Readers Wanted, Open Fiction Submissions, Website Makeover and What We Published Last Month
Write or Die Magazine Updates: August 2024
Each month, you will receive this special newsletter with a recap of what our magazine published the month prior and what our editors have been up to. As the Write or Die Mag team, we will share what has been inspiring us, along with craft tips and opportunities to work one-on-one with us! Keep scrolling! <3
Quick little update: we have split our newsletter into two separate ones. The one you are receiving now will be magazine happenings and updates only. You should have received our educational updates newsletter already.
If you are do not wish to receive magazine updates, you can click unsubscribe at the bottom of this email.
A Note from the EIC
Hey writers,
Did you know Write or Die Magazine got a little makeover?! We are back to our old domain, writeordiemag.com, and with that, we gave our magazine a dark mode facelift (lol)
I’ve spoken about it in many newsletters last month, so I won’t be redundant here. But I hope you check it out for yourself if you haven’t already!
In personal news, I also wanted to share with you that I got an agent! After 3 months of querying, my journey is now complete! I wrote about it at length here if you are interested in learning about the nitty gritty process stuff. Just a reminder, it only takes one yes!
Keep going, wherever you are in the process.
<3
Kailey
Announcement: Essay Reader Wanted!
We are looking for an essay reader to join our team! This is a remote, volunteer position that requires a commitment of approximately 3-4 hours a week for six months, with an opportunity to renew. Readers will support editors in reading and rating essay submissions per Write or Die Magazine guidelines.
While this is an unpaid position, it is a great way to participate in the literary community, work with other editors, and gain experience working behind the scenes of a literary magazine that publishes work on a weekly-basis. All readers will receive free admission to one Write or Die Workshop a month, a free subscription to Sub Club and The Forever Workshop, and our immense gratitude for supporting the work we do.
Responsibilities include:
Reading ten submissions per week, ranging from 1,000 to 5,000 words.
Review and evaluate submissions based on established criteria and guidelines.
The ideal applicant is:
Familiar with the work we do at Write or Die Magazine
Knowledgeable about literary topics that are relevant in the community
An avid reader
Interested in conversations that expand the literary discourse
Self-motivated and able to meet deadlines
Able to express themself clearly in writing
An educational background in literature and/or professional experience in literary criticism, editing, and creative writing is a plus, but not required
Is this you? We hope you will apply!
Submit to Us! We are open for…
Themed Call: Private Terrors
Our very first themed call! Guest editor Richard Scott Larson will choose four creative nonfiction pieces for our inaugural issue. Here is what he is looking for:
For me, horror has always been personal. The genre was a place for me to hide as a child in need of its metaphors to explain my fear of the real world around me, my own otherness leading me to identify with its masked villains and doomed victims. And horror continues to offer a lineage of tropes and terminology with which to describe the things we dread the most, which so often reflect elements of our personal histories back to us, metaphorically or otherwise.
I'm looking to hear from voices that use the genre to expand upon the personal or that elaborate critically on something under-explored about horror's unlikely marriage of fear and pleasure in ways that only that particular writer could accomplish.
The theme call closes on Friday, Sept. 13.
Fiction
Fiction subs are back, baby! Send us your short stories! We also have an expedited submission option where you can hear back within two weeks! Bonus: all fees go directly to pay our editors, who volunteer their time generously to make this magazine what it is <3
Creative Nonfiction
We are interested in essays that focus on the writing life and especially love work where the personal intersects with the critical.
Author Interviews
We accept pitches from interviewers interested in covering authors with a forthcoming or recently published book. We are especially interested in featuring books by debut authors and/or books published by indie presses.
↓ Click the button below for additional details about what we are looking for and how to submit it! ↓
, assistant editor
I’ve entered my Primal Yoga era, and so I’d like to recommend a pranayama (breathing) exercise called Lion’s Breath. Open your mouth, stick out your tongue, and exhale while shaking your head from side to side. Yep, that’s it! For real, it feels great as you relax your neck and face muscles and let your insecurity about This practice is related to the throat chakra (the fifth chakra), the thyroid, which is the seat of creativity, communication, and expression. It takes a bit of putting your consciousness aside so you can go full-roar, but it’s worth it to receive the benefits of Lion’s Breath. So, don’t be shy…let’s get roarin'!
Nirica Srinivasan, interviews editor
I really love titles that surprise me, and that happens more often than not with the author Laura Van Den Berg—I mean, how could you forget something like I Hold A Wolf By the Ears or What the World Will Look Like When All the Water Leaves Us? In specific I’m revisiting the short story “I Looked for You, I Called Your Name”, which is one of those stories that (aside from having a great name) worms its way into your head and won’t leave. Kyle Dillon Hertz wrote about why he loved it for LitHub this year, a great companion essay to read with the story!
, editor in chief
I’ve been really into audiobooks this summer. For some reason, when trying them out this time around, I was able to fully immerse myself in being read to—something I had forgotten how much I enjoy. My mother read to me often as a kid. I also had a wonderful sixth grade teacher who somehow got all of us eleven-year-olds to remain attentive as she read from Rumble Fish or And Then There Were None. Even the boys stilled their fidgeting limbs as her clear and easy voice blanketed the room for us all to nestle in. In the chaos of middle school and the horror of being in an adolescent body, I remember her English classes fondly, a time when I could actually relax.
I hadn’t considered this for a long time until my sister and then a friend mentioned their love of listening to audiobooks while they worked out at the gym. It seemed like a revelatory idea, one that coincided with the return of my passion for lifting.
I was craving mystery stories with gripping plots and suspense. Since July, I have read or listened to 12 books total—a wild number for me that would only be made possible by audiobooks.
Our assistant fiction editor, Suzanne, is a collector of craft tips. She will share her favorite tidbit of the month with us in each issue!
A decade ago, I did something odd.
My friend—someone I met in a middle school art class that involved much lopsided, ugly pottery—bought me a book. Hardcover, slim. The jacket hypnotic in its geometric blue design. She knew me; she knows me. She told me I would like it. It was a gift for my birthday.
But, instead of reading it, I put it on a shelf in a guest bedroom, and I let it sit for years. I was trying to write my first novel, but, more importantly, I was mentally shuttered by an abusive relationship.
Years later and many years ago now, I pulled the novel off my bookshelf. I’d moved. I’d survived. I was going through another grief—a different grief—that I still haven’t found the words to even reference in anything I’ve ever written. My dog was dying. Too young, and from a rare disease that had no clear origin. The dog who had been by my side through nearly every moment of abuse. It is a pain I have yet to fully process because the feeling still sucks at my ribs, at my core. It wretches a hand down my throat and pulls. Someday I will say more.
But during that time, I’d begun watching Y_ou’re the Worst_, and I heard the song “No Children” by The Mountain Goats in the series finale. As I obsessively researched the band, I realized the lead singer, John Darnielle, is also the author of the book I had been avoiding. I read it. My dog died. I still think about both all the time.
This novel, nominated for a National Book Award, unmoored me. It is about suicide and loneliness. Metal music and mental illness. Grief and death. Very few people I know have read it. There is a moment toward the end that completely rearranged my understanding of the protagonist. I was devastated, and enraged. I still don’t understand if I misread this moment—or if I missed some early cue that I should have understood and known what it conveys all along. It’s not exactly a plot twist, but it feels like something else. A character twist, perhaps. I’ve longed to talk to someone about this book for a very long time.
So, what exactly is my craft tip this month? I often advise writers to purchase their favorite novels and go at them with highlighters and pens. Cover the pages of that novel until it is unreadable, so annotated that you could never lend it to anyone. Mark not only your favorite sentences, but each little moment of intrigue, each question raised in a scene. Note motivations and stakes. Where there is mystery. Beats of action and reaction. Transition sentences and narrative modes.
But, also? Talk to people about the books that move you. Talk to your friends. Talk to strangers on the Internet. Ask someone to do a two-person book club. Let them know what confused you or frustrated you. Let them know what you loved, and hated. Talk craft. In person. Via text. On the phone. We do not exist in isolation. Literature does not exist in a vacuum. Reach out. You don’t know when someone might be silently facing the hulking beast that is grief. When they might need you to say, Hey. Come get lost with me in another world.
Essays
“The Cheese Plate” by Jake Maynard
Published: August 7
If someone reads your book and their first thought is about its craft, one of you has a limiting concept of what a novel can or should be.
“This Telling: An Abortion Story” by Emily Alexander
Published: August 21
Trying to defend the decision is the real betrayal, perhaps the entirety of my hesitation to discuss it. I did not want to list my reasons, nor did I want to over- or under-emphasize how the experience had affected me. I wanted to be understood, of course, as always, fully and honestly as perhaps it is impossible between two people.
Getting Into Character: How Early 2000s Online Roleplaying Helped My Writing Evolve by Melissa McDaniel
Published: August 28
The solitude of writing can be wonderful and liberating, but it can also be crushingly lonely. It takes an incredible amount of willpower to finish any writing project, especially when there is a good chance that no one else will ever read it.
Author Interviews
Jack Skelley and Dennis Cooper: In Conversation on the Biology of Language, Adaptations, and Literary Scenes
Published: August 1
Evolving and sharing one’s core themes, obsessions, and values has a snowball effect. It generates new inspiration for oneself and those around you.
Stacey D’Erasmo: On Perseverance, Writing Anonymously, Not Denying Yourself the Pleasure of Making Art, and Her New Book, ‘The Long Run’ by
Published: August 13
Screw the industry; screw the market. Why would you deprive yourself of this tremendous pleasure?
Kristen Felicetti: On IRL vs. Online Relationships, How to Thrive on Book Tour, Writing about Non-Traditional Families, and Her Debut Novel ‘Log Off’ by Shelby Hinte
Published: August 22
The media cycle brutally promotes this pressure to remain relevant. But the concept of being relevant in every moment matters much less when you zoom out and consider what I think is most creatives’ goal—to have a long artistic career.
Evelyn Berry: On Accepting Past Versions of Yourself, Building Queer Writing Communities, and Her Debut Poetry Collection ‘Grief Slut’ by
Published: August 27
Reading about queer history also helped me realize I was queer. The more I learn about queer history, the more I can contextualize my own life and the people I love in a much longer timeline.
We ask our past contributors to keep in touch and let us know if they have writing or publishing news after being featured in Write or Die Magazine! We are so honored to have published these writers and their work. Here is a look at what they've been celebrating since their appearance in our mag!
Regular Contributor
News: My new movie essay in Bright Wall/Dark Room explores the twists and turns of life and The Night House through the lens of genre (with a little structural help from the dictionary)!
Interview for Prachi Gupta: On the Myth of the Model Minority, Creating Meaning from Tragedy in Art, and Her Debut Memoir ‘They Called Us Exceptional’ published on September 4, 2024
News: A published poem in an upcoming literary magazine's Issue 5. Preorder here!
Thanks for the shoutout :) Can't wait to read the Private Terrors issue!!