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Behind the Editor’s Desk: An Interview with Siel Ju

"Remington" by Mark Grapengater (flickr.com/mgrap). Original link: https://www.flickr.com/photos/mgrap/2261210942/in/photolist-4rPiey-37ASje-MUwf8-dXXLCh-bBSf6F-Wdari-8gQCTK-pJLZ1-BYpmP-dmn5g3-gHKpus-dSDBv9-5prNbT-5y4Y3Q-6SZGVh-81FxpK-6SVEgx-cR4sY9-dmn1gF-6SZGTJ-dmn4mz-878fHx-auJWRu-auGeC8-dmn5QX-8uXJ49-9DofZL-ezhHew-auGfwH-auGgqH-d59cyC-x13xS-auGgSz-ma1E7G-dmn929-dmn9aS-6ZA9Sv-dmn5qr-auGf58-6ZA9Mp-dF4Zk6-auJVsQ-qX6Mkb-rBDo5B-r6hX1j-rRNCAL-qNcJP1-rBDobt-6ZEaKL-85H5Ye

by Lauren Eggert-Crowe

Siel Ju is the editor of Flash Flash Click, an online lit zine for fast fiction. Subscribers get a weekly flash prose piece delivered every Tuesday. The pieces range in style, tone, and content but all have a compelling narrative driving them, no matter how short. Some veer more towards the lyrical and sublime while others give the reader a sardonic slice-of-life from a first-person narrator. Siel has featured such authors as Wendy C. Ortiz, Catherine Daly, Lisa Cheby, Maureen Gibbon and Molly Fuller. I asked Siel a few questions about her job as editor of Flash Flash Click.

Why did you decide to start Flash Flash Click? 

The impetus came from feeling there was a big, untapped population of readers out there who weren’t being reached by the current literary marketplace. I have friends who are writers, but I also have many non-writer friends who are smart and literate — who might very well enjoy reading poems and stories but are completely unfamiliar with the world of literary journals. I think a lot of people don’t even know literary journals exist! So the idea was to start a lit zine that sent a short piece a week via email — tiny bits of prose that can be read easily on a smartphone — sort of like a gateway drug to entice “regular” people to become regular readers of contemporary fiction and poetry.

What sets Flash Flash Click apart from other online journals? Continue reading “Behind the Editor’s Desk: An Interview with Siel Ju”

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A WWS PUBLICATION ROUND UP FOR JULY

A laptop computer with an article titled "Submissions Made Simple" on the screen and a stack of literary journals sits on top of the laptop base, titles facing out

The summer has not slowed down the members of Women Who Submit who have accumulated yet another impressive list of literary awards and publication acceptances.

Lauren Eggert-Crowe had three poems published in Angels Flight Literary West. From “Never Shop Thirsty:”

My heart is a hole I want
to stuff with bread

so I go to our Trader
Joe’s for the first time

since you left. Rearranged
shelves are enough to bring it on.

Continue reading “A WWS PUBLICATION ROUND UP FOR JULY”

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So you want to be a writer, Mija?!

by Iris De Anda

On the lower shelf of my bookcase, there is a row full of journals spanning the years of my writing attempts. A self portrait of a young girl at the age of 13, who took pen to paper on the bedroom floor. What began as stream of consciousness turned into wannabe poetry by the age of 15, when I ventured into my first open mic at a coffee shop in Alhambra, CA. Some girl approached me afterwards and said something about my words meaning something to her. I was perplexed and inspired, and I didn’t do another open mic for about 3 years. Always reading, always writing, never sharing was my silent motto.

Continue reading “So you want to be a writer, Mija?!”

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Claps and Cheers: Aya de Leon interviewed by Toni Ann Johnson

The first time I saw Aya was during graduate school at Antioch University Los Angeles. I noticed her immediately because she’s taller than most (while I’m shorter than most), and she has beautiful, long dreadlocks. Her intelligence, however (she’s a Harvard graduate), was the attribute that would remind me of who she was once we left campus and communicated from our respective locations for the rest of the semester. (Ours was a “low-residency” program.) During online conferences I’d read her posts and think: Oh yeah, that’s Aya, the really smart woman.

 

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Aya de Leon – Author – Activist – Faculty – Mom – Really Smart Woman

Continue reading “Claps and Cheers: Aya de Leon interviewed by Toni Ann Johnson”

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7 Steps I Took to Find my Literary Agent

by Siel Ju

This article was first published at sielju.com on June 14, 2016. It is reposted with permission from the author. 

It’s gotten a bit better now, but I used to be a really terrible procrastinator. I did everything I didn’t need to do while procrastinating on the one thing I purportedly really, really wanted to do: write. Then I complained about how I had no time to write.

Best way to procrastinate on writing while clinging to your identity as a writer: Do things vaguely related to writing that don’t actually require you to write. (Remember that Ze Frank video? Take on tasks that give you “the illusion that you’re getting closer to the thing you’re trying to avoid.”)

Continue reading “7 Steps I Took to Find my Literary Agent”

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Women Who Submit Stands with #BlackLivesMatter: Resources for Awareness, Unity and Healing

Women Who Submit stands in solidarity with the #blacklivesmatter movement as we work for equality and visibility of not just women writers but all marginalized people. As we each individually and as a collective search for ways to help the movement, we share the following collection of articles, interviews, poems and videos that we have found helpful in this dark time. We hope you find them helpful too. Continue reading “Women Who Submit Stands with #BlackLivesMatter: Resources for Awareness, Unity and Healing”

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Finding the Power in Submission

by Lisa Cheby

After my father died when I was ten, I watched my mother, who had been a stay-at-home mom, struggle with returning to the workforce while avoiding managing her grief. At the time, I only saw the struggle and deduced my job in life was to never depend on anyone else. This somehow translated into a reluctance to ask for anything from anyone. Through college and film school, I embraced autonomy, working summers to pay tuition on my own, coordinating moves within Florida then to New York City and Los Angeles on my own, paying my bills on my own, finding jobs on my own, buying a home on my own, and traveling on my own.

In her book Shakti Woman, Vicki Noble writes how the taboo of menstruation and women’s bodies paired with women’s conditioning to deny the Dark Goddess in themselves leads women to view autonomy as unacceptable and, quoting Sylvia Perera, devours their “sense of willed potency and value” (30). With all this autonomy, with all my effort to create a life where I depended on no one, I wondered why I still felt devoid of “willed potency and value.” Rather than empowered, I was disconnected and inhibited. Continue reading “Finding the Power in Submission”

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A WWS PUBLICATION ROUND UP FOR JUNE

A laptop computer with an article titled "Submissions Made Simple" on the screen and a stack of literary journals sits on top of the laptop base, titles facing out

The summer has gotten off to a pub-tastic start! Congratulations to all the women who have had work accepted or published in June.

From Alana Saltz‘s “How ASMR Videos Help Me Cope with My Anxiety” on Bustle:

Until six months ago, I’d never heard of ASMR. All I knew was that I had a fondness for particular sounds and voices. When people spoke to me kindly and softly, it eased some of the symptoms that came with my anxiety disorder. Certain accents and tones made my body feel tingly and calm.

Continue reading “A WWS PUBLICATION ROUND UP FOR JUNE”

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Building Up to Emerging: Tips for Applying to Fellowships, Residencies and Workshops

by Xochitl-Julisa Bermejo

The first time I applied for a fellowship was in spring 2009. I was about to finish grad school, and I sent out a slew of applications like I was applying for a PhD. I figured it was the next logical step as I readied myself to move beyond my MFA program, and I had the mentors close by to help. I gathered transcripts and letters of recommendation, curated samples of work and wrote project proposals. I remember one mentor agreed to write a letter with what I perceived as little enthusiasm. When all the rejections came in that summer, I read the bios of those who won and took notice of all their previous awards and accolades. I thought back to that mentor and considered her lackluster support the response of someone who understood the literary world better than I did at that time.

See what I learned from this experience was that “emerging” doesn’t mean new like I thought it did, Continue reading “Building Up to Emerging: Tips for Applying to Fellowships, Residencies and Workshops”

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Writing Myself: On Becoming a Real Writer

by Marya Summers

In the summer of 2003, poets from around the world converged in Chicago for the National Poetry Slam. One densely packed nightclub was electric with anticipation for the group poem showcase, a highlight of the annual event. You could have supplied power to a small town with the energy my own body was generating as I took the stage with two women on my team to deliver the poem “Penis Envy.” It had received perfect scores the night before in preliminary bouts.

For any team, but particularly for our small-to-middling town team from Delray Beach, Florida, this showcase was The Big Leagues. Because it wasn’t part of the competition (it was a “best of”), all we had to do is exactly what we did the night before – deliver our bawdy, satiric conjecture on what we would do if we had penises. We were only a few seconds into our poem when the room began to hiss as if giant, terrible snakes were about to strike. I recognized the sound immediately. I’d heard other poets call it “the feminist hiss.”

Continue reading “Writing Myself: On Becoming a Real Writer”