RW Spryszak is Editor-at-Large at Thrice Publishing and managing editor of Thrice Fiction, both of which are based out of the Chicago area. Thrice Fiction is published three times a year, and Thrice also publishes up to two novels a year. He has been published in Slipstream, The Lost and Found Times, Peculiar Mormyrid, and a host of other alternative magazines since the 1980s. He was editor of The Fiction Review in 1990-1991.
Please describe your website/social media:
I am trying to adapt my old-school notions to the modern era. The magazine website offers free copies for every issue (or you can buy a hard copy there). My personal website is pretty basic.
What is your average day as editor/writer:
Because Thrice is an indie, and we have yet to qualify for grants; it is strictly a labor of love right now.…
...continue reading
Tom Perrotta’s latest novel, Mrs. Fletcher, involves a lot of porn and sexual adventure, but that’s not to say it’s lacking in heart. Beneath the more sensational parts of the book is a story about embracing the fluidity of your identity and giving yourself the freedom to change.
The first part of the novel cuts between the titular character of Eve Fletcher—a single mother in her mid-forties—and her son Brendan during a major transitory period in both of their lives. Brendan leaves home for his first year of college, and Eve is alone for the first time. In her son’s absence, she is left to reexamine her choices. Her newfound independence becomes the impetus for her awakening sexually, intellectually, and socially. Specifically, she becomes transfixed by lesbian porn sites and starts seeing the scenes of her life through the lens of porn scenarios.…
...continue reading
Julia Tagliere is a freelance writer and editor whose work has appeared in The Writer and Hay & Forage Grower magazines and online at Buzzle; in various anthologies, including Here in the Middle: Stories of Love, Loss, and Connection from the Ones Sandwiched in between, Candlesticks and Daggers—An Anthology of Mixed Genre Mysteries, and in the juried photography and prose collection Love + Lust. Her short story, “Te Absolvo,” was named Best Short Story in the 2015 William Faulkner Literary Competition. Julia currently resides in Maryland with her family, where she recently completed her M.A. in Fiction Writing at Johns Hopkins University. Look for more of Julia’s work in the forthcoming anthology The Way to My Heart—An Anthology of Food-Related Romance, Issue 61 (August 2017) of Potomac Review, or at her blog/website.…
...continue reading
Christoph Paul is an award-winning humor author. He writes non-fiction, YA, Bizarro, horror, and poetry, including The Passion of the Christoph, Great White House Volume 1 and Volume 2, Slasher Camp for Nerd Dorks, and Horror Film Poems. He is an editor for CLASH Media and CLASH Books and edited the anthologies Walk Hand in Hand Into Extinction: Stories Inspired by True Detective and This Book Ain’t Nuttin to Fuck With: A Wu-Tang Tribute Anthology. Under the pen name Mandy De Sandra, he writes Bizarro Erotica that has been covered in VICE, Huffington Post, Jezebel, and The A.V. Club. He is represented by Veronica Park at the Corvisiero Literary Agency.
In this episode, Editor-in-Chief Jordan Blum chats with Paul about managing life as a full-time writer and editor, exploring bold and fearless possibilities with a pseudonym, reflecting on punk rock roots, and much more.…
...continue reading
Absence populates Rachel Khong’s stellar debut novel, Goodbye, Vitamin. It’s a book about the absence of reliable memories, the absence of people you thought were permanent, and the absence of self-understanding. It’s about the memories that follow and haunt you, and the ones that only leave behind traces of themselves, their negative space haunting you all the same.
When we meet our narrator Ruth, she’s in her thirties and the life she envisioned for herself is in shambles. Her fiancé broke up with her on the day she thought they were moving in together. If that weren’t enough, she’s dispassionate about her job and her father, Howard, has Alzheimer’s disease, which is getting progressively worse. Everything she thought she could depend on has been upended.…
...continue reading
Joanna C. Valente is a human who lives in Brooklyn and is the author of Sirs & Madams (Aldrich Press, 2014), The Gods Are Dead (Deadly Chaps Press, 2015), Marys of the Sea (The Operating System, 2017), and Xenos (Agape Editions, 2016). She’s also the editor of A Shadow Map: An Anthology by Survivors of Sexual Assault (CCM, 2017). She received an MFA in writing at Sarah Lawrence College, and is the founder of Yes, Poetry, a managing editor for Luna Luna Magazine and Civil Coping Mechanisms, and an instructor at Brooklyn Poets. Some of their writing has appeared, or is forthcoming, in Brooklyn Magazine, Prelude, Apogee, Spork, The Feminist Wire, BUST, and elsewhere.
In this episode, Editor-in-Chief Jordan Blum sits down with Valente to discuss her writing history and inspirations, as well as her feelings on social media, the lit community, and even some pop culture stuff (like music, The Leftovers, and Twin Peaks).…
...continue reading
Anyone who saw me reading Things We Lost in the Fire in public must have thought I was suffering and in deep pain. Every story in Mariana Enriquez’s debut collection had me grimacing and squirming, shifting uncomfortably in my seat. But her stories are so thoroughly transporting that I lacked the self-awareness to care. I was far away in Argentina, worried about the news of the decapitated child flashing across the television screen, and the one-armed girl who went missing in a haunted house, and on a murder tour of Buenos Aires. Enriquez’s stories all center around life in Argentina, often detailing the lives of disadvantaged youth. These stories are dark and unsettling, written so beautifully that the whole experience of reading them leaves you in a macabre trance.…
...continue reading