Suspend Your Disbelief

Posts Tagged ‘emerging writers’

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The Origins of Short Story Month: a guest post by Dan Wickett

by The Editors

Editor’s note: As part of our celebration of Short Story Month, we’re delighted to re-publish a 2011 guest post by Dan Wickett, founder and editor of the Emerging Writers Network, co-founder of Dzanc Books, and creator of Short Story Month. In early April of 2007, I was celebrating National Poetry Month at the Emerging Writers Network blog by taking a look at the poems of the day being posted by the Writers In The Schools (WITS) program of Houston, which had been written by 4th graders. It was a fun project, but readers of the EWN know that fiction is […]


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When are you big enough to handle the bad review?

by Celeste Ng

Last week, a personal book-review blog called BigAl’s Books and Pals posted a review of a self-published novel by Jacqueline Howett. Howett took exception to the review and posted a series of ranting comments, eventually deteriorating into obscenities—but not before the thread had gone viral, and not in a good way. Some insist that any publicity is good publicity, but the writing blogosphere unanimously agrees that Howett shot herself in the proverbial foot with her behavior. But for writers who don’t have public meltdowns over bad reviews, is any publicity good publicity? How do bad reviews affect book sales? David […]


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An idea is worth… Three MILLION dollars

by Celeste Ng

I am selling my story that I have been creating for 10+ years. (not constantly writing, but of piecing everything together in a cohesive manner) It can be compared to stories like Star Wars, Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, Matrix, Indiana Jones and other titles in those categories. This is a really great story I have. This story needs to be completed by a professional writer or Ghost Writer. I am by no means a writer. Thus begins a recent listing on eBay. The item up for auction? Not the story, but the story idea. The listing continues: I […]


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American Rust, by Philipp Meyer

Philipp Meyer sets his debut novel, American Rust, within a landscape of retired warehouses, rattling railways, prisons and Wal-Mart. The crumbling underpinnings of American industry provide the backdrop for human catastrophe. Meyer made The New Yorker‘s “20 Under 40” list on the strength of a book in which Hanna Pylväinen finds echoes of Mark Twain, Frank O’Hara and Cormac McCarthy.


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The Story of Dzanc

by Lee Thomas

Here at Fiction Writers Review, we’re big fans of the work that nonprofit publisher Dzanc Books has done in the past four years to publish, promote and generally champion writers who “don’t fit neatly into the marketing niches of for-profit presses.” FWR’s own Jeremiah Chamberlin has a terrific piece on Poets & Writers website about the origins of Dzanc, and the Emerging Writers Network, started by Dzanc co-founder Dan Wickett: [The Emerging Writers Network’s] mission, like the goal of those very first reviews, was—and still is—to help develop a larger audience for emerging writers and established writers deserving wider recognition. […]


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Granta's New Voices Series

by Jeremiah Chamberlin

Every six to eight weeks Granta highlights new fiction by an emerging writer exclusively on their website. The New Voices Project has featured work by such writers as Jessica Soffer, Laura Fellowes, Soumya Bhattacharya, Hannah Gersen, Erin McMillan, Evan James Roskos, Lana Asfour, Evie Wyld, and P.D. Mallamo. In addition to original work, each feature also includes an interview with the author. For details of how to submit your story, please see Granta’s submissions guidelines. The most recent writer to be featured as part of this project is Kenyan author Billy Kahora. Below is the opening to his story “The […]



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