Erin Regan: AWP Round Two: Like Coming Home

A few weeks ago, I packed a suitcase with extra room for books and literary paraphernalia and boarded a plane for blustery Minneapolis. It was my first time in the city and my second time at the annual AWP Conference. (You can read all about my inaugural trip here.)

Attending AWP last year gave me such an incredible boost of enthusiasm and motivation. I went home with a backpack full of journals, business cards, and call-for-submissions fliers. I was ready to really commit to being a writer, and to my own happy surprise, I have submitted a few pieces to various literary journals – all without success. That’s why this year, I attended a few panels about how to cope with rejection!rejected-1238221

This time, I not only entered the conference with a more personal knowledge of the reality of rejection but with a greater understanding of the madness I was descending on. As I boarded the plane to Seattle for the conference last year, I imagined the looks I would get when I told people that I hadn’t been published yet or that I was only getting my bachelor’s degree in literature. I expected everyone in attendance to have already written their first novel. Now I know that is wholly not the case.

Of course you do run into some profoundly successfully writers, and it’s such a joy to see them and hear them speak. (This year, I chatted with Ron Carlson and was able to attend panels with Stuart Dybek and T.C. Boyle.) But the AWP conference is also full of students and new writers who are trying to break into the world of literary publishing through small journals and publishing houses. It’s incredible to be in the company of thousands of aspiring and inspiring writers and editors. This year, walking into the book fair at the Minneapolis Convention Center felt just a little bit like coming home.

Here are some things I’ve learned from my first two AWP experiences:

Offsite events are the best. This year, Superstition Review co-hosted a reading with Blue Mesa Review and Hayden’s Ferry Review at The Nicollet, a lovely little coffee shop. I also attended Literary Death Match and a poetry reading in a supposedly haunted German hotel.

Missing the keynote is part of the AWP experience, especially after your first year. Admittedly, I was pretty disappointed to miss Karen Russell, but I was enjoying a really tasty bowl of pasta at the time, so I can’t complain too much.

It feels great to represent a magazine. Having Superstition Review printed on my badge did wonders for my confidence, and meeting past contributors as they stop by the table is pretty exciting. Plus, table 318 was my little haven in the swarming book fair.

Go outside. It’s easy to forget that there’s a world outside the convention center, so when you get a chance, go for a little walk; grab a bite to eat that isn’t a personal pizza or boxed salad.

The book fair is where it’s at. The panels are great, but there are so many people to talk with and new publications and presses to meet. Plus, you can get some amazing reading material and literary loot.

See you in Los Angeles at #AWP16!

SR Pod/Vod Series: Writer Allegra Hyde

Each Tuesday we feature audio or video of an SR Contributor reading their work. Today we’re proud to feature a podcast by Allegra Hyde.

allegrahyde_0Allegra Hyde serves as prose editor for Hayden’s Ferry Review. Her short stories and essays have appeared in the North American Review, LUMINA, Southwestern American Literature, Bellevue Literary Review, Grist Journal, and elsewhere. She lives in Arizona.

You can listen to the podcast on our iTunes Channel.

You can read along with the work in Superstition Review.

Intern Post, David Klose: An Open Letter on Lit Mags

 

Literary MagazinesSo you want to start reading more Literary Magazines?

I was once in your shoes. I even interned at The Review Review to review Literary Magazines, just hoping to discover more magazines and the writers they publish. And doing that, just once mind you, along with working at Superstition Review for two semesters, I’ve come across a few revelations about how I feel about Literary Magazines.

First, I think there are far too many of them. However, I guess that is better than having a shortage (well, maybe not). But since there are so many of them, there are a lot, I hate to say it, that aren’t that good. And since there are so many of them, and plenty of them don’t always produce the best work, it is good to know what you are looking for to save yourself some time. You can find a literary magazine for nearly any kind of writing and I recommend following Submittable and The Review Review on Twitter to learn just how many different lit mags there are in the world (in addition to being reminded about contests and submission dates for the various journals).

As for my preferences, I like New England Review and Alaska Quarterly Review. McSweeney’s is interesting, though I find it a bit overpriced. (Before I forget, it’s great to go to a used book store and buy back issues of lit mags for a discounted price.)

Bartelby Snopes is a fun read for online literary magazines. Anderbo is a good online lit mag as well and easy to read on your phone. I am partial to magazines I can easily read on my phone as I take the light rail into ASU and I am always looking for a valid reason to keep my head down. And, now that I think of it, while I said McSweeney’s is overpriced, they have a great app which allows you to buy some great content.

Virginia Quarterly Review is a good one, too. Let’s not forget Hayden’s Ferry Review. A lot of quality work is published out of Arizona State University. A good tip that I learned from a talk given by Amy Holman at Bread Loaf is take whatever writer you like to read and, if they have written a short story collection, look in that collection to see where some of those stories have been published previously. You will quickly see a pattern in where your favorite writers are published. If you like political writings and follow political writers, you will end up reading magazines with a political vibe.

Also, read where you want to be published if your aim is to be published one day. This way, at the very least, you’ll understand the talent of your competition. If your aim is to discover new and interesting forms/writers, check out something like Muumu House or just start looking up lit mags on Twitter and see what magazines they follow.

This isn’t to say great writing can’t be found in obscure journals. As a Nonficiton Editor at Superstition Review, I’ve come across a few obscure journals in the writer’s bio section. Sometimes I look them up and read a few of the stories featured in their journal. But usually, I find better odds at the roulette table, and that’s betting on individual numbers.

The trick, I think, is to follow writers you like and find the writers they like and use that to branch out into different magazines. I think this is a more successful (not to mention time saving) approach, rather than just jumping head first into a pool of literary magazines. But I do tend to tray towards the more established lit mags when I can, because I like to read from the journals where I’d like to be published.

One more thing I heartily recommend is reading fiction/poetry from magazines that don’t just specialize in writing fiction/poetry, such as The New Yorker or Esquire. The best stories can be found in the most unusual places if you follow your favorite writers. For example, when I was about 14 I was really into reading Chuck Palahniuk. One day I found out he was publishing a new short story called Guts in Playboy Magazine. I pleaded with my dad to buy it for me so I could read the story. He bought it for me, tearing out the story and throwing away the magazine (or so he’d like me to believe). I still remember reading that story, the edges all ripped, the pages paper-clipped together. Thinking back on it, what happened in that story was probably more adult than anything else in that magazine.

This isn’t me telling you to buy Playboy. This is me saying there are so many magazines out there, so many avenues for writers to publish their work, that you are better off following writers as they publish and just sticking to your list of highly established and respected magazines, as your safe “go-to” journals.

SR Pod/Vod Series: Poet Luisa Villani

Each Tuesday we feature audio or video of an SR Contributor reading their work. Today we’re proud to feature a podcast by Michael Schmeltzer.

Luisa VillaniLuisa Villani is the recipient of a Pennsylvania Council on the Arts Fellowship in poetry, an AWP Intro Journals Award, and an Academy of American Poets Prize. Her work has appeared in The New England Review, The Literary Review, Prairie Schooner, Hayden’s Ferry Review and other literary journals. Her book, Running Away from Russia, was chosen for the Bordighera Prize by W.S. Di Piero, and selections from her forthcoming book, Highway of the Mayan Sky, recently appeared in the Random House anthology Poetry 180. She currently is a University Diversity Fellow at the University of Southern California.

You can listen to the podcast on our iTunes Channel.
You can read along with the work in Superstition Review.

SR Pod/Vod Series: Poet Suzanne Marie Hopcroft

Each Tuesday we feature audio or video of an SR Contributor reading their work. Today we’re proud to feature a podcast by Suzanne Marie Hopcroft.


Suzanne HopcroftSuzanne Marie Hopcroft’s poetry is forthcoming or has appeared in Hayden’s Ferry Review, Drunken Boat, The Carolina Quarterly, The Southern Humanities Review, and Valparaiso Poetry Review.  Suzanne is a PhD candidate in Comparative Literature at Yale University and will begin her MFA in poetry at The University of California, Irvine in the fall.

 

To learn more about Suzanne, you can visit her website.

You can read along with her poetry in Issue 9 of Superstition Review.

To subscribe to our iTunes U channel, go to http://itunes.apple.com/us/itunes-u/superstition-review-online/id552593273

Hayden’s Ferry Review Auction

Haydens FerryArizona State University’s international literary magazine will be holding their first fundraising auction on February 7 at 8 p.m. at Boulders on Broadway. Everyone in the community is encouraged to stop by and place a bid on what is promised to be a wide range of items from MFA faculty signed books, to handcrafted blankets to belly dancing lessons. All of the proceeds will go directly toward the production and mailing costs for Hayden’s Ferry Review, allowing the magazine to uphold their dedication to “providing a forum to showcase the voices of emerging and established talents in creative writing and visual art.” Support artists and writers by supporting Hayden’s Ferry Review.

 

Boulders on Broadway is located on Broadway and Roosevelt.
530 W Broadway Rd, Tempe, Arizona 85282-1311

Hayden’s Ferry Review
Facebook Event Page
Boulders on Broadway

SR Pod/Vod Series: Poet Emilia Phillips

Each Tuesday we feature audio or video of an SR Contributor reading their work. Today we’re proud to feature a podcast by Emilia Phillips.

Emilia Phillips is the author of Signaletics (University of Akron Press, 2013) and two chapbooks including Bestiary of Gall (Sundress Publications, 2013). She has held fellowships from U.S. Poets in Mexico and Vermont Studio Center and received the 2012 Poetry Prize from The Journal and Second Place in Narrative’s 2012 30 Below Contest. Her poetry appears in AGNI, Hayden’s Ferry Review, The Kenyon Review, The Paris-American, and elsewhere. She is an adjunct instructor of creative writing at Virginia Commonwealth University, the associate literary editor of Blackbird, the De Novo Poetry Prize and social media coordinator for C&R Press, and the prose editor for 32 Poems. She lives in Richmond, Virginia.

You can read along with her poems in Issue 6 of Superstition Review.

To subscribe to our iTunes U channel, go to http://itunes.apple.com/us/itunes-u/superstition-review-online/id552593273

SR Pod/Vod Series: Poet Sarah Pape

Each Tuesday we feature audio or video of an SR Contributor reading their work. Today we’re proud to feature a podcast by Sarah Pape.

Sarah Pape lives in Northern California and teaches English at California State University, Chico. Her poetry has recently been published in The Southeast ReviewHayden’s Ferry ReviewWatershed and Cadence of Hooves: A Celebration of Horses. Her chapbook, Road Z, was published by Yarroway Mountain Press. Committed to community arts and literary collaboration, she is on the board of the 1078 Gallery and leads creative writing workshops.

You can read along with her poems in Issue 8 of Superstition Review.

To subscribe to our iTunes U channel, go to http://itunes.apple.com/us/itunes-u/superstition-review-online/id552593273

CGCC Poetry Reading: Allyson Boggess, Matthew Jolly, Patricia Murphy

Join us to celebrate National Poetry Month.

Thursday, April 5, 2012
7 p.m. until 8:30 p.m.
Library First Floor
Chandler-Gilbert Community College
2626 E. Pecos Rd., Chandler, AZ 85225-2499

 

Allyson BoggessAllyson Boggess is a graduate of the MFA program at Arizona State University, where she was a poetry editor at Hayden’s Ferry Review. She teaches poetry at CGCC and writing at ASU and the Harvard Extension School. Her work was recently published in [PANK]. She lives in Phoenix.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Matthew JollyMatthew Jolly is a member of the English faculty at GateWay Community College where he teaches classes in English composition and literature. He grew up outside Cleveland, Ohio, but now lives in Southeast Phoenix with his wife Lauren, his son Benjamin, three devious dogs, and a cat named Ebbilah. He received his MFA in poetry from Arizona State University where he was the recipient of a graduate fellowship and winner of the Glendon and Kathryn Swarthout Award in poetry. His work has appeared in Phoebe: A Journal of Literature and Art; The New Delta Review; and as part of NCTE’s online celebration of National Poetry Month. His “Elegy, Autopsy, and Archeological Excavation: An Interview with David Wojahn” (Hayden’s Ferry Review, 2003) was nominated for a Pushcart Prize.

 

 

Patricia Murphy

Patricia Murphy is a Senior Lecturer at ASU where she teaches creative writing and is the founding editor of Superstition Review. In Spring 2009 she won the Provost’s Faculty Achievement Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Student Mentoring. Murphy earned her B.A. in English and French from Miami University and her M.F.A. in Poetry from ASU. Her poems have appeared in many literary magazines including The Massachusetts Review, Clackamas Literary Review, New Orleans Review, Seattle Review, Cimarron Review, Kalliope, Quarterly West, American Poetry Review, Green Mountains Review, Indiana Review, and The Iowa Review. Her poems have received awards from the Cream City Review, The GSU Review, Glimmer Train Press, the Ann Stanford Poetry Prize, and Gulf Coast among others. She is the recipient of an Artist’s Project Grant from the Arizona Commission on the Arts and she has been awarded residencies at Mesa Refuge, Atlantic Center for the Arts, and Vermont Studio Center.