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Editor Interview: Oh Reader

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

A: Unique essays on reading

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

A: I love the indie mags: Frankie, Kinfolk, Cereal, DRIFT, Womankind, Counterpoint.

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

A: For essays, poetry and short stories: George Saunders, Joan Didion, Nam Le, Anne Carson, Wells Tower, David Sedaris, Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah.
For longer fiction: Don DeLillo, Kazuo Ishiguro, Donna Tartt, Nora Ephron, Ottessa Moshfegh, Maggie Nelson, Colson Whitehead, Jennifer Egan, Rebecca Makkai, C Pam Zhang, Octavia Butler, Yaa Gyasi, Elena Ferrante.
Memoir: Patti Smith, Tara Westover, Carmen Maria Machado,
I also love light romance, often British: Paige Toon, Lindsey Kelk, Sarra Manning, Emily Henry.
But the list could be a million titles long—I just REALLY love to read.

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

A: There are quite a few magazines about books, but Oh Reader is the only magazine that looks at books from a reader's perspective. Most literary/bookish magazines focus on book reviews and author interviews; Oh Reader tells the story of how readers interact with books—which books have affected them personally, how reading has shaped their lives, what they have discovered about the world or themselves through reading. We don't tell you what to read—we ask what you're reading, and why, and our writers tell their own stories of literary encounters. It's funny, sad, revealing, thoughtful and very human. Which is what literature is, too, right?

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

A: Understand what the publication is about—read a few issues, get an idea of what our aims are as a magazine. Then, tell us a story that is personal to you, and that is unique—we receive a lot of pitches along the lines of, "Reading has been my life since I was a child, and I love to read. I am who I am because of books." And that's awesome and we love to hear it, but it's not a story that is unique to you. We want to know the story that only you can tell. Pitch using your own voice, tell us why our readers would connect with your story, and be authentic and open. Try to tell a story that has a narrative, rather than being just a love song to books (which, again, is great—but we want our readers to be pulled through your story by a narrative thread).

Q: Describe the ideal submission.

A: The ideal submission tells us a bit about you as a reader and as a writer (have you been published? If not, can we see some samples of your writing?). Tell us why you're writing this story, and why you're the best person to write it. Then, give us a concise overview of the story. We love to see a great title that pulls in a reader from the get-go. We want a compelling concept, a strong outline, and a clear understanding of the focus of the piece. How will it start and end? We don't need excessive detail—just give us a good summary in a paragraph or two.

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

A: Not understanding what we're looking for. We get a lot of pitches for stories about writing, rather than reading. We get pitches for stories that are not relevant to the subject matter (fiction pitches, essays or poems about unrelated subject matter). It's so important to be familiar with the style and subject matter of a magazine before you pitch. Otherwise, why are you pitching? It's also always obvious when someone is sending multiple identical pitches, because there's nothing that indicates that the submitter knows what you do. Oh, and don't EVER send a copied-and-pasted pitch that refers to a different publication. *Face palm*

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

A: We don't need cover letters. In fact, our submissions process is via a form on our website, so you'll know exactly what we want. We ask for a little about you and why you'd make a great writer for Oh Reader. We always like to see where else you've been published, and it's useful to include links to previous work, so we can get an idea of your writing style.

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

A: We only ask for pitches (not full pieces) via our submissions page, so the pitch really needs to sell your story to us. If we do receive the full body of a story, it's usually within a paragraph or two that we can tell whether it will work for us or not. The piece needs a strong hook and demonstration of writing skill, and it needs to be relevant to our magazine.

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

A: We don't have any additional evaluations. We will publish someone who has never been published before if the story conceit and the writer's ability works for Oh Reader.

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

A: Every day is different, particularly because I run the company while editing the magazine. So, when I get the chance to assess pitches when I'm not paying writers or talking with insurance brokers or approving social media posts, I'm always delighted! Unfortunately, because there is so much involved in running a magazine business, pitches can go for weeks without being read, and then I'll do a mass read when I get some good, clear time to devote to reading. So, please be patient! I'm trying, I promise :)
I read through the submissions in our pitch inbox, and I will always know within a minute or so whether I'm interested. Then I move the shortlisted pitches into a separate file and have a fellow editor look through them for their comments. Usually we have a pretty similar assessment of the stories that will work for us. Then, I reach out to the selected writers to let them know that we would like to publish their story. We provide writer guidelines and a freelance agreement, and once they have evaluated the information, including deadlines and worth length etc., they will let us know whether they would like to proceed. And then we get to work!

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

A: The process of getting our magazine from pitch to printer uses a ton of modern technologies—email submissions, digital editing, that kind of thing. Our printing process is all electronic, including proofing the press-ready files. We publish our magazine online as well as in print format. But with all of that said, I think that the print product is a vital part of magazine publishing, and it's the thing that we champion most. Print is gorgeous, and tactile, and permanent. I don't think we could ever take our magazines to online-only. Holding a magazine in your hands is magic.

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

A: It really depends on the work. Sometimes I'll send an author's story back to them with very few edits, because they've done such a wonderful job with the piece. But if the work needs it, I'll do structural, line and copy edits, as well as proofreading. I will provide a document showing all edits in track changes, including edits for style. We will never publish a piece that has not been approved by the author—it's imperative that they sign off on the edits before their work is published. We're about helping share your voice, not coopting it for our own gain.

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

A: We haven't done so yet, because we haven't been around all that long. But it's definitely something we'd consider!