Suspend Your Disbelief

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Michael Rudin

Development Director

Michael Rudin is an author and the founder of the creative agency Armed Mind. His short fiction, novel-length fiction, and digital storytelling has earned numerous awards, including recognition from The Webby Awards, Creativity Awards, and a Hopwood Award. Say hello via Twitter @mikerudin or www.mikerudin.com.


Articles

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Stories We Love: "Refresh, Refresh"

by Michael Rudin

I’ve fought close to a dozen fights. I’ve fought my brother, two best friends, five or so drunks in college, and a few New Years Eves ago, a group of six with one Australian and two Samoans at my side. It was the broad-shouldered Australian who began things by tapping my shoulder and informing me, “I’m going to go hit that chap. And you’ll hit his friend. And we’ll see what happens from there,” and it was the Samoan bouncers who came to our rescue shortly thereafter, doing all the actual fighting. I’d known the Aussie for all of two […]


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Journal of the Week subscription winners: The Missouri Review

by Michael Rudin

We’re delighted to announce the winners of our Missouri Review Journal of the Week giveaway, chosen at random from our Twitter followers. Congratulations to: Nathan Golden (@nathgolden) Robert Yune (@robertyune) Spirit Authors (@SpiritAuthors) You’ll each receive a complimentary one-year subscription to The Missouri Review! Please contact us at winners [at] fictionwritersreview.com with your contact information and we’ll coordinate the rest. If you missed the profile of The Missouri Review and the exclusive interview with Managing Editor Michael Nye, you can read the whole thing in our blog archives. And remember: if you’d like to be eligible for future journal giveaways, […]


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Journal of the Week: BOMB

by Michael Rudin

In May of 1981, a bomb went off. At the time, a tribe of Tribeca artists thought their newly minted BOMB magazine would do just that: bomb. Tank. Fail miserably. They had the courage to print an ambitious first run of 1,000 issues but expected to sell just a fraction of them. Reader reaction was, to their surprise, explosive. BOMB’s hope for a forum in which artists could speak about their work in the same ways they spoke about it amongst themselves wasn’t just well received, it was rallied behind. For the first time, a journal pinned artists together regardless […]


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Journal of the Week subscription winners: Gulf Coast

by Michael Rudin

We’re delighted to announce the winners of our Gulf Coast Journal of the Week giveaway, chosen at random from our Twitter followers. Congratulations to: Lesley Clayton (@lesleyclayton) Kristin Pedroja (@kramblings) Michelle Judd (@mjudd) You’ll each receive a complimentary one-year subscription to Gulf Coast! Please contact us at winners [at] fictionwritersreview.com with your contact information and we’ll coordinate the rest. If you missed the profile of Gulf Coast and the exclusive interview with editor Ian Stansel, you can read the whole thing in our blog archives. And remember: if you’d like to be eligible for future journal giveaways, please visit our […]


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Journal of the Week: Gulf Coast

by Michael Rudin

To the uninitiated, a group to which I belong and will forever remain, the literary journal circuit can be a daunting index of titles backed by an even more daunting list of founding universities, non-profits, and artistic heroes—a collage of mastheads and mission statements boasting achievements and honors that, after a while, blend into one giant ecosystem: The lit journal. Unless you subscribe to and read each one—yes, a brave few have tried—you’ll find yourself relying on friends and fellow readers, anthologies, and posts like these to learn about a particular journal’s taste and aesthetics, its history and goals for […]


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Journal of the Week subscription winners: Ploughshares

by Michael Rudin

We’re delighted to announce the winners of our Ploughshares Journal of the Week giveaway, chosen at random from our Twitter followers. Congratulations to: Barbara Chai (@barbarachai) Trevor Schmidt (@TrevorSSchmidt) Ivy Pittman (@letitbesaid) You’ll each receive a complimentary one-year subscription to Ploughshares! Please contact us at winners [at] fictionwritersreview.com with your contact information and we’ll coordinate the rest. If you missed the profile of Ploughshares and the exclusive interview with editor-in-chief Ladette Randolph, you can read the whole thing in our blog archives. And remember: if you’d like to be eligible for future journal giveaways, please visit our Twitter Page and […]


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Journal of the Week: Ploughshares

by Michael Rudin

Rebecca Makkai’s Professor Alex Moore is one of the most memorable characters in 2010’s Best American Short Stories. Not just because she accidentally kills an albatross while hunting ducks in Australia, or because as a teacher of “Rime of the Ancient Mariner” she becomes a minor celebrity on campus due to the ironic crime, but because that one pull of the trigger sets forth a steady unraveling of her personal and professional lives—so thorough a deconstruction that the reader soon joins Moore in doubting its authenticity. The conclusion to Makkai’s “Painted Ocean, Painted Ship” does what you would expect a […]


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"Journal of the Week" subscription winners: One Story

by Michael Rudin

Since launching in September, Fiction Writers Review’s “Book of the Week” promotion has shipped dozens of books to dozens of states. A few weeks back, we extended the promotion to highlight literary journals as well. Our inaugural “Journal of the Week” post featured One Story, and in addition to an exclusive interview with Associate Editor Marie-Helene Bertino, the post offered three free One Story subscriptions to our followers on Twitter. Congrats to our winners: Helen Smith (@emperorsclothes), Kenneth Jarman (@Krjarman), and Hank Nielsen (@hheerup). You’ll each receive a complimentary one-year subscription to One Story! Please contact us at winners [at] […]


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Journal of the Week: One Story

by Michael Rudin

Since launching in September, Fiction Writers Review’s “Book of the Week” promotion has shipped seventy-nine books to readers located in twenty-four states and three countries. Whether we’re giving away debut novels or acclaimed collections, the enthusiasm on Facebook has less to do with free, signed first editions than what these books do and how their authors accomplish it. It’s exactly this enthusiasm that now allows us to expand the spotlight from books deserving your attention to literary journals deserving your attention. Starting this week, Fiction Writers Review will begin profiling publications we admire right here on the blog in a […]




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