Tag Archives: literary journals

by Luanne | July 17, 2014 · 5:20 am

Lit Journals Again

Last week I posted a poll on Does Short Form Memoir Count?

Although the results are limited by the few numbers taking the poll, I was heartened to see that the highest percentage was for people who subscribe to at least one journal. But when you add rarely and never together, you get the same score.

So why don’t more of us read lit mags? And I put myself in that category because I haven’t been consistent. More often than not, I would skim a new magazine and end up not reading it because I turned to a book instead.

Now that I’ve been reading literary journals again, I feel so energized, enthused, and educated. I think my writing will be better for reading them. So I plan to continue.

How about you?

Photo by Marisha

Next Thursday: I (sort of) review an iconic memoir.

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Filed under Creative Nonfiction, Literary Journals, Memoir, Memoir writing theory, Nonfiction, Research and prep for writing, Writing

Tagged as Book Writing, Creative Nonfiction, Creative writing, essays, literary journals, lyrical essays, Memoir, Nonfiction, Ploughshares, political essays, Writer, Writers Resources, Writing memoir

by Luanne | July 10, 2014 · 5:20 am

Does Short Form Memoir Count?

Lately I’ve been reading shorter memoir pieces in back issues of literary journals, rather than book-length memoirs. I’ve noticed a few things by reading stories in journals:

I don’t know what I’m going to get ahead of time. These pieces are usually listed until the category of “nonfiction.” A story might be a memoir, but it also might be a political essay or a lyrical essay. I’m more likely to find an experimental piece than if I read a book. Whether that matters or not is another issue. But I have long suspected that the reason we have “genres” is that we know how to “take” something when we read it.
The piece is more likely to have some contemporary slant to it than if it were part of a book. These essays tend to be more “timely,” but sometimes that feels like a magazine trying to be trendy.
I don’t become as obsessed with any of these short stories as I do when I read a book. I am less invested. Are the writers less invested, too? Nevertheless, some of the short pieces are thrilling in their brilliance.
I am exposed to a wider range of thoughts and emotions by reading a variety of essays by a variety of writers.
By reading many writing styles, I learn more about writing at the sentence and paragraph level. By reading books, I learn more about structure.
I can read one short piece at each sitting, so I feel as if I’ve accomplished something.
BUT I am not drawn back to the story as I am when I have to take a reading break during a book.
I can learn a lot about where to submit stories by reading the journals.

Click on this link to order back issues of Plougshares

How often do you read literary journals?

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Filed under Creative Nonfiction, Literary Journals, Memoir, Memoir writing theory, Nonfiction, Research and prep for writing, Writing

Tagged as Book Writing, Creative Nonfiction, Creative writing, essays, literary journals, lyrical essays, Memoir, Nonfiction, Ploughshares, political essays, Writer, Writers Resources, Writing memoir

by Luanne | May 5, 2014 · 5:20 am

Why Wait to Publish?

We have a lot of book writers on WordPress–all in various stages of book writin’: thinking about writing a book, actually writing one, talking about writing one, with several finished manuscripts, publishing a first book, many published books on the shelf.

What I hear very little about on WordPress is publishing smaller pieces before the book is finished. Maybe because I started as a poet, this has always been my route.

Poems are arguably the smallest genre of writing, so it made sense to send a few out into the world and see how they fare. Eventually, I had enough poems written and published to pull them together into a manuscript, but it didn’t occur to me that it was time for a book. I had to be reminded about it by a mentor.

When I branched out into writing creative nonfiction, my goal from the beginning was to produce a book. The writers on WordPress and the writers in the memoir-writing classes I’ve taken have been as focused on The Book as I have been.

But my opinion is that it’s just as important to write smaller pieces or to take chapters or smaller portions of the book-in-progress and revise into stand-alones. These pieces can be submitted to magazines and journals. Maybe you are thinking, “Well, I am writing a novel, so there is no way to send out part of this baby!” I searched Duotrope (search site for writing submissions) for “novel excerpts” and over 100 places are accepting submissions of novel excerpts currently. Once you weed through them, you might find only a dozen are a good fit, but hey, maybe that’s 12 more than you realized were out there!

What I am trying to do is figure out what kind of market is best for each short piece and then revise each one until it sparkles before sending it out to editors of the “right fits.”

I try to think of my short works as canaries in the coal mine of the literary world. Either they make it or they don’t.

Here is some great advice given by the character Christmas Eve in the Tony award-winning musical Avenue Q: