Haunted by a Font, Graphic Artist Wanted, Spooky Things to Come and What We Published Last Month
Write or Die Magazine Updates: September 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. Keep scrolling! <3
A Note from the EIC
Hey writers,
Be on the lookout next week for the drop of our inaugural issue! We put out a themed call back in August, Private Terrors, and let me tell you, these writers DELIVERED. I’m so excited for you to read these vulnerable and raw pieces. We have some more special issues planned, so be on the lookout for that in December.
Private Terrors launches on Oct. 14!
To hold you over, be sure to check out
’s feature we published on October 1! Haunt Your Own House II showcases 31 movie and short story pairings, one for each day of the month. It's such a fun one.Another update: we hope you have noticed
’s latest editions to this newsletter! In addition to the GRWM interviews you know and love, Brittany will be creating two special writing prompts for you a month. She also launched her latest column last week, Treat Yourself, with an essay about literary friendships and community that really seemed to resonate with so many.
I’m very excited to have Brittany in this new role, as she is one of the most fun, hardworking and authentic writers I know. More to come!
Thanks for subscribing! Happy writing!
<3
Kailey, EIC
Graphic Artist Wanted
We are looking for help on some future projects and are looking for a graphic artist! Must have experience creating social media graphics. Being familiar with Squarespace is a big plus! This is a paid position.
If you are interested, please send an email to Kailey at hello@writeordiemag.com with your portfolio/links to your work, plus a cover letter letting us know why you would like to work for Write or Die Magazine and what type of content you are excited about creating.
Submit to Us! We are open for…
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
Since moving back to Los Angeles, I’m in the car A LOT more than I’m used to. So, I finally downloaded Libby and started listening to audiobooks! Open Book by Jessica Simpson has taken my commutes by storm. This woman is a triumph, y’all. I’ve laughed, cried, like seriously sobbed while on the 405, and felt endeared to this woman I do not know but remember for all the early aughts drama. While I’m not a singer and grew up with a completely different background than JSimps, I relate to all the rejection she faced early on in her career, and the pressure she felt to succeed and keep going and perform. The book is heartfelt and deep and lovely. I love that Jessica Simpson is in on the jokes of the past and can laugh at herself, but also, she can stand strong where strength is necessary.
Nirica Srinivasan, interviews editor
The 4K restoration of Tarsem Singh’s film The Fall is streaming on Mubi now! When I first joined Tumblr, way back when, The Fall was practically mandatory viewing—it had such a cult status. I can remember the first time I saw it—I was blown away by the visuals, by the sense of wonder it carries throughout, and by the playfulness of how it approaches storytelling. I love this film still, and I’m so excited for people who get to experience it for the first time!
Suzanne Grove, assistant fiction editor
Next to my desk, I keep an extra bookshelf. A small slab of fake wood that is currently overflowing with issues of The Paris Review, Ploughshares, and The Sewanee Review, among other literary journals. Plus, all my favorite novels, all my craft books, and far too many empty Moleskines and LEUCHTTURM1917s.
I might have an addiction to purchasing both notebooks and books on the art of writing.
Still, there is one I recommend over and over again: The Making of a Story by Alice LaPlante. At over 600 pages it’s both incredibly comprehensive yet somehow also precise. It’s easy to read, full of exercises and quotations and excerpts and stories by writers like Lorrie Moore and James Baldwin and Denis Johnson, all of which help to illustrate the teachings in the prior chapter.
This volume covers nearly every element of craft you can imagine, and LaPlante isn’t afraid to push back against some common wisdom or to question certain popular writing tips. This book will not only educate you, but make you think.'
Shelby Hinte, senior editor
I recently gobbled up The Hypocrite by Jo Hamya. It manages to be a clever comedy about morality and identity in art without ever coming off as didactic (this feels more and more difficult to achieve). The novel takes place during a matinee showing of a young woman’s play in which she has fictionalized events from a summer spent in Italy with her father. Her father, a social pariah as a result of his so-called transgressive and misogynistic novels aging poorly, learns about his daughter’s very different perspective of their shared summer via the play she’s exposed him in. This is a novel about writers blinded by their own self-righteousness that they can’t see how they’re guilty of the very offenses they detest. A hilarious novel about what happens when writers (or people) set out to teach a lesson rather than have a conversation.'
, editor-in-chief
If you have the funds and the time, I highly recommend getting professional author photos taken. I wrote about my experience in my In the Weeds newsletter because it was such a profound one, that divinely coincided with signing with my agent. No matter where you are in the process, it's never too early to start taking yourself and your writing career seriously.
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!
Have you ever been haunted by a font?
Perhaps an unfair question to ask writers.
(Yes, my poems are absolutely smarter and sexier and more emotionally truthful in Garamond.)
Let me tell you about the font that haunts me: The text belonging to the Unsolved Mysteries logo.
Are you hearing the theme song? Robert Stack’s voice? Good.
As a kid, I spent many weekends in the basement game room of the home my grandfather built. The massive brick fireplace, the paneled walls, the tube television in its wood encasement, bunny ears shooting up to the ceiling. There, seated on the floor à la Poltergeist, I terrified myself with episodes of The X-Files and Unsolved Mysteries.
I also spent much of that childhood crushing on David Duchovny and being absolutely convinced I would, at some point, be abducted by aliens. Now, October has me thinking about those nights, and about the stakes in those stories. They were high. They often involved literal death.
My craft tip this month focuses on story stakes. I want to share the best, most concise advice I’ve ever heard about this craft element. I wish I could credit just one person, but this tip has been repeated in a myriad of classes and workshops and texts. I’ll summarize here: I find it helpful to think of stakes in terms of a death—literal, romantic, personal, professional, psychological, etc. What are the negative consequences of failure for your protagonist(s)? What might your characters gain or lose over the course of the narrative? And how will this affect them? If they can easily return to life as they previously knew it—their own status quo—after this gain or loss, then the stakes are usually low; however, if the events of the story will radically disrupt their lives, the stakes are usually high.
This fall, pay close attention to the stakes of your stories, and perhaps don’t get caught up in any brilliant beams of light.
Essays
“A Win-Win” by Seth Kaplan
Published: September 4
Writing is putting your heart on the page for someone else to see.
“Fractured; or, A Sum” by Faith Palermo
Published: September 11
Versions of me exist online. Versions of me exist in the present, in the future, created by previous iterations, informed by personal lineage. All of these versions are true. The distinction of the self is imagined, imperfect.
On the Vine by
Published: September 18
The complexity of growing winter squash reminds me of the writing process. For weeks, I water the vines, waiting for the first squash blossoms, but the blossoms themselves are not enough.
Excuse Me, May I Seduce You, Please? by Arcadia Molinas
Published: September 25
To seduce is to walk the tightrope between deceit and honesty
Author Interviews
Prachi Gupta: On the Myth of the Model Minority, Creating Meaning from Tragedy in Art, and Her Debut Memoir ‘They Called Us Exceptional’ by
Published: September 3
It's very hard to conceptualize change, but I do believe that one individual's actions have tremendous ripple effects.
Janelle Bassett and Amy Stuber: On Writer Friendships, Publication Anxiety, and Their Debut Collections, Thanks For This Riot” and “Sad Grownups” by Amy Stuber
Published: September 10
There’s so much rejection involved in writing, and you have to get a kind of fuck you all if you don't like it mentality. But there’s definitely that constant feeling of maybe I’m just bad at this and should quit that we’ve talked about a lot.
When I’m working on something, I’m not really thinking about pleasing anyone other than myself, but of course, I am also writing under the assumption that other people will read it. I guess it’s really the difference between expression to get a feeling out versus expression to be understood or to connect.
Emily Layden: On Clearing the Noise of Publication, Getting off the Grid, Music as a Parallel to Writing, and Her Novel, ‘Once More From The Top’ by
Published: September 17
Every one of us is weaving the tightrope of our life as we go, and this is the balancing act I’m striving for: keeping my nervous system soothed while somehow nonetheless fueling my ambition.
Tony Stubblebine: CEO of Medium Discusses Writing Authentically, Thinking Beyond the Content Treadmill, and Crafting a Lasting Author Brand by
Published: September 24
I do think the future is all about writing in a way that creates a really powerful, authentic connection with readers. You have to find ways to be authentic everywhere, and that’s harder—maybe sometimes not possible for everyone. But the good news is that it’s way more fulfilling. It’s a better way to live.
Sophie Hughes and Annie McDermott: On Female Revenge, Giving Voice to a House, and Co-Translating Layla Martinez’s Novel ‘Woodworm’ by Sophie Hughes
Published: September 26
What is history but a haunted house we all have to live inside?
It feels somehow symbolic that it took a novel about two women living cheek-by-jowl in a house visited by troublesome ghosts, angels, and saints to bring us together as co-translators, and now friends. A haunted house is a great metaphor for a book in the process of being translated.
Features
Novelist and Creative Director Balances Careers and Steals Moments to Write for Himself — Writer Diary
Brendan Gillen is a writer in Brooklyn, NY. His debut novel, STATIC, was released via Vine Leaves Press in July.
This diary represents a week in his life in which he had his first reading event, wrote and creative directed two pieces for the US Open, queried a new novel manuscript, stole time to write a new project, and more.
Pre-Pub Jitters, Family Balance, and West Coast Adventures – Writer Diary
Jessica Elisheva Emerson is obsessed with cooking beans, growing food, eating pie, sleeping in on Shabbat, and working toward a better world. A Tucson native, Jessica spent twenty-two years in Los Angeles before returning to the Sonoran Desert, where she lives with her husband and children. Her stories and poems have been published in numerous journals, and she's a produced playwright.
This diary represents a week in her whirlwind life as a writer balancing family, work, and the excitement of the launch of her book, Olive Days (Catapult).