Right In Front Of You + Immersive
Poets & Writers Magazine|November - December 2019
MY HOPES for the future of independent publishing involve three major elements: stronger “channels” of interest that drive better visibility for writers, particularly fiction writers; more collaboration among writers to create these channels and gather power; and deeper experimentation with format and delivery.
Molly Barton
Right In Front Of You + Immersive

Fewer and fewer novels are making their way through the gauntlet that is traditional publishing success today— a process that typically requires getting an appropriate agent who has the time, focus, and influence to sell your book. At which point there begins a new complex and lengthy process that involves igniting a small fire of interest in the book inside the publishing house that results in lots of galleys being printed, lots of anticipation, starred reviews, and championing by booksellers.

There is much talk about how fiction sales have declined over the past five years. I don’t believe that the numbers indicate a change in reader and listener appetite; the falling fiction sales are a result in the shifting landscape of book distribution. As a higher and higher percentage of book sales travel through Amazon, there are fewer points of discovery for all but the most engaged readers and listeners. And it’s much easier to find nonfiction books through a keyword search.

Presuming that declining fiction sales means people are more interested in nonfiction is like saying in the early days of BuzzFeed that people seemed to want listicles instead of articles. Listicles were prioritized by search algorithms, just as video was preferred by Facebook algorithms.

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Literary MagNet
Poets & Writers Magazine

Literary MagNet

When Greg Marshall began writing the essays that would become his memoir, Leg: The Story of a Limb and the Boy Who Grew From It (Abrams Press, June 2023), he wanted to explore growing up in Utah and what he calls \"the oddball occurrences in my oddball family.\" He says, \"I wanted to call the book Long-Term Side Effects of Accutane and pitch it as Six Feet Under meets The Wonder Years.\" But in 2014 he discovered his diagnosis of cerebral palsy, information his family had withheld from him for nearly thirty years, telling him he had \"tight tendons\" in his leg. This revelation shifted the focus of the project, which became an \"investigation into selfhood, uncovering the untold story of my body,\" says Marshall. Irreverent and playful, Leg reckons with disability, illness, queerness, and the process of understanding our families and ourselves.

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Poets & Writers Magazine

THE MEUSEUM OF HUMAN HISTORY

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Poets & Writers Magazine

The Sea Elephants

SHASTRI Akella's poised, elegant debut, The Sea Elephants, is a bildungsroman of a young man who joins a street theater group in India after fleeing his father's violent disapproval, the death of his twin sisters, and his mother's unfathomable grief.

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The History of a Difficult Child
Poets & Writers Magazine

The History of a Difficult Child

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The Sorrows of Others
Poets & Writers Magazine

The Sorrows of Others

AS I read each story in Ada Zhang’s brilliant collection, The Sorrows of Others, within the first few paragraphs— sometimes the first few sentences— I felt I understood the characters intimately and profoundly, such that every choice they made, no matter how radical, ill-advised, or baffling to those around them, seemed inevitable and true to me.

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We Are a Haunting
Poets & Writers Magazine

We Are a Haunting

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Poets & Writers Magazine

RADICAL ATTENTION

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Poets & Writers Magazine

The Fine Print

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First
Poets & Writers Magazine

First

GINA CHUNG'S SEA CHANGE

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Poets & Writers Magazine

Blooming how she must

WITH ROOTS IN NATURE WRITING, ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE, POETRY, AND PHOTOGRAPHY, CAMILLE T. DUNGY'S NEW BOOK, SOIL: THE STORY OF A BLACK MOTHER'S GARDEN, DELVES INTO THE PERSONAL AND POLITICAL ACT OF CULTIVATING AND DIVERSIFYING A GARDEN OF HERBS, VEGETABLES, FLOWERS, AND OTHER PLANTS IN THE PREDOMINANTLY WHITE COMMUNITY OF FORT COLLINS, COLORADO.

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