Strangeness in the context of truth and fiction

In one sense, you do expect to read about the end of the world in the newspaper. But to see it just this side of fiction isn't quite as usual. Last weekend, the Washington Post published a piece about Americans' idealization of the Great Depression, complete with imagining how such an event would look in today's terms, and to future historians. Now that's what I'm talking about!

American Gods by Unlined's patron saint, Neil Gaiman, is going to be made available for free online in the near future. Keep an eye out for this -- if you've read this book, then you know how fantastic it is, and if you haven't or you know someone who hasn't, this is the perfect opportunity to see why America is a bad country for gods.

I know Unlined's been quiet since the submission deadline, and you all have my thanks for your patience. We've got some wonderful written pieces in the works, but we're still in need of visual art. Got photographs, illustrations, paintings, video, collage? American Apocalyptic wants your eye! Email unlined.org@gmail.com if you'd like to talk.

By the way, speaking of the Great Depression, we can haz lolbos? The Laugh-Out-Loud Cats are what happens when you combine the modern sensibilities of netspeak with the aesthetic of early cartoon strips and the 1930's vagabond lifestyle.

Call for meta

Hey there, non-Americans! How's it going?

So, I've got a proposal for you. There's an essay I'd be particularly interested in seeing in the next issue of Unlined. As you know, the forthcoming theme is "American Apocalyptic." Maybe you saw that and went, "Well, there goes universality."

I want your outsider perspective. I want to hear about how everything you know about America, you learned from the talkies or the funny pages or the television screen. I want to know what you make of us when you see us portrayed. How weird is this country, seriously? You tell us. Garth Ennis (Preacher) is from Northern Ireland; Neil Gaiman (American Gods) is from England; these are just the two authors I can come up with off the top of my head, but they're proof enough that the outsider perspective is often the most potent.

What do you think about America through the lens of Supernatural? Carnivàle? Stephen King? Popular music? By the by, if you're reading this and thinking, "Gee, I'm American! Can I write that up and send it in too?", the answer is most emphatically yes.

Submission guidelines, as always, can be found here. The deadline is Tuesday, January 29th; email me at unlined.org@gmail.com if you're interested.

Photoalphabetical

Whenever I'm writing, I'm an utter jackdaw when it comes to pictures. I collect photographs and artwork and all manner of other files and stockpile them in esoteric folder arrangements all over my hard drive. They might be the perfect setting for a specific scene; they might have the right pair of shoes for a character to steal in a cat burglary; they might have nothing to do with the subject, but capture a mood perfectly.

Daily Coyote has just come to my attention. It stars a young coyote named Charlie who was found by a woman in Wyoming at a scant ten days old, both his parents dead at the hands of hunters. Physically, she reminds me of Ruby, a character in the third season of Supernatural. She sure has a talent for capturing unexpected and surreal moments, in addition to the too-easy "baby coyote is beautiful and cute!" stills.

If you live in the Washington, DC metro area, I'm envious -- there's a free exhibit through December 31st at the National Gallery about the evolution of snapshot photography, and the strangely marvelous images collectors have found amid all the new cars and prom dresses and poolside gags. It reminds me of perennial favorite Accidental Mysteries. I love the phrase that goes with pictures like this -- "vernacular photography."

While I combing Google, trying to determine whether American Apocalyptic was as "already taken" as American Gothic, I stumbled on Wink, what seems to be a mostly constant stream of images alternately impish and arresting. Comb through this and see if you get any ideas. All of the above are fantastic mood-setters.

Haunted by American dreams

Dear readers, you may have noticed that Unlined failed to happen in the second half of 2007. For that, I sincerely apologize. But, to look on the bright side, all this time off has given me a chance to collect my thoughts about how I'd like the litrag to progress. We'll probably be moving to a bi-annual release schedule, just to keep sanity and quality at fighting weight. Which leads me to my next announcement!

Sound the kazoos! The third issue of Unlined is officially opening up for submissions. The theme and title of the volume is American Apocalyptic. As with all issues of Unlined, I urge you not to take that prompt too literally: twist it around a little bit, play with it. I'm not explicitly looking for end of days disaster scenarios, but rather the strangenesses that become ordinary afterward.

There's a genre I've been noticing gaining popularity in the last few years: I call it post-apocalyptic Americana. In books, you have Neil Gaiman's American Gods, or Stephen King's Dark Tower series. In music, you have the rise of artists like Neko Case, Calexico, Iron & Wine, M. Ward and The Black Keys (and these are just a few of my favorites -- I promise I have more, if you need the inspiration!). In movies, you have O Brother, Where Art Thou?, as well as a growing number of Westerns coming back into vogue. My two favorite examples in television are Firefly and Supernatural. Getting ideas? I hope so! This blog will continue to feature examples of the genre, as well as discussions on the theme, for some time to come. Submissions are due Tuesday, January 29th, 2008. We want everything, so sock it to us, writers, artists, essayists, photographers, playwrights, videographers, poets, humorists, and postmodern multi-format defiers of description!

Serious literature is, indeed, serious business.

Lucy Snyder has linked to a glorious repudiation by Ursula K. LeGuin of the frankly ridiculous assumption that genre fiction has no literary value.

In short, watch out, Slate, or angry zombie golems will come for you in the night, and then all the John Updike in the world can't save you, my friend.

Unlined's deadline for Issue 3, Still Water Runs, has been extended to July 27, 2007. I want you to think about water, its presence or its absence; I want you to think about deception; I want you to think about movement and persistence; most of all, I want you to play. Parse that title -- turn the words into different parts of speech, make them modify each other the way you look at optical illusions.

Have fun.

And the first person who can filk "Hoist the Colors" from Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End -- or "A Pirate's Life for Me" -- with the words "Submit, me hearties, yo ho!" gets a very special prize, to be determined by the winning entry.

The best mugging ever

I just found a magnificent quote in a book I've had for a long time, but never got around to reading in depth.

As I see it, a successful story of any kind should be almost like hypnosis: You fascinate the reader with your first sentence, draw them in further with your second sentence and have them in a mild trance by the third. Then, being careful not to wake them, you carry them away up the back alleys of your narrative and when they are hopelessly lost within the story, having surrendered themselves to it, you do them terrible violence with a softball bat and then lead them whimpering to the exit on the last page. Believe me, they'll thank you for it.

Alan Moore, Alan Moore's Writing for Comics

This is the only writing-about-writing book I own, and really, I'm finding myself quite glad of that. Who needs more with pep talks like his?

Many apologies for the long radio silence. But things are heating up again at Unlined. I'm working on a system of leaving comments directly onto a story or piece of art, which should be much more useful than the forums have proved. Meanwhile, submissions for Still Water Runs, the Summer 2007 issue, are five weeks from the deadline. There's still plenty of time to get started, and the season, she's still young. This blog is also still, as always, open for contributors. Both can be queried at unlined.org@gmail.com. Bring your own softball bat.

Anima

I've been thinking a lot about Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy lately. New Line is, as you might know, releasing a film version of the first book, The Golden Compass, in December. One of the conceits that bonds me so fast to these books (moreso because of their characters than their plot, but that's another post) is that of the daemon. The daemon is like an external hard drive for the soul, and it takes the shape of an animal. You can learn more at the linked websites, or better yet, by reading the books.

One of the reasons I chose Country Wolf, City Wolf as this issue's theme was my ever-abiding love of animals. I love thinking about cultural perceptions of animals, and how they vary from context to context and person to person. A favorite website of mine is The Medieval Bestiary, a fairly extensive catalog of common and allegorical information about creatures one might find in Western European illuminated manuscripts. This is a neat resource in its own right, but becomes more interesting if you read through it with daemons in mind, given that His Dark Materials is a retelling of John Milton's Paradise Lost.

As for myself, I find myself fixating on the whippoorwill, which has strong Underground Railroad connotations to me, particularly affecting because I grew up in that part of the country, near the Ohio River. I've just found out that, according to Wikipedia, "in New England, legend says the Whip-poor-will can sense a soul departing, and can capture it as it flees." If anybody else finds themselves as unable to stop thinking about this as I am, let us know if something comes of it.

Gleefully validated

This is just a note to say that Neil Gaiman, Unlined's patron saint (or otherwise supernatural being of great, if perhaps more morally ambiguous but much more interesting value) if ever there was one, handwrites the first draft of his novels in unlined notebooks.

I go off and number the pages about 50 pages ahead of where I am, because otherwise I will absentmindedly misnumber them while I'm writing. And as I start a new page I circle the number. Putting the circle on the number makes me remarkably happy. Also drawing a small gravestone with a number on it at the end of each chapter.

Photoillustrations and all, Mr. Gaiman really is my kind of nerd.

If you don't follow his blog directly on the site, there's also a Livejournal feed which you and 16,000 of your closest acquaintances can see on your friendslist.

You know who else you can follow on your friendslist? This very blog right here. Unlined now has a feed of its own, so add unlinedstories to bring the magazine's latest finds right to your doorstep, like the milkman did back in the day.

That's all for the moment -- over and out!

It's all about rights-free scavenging

I see by my hit counter that you all are really enjoying Country Wolf, City Wolf. Fantabulous! Obviously, the very talented authors and artists are credited where due. The forums don't seem to be catching, so I'm working on a way to leave comments directly into the site, a la something like Yuletide, which is the source of many good things.

The other bits you might find interesting, or at least useful:

All Photoshop brushes are by JennSanity, who seriously has gobs and gobs of amazing resources that may be showing up in a future version of Unlined, if they're appropriate to the issue, of course.

The two wolf images are the result of some Google Image searches. I try to use my own photography if I at all can, but I'm just not all that lush with images of wolves, and neither are the good people at stock.xchng. Getty has been issuing hefty fines to people illegally using their images, so I do my best to make the physical setup of Unlined as totally airtight as possible.



This isn't in the main Reconyx gallery, but I suggest you take a look anyway, because the photography they've got there, even if it's remote, is just incredible. businessofemotions found it before I did.



This is from an early 19th century schoolbook. Ah, the legacy of the McGuffy Reader.

The frabjous day of lore

Country Wolf, City Wolf is officially live! I'm really thrilled with it. Things were a little hairy for a bit, between my taking off on a roadtrip or three and my moving back to Chicago, but it's come together beautifully, and all the authors and artists deserve all sorts of praise for their wonderful work.

Keep an eye on the site, by the way: there's still more to come in the next few weeks. In the meantime, I'm in the market for contributors to this blog! If you like sharing finds and reviewing what the few, the lucky published few (or too many, as it may be), are giving us, email me, Esther, at unlined.org@gmail.com with some ideas.

Happy spring, everybody! And of course it's never too early start thinking about submitting for Unlined #3, Still Water Runs. I, meanwhile, will be off in a corner finishing up Slow River. Expect a review once I've recovered from all of this past week's site-building.