff, you know, you can step on some toes that way.)

Anyhoo, this week, I wrote another piece on the same topic and the dude goes at it again. He wrote once and very angrily and this time I was like, no way, I'm not answering it, I already know where this is going. If somebody's belligerent enough I'll usually give myself a pass, though it's usually not until somebody drops the F-bomb in an email, or says something ignorant like "your article is a good example of why women are bad journalists" -- yes, that's a real quote and I should add, my writing I do for my day job isn't actually journalism. Anyway, I didn't answer and today he proceeded to email me another three times. Like every couple hours. Blam, blam, blam!

I did finally answer him; I guess my reason for writing about this here is I just wanted to vent seeing how that sort of made it a particularly annoying day while I was trying to get other stuff done. And I guess the real theme here is that people feel damn comfortable bitching somebody out in the comfort of email. It's weird. I have had people write me hateful mail, and when I respond, they respond, "Oh. I didn't think anybody really read the mail. I was in a bad mood."

So if anyone out there thinks they can spew hate and that nobody's reading their mail, just know that there probably is somebody reading your mail. And promptly deleting it if you're hateful enough. Ha. (And I know that none of my regulars here are the types to just spew hate in an email! You all are good peeps!)

Anyway, I know I'm supposed to have a tough skin and all that jazz... but at times, it just gets OLD. Sigh... I'll be over it in a few days. ;) Unless this dude sends me a letter bomb... sheesh.

Thanks for reading,

LLB

Cult of Personality

2005-03-10T19:52:00.000-05:00

My literary reading has taken a bit of a hiatus, as I'm currently reading Scar Tissue by Anthony Kiedis. Hebdomeros beat me to the punch in reading it and gave it a good review, and so far I wholeheartedly agree.

I have to give Kiedis credit for putting it all out there, no matter how painful it might have been to relive some of those memories, some not too flattering. It takes a big person to do that as opposed to airbrush over unpleasantries because one's a "personality" or a "star." I daresay his frank talk about drug abuse should (hopefully) help serve as a warning, or inspire those who need help to seek it.

I have a feeling most people wouldn't have the courage to delve that deeply into their past and lay it all out there, for any reader to see. Good for him.

Thanks for reading,

LLB

Is Silence Really Golden?

2005-03-09T22:23:00.000-05:00

So here's a writerly question. For those of you who have gotten published, do you ever feel like some of your friends actually don't want to read what you've written?

Don't get me wrong, I have several friends who are VERY supportive and good about reading my fiction on the very rare occasion that it's published, or notice my day job writing and comment on it and maybe congratulate me, but lots seem to shy away from the stuff that I write for my day job, which is pretty easily accessible. And some seem to shy away from all of it, altogether.

Has anyone encountered anything like this? It just seems weird to me. I don't know, I guess being a writer doesn't mean everybody you know should read what you write. I suppose I don't go watch my friends who, say, participate in bike races, race all the time or whatever. But sometimes I just get weirded out, and sort of feel like if I tell people about something I wrote, I'm being arrogant... or they're afraid I've written something about them... or something. Maybe it's too personal.

I kind of feel it's a dumb question (not to mention maybe egocentric, since it's not like many people demand that I participate in the things they do, like I said before), but a question nonetheless.

Thanks for reading,

LLB

Say What?

2005-03-09T19:44:00.000-05:00

Check out this story from The New York Times. The upshot is, literary novelists "finally" address 9/11.

I find that weird because I swear I read about a glut of 9/11 short fiction. Meanwhile, I've definitely seen a whole bunch of 9/11 story drafts from aspiring writers.

Maybe it took novelists longer to crank out the novels, or publishing houses longer to actually decide on some or publish them, but I just found it interesting. Indeed, that was a day that will live on in infamy for this generation, so it definitely seems odd that the trend is supposedly starting now.

LLB

Literary Update

2005-03-08T20:17:00.000-05:00

Two rejections came in while I was away. A slightly late, impersonal rejection from Tin House and a personalized rejection from Night Train. The latter gave me some nice suggestions for the story in question and invited me to submit another piece in their next reading period, so that was nice. I have had good luck with them inviting me to submit again in the past. So that was nice. (Writer, edit thyself. And why would I put "so that was nice" twice? Sheesh.)

So, in other words, same story, different day. :)

Thanks for reading,

LLB

Back From the Big Easy

2005-03-07T19:18:00.000-05:00

I have to admit, I fell in love with New Orleans from the first. Despite the fact that it takes a bit of adjustment to get used to the pace of the place. It's intense... just in terms of so much to see, so much sensory stimulation. But I loved it... Granted, I wouldn't want to live there all year round, but man, oh to be rich and famous and have money for a second residence, I'd love to have a place there for the winter (and to avoid Mardi Gras -- or perhaps have private Mardi Gras balcony to overlook the scene but still be separate from the masses!).

It seems the perfect place for writers or artists (although, in the words of one particularly entertaining cabbie, there are a lot of "underachievers"). The mystique and magic of the place was palpable. Along with the feeling -- surely exacerbated by the go-cups and the fact that we saw a placard for drink specials "from 9pm until 9am") -- that anything could happen there. Music would just break out spontaneously. Fortune tellers sat at carefully set up tables in Jackson Square. We heard quite a ruckus outside our hotel room at 9 in the morning -- a whole mass of apparently drunken men were putting together the St. Patrick's Day parade, playing zydeco and getting ready to parade through the streets. They threw green beads around our necks as we walked by, hollering "woo hooo!" and "hello pretty ladies!"

My cousin and I did a lot of touristy things... including getting our fortunes told at the Bottom of the Cup Tearoom. I was told that I can have my writing career and have love. Let's hope so. We hoofed it throughout the French Quarter, stopping at the (haunted) Hotel Monteleone for drinks at the Carousel Bar (the bar really slowly spins!) and grabbed muffaletta at a divey place on Bourbon Street. One lunch we got a sampler of jambalaya, red beans and rice, gumbo, and shrimp creole, in the French Market. Yummny dinners included a great meal at Muriel's (highly recommended) and at Bourbon House (also nice). We stopped in a shop called Sideshow and Harry Anderson (of Night Court fame, remember him?) did tricks for us, and another shopping adventure was the infamous Marie Laveau's. Touristy fare: cab to Garden District to do the tour (which included the Lafayette Cemetery) and a ghost tour through the French Quarter.

I can't recommend this city enough, especially for artistic types. I could go on and on... but I'll stop now. ;)

thanks for reading,

LLB

The Big Easy

2005-03-02T23:54:00.000-05:00

Well, I left work today with quite a feeling of well-being, seeing how I got all my work done so that I could safely go on vacation to New Orleans tomorrow (Thursday). I'm not much of a traveler, and I don't think I realized that there would be a palpable sense of relief that I will be truly "away from it all," off the hook, etc... it was a good feeling, actually. I guess I have to actually GO somewhere more often. It's been quite some time. Most of my vacations are spent at home resting and doing whatever the hell I want to do... but I think I'm realizing that I also still think a lot about work when I have a few days at home yawning ahead of me.

So yeah, basking in that glow of well-being I did some errands and came home. Honestly I've done less preparation than I should have, having decided maybe I should load a bunch of my CDs onto my new computer so to choose favorite songs to put on my iPod Shuffle. (I guess that kind of is packing for the trip -- packing music that is.) Have I mentioned that now that I have this Shuffle I want a full-grown iPod now? For God's sake, would someone pay me for one of my short stories, about $400 would be nice. ;)

Anyway, since it's a fairly whirlwind trip, I don't think there's that much preparation really left other than throwing a few more items into bags, remembering a journal and my digital camera. I'll catch you guys on the flip side!

Thanks for reading,

LLB

No Sour Grapes Here

2005-03-01T19:58:00.000-05:00

All right, I found the voting site for the StorySouth Million Writers Award -- here's where you read the stories and vote. (In case you forgot, one of my stories was nominated, but didn't make Notable Stories, nor the Top 10, obviously.)

Sooo... among the Top Ten stories are a piece by Dave Housley, of Barrelhouse fame, and a story by Alicia Gifford, one of my favorite writers whose work I ever ran across on Zoetrope's online writing community. I loved her stuff and had a funny feeling even then, years ago, that she was gonna go places.

Anyway, there it is. Seriously, from those that I do recognize (before having read all the stories yet), maybe I'm glad I didn't make the grade. That's some tough competition!

Thanks for reading,

LLB

Check It Out!

2005-02-28T22:35:00.000-05:00

Jen's lit mag is up for the spring... and it looks great! It's good to know that spring is here, even though we've had quite the blast of winter today here in the DC area... (although for the most part it was a no show). Check it out if you get a chance!

Do I have any literary stuff going on at the moment? Not hardly. Between being sick for what, almost two weeks and buying my new computer, it's all been fairly rudimentary around here. I did start Scar Tissue by Anthony Kiedis, which of course makes me think that my own childhood of punk rock was just not that punk rock. Ha...

Anyway, having the new computer also implies that I will have to begin transferring all my writing-related files over, etc. Meanwhile, I haven't heard a peep from any of the literary mags that are holding my stories at the moment.

And, on Thursday I'll be leaving for my trip to New Orleans! I can hardly wait, and I hope to take copious notes. :)

Bye for now,

LLB

Buyers Remorse

2005-02-26T12:16:00.000-05:00

All right, I haven't been able to get much done lately but I am about to go get my new iBook (knock on wood). I'm already having a bit of buyers remorse and I haven't even bought it yet. It's just so much money to lay down and I don't even have the full amount of cash so I'm going to have to use the credit card and then pay off as much of that portion as possible... but it certainly stands to reason that there are times when you've just got to bite the bullet. I kind of feel like if I don't do it now, it will just never get done. I have already explained ad nauseum that I have known I needed a new computer for years now, so there's no time like the present.

Hopefully I can get it set up with a minimum of trouble. But I know I may be computerless for a time.

LLB

Yes, I'm a Loser!

2005-02-24T08:47:00.000-05:00

Yeah... what a week. Why am I a loser? I didn't make the Notable Stories in the storySouth Million Writers competition. Just kidding -- I know it was good to be nominated.

Why else am I a loser? I missed my long-awaited reunion dinner with Jen on Tuesday. This cold has lasted more than a week, and I still felt crappy Tuesday (and canceled all extracurricular activities for this week as of Tuesday when I realized I wasn't even going to make it through a full day's work, much less dinner out). I haven't done a full day's work since LAST Tuesday because of the cold. And maybe some of you have noticed that I haven't even been blogging... I've been coughing, blowing my nose constantly, and exhausted.

So, everybody, avoid getting whatever it is that's been going around, it's a killer.

LLB

Backlog

2005-02-20T15:53:00.000-05:00

Well, seeing how I have a few short stories that are late in responses, it brought to mind one of the themes of the last year or so -- where lit mags will say that they are on hiatus or have long response times (recall my post about McSweeney's with my 20-month wait), which means they take much longer to respond than posted.

Are there more fiction writers out there now? Is it that so many now have electronic submission processes? I guess my biggest theory is that during the recession, lots of writers got back to writing as opposed to concentrating on their day jobs. During the recession, I was out of work twice, and then underemployed for a year, which resulted in a steep curve of productivity for me, fiction-wise.

I also think it's arguable that during the recession, lots of people transferred loyalty from the companies they worked for to the things they enjoyed with their free time -- whether that might be families or loved ones, or something they feel close to, like writing fiction.

Anyway, my sense is the competition is steeper than ever, despite the fact that the Internet has spawned a lot of new markets for short fiction.

Thanks for reading,

LLB

To Renew, or Not to Renew?

2005-02-18T17:13:00.000-05:00

I'm referring to my subscription to Poets & Writers. I guess I will renew, since it does provide updates to markets, but sometimes I get so annoyed...

This month's big feature was "A Room With a View," a look at writers' retreats that they put together every year. I don't know, all I could think of was, who the heck are these writers who can afford to go to these writers' retreats all the time? I've never quite gotten that.

Of course, it reminded me of the hilarious story "Auden's Toothbrush," by Lucinda Ebersole, in one of the issues of Gargoyle I read over recent months.

Anyway, writers' retreats always strike me as something very "old school," where a bunch of people who have money to burn go to be pretentious and name drop and network and get their egos stroked. Or they're all part of the old-school network and so they're kind of preaching to the choir or something. I don't know, maybe I'm wrong. Also, I'm betting there's big money in writers' retreats, but again, I don't know who these people are who have all this money, not to mention time, for retreats.

The issue was fairly lackluster, the best article being "Imperative: An Argument for Writers Taking Charge," by Johnny Temple. I guess the biggest reason I liked this article about indie publishers is because this guy was local, and started Akashic Books with Mark and Bobby Sullivan, both of whom I am familiar with because when I was a teenager, I used to go see their bands, like Kingface and Soulside, play. If you like punk or emocore, you'd best try to get some Kingface and Soulside, those were great bands and part of the D.C. Dischord scene. But anyway, the article was interesting and like I said, really the only thing I enjoyed about the entire issue.

Thanks for reading,

LLB

Black Clock

2005-02-17T11:25:00.000-05:00

I checked out Black Clock's site and I have to say, it looks cool, and I'm certainly interested in getting my hands on a copy, though I've never run across it on any shopping excursions. I believe Hebdomeros has posted favorably about it in the past.

However, I was a little disappointed when it said on the Web site that there's no open call for submissions for Black Clock. That just got me a little riled up, as a writer. I know that there are many respected publications that mostly take agented fiction, or fiction from authors they solicit themselves, but for some reason, to so baldly state that they're not interested in perhaps finding some emerging new talent, just really rubbed me the wrong way.

Maybe it's just me...

LLB

The Rejected

2005-02-16T21:36:00.000-05:00

If anybody remembers the old movie Suburbia, a punk rock anthem in film form, the kids all called themselves "TR" -- The Rejected.

Anyway, the 2005 Novel and Short Story Writers Market had a neat feature about rejection, by Will Allison. He talks about the business of being rejected, and culls from his experiences as an editor at now-defunct Story magazine, as well as a writer in his own right.

He backed up a lot of the stuff I already suspected -- any personalized rejection is good, for example, but also pointed out that a rejection always means the editor doesn't like it enough to publish it. However, he softened that blow by stating that what holds the most weight is when an editor asks to see more of your work.

He also supported my theory of the "tiered" rejections -- form rejections with varying forms of meaning, some better than others, as well as the idea that if it's taking a while to hear back, that likely means it is working its way to other editors at the same publication and might mean that it is seriously being considered.

Most of it is pretty obvious, but it's nice to get some backup. Now, I've got to go and take care of this cold. It's a whopper.

Thanks for reading,

LLB

Not a Million...

2005-02-15T19:28:00.000-05:00

... but close! Well, not close at all, but statistically speaking...

It turns out that that storySouth Million Writers Award won't announce finalists until Feb. 22. There have been 1,200 nominations, so they're still reading through them, I guess. 1,200 is twice as many as last year, so obviously, this little competition has taken off a bit over the last year. That says good things about the Web, as well as marketing. (It was highlighted in USA Today last year, and also has a piece in the 2005 Novel and Short Story Writers Market.

So, odds are I won't make finalist but it's nice to worry about it for an additional week, hahaha.

In other news, I have no news, other than the feeling that I have caught a sudden cold. Getting run down over the past couple weeks was not good to avoid illness.

LLB

Recommendation

2005-02-14T21:29:00.000-05:00

All right, so even this is a writing-related blog, it sure doesn't hurt to talk music once in a while. Over the weekend, during my consumer spending frenzy, I picked up "eMOTIVe" by A Perfect Circle. It's an album that consists mostly of covers, with the themes of war, greed, and peace.

I wouldn't say every track blows the doors off, but it's pretty damn good regardless (in my humble opinion, of course). There's an eerie, pondersome version of Lennon's "Imagine," as well as covers of Black Flag's "Gimmie Gimmie Gimmie," Depeche Mode's "People are People," and the like. Best of all, a kick-ass rendition of Fear's "Let's Have a War," as well as an awesome song called "Counting Bodies Like Sheep to the Rhythm of the War Drums."

Anyway, I just wanted to share.

Also, I had quite the weekend, writing-wise. Er, didn't actually write, but I can say that just about all my viable stories that aren't still works in progress have been submitted now. It's about 7 or 8 that are out there. So, fingers crossed. For a while there I had gotten terribly behind on the business of submitting, so it's good to feel like I can sit back for a while now.

Thanks for reading,

LLB

Happy Valentines Day!

2005-02-14T21:24:00.000-05:00

And so, it was a rainy, foggy Valentines Day night, much like this one, about 7 years ago, when I struggled on a 2 hour rush-hour commute (should have been forty minutes, but ended up being that long because of the traffic and the inclement weather), when I arrived at my boyfriend's group house, only to find that the romantic evening wasn't going to be as romantic as I thought. He announced that he had dropped acid with his friend (male friend) which gave me the distinct impression that that guy was actually his real (albeit non-romantic) Valentine, and not me.

Granted, I guess he felt bad about that little debacle when he took me out to dinner the following year, and gave me a big bouquet of flowers, sans mind-altering drugs.

And we wonder why Valentines Day kind of makes me mad? I can't say I've had too many nice ones.

Anyway, I hope that everyone's having a nice Valentines Day! And that your lovers are living up to expectations. :) And if you currently don't have lovers, that you're happy with the wonderful person that you are, and know you know for sure you're not putting up with any BS next time around! ;)

LLB

Tea & Barrelhousing

2005-02-13T20:51:00.000-05:00

I have to say I passed a lovely afternoon sitting down to read Barrelhouse and drinking some creamy Earl Grey tea.

I highly recommend Barrelhouse's debut issue. I thought it was solid and entertaining just about all the way through (with the possible exception of poetry but I guess you guys already know I'm just not the poetry type). I especially liked Metal Church by Matthew Kirkpatrick (which I believe is also on the site). That piece was just utterly amazing -- and hilarious. I think it speaks of Gen X quite nicely... how we fit in, how we sold out, how we rediscover who we want to be and come to terms with it, the things we'll do for love. All against the juxtaposition of the church of Heavy Metal. Highly, highly recommended.

Also of note, in my opinion, was Cool by David Barringer, Hope I Die, by David Starkey, and Partners by Paul Graham. The latter story required a great deal of suspension of disbelief on my part -- it's basically a story of the tension in a sexless marriage, which the male protagonist didn't actually know was going to be the case going in. I also had a hard time with infrequent POV shifts, so if I had been an editor I likely wouldn't have chosen it... but for the fact that it ends up being a pretty impactful story where suspension of disbelief was worth it.

Reality x Reality by Stacey Starkey, the only female contributor of short fiction in the tome, gave me a case of mixed feelings. It's really good -- I'm not sure exactly how to explain it, other than utter pop culture horror (although it kind of reminded me of a movie I saw, where a "reality webcast" was real) and quirkiness but I will say that it made me uncomfortable all the way through. Which certainly is not to say it's bad, but it gave me that sort of inward shudder. I also can't exactly say I liked the narrator, but it's definitely worth a read.

Also particularly enjoyable was the essay Burn Hollywood by Steve Almond.

Now, I will say, putting this head-to-head with Gargoyle and I'd still pick Gargoyle hands down. Metal Church was the closest thing to a piece that just blew me away. However, Barrelhouse is far superior (in my view, and I suppose mine might be a sort of Gen X view) to something like Glimmer Train. I'd also say I'd choose it over something like Tin House where in my experience, many of the pieces try too hard to be "intellectual" or "clever" or what have you, to the point of getting tedious at times.

In the long run, though, I think this mag could end up being very important, especially to those of us in DC. Nine bucks (eleven, with postage) might seem a little steep but again, it's nice to support a new publication.

Thanks for reading,

LLB

Jumping the Train

2005-02-13T13:05:00.000-05:00

For any of you who wanted to try your hand at submitting to Night Train, the magazine's off hiatus and is now accepting submissions again as of this month, according to its Web site.

I also recently ordered the print edition of Barrelhouse, and it arrived via U.S. snail mail yesterday.

I haven't had a chance to read it yet, but the issue looks good from browsing through the pages. Ah, the wonders of desktop publishing. They've got a nice artistic look going on -- what they did with the layout of the pages kind of reminds me a bit of Tin House, in the effect that it doesn't look like a conservative literary quarterly. They got a little sassy with it.

I'll let you guys know how the issue is once I read it. I've still got a submission sitting over there with them, so we'll see how that goes as well. But it felt good to support a fledgling publication, at any rate.

Thanks for reading,

LLB

Business As Usual

2005-02-13T02:24:00.000-05:00

Okay, after my egocentric couple of days I'm getting back to normal. I'm sure once Feb. 15 comes around and I don't get into the finalists for that award, it will all be business as usual, hee hee. It was nice to be nominated though.

So today I went on a consumer frenzy (ugh) and did break down and buy this year's Novel and Short Story Writer's Market. I have been kind of mean about it recently because I found myself so irritated with some of the things that were wrong in last year's version, but I think I'm already finding that they've done a better job updating it this time around.

For one, I flipped it open and there was a listing for Gargoyle. That magazine has been around for what, more than 20 years and I've never seen it listed before, so it's a step in the right direction. So I'm feeling a bit more hopeful -- I haven't had a chance to peruse it yet, though, because after the consumer frenzy I had to go to a party.

It's a birthday party I go to every year, but the kind of party where you inevitably only know a mere handful of people, so it can be a bit painful. I did get to talk to an astronomer which was cool, but other than that just stuck with the people I already knew. However, I had a panic attack at the end, because this guy showed up who I gave my email address to last year when he asked, and I never emailed him back. I know, that's like the meanest thing somebody could do, and I feel like a terrible person -- there's some better way to handle that sort of thing, like just tell the person straight up that you're not interested, but I wimped out. So then I made myself even meaner by avoiding him tonight. Not really one of my finer moments, then or now.

I don't know why I'm sharing that information. Boy, my life is fun. ;)

Thanks for reading,

LLB

Bad Habit, Good News

2005-02-12T13:00:00.000-05:00

I have a bad habit -- occasionally I Google myself. It sounds so self-centered, but since I have fairly high exposure writing for my day job, I sometimes get a little worried that I'm being savaged on the Internet for some of my commentary. It still feels a bit self-centered though, like I'm some kind of closet egomaniac, but oh well, I do it and it's one of those dirty little secrets.

So, last night I indulged in the bad habit, and found out that one of my short stories apparently has been nominated for storySouth's Million Writers Award for 2004. Finalists are chosen on Feb. 15, I think, and I can't say I know all that much about the contest other than what I read here.

I suspect that the editor for the magazine that the story appeared in nominated the story, but it's funny that she didn't inform me (of course, there's always the possibility that it accidentally got swept up in spam deletions, I get a ton of spam in my inbox here at home). It's awfully nice of her though.

Anyway, the award itself is interesting on a big-picture level, when you take into account one of the issues facing modern literature, i.e., print vs. online -- it's definitely a bit of an "eff you" to all the "best of" anthologies. It was started with the premise that the most well-known "best of" anthologies largely ignore quality fiction that's published on the Web; that print is still considered the vanguard or whatever. Beyond that kind of controversy, it's a very nice idea to try to give some exposure to authors who have mostly been published on the Web.

Write on,

LLB

Heartening?

2005-02-11T18:47:00.000-05:00

Okay, I feel like I've been run over with a steamroller this week, but last night I did get what seemed like a heartening rejection from StoryQuarterly. See excerpt below:

This fine, very strong story, [BLANK], received serious consideration here at StoryQuarterly. Finally we felt it wouldn’t work for us this time, always a subjective opinion, of course. Do know that we recognize our unavoidable biases and also feel that another editor will most likely snap up this fine fiction. Composing a large anthology becomes an artform itself and its pieces fit like a jigsaw puzzle. We look for subjects, styles and insights that balance, offset or enliven an overall book of many stories. Sometimes either subject matter, style or some prose experiments simply won’t fit with what we already have or with what we feel we need to complete our own annual opus. All this is to say we can only express gratitude to you for insuring that we receive such good work to consider. Our passion remains good fiction and its success depends on receiving wonderful choices, so we appreciate your interest and support of StoryQuarterly in this way. Best of luck on your own fine fiction, which we hope you’ll continue to share with us.

I guess in particular, I liked the first line. The rest kind of sounds like a form rejection though -- albeit, a nice one. What do you guys think? Anybody have any experience with sending fiction to these folks?

Thanks for reading,

LLB

The Crush

2005-02-09T23:49:00.000-05:00

Nope, this isn't about me stalking out some poor hapless guy who is the object of my affections. Rather, "the crush" refers to the feeling like my head's been in a vice all week.

Ha... it's been a tough, overly busy week at work. Not to complain too much about that of course, since I do love my job and it's just a fact of life. Last night I did my taxes (which would explain my lack of blogging) and tonight I treated myself to a haircut and a manicure. I'm usually not so girlie to get manicures, it happens maybe once a year, but I felt like I needed a treat. Of course I ruined one thumb within 5 minutes of leaving the salon...

So I had dinner with a friend after and we met up in Books-A-Million. I didn't see anything of note, really (rather shocking considering I was in a bookstore, for goodness' sake). They had their Valentines display up, which was a whole pile of books about relationships and then, of course, a huge display of wedding books. Ick. I have never seen so many wedding books in my life. Just too many. I guess it makes sense... maybe lots of people get engaged on Valentines Day and they wanted them ready for all those new brides-to-be on Feb. 15, but I was a little bummed out to find so little of note on the front tables (of course, it's also Books-A-Million which is generally not so rewarding in the first place). I just didn't realize there was going to be such a run on weddings this year....

I'm ashamed to admit that if they'd had the new Novel and Short Story Writers Market I probably would have broken down, if only out of sheer frustration, even though I've bitched about the last version right here on this blog. Alas, they had nothing.

Hope you're all having a good week, obviously my fiction pastime has taken a lull at the moment...

LLB

Migration... To What?

2005-02-07T19:45:00.000-05:00

Okay, here's the next ridiculous step in my procrastination last night. After the Super Bowl, I heard that commercial for Nike Pro Apparel blaring on my TV -- I had heard it a week or so ago, and it freaked me out. Because I realized that this song they used was something in my music collection. Something that I would never, ever guess would be used in an ad. For sports gear????

This has been bugging me on and off. When I first heard it, I did a Google search. All I could find were articles and posts about the ad -- how it was "creepy" (use of masks) and had a "horror movie soundtrack."

Okay, so I had a lot of caffeine and a few cups of decaf green tea while I'd been working. And sat down and really thought about it. And thought. And thought.

I suspected perhaps NIN's "The Fragile." I skipped through that disc. No dice.

Second guess, after more concentration (me inwardly yelling at myself to think really freakin' hard) -- I got it. Cop Shoot Cop's album "Ask Questions Later." It's a song called "Migration." (Awesome album, by the way.)

I was shocked when I heard an Amon Tobin song being used to advertise a car recently. It was easier to deal with "Lust for Life" or "How Soon is Now" being used to advertise stuff.

Anyway, it's weird to hear something as obscure (at least, I thought it would be obscure) as "Migration" used in an ad. Weirder still to think that when HFS was still on the air, touting itself as "alternative," it wouldn't have played that song (it would have 10 years ago, when HFS was still good, of course) -- but a commercial will play it now? Odd, that.

Thanks for reading,

LLB

The Part Where I Procrastinate

2005-02-06T17:11:00.000-05:00

Yep, I said earlier that I need to be doing writing -- for work. Yes, for work. So far, I've managed to do all kinds of shit that has nothing to do with the part of my work that is really looming.

Okay, I do have to give myself credit for working on the Valentines' Day feature piece, which is due tomorrow COB. That's progress. I should be able to clean that up the rest of the way at work tomorrow and turn it in, no problem.

However, of course, before I pat myself on the back too terribly much, there's also this really big-deal writeup I have to do -- complete with research -- and I haven't even started that. All I have done so far is print up the email with some of the important bullet points about the assignment. Print it up, stare at the computer screen, visit a blog. Stare at the sheet of paper, decide it's time to check my horoscope. Look at the paper, decide to write a blog post about procrastinating.

I really want to watch a movie or something. Or tend to my gouged thumb. Or sleep on the couch with the windows open with the springtime-like air blowing in.

Hmm... I hate this. Whenever something looms over my head, I'll find ninety other things I feel compelled to do before digging into it. I sit here thinking I should clean my room... No, No, NO! Of course I do need to clean my room, but not when I have a major assignment to work on. I need to get it at least halfway done before I can safely say to myself that I'll just finish it tomorrow at work...

I just wanted to share, and, of course, procrastinate by doing so.

I salute those of you who are doing something fun, like perhaps drinking some beer, eating some chips and ribs, and watching the Superbowl.

LLB

The Lost Weekend

2005-02-06T13:07:00.000-05:00

Ever have a weekend where everything seems to go wrong? I guess it all started going wrong on Friday night, when I certainly didn't get much sleep. I woke up at 3am, and then at 5am there was a fire alarm in my apartment building and I got mauled by the cat (she freaked out at the prospect of the cat carrier). That scratch has been bleeding all weekend.

Anyway, so Saturday ended up being constantly running late and feeling out of sorts. I did have Japanese food with a friend, caught "Hide and Seek," stopped by another friend's juried art show where she had a piece in it, and then my roommate took me to dinner at a great restaurant in Old Town. It was a nice day but one of those days that just doesn't stop.

So, I have gotten nothing related to fiction accomplished. Over the last couple days, I did send a submission to Five Points and requested a free sample copy of WordWrights! And, was rejected by Missouri Review, pretty handily in fact. (It did take a few days longer than their requisite 15 business days, but not by much.)

Today I have to do some writing for work. Last week I just didn't get everything done, unfortunately. So I'll have my nose to the metaphorical grindstone for the Superbowl -- usually I have plans but for some reason, this year it was just not to be.

Hope everybody's having a great weekend,

LLB

St. Vitus Dance

2005-02-03T21:08:00.000-05:00

Okay, so I had a mini nervous breakdown at work today, when I found out the bands that are playing the Coachella Festival. Nine Inch Nails, Bauhaus, Cocteau Twins, Gang of Four...

All right, so it's a lot of bands from my generation, but I just about lost it. Bauhaus was a little bit before my time in terms of show-going years so I'd kill to see them perform their songs live. I've never managed to see NIN live, even though I'm a big fan. I always loved Cocteau Twins... okay, need I say more? I guess I'm the exact demographic they're looking for for the festival. Someone who was growing up in the '80s... ha.

Anyway, yeah, I flipped for about 15 minutes, telling my boss I was probably going to need time off, but then reality hit later. As in, how the hell am I going to afford something like this? It requires flying out to California, first off. And I could be wrong but I think maybe Coachella is in some part of California that isn't really near anything else in California. So... dunno. But it would be so cool!

In other news, I finally ordered a sample copy of the print version of Barrelhouse and requested a copy of WordWrights. So hopefully I will have some good new research going on soon.

Thanks for reading,

LLB

Amen Sister

2005-02-02T22:57:00.000-05:00

I got a catalog in the mail from Daedalus Books, and they have major discount books -- everything seemed to be priced between $4 and $7 in the catalog. Not everything is great in the catalog, but there were a few things that were worth the price. So I picked up a wall calendar, a copy of Pattern Recognition by William Gibson (I borrowed it from the library and always meant to purchase it) and a book called The Quotable Book Lover -- basically quotes from authors. I thought it would be fun for times like this, when I haven't had time to read too much.

So today's installment is:

As for writing, at thirty I was still writing, reading; tearing up industriously. I had not published a word (save reviews). I despaired. Perhaps at that age one is really most a writer. Then one cannot write, not for lack of skill, but because the object is too near, too vast. I think perhaps it mst recede before one can take a pen to it.

-- Virginia Woolf

I took some degree of comfort in that quote. Just the whole idea that maybe it's okay to be 34 and still in the beginning stages of the fiction writing career. Every once in a while you'll hear of some promising youngster getting some novel published and not even appreciating the huge amounts of effort it takes some people to get to that point, but I think there are even more people who struggle longer to make that breakthrough. And to never give up is an important rule of thumb.

Of course, I think her whole point is that when you're younger, you might not have the seasoned view -- the detachment from living life -- that you may gain when you're older. And true, my tone and style has changed a whole lot. But I took some degree of solace in the quote.

Write on,

LLB

House

2005-01-31T23:06:00.000-05:00

Just in case anyone was wondering, I haven't given up on House of Leaves. I have just gotten a little stalled out in the appendices at the end. So I'm not quite done yet (though maybe for all intents and purposes, I am).

I will post a more lengthy post when I am officially done, but for now, I will say it knocked my socks off (and also made me feel as if I wouldn't want to meet the author in a dark alley!). But it's really, really amazing. And it was very unsettling indeed.

That's all for now. Hopefully I will get through those appendices soon but I am still kind of dragging what with some long hours at work, which of course leads to the inevitable flake-out-on-the-couch syndrome.

Thanks for reading,

LLB

Five Points

2005-01-30T23:41:00.000-05:00

Has anyone ever read the literary magazine Five Points? It seems to have a whole lot of critical acclaim but I just ran across it... I had never heard of it before or even seen it, even though it seems to be a magazine that sometimes offers up candidates for Pushcart Prizes and such. I thought I'd pose the question...

Thanks for reading,

LLB

Interesting... But Not

2005-01-30T01:48:00.000-05:00

Ah, the disappointment. This month's Wired had an article that really enticed me with its headline: Why Right Brainers Will Rule the Future. For anyone who needs a refresher course, the right brain is the creative side of our processes.

The article just ended up being a sort of amorphous argument for why the left brainers are going to end up getting left out in the cold, economically speaking, since left brain tasks can so easily be exported for cheap labor. I guess the article did a good job of supporting its argument, but it didn't really explain how right brainers are going to become the new coveted brainiacs. There were a few half-assed examples, but... yawn.

Let's hope that such prediction also includes getting paid for literary endeavors. ;)

More exciting perhaps was the cute (albeit too young for my blood, but I'm just looking) Firefox guy on the cover, but so far the issue has failed to impress me too terribly much.

Thanks for reading,

LLB

They Come In Threes

2005-01-28T01:07:00.000-05:00

For those of you who keep count, I just received my second form rejection in a matter of two days today. What's perhaps worse, is this story is what I consider my crown jewel of my story portfolio. I've been aiming high with this one -- obviously too high. But I love it and I really want to get it somewhere very special. (Stop dreaming??)

Ah well... I could say... rejections (bad things) come in threes, or I could say, maybe, third time's the charm. :) We'll see. There are several others that are overdue. But now I have quite a list of stories I need to send out to new markets. I guess I won't be hurting for a weekend of constructive activity.

Thanks for reading,

LLB

Alice

2005-01-27T22:50:00.000-05:00

All right, so tonight I was too tired and braindead so I didn't have anything proper for Rabbit Hole Day that Maktaaq let us know about. So, I figured there is a veritable cornucopia of (weird!) songs featuring Alices. (And no, I don't tolerate the Jefferson Airplane song in the least, even though it's the clearest Alice in Wonderland reference.) Let's sing along!

Two of my personal favorites are "Alice" by Sisters of Mercy and "Alice's House" by Psychedelic Furs. Both are a bit eerie in their own ways. It's not like Alice in Wonderland wasn't a weird and unsettling book.

Also, for the smell of Alice In Wonderland, try Black Phoenix Alchemy Labs. Check under Mad Tea Party -- highlights include a scent called Jabberwocky and, of course, Alice, which is quite nice. Some of the scents might make you feel just a tad transported down some kind of rabbit hole...

And it really was a kitten after all. -- Lewis Carroll.

LLB

Whiny Wednesday...

2005-01-26T23:41:00.000-05:00

I returned to work today and felt like a pile of rubble had fallen on my head. Well just in the fact that some stuff had gone on without my knowledge (seeing how I was in my sickbed Monday and Tuesday, other than brief bouts on this blog). Nothing terrible, I just felt like somehow I had missed a lot and was sort of panicked and stressed all day. Then I ended up the day by taking on some new responsibilities.

Nervous breakdown, here I come! Hee hee, just kidding.

Anyway, that's my own problem that I didn't feel well and things got backlogged. I just felt like whining about it.

In other news... there's not much. I got an anticipated rejection from Kenyon Review -- yeah, I didn't really expect to be accepted there. It was a nice rejection of the "form" variety. I have other responses that are due as well. It's one of those pockets of time when a bunch are due. Always great for the old self esteem. ;)

Thanks for reading,

LLB

Behind Every Strong Writer...

2005-01-25T13:02:00.000-05:00

... is a strong partner. I watched The Daily Show yesterday (don't ask me what day it was from, it was TiVoed) and Jon Stewart interviewed John Grisham. I found it interesting that he said his wife is an important influence over his work.

Apparently she'll let him know if a manuscript isn't going to work. He said that once she threw a manuscript -- all 500 pages -- at him, because she thought it wasn't good. It reminded me of Stephen King's stories of how important his wife's viewpoints have been to his writing. (She fished the draft of Carrie out of the trashcan when he thought it was bad -- and that ended up being his break into fame.)

It's nice to think of a life when you have someone who backs you in your writing endeavors. I've had a few boyfriends who were supportive of my work, but also a few who really could have cared less. Some were supportive but not necessarily interested in actually reading anything I wrote. I hope that one day I have a significant other who takes a real interest in it.

For the time being, though, I do have a few friends who are great about reading my drafts. My roommate's also a great person to bounce them off of.

Write on,

LLB

Cancel My Monday

2005-01-24T13:51:00.000-05:00

All right, so I'm not feeling well today so I'm not at work nor am I even working at home. I'm not sure what it is, kind of a big case of "ick" followed by the feeling that my brain's not working properly. I just woke up, what a long winter's nap that was. Hopefully I'll be back in tip-top shape for Tuesday.

Anyway, I need some help with a short story character's employment. Anyone have ideas on an occupation that's usually described as "noble," or some adjective of that ilk, and doesn't pay a lot? I had originally used "teacher" (my roommate's occupation, and it is noble and doesn't pay much) but thought maybe I should try to think of something else since that was the first thing that came to mind. She suggested someone who works for an organization like Greenpeace or PETA, which I think is a good idea. She also suggested police officer or firefighter but let's just say, I don't peg this character as either of those. The character is a male.

Another thing, the character is kind of slacker, emotionally anyway, so therefore, I'd say that "teacher" or any other number of those occupations doesn't really compute. He's in his mid-30s.

Any other suggestions? Thank you in advance.

Thanks for reading,

LLB

The Aftermath

2005-01-23T13:50:00.000-05:00

So I was just pretending it was really bad outside -- so what! Ha. After eating a lot of mediocre food and watching rather mediocre movies (Stepford Wives, Resident Evil 2) this weekend, I finally ventured out today and the streets are very clear. I swear here in NoVA we hardly got a bit of snow -- maybe 2 inches, if that. However, the wind is gusty and wicked and it's cold. So I'm not too put out that I'm being a homebody today, too, with even more mediocre food that I just bought at the grocery store.

I also have something for work I should be tackling, and I'm desperately trying to procrastinate. The last couple weeks have had some deadlines there that I really haven't relished. And some new initiatives mean that I have more and more meetings to go to. Joy...

I'm still enjoying House of Leaves very much. I liked the rather long discussion on labyrinthes, as I have a tattoo of the labyrinthe from Chartres Cathedral -- which took years for me to decide that was the design I wanted for my second tattoo and I did a little reading on labyrinthes at the time. I'm sure the artist hated me when I walked in wanting that.

And imagine how difficult it was for me to fall asleep last night, considering the apartment was absolutely groaning and creaking from the gale force winds... not what you want to hear when you're reading something like House of Leaves! I didn't get out the tape measure though... ;)

Hope you're all enjoying your Sundays...

Thanks for reading,

LLB

Let it Snow

2005-01-22T11:50:00.000-05:00

I kind of like when the forecast is for a snow storm, even on the weekend. (During the week, the office rarely closes, I'd be more likely to just work at home.) But on the weekend, it's pretty much, well, I'm staying in and I'm totally justified to do so.

So last night, I felt prepared. Food? Check. Snacks? Check. Diet Coke? Check. Cigarettes? Check. Logs for a fire in the fireplace? Check. A book to read? Check. Some Netflix movies? Check. Some movies stored up on TiVo? Check.

I've got my needs pretty much accounted for, although an extra 12-pack of diet Coke might have been nice. Oh well, there's also plenty of coffee and tea here too.

Lack of power might be a downside in my plans, of course. However, I have this killer lantern that throws off a lot of light and, again, I could always light a fire for warmth. And I don't think it's going to ice enough to prove to be a power concern.

And hey, maybe I'll even do a little bit of writing... I have a lot of time to myself, since my roommate went to visit her family in Philly... the day is MINE!

Anybody have special plans for the snowstorm?

Thanks for reading,

LLB