The Loft Blog

Launching an imprint can be a heavy lift, even during an economical era which is becoming increasingly advantageous for independent creators. Self-publishing allows a writer to retain primary control of how, when and to whom her/his/their work is distributed.

City of Incurable Women, by Maud Casey, is a book about the psychiatric patients of Paris's Salpêtrière Hospital in the 19th century. It's about women diagnosed as hysterical. It is both historical and fictional.

Writing a book is not easy. But getting one published is often even more difficult. The time it takes to query agents and/or publishers who accept unsolicited manuscripts can often accumulate into months of what feels like much wasted effort.

Emma Harrington begins her series of Publisher Profile interviews by checking in Flexible Press publisher and executive editor William E Burleson.

"Portrait of a Good Father" by Kristiana Kahakauwila (found in the collection This Is Paradise) is a short story that takes place over many years, following different family members as they cope, or fail to cope, with a traumatic loss. It's devastating.

I wrote the first draft of my novel—sketch really—by hand. I was alone in a hotel room, cooking on a hot plate and taking breaks in a courtyard that smelled of cat pee. It was pure magic. I’d just left my career in politics at the Minnesota State Capitol to pursue my writing.

This past fall I found myself teaching an intense class on revision. I also found myself with about the same amount of time to complete final revisions on a short story collection that would launch in March (Splendid Anatomies, Veliz Books). What a thing!

Not that long ago, being able to write full-time for a living was the dream I was working toward. Another major professional goal was becoming a published author. Both of these have now become a reality. To be sure, neither was easy. But I received a lot of useful advice and encouragement.

When you’ve experienced financial hardship, especially when it comes to putting your writing out into the world, it can be difficult to get back in the saddle again and attempt to publish your next book.

One question I hear time and again from students is a simple one: how to begin? When it comes to facing the blank page, writers develop all kinds of strategies to build momentum: set a timer for 15 minutes, use an app to block use of email and Internet, stop writing in the middle of a sentence.

Stephen Graham Jones's Mongrels is a novel about werewolves. Oh! I've spoiled it. But of course that much is spoiled. We live in a world of hype and trailers and book covers. You might only pick it up because you are looking for a book about werewolves. (You should pick it up either way.)

Margaret LaFleur writes fiction and teaches writing in Saint Paul, Minnesota. Her writing has most recently appeared in Bright Flash Literary Review and (mac)ro(mic), but you can more often find her reading over the heads of her small children.