Animalcula: A Young Scientist's Guide to New Creatures

The new issue of The Kenyon Review is about to drop, as the kids say. The issue will feature a sizable excerpt from my epic, pseudoscientific work, Animalcula: A Young Scientist's Guide to New Creatures. So get ready for twelve (count 'em, twelve) short stories about some exciting microscopic organisms that I'm pretty sure I made up.

The issue will also feature a bunch of amazing work from some incredible people (including a bona fide hero of mine, Albert Goldbarth).

In the next few days The Kenyon Review will also be running a micro-interview with me on their blog. It's not an interview about microscopes, though that would have been completely awesome. It's just called micro because it's short. They've already posted two great interviews with contributors from the issue. Be sure to check them out: Ted Wheeler, Robert Yune. I'll link to my interview once it's up, as is my wont.

Also, while you're waiting to get your hands on a copy of The Kenyon Review, I encourage you to enjoy the work of some actual young scientists over at the Oklahoma Microscopy Society, from whom I borrowed the above picture of a wheel bug.

The Missouri Review's textBOX Anthology

The Missouri Review is about to launch textBox, their new online anthology. The site -- which goes live tomorrow morning -- will feature a selection of fiction, essays and poetry previously published in The Missouri Review.

TMR has spent over three decades putting out one of the best print journals in the country, so, as a reader, I'm incredibly jazzed (yes, jazzed) to see them take this exciting new step. As a writer, I'm even more jazzed (jazzeder?) to point out that the anthology's debut will feature Loeka Discovered, a story of mine that TMR originally published in 2008.

Needless to say, I'm honored to be included in the first installment of this soon to be beloved anthology. Make sure to check it out!

Cover Letters: Gettin' Noticed

A very serious and well-made video of mine is being featured over on Ninth Letter's blog. It's a little educational film that I threw together early last year during a cold-related Sudafed binge. While you're over at Ninth Letter's site, make sure to subscribe toot sweet. They have a new issue coming out, which, though I'm not in it, still looks like it's going to be awesome.

Frost Mountain Picnic Massacre Wins Pushcart

Those of you who refuse to read the titles of blog posts before you read the actual post will be excited to learn that my story Frost Mountain Picnic Massacre has just won a Pushcart Prize. Needless to say, I have been high-fiving strangers all day. Huge thanks to Pei-Ling Lue and everybody at One Story.

Literary Magazine Rankings II: Rank Harder

A lot of people on the Information Superhighway are talking about this list of lit mag rankings put together by Lincoln Michel at The Faster Times. Naturally, I've decided to put together my own list. Enjoy!

First Tier

Magazines put out by people who are passionate, hardworking, and who believe in what they're doing.

Second Tier

Magazines put out by people who are jerks with terrible taste, but who are physically good-looking.

Third Tier

Magazines that have ceased publication.

Fourth Tier

Magazines put out by white supremacists.

Fifth Tier

Things that aren't magazines (hats, drawbridges, etc.).

Sixth Tier

Writing your story on the face of a sleeping stranger.

Seventh Tier

Showing your work to a loved one.

Cheston Knapp in One Story

Reasons to be excited about Cheston Knapp's upcoming issue of One Story:

1.) This awesome short story trailer(!) that he made:



2.) He worked with me as my editor for Life in the Harem at Tin House, and so I can tell you from personal experience that he is blisteringly cool.

3.) He's a fantastic writer. Perhaps it says something about my priorities that Cheston being a great writer was the third thing I mentioned behind making short story trailers and being cool. But I refuse to retype this list, so maybe you should just read it backwards.

Animalcula Excerpt in JMWW

I'm excited to announce that the current issue of JMWW features a quick excerpt from my series, Animalcula: A Young Scientist's Guide to New Creatures.

The issue, put together by the brilliant/incomparable/many-other-positive-adjectives David Erlewine, is a special all flash-fiction issue featuring stories by many cool writers.

Also, you can find more Animalcula in Ninth Letter 6:1.

Harems Are For Closers

Tin House #43 is on its way! The issue will feature work by Steve Almond, Ron Carlson, Martha McPhee, David "Always be closing/Put that coffee down" Mamet, and many other awesome people.

Click here to check out an excerpt from my contribution, Life in the Harem.

Holy Macaroni!

Time Magazine just did a nice write-up about McSweeney's 33. The article doesn't mention my story specifically, but if you read it carefully I'm sure you'll find (as I did) that a great deal of praise for my story is implied.

The Novella Excerpt Event of the Decade

In a testament to my own boredom, I've started to make trailers for work that has already appeared in literary journals. So, in essence, this is a preview of the past. Did that blow your mind? If not, this might:

Chicago Reading

Just a heads up: I'll be doing a reading on November 5th at 57th Street Books in Chicago. Click here for more details. The event is being put together by Ninth Letter, and should therefore be pretty classy. Hope to see you there!

New Short Story Trailer? New Short Story Trailer!

Remember the other day when you were saying how you wish that Seth Fried's short story trailers would somehow involve stop motion animation? Well, your wish is about to come true. My new trailer is my most stop-motioniest to date.

The animation is by no means good, but - like a Mother's Day gift constructed out of dry macaroni and colored paper - I submit to you the notion that it is the thought that counts. Also, I refuse to apologize for my penmanship.

Misery of the Conquistador is forthcoming in StoryQuarterly:



In case you're curious, here are the materials I used to create this trailer:

1.)One drawing of a conquistador
2.)One digital camera
3.)One upside down stool converted into a vertical camera mount
4.)One felt-tip pen
5.)Five sheets of computer paper
6.)One freeware 2-D animator, which magically didn't install a virus onto my computer
7.)One unflappable desire to create a short story trailer for the ages

One more thing, you can check out all my short story trailers on my youtube channel.

Life in the Harem

I'm excited to announce that a story of mine called Life in the Harem is going to be appearing in Tin House. A lot of details are still pending, but for now I encourage you to kick back and enjoy the short story trailer that I whipped together in honor of this excellent news.

I'm pretty sure everyone is going to love this trailer. By everyone, of course, I am referring to people who spent the mid to late 80's playing video games.

Somebody should invent the short story trailer. Oh wait, I totally just invented the short story trailer.

Book trailers are pretty big right now, but do you know what's going to be even pretty bigger? You guessed it: trailers for individual short stories written by people who don't have books yet.

Check out this one that I just put together for my upcoming McSweeney's story:



On a scale from 1 to 10 (10 being I take this video seriously and 1 being I am actually aware of how ridiculous it is), this trailer comes in at about a 6.

Frost Mountain Picnic Massacre

My issue of One-Story is currently available. You can grab a copy of the issue here or, even better, you can subscribe to One-Story here. I'm also pleased to announce that One-Story is now available on the Kindle.

If you had told me five years ago that one day people would be able to beam a short story of mine into their homes by means of a wireless device, I would have thought it was only a beautiful dream. And while I think the good people at Amazon might be flying a little too close to the sun in this regard, I refuse to stand in the way of progress.

Also, if you would like to enjoy a free copy of my story over some world-class Japanese cuisine, then check out this post by Pei-Ling Lue for details.

My thanks to everybody at One-Story, especially Pei-Ling Lue and Hannah Tinti, for this incredible opportunity. One-Story is a mind-bogglingly cool enterprise, and I'm pretty honored to have gotten the chance to contribute.

Forthcomingapallooza

Some stories are on their way! Right now you can check out an excerpt from Frost Mountain Picnic Massacre at One-Story.com. There's also a quick Q&A with me. My answers are all lame, because I am a genuinely lame person. But if you're looking to have your socks rocked off, you should check out One-Story's archive, which includes interviews with Stephen Dixon, John Hodgman, Kelly Link, and many other awesome writers.

I also have a story called Those of us in Plaid forthcoming in McSweeney's #33, and a story called The Misery of the Conquistador forthcoming in StoryQuarterly. However, unlike One-Story, there are currently no online excerpts for these stories. And, for contractual reasons, I probably can't put any excerpts up on this blog. So instead I have written an alternate first sentence for each story, both of which are included below:

The Misery of the Conquistador

"Wow, I sure am miserable ... for a conquistador," said he.

Those of us in Plaid

We realized from the very beginning that we were not like all those people who did not wear plaid, but that we were actually very different.

There you have it! No firm release dates for either, but - having tempted you terribly with these alternate first lines - I will make sure to do the decent thing and keep you informed.

Ninth Letter Spring/Summer Issue

The Spring/Summer issue of Ninth Letter is out, featuring work by yours truly. The magazine has a great new look. You can check out some sample spreads here.

Thanks in advance for buying dozens and dozens of copies and throwing a series of really elaborate Ninth-Letter-themed dinner parties to which only your most good-looking friends will be invited.

Blog Love

In news that probably wouldn't excite a person with normal priorities, I've been told that Ninth Letter has begun linking to this blog on their blog. So don't worry, that funny feeling you got the last time you were on the Internet was just the stray vibes that resulted from Ninth Letter's blog and my blog falling madly in love with each other.

Suggested use:

1.) Go to Ninth Letter's blog and click on my name.

2.) Once you've clicked on my name and have arrived safely at this blog, click on Ninth Letter's name.

3.) Repeat these steps until your computer breaks, at which point you will be of no use to anyone.

Oh! And this also means, I assume, that Ninth Letter now endorses all the opinions expressed on this blog. Especially the controversial ones. That is a tremendous step toward legitimacy for me, as well as for my one-man campaign to disband the United Nations and replace it with a Scientologist think-tank.

Anyway, I should also take this opportunity to remind you that I've got some work forthcoming in the next issue of Ninth Letter and that I couldn't be more excited about it. Keep your eyes peeled!