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Editor Interview: NonBinary Review

Q: Describe what you publish in 25 characters or less.

A: Responses to literature

Q: What other current publications (or publishers) do you admire most?

A: I love Smokelong Quarterly for the deep, surreal quality of their published pieces. I love Drunk Monkeys because of the philosophy and humanity of their Editor in Chief. I love any press that's putting out things that are tiny and beautiful, be it chapbooks, postcards, or daily web posts.

Q: If you publish writing, who are your favorite writers? If you publish art, who are your favorite artists?

A: My favorites change all the time, but right now I'm in love with Cathrynne Valente, China MiƩville, Jasper Fforde, Helene Wecker, and Greg Egan.

Q: What sets your publication apart from others that publish similar material?

A: We publish only works that refer to other popular works of literature, exploring new aspects of familiar works. We're branching out by expanding our definition of "literature," allowing writers to respond to photographs and essays as well. We're also extraordinarily receptive to new writers.

Q: What is the best advice you can give people who are considering submitting work to your publication?

A: First, read the guidelines. Second, if a piece doesn't have a solid connection to the source material, no matter now well-written it might be, we can't use it. The last thing is that you shouldn't go for the obvious. When we did an issue about Alice in Wonderland, we got hundreds of "down the rabbit hole" submissions. Don't go with your first notion of what would make a great story. Go with your fourth or tenth or thirty-second.

Q: Describe the ideal submission.

A: The ideal submission contains a cover letter with the author's third-person bio and a headshot that's not a selfie, and a valid email address that the author checks regularly. The ideal poetry submission contains 2-4 poems that make innovative use of language rather than relying on white space (because rendering white space for Kindle is really, really difficult). The ideal prose submission is between 2,000 and 3,000 words and explores the source material in a way that's unexpected.

Q: What do submitters most often get wrong about your submissions process?

A: The submissions we end up rejecting either don't deal correctly with the source material (they are based on a movie version of a work, rather than the book; or the link to the material is too tenuous to be clear), or they only explore the most trite, superficial aspects of the source material (madness in Alice in Wonderland, wish fulfillment in 1001 Arabian Nights).

Q: How much do you want to know about the person submitting to you?

A: As long as I have a valid email address and a name under which they would like to publish, I don't really care about anything else. We've published New York Times bestselling authors as well as brand-new authors. I normally don't even look at the cover letter until after I've passed judgement on the work itself.

Q: If you publish writing, how much of a piece do you read before making the decision to reject it?

A: I normally know whether I want to reject a piece after about 3 pages. If something doesn't grip me in that time, it never will. If I have the urge to check Facebook while I'm reading your story, I probably won't take it.

Q: What additional evaluations, if any, does a piece go through before it is accepted?

A: Each piece goes through at least 5 readers. Sometimes, if we get a lot of submissions related to the same aspect of the source material, we do another round of readings so that we don't end up with too many similar pieces.

Q: What is a day in the life of an editor like for you?

A: I look at my reading queue and read and vote on as many submissions as I can. I will label submissions for rejection or acceptance, and then before I reject anything, I email all the editors and give them a chance to advocate for anything they really feel passionate about. We use Slack so that all the editors can chat about things, and we have conversations about individual pieces, the overall direction of the issue, and how we can get more submissions. I spend the rest of my time doing my own writing, because I'm an author as well.

Q: How important do you feel it is for publishers to embrace modern technologies?

A: I feel that any publisher who doesn't embrace modern technology is fooling themselves. People read in line at Starbucks, in the elevator, on the train to work. They don't want to have to carry more paper books around - they'd rather access everything from their phone, tablet or computer. I totally support the traditional curated publishing model (rather than self-publishing), but I think that publishers need to pay attention to where and how people are reading today.

Q: How much do you edit an accepted piece prior to publication?

A: For copy editing and basic proofreading, we don't normally consult the author before publication. For anything more substantial than typos and punctuation errors, we consult authors. Occasionally, we suggest substantial re-writes, but that is the exception rather than the rule.

Q: Do you nominate work you've published for any national or international awards?

A: We regularly nominate for the Pushcart Prize, Sundress Press's Best of the Net anthology, the Bettering American Poetry anthology, and the Rhysling award. We think that award nominations are a win/win for any small press - it lets authors know that we recognize the outstanding quality of their work, and anytime one of our authors wins, it reflects well on us as a press. Any small press that doesn't nominate is doing their authors a disservice.