Seattle's Pilot Books

Seattle has a new independent book store, tucked away in a second floor story of a shopping plaza off Broadway and specializing in poetry and small press releases. Pilot Books doesn't sell all the latest bestsellers, and it probably won't change that anytime soon. If you're looking for chapbooks, local zines or small press novels you'll be well suited to stop by. The store is open 12-8 every day except Wednesday.

The owner, Summer, is a friendly and knowledgeable book lover with a rockin tattoo of mastadons on her arms. "I’m always saying Pilot Books is for the now, the new, authors writing and publishing in times such as these," writes Summer on the bookstore's blog.

Don't fear that you'll have a hard time browsing just because you don't see the latest Dave Eggers or Jhumpa Lahiri. Handmade signs bearing slogans like "new" and "local artist" stick out of books. I'm sure Summer would be happy to discuss any of the titles in detail with you.

The tiny upstairs features a lending library and armchairs. According to the Pilot Books blog, Summer's planning on hosting weekly themed writing workshops and possibly reading groups in the future, too. During my visit the store was crowded with curious shopper and well-wishers, and was getting ready to welcome its first reading later that week. Not bad for a shop that had been open three weeks.

Pilot claims to be Seattle's Most Secretive bookstore. If you're in the area give it a shout-out and maybe we can change that reputation.

Drink in a tasty cup of word coffee

Greetings fellow Fringe fans; I return from my brief but fun-filled travels (cut short by icky hot weather) and have thrown myself into the choppy waters of the publishing world once more – or, to be a tad more accurate, I am trying to dive back into them in what, admittedly, has become my rather badly timed job hunting adventure.

My frenzied rummaging around the interweb has thrown up all sorts of little treasures in regards to independent publishers and relevant news pieces in general, amongst which I discovered a slick little outfit dubbed Bookkake, a self proclaimed ‘new’ type of publisher of ‘transgressive literature’ which appears to have an erotic bent. They use a handy-looking outfit called Lightning Source to print on-demand, when (and only when) someone orders a title. Sounds like good idea in terms of minimising waste/saving some trees and not being burdened with a costly warehouse of books to push onto already chock-full market.

I later stumbled upon another piece of oldish news – a magical photocopier that squeezes out whole books in minutes. The Espresso Book Machine has been winging their way around the US/Canada/Australia for a while now, but only made their UK debut at the London Book Fair last week, so this is shiny and new to me.

So what does all this speedy book making mean? For one, obscure and out-of-print titles can find their way back into the hands of those who want them, plus it also means smaller presses can hopefully continue doing what they do best; publishing riskier titles which range from the sublime to the shocking, keeping that door to a viable future propped open for niche markets.

This potential freedom may also open up the way for almost endless choice, which bodes less well for new writers yearning for that big break, as one would imagine it’s trickier to get your voice heard in over a increasingly noisy rabble, no matter how fresh or dazzling that voice might be. But then if your heart is still pure and you’re not in it for the money or the glory anyway, there’s nothing new to fear.

Next week: the dirty world of self-publishing

Help Us Redesign Our Site

We rarely ask for funds, but this time around, Fringe needs your help.

At the beginning of February, we turned 3. Over these years we've published 17, soon to be 18 of the Fringiest issues anywhere on teh interwebs, garnering 6,000-35,000 unique users each month. We've loaded the work of 124 writers and artists, many of whom we published for the first time.

We finally want to take better advantage of our digital format by publishing new work weekly, and hosting this fine blog on our own website. But we can't do it with the website we have: each issue takes 50 hours to load.

We're trying to raise $900 over two months to make our Wordpress dreams come true, and to give our webmistress a well-deserved night of sleep. We'll use the time we save to give you more of that content you love.

If you've enjoyed reading site or blog, consider a donation of $5 to help us meet our goal. You can see our campaign's progress through the widget to the right of our blog and all donations are tax deductible, as allowed by law.

We're also offering the following gifts with donations:

• Donate $6 and receive a colorful set of frame-able Fringe excerpts from previous Fringes in the mail
• Donate $25 and receive a sturdy Fringe shot glass
• Donate $50 and receive your choice of an author-signed copy of a small press book or a solid read of your work (up to one ordinary Fringe submission in length), with copious comments, from one of our crack team of editors.
  
• If you prefer to spare us the postage, please put "no gift" in the PayPal message to sender.

Thanks for all your support.

Fringe is a tax-exempt organization under section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code and a not-for-profit corporation registered as a charitable organization under the laws of the Delaware. Charitable donations made to Fringe are deductible to the full extent of the law for federal and estate tax purposes. 100% of all contributions made to Fringe will be used to fund its charitable activities. Fringe is currently soliciting donations from residents of any state in which such solicitation is legal. Certain states require us to register as a charitable organization under their respective laws before soliciting charitable contributions from their residents. We are currently so registered in Massachusetts, and can lawfully solicit contributions from residents of that state and the states of Delaware, Hawaii, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Louisiana, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, South Dakota, Texas, Vermont and Wyoming. Residents of other states should not construe or deem any content on our website nor any other communication made by or on behalf of Fringe to be a solicitation of their donation or contribution to Fringe. Copies of our registration statements and Annual Reports can be obtained by writing us at fringeeditors(at)gmail(dot)com. Registration with the Secretary of State or Attorney General of any state does not imply endorsement.

A Dysfunctional Family Holiday

Fringe is once again teaming up with Redivider, Black Ocean, and Quick Fiction to host the Dirty Water Reading Series' 2nd Annual Dysfunctional Family Holiday.

There will be holiday-themed mad-libs and short readings by Fringe contributor Steve Himmer, as well as Sommer Browning, Stace Budzko, and Tao Lin.

Oh, and there will also be free food, spiked egg nog, and a KEG. Yes, that means FREE beer. Just in time for the [guilt-ridden, drama-charged] holidays ahead!

Details:

Sunday, December 16

7-9pm

Grub Street 160 Boylston, 4th Floor, Boston MA

FREE Admission, food, beer

Wishing you drama-free holiday!

12/16 Note: Unfortunately, the reading has been canceled due to extreme Boston weather!

Send Us Submissions About Ethnicity and Race

The Ethnos issue is coming, and we're still looking for submissions.

We're looking for writing that navigates the complexities of ethnicity, race, and identity, and are accepting work in the genres of fiction, non-fiction, poetry, criticism, and cross genre, as well as original artwork. Experimental and political work are always welcome. See the site for complete guidelines.

We have extended the submissions period -- it now closes DECEMBER 31, so there's still time to get your work in.

While we always judge your work on its literary merits alone (using a blind submissions process), we are are particularly interested in publishing minority writers, and intended this special anniversary issue to help us get the ball rolling.

Why wait? Send us your stuff!

Advice to Submitters: Cover Letters

Here at Fringe, we see a lot of cover letters from submitters, ranging from the perfectly-composed traditional cover letter to the multi-page biography. A good cover letter allows your work to stand on its own, while a bad one can be off-putting to editors and start them out with an attitudinal deficit.

As a service to writers and editors everywhere, I thought I'd run through some of the most frequent pitfalls, at least by Fringe standards.

DO:

• Keep it short, no more than three paragraphs maximum.
• Send a two or three-line bio either within the letter's body text, or below your sign-off.
• Tell us if the submission is simultaneous.
• Use proper capitalization, punctuation, and spelling. Yes, the Internet is a casual place, but we haven't let our hair down THAT much.
• Let us know if you are/are not previously published, and list a few of your most recent or most important publications.
• Include a cover letter.
  

DO NOT:

• Send us a curriculum vitae or a list of all 57 journals you've published in.
  
• Summarize the piece(s) you are sending. Doing so robs us of the pleasure of discovering your writing on our own. If you have a sentence of background you simply must put in there, or which is necessary to understanding the story ("I wrote this piece while living with Sherpas in Nepal and studying their myth cycle which relies on..."), that's fine.
• Address us as "Dear Sirs" -- we know you don't mean to cause offense, but we are not male, and also we are feminists. We prefer "Dear Fiction/Nonfiction/ Poetry/ Etc Editor."
  
• Tell us that your piece is exactly the avant piece of literature we have been waiting for.
• Tell us who your literary influences are. This can be a turn-off, which makes it harder to give your piece the fair reading it deserves. Remember, it may happen that your most venerated literary fore bearers typify all we loathe about the hetero patriarchal canon. Also, Burroughs and Hemingway influenced everyone.
  

Remember, as my old adviser Pamela Painter says, the primary function of a good cover letter is to tell editors, "hello" and "I'm not crazy." Follow these tips and yours will do just that.

Happy writing.

Keggers and CliffsNotes: Passed the test!

Keggers and CliffsNotes was the best college party, ever. Maybe it was the keg, maybe it was the pizza, maybe it was the 4 awesome readers that made the night, well, magical.

After some boozing and schmoozing to the college-band soundtrack in the background, a crowd of about 50 people settled down to hear Amy L. Clark read 3 short shorts, one of which was brand new. Then her true skills as reader were put to the test as she read a CliffsNotes version of 'The Scarlet Letter' with mad-libbed words thrown in from the rather creative audience. Brian Foley, Urban Waite, and Janaka Stucky continued the pattern, each reading compelling literature, followed by audience-enhanced renditions of 'Paradise Lost,' 'The Odyssey,' and 'Moby Dick' ("Discover this American classic of Captain Mr. T on his maniacal search for the emu Schmoopy Dick who took his leg...").

It was the 3rd reading of the series, but the first under the new official name: Dirty Water Reading Series. We love that dirty water, love great literature, love that fizzy beer. The next reading will be December 16 at Grub Street...write it down! You won't want to miss it.

Keggers and CliffsNotes: A (Mercifully Short) Reading

THIS Sunday, September 23, (after the Race for the Cure) the Dirty Water Reading Series will present Keggers and CliffsNotes, a (free!) reading at Grub Street in Boston.

Readers on tap: Amy L. Clark (published in Fringe's feminism issue), Beth Woodcome, Brian Foley, and Janaka Stucky. What better way to kick off the school year than a college dorm party at Grub Street?

This is the third installment of our seasonal reading series, co-hosted with Redivider, Quick Fiction, and Black Ocean. Just like readings past, we will have (mercifully short) readings, audience-participation mad-libs, and of course, FREE pizza and beer (yes, there will be a keg!).

So if you'll be in the Boston area, come and reminisce those college days of scantrons and keg stands. And if you can't make it, we'll raise a plastic cup of fizzy beer in your honor.

DETAILS: Sunday, September 23, Grub Street HQ, 160 Boylston, 4th Floor, 7-9pm

How Main Stream Media Killed the Small Press

During a recent Critical Issues lecture, the professor asked me if I thought the growing popularity of web communities was evidence that the public had lost faith in mainstream media. I believe I sputtered something at the mic, but the question got me thinking and I would like to respond to it more fully here.

I believe that the answer is yes, and that the public's lack of faith in mainstream media outlets comes from two sources:

1. Unavoidable byproducts of having big media.
2. Big media getting lazy and not doing its job right.

The first source directly led to the formation of Fringe. There's been some speculation in the literary community that big media (aka corporate bookstores) ran a lot of independent bookstores out of business. These independent bookstores were the main subscribers to literary magazines, so when the bookstores collapsed, many journals went belly-up. It sounds like regular capitalism at work, but this had disastrous consequences for journals catering to specific niches and minority groups.

Big media is concerned with eyeballs, which translate into profit, and niche journals don't have as many eyeballs. This might not have been a problem for small publications catering to latino writing or feminist writing, except that the literary market isn't very large to begin with. So these tiny journals went under, unfortunate because many of them had given writers like Sandra Cisneros (early pub credits in Revista Chicano-Riquena and Nuestro, both now defunct), Dorothy Allison, and many many others their crucial early publication credits, which often help writers get noticed by larger publications.

We founded Fringe because we worried that the dearth of niche publications would have a trickle-up effect, making it harder for minority writers to get published early on, which would make it harder for bigger publications to notice them, which would homogenize literary culture at the upper levels. (Check the NYT's hormonally imbalanced, melanin deficient list of best books to get a sense of the homogenization.)

Did the corporate bookstore say to itself, "let's screw over minority writers"? Of course not. But the unintended effect of big media has been to make the already fiscally unfeasible print-jounal model even harder to sustain. And so we turn to the Internet, where space is cheap and circulation costs nonexistent.

I'm guessing that other media -- newspapers, music, etc -- have followed the route of the literary journal. Corporate media caters to the most marketable and mainstream group, but many individuals want to read about their specific interests. As a model, MSM hasn't yet found a way to fill the void.

I'll cover source #2, the way MSM has actively broken the trust, in my next post.

In memory of Sarah Hannah

Emerson poetry professor Sarah Hannah took her own life on May 23rd. The Boston Globe wrote a beautiful obituary, highlighting Dr. Hannah's life and work. Tupelo Press of Dorset, Vt., has moved up publication of her new book, Inflorescence, from November to September, and Jeffrey Levine promises that Tupelo Press will hold a memorial for Sarah at Poet’s House in September when her new book comes out. "I will invite the entire writing community to come and read from her book, and to read tributes or poems in homage," says Levine.

Local poet Douglas Holder wrote a heartfelt blog post in his Boston Area Small Press and Poetry Scene blog, where he said "I sent her an email last week. I was told that she killed herself last week. She was only in her early 40’s. I know her high school teacher. She seemed so happy. Her star was rising. She had been through a divorce. She had everything to live for. I have only clichés. I am sorry. I have worked at McLean Hospital for 25 years, but I am not immune to this. May she rest in peace."

In times like these, it is impossible not to look at your own life with a new perspective. Take a moment to focus on the good stuff, to appreciate the relative happiness you might take for granted. Kiss your lover, call your mother, write, eat a good meal, connect with an old friend...do whatever you need to do to feel alive, appreciated, loved, and important.

We love the Post Office, but it's doing us wrong

By now y'all have probably heard about the nefarious plot by our Postal Service to raise rates for periodicals through a deal with Time-Warner. Here at Fringe, our thoughts usually run more to web stats than stamps. But the new rates are going to have a serious effect on our literary sisters, small print journals. This isn't just a matter of a few cents an issue; it's a crisis for small presses--and for the principles of free speech itself. The Postal Service is one of my favorite things about America, but right now it has me so mad I'd pontificate to a mailbox.

Some folks say we'll soon live in an online-only literary world, but we all know they are wrong. We need the dual forces of print and online. They're like Superwoman and Supergirl. Like Nero Wolfe and Archie Goodwin. Like ketchup and mustard, whiskey and ginger ale, peas and honey.
I need both the leisurely, tactile pleasure of print journals and the quick fix of online journals that can deliver a hot new poem any time I want one. And I don't think I'm alone on this one.

So what's a gal or guy to do? Well, first, you might scrape together your spare change and renew a print journal subscription or two. Who knows--your puny little subscription could be the difference between life and death for a journal. Or you might sit down on your lunch break and write a letter. Perhaps if the P.O. got a bit more business, it would be less tempted to sell its soul to corporate America. And most importantly, sign on to the petition at Free Press, and let our friends at the P.O. know how you feel. The window for public comment was ridiculously small, but maybe it's not too late to raise a ruckus.