THINGS I DID THIS PAST WEEK:
1. Ran around The Mission and Dolores Park taking pictures for the McSweeneyâs instagram (@mcswys). The thing I love about working at small non-profit publishing companies is they take their work very seriously, but they also donât take themselves too seriously. Which means this photo I took of one of our books next to a random dog outside a cafe is totally legit and social-media worthy! Ever since I mentioned to Ruby, the point person for publicity, that I love Instagram and VSCO Cam filters, she and I have been bouncing fun ideas off of each other about how to promote upcoming events and deals and how to capitalize on the buzz thatâs already out there about our books. (Stay tuned for the Valentineâs Day pics!) A surprising amount of thought goes into those photos and captions that you scroll through when youâre lying in bed avoiding getting up to go to work in the morning...
2. Read McSweeneyâs Issue 46 (a special themed issue: thirteen crime stories from Latin America) and pulled interesting phrases from the stories that could potentially be used as titles for the story collection. (Since this issue did so well, McSweeneyâs is going to re-print it as its own book, instead of re-printing it as a random issue of McSweeneyâs.) Admittedly, crime fiction is not something I would ordinarily pick up on my own, but on a stormy day here in San Francisco, I really enjoyed pouring through these pages. (Classic Field Work Termâexposing students to new things.)Â
3. Fact-checking. A lot of fact-checking. The Believer is the McSweeneyâs publication thatâs full of interviews and essays. This means that everything that goes into this magazine has to be fact-checked. While in my personal writing, I tend to stay in the realm of fiction, having to go through a piece and validate almost every sentence really makes you think about the weight each and every statement has.Â
4. Proofing One Hundred Apocalypses and Other Apocalypses by Lucy Corin. Itâs going to be re-printed soon (because it is amazing!), so Iâm going through the text with a fine-tooth comb to make sure there are no typos, widows, or orphans. This has probably been my favorite assignment so far because the stories themselves are amazing; itâs the kind of book that makes you want to write.
5. Talked to Dave Eggers about reading submissions. He was in the office today for some meetings, but he made sure to stop by the intern corner to ask us how we were doing. He said something along the lines of, âReading submissions is kind of like getting an MFA.â In a weird way, heâs right; you learn an incredible amount by reading through the stories people have submitted. Whatâs even more inspiring is that Dave was talking about how exciting it is to âdiscoverâ a truly great writer and to watch them go on to do even greater things. He was talking about someone McSweeneyâs published first a few years ago. He was talking about how incredible it felt to be able to offer someone that bit of encouragement. Several books later, he and Dave still have some kind of writer-editor relationship and are getting lunch next week. It amazes me how down to earth Dave is. He ducks in and out of the office in an unassuming baseball cap, and if you didnât know it was him, youâd never suspect this was the man responsible for several great novels and a whole publishing company. But here we are.