Harper Perennial is already building buzz for its upcoming Summer of the Short Story campaign, declaring that “it’s high time to celebrate the much-loved, but oft-overlooked, short story form.” The publisher will promote six new collections (due to publish this summer and fall)—along with six collections of classic shorts. The festivities will begin in earnest this May, but in the meantime, Perennial is featuring a new story every week in 2009 on a site called Fifty-Two Stories. According to Cal Morgan:
Some of them will be new stories from our original collections, or from upcoming hardcovers; some original contributions never before published anywhere; some classics from our backlist. We’re even (gasp) accepting submissions for new stories from our readers, professional or amateur, published or not. (This may cause us some heartache, but we are strong.)
A new story will go up every Sunday night. We’ve been in soft-launch since the beginning of the year, so there are stories up now by Mary Gaitskill, Tony O’Neill, Simon Van Booy, and Tom Piazza. In coming weeks we’ll bring you stories from Katherine Dunn, Jess Walter, Louise Erdrich, Mark Twain, Dennis Cooper, and Special Guest Stars.
This week’s offering is “Burn Me Up” by Tom Piazza. Opening lines: “Fuck you. Fuck you. Stay the fuck out of my dressing room.”
Submit your own story for consideration by email to: calvertmorgan@gmail.com
