Chris Galvin’s “Groundnut Soup” is published in issue 13 of the Maple Tree Literary Supplement. “Sympathy for the Devil,” first published in The 24 Project, appears in Tuck Magazine. “Life with Mệ” is forthcoming in the 2012 Writers Abroad anthology, Foreign Encounters. Chris also has work forthcoming in PRISM International.

Andrew Stancek’s story “Libor’s Looking” appears in the new issue of LA Review.

James Claffey’s “Turned to Tiny Vessels” is at Flash Frontier, “Birdcage” at Necessary Fiction; “Jakes’ Games” and “Harvest Moon” is forthcoming in Trachodon’s anthology, Bite; and “Spreading from the False Fly,” appears in Pure Slush’s Real.

Linda Simoni-Wastila’s “The Abridged Biography of an American Sniper“ is at Smokelong.

Strannikov’s “All the Pretty White Fonts!” is one of two prose “Best of the Net 2012” nominees from metazen.

Marcus Speh’s “Family“ is at Hobo Camp Review, and “The Butterfly Collector“ at Flash Frontier.

Scott Tienken’s Handbook to Town Crying is available at Amazon.

Marcelle Heath is a contributing editor for Fictionaut and Editor-at-Large for Luna Park Review. Her stories have appeared in PANK, Wigleaf, Snake Nation Review, Matchbook, Necessary Fiction, and other journals. She works as a freelance editor in Portland, Oregon. She blogs here.

Brian Warfield lives in Philadelphia and publishes chapbooks thorugh Turtleneck Press.

What is your feeling about having mentors as a writer? Talk about the mentor relationship if you will, its importance to a writer…

I don’t really have a mentor but have always wanted one. I guess there are certain writers that I look up to and emulate. I have reached out to my top ten living authors and some of them have responded. I think it is important to have some kind of personal relationship with someone who knows more than you who is willing to be of assistance. I think just having a group of supporters is as important as a mentor. I also tend to be very self-reliant and foster self-mentorship.

What do you do when you feel stuck or uninspired and does it work to trick the brain into working?

I feel that way right now. And no, it is apparently not working. I think I underestimate myself a lot. People consider me to be more prolific than I am, more hard-working. I think periods of rest are crucial. When writers tell me that they are quitting writing, I say “Good.” It is usually after you’ve given up that you let your mind rest and it presents you with better material than if you had continuously prodded it. Nevertheless, I mostly hate not writing. This segues nicely into the next question.

Are there favorite writing exercises or prompts which you use regularly & will share?

Lately I’ve been looking at this website which dedicates one story or poem per year from 1400-2012. Also I find working with these moves  interesting. I tend to write more fiction than poetry and I don’t find prompts helpful for my fiction writing because I tap into my own stuff there. They are probably helpful to others though.

Suggestions for making characters live? Do you know who they are before you write or do you find out who they are in the writing?

I’m actually not very good at character development. Or, I don’t consider it my strong suit. I live in my own head a lot, and I would imagine most of my characters are just shades of me or embodiments I wish I could become. If I had to pick whether I know them or not before writing, I suppose I would have to say that I always write to discover new things. So I don’t know much ahead of time except certain elements that always find their way into writing and letting new routes make themselves known.

Ask yourself a question here (what question would you most like to be asked?)

What was the last movie you watched and how did it make you feel? I just watched the movie The Future by Miranda July, and I guess I’m mentioning it because I’m curious what other people thought but I don’t feel like reading anonymous reviews of it. So, feel free to comment. I didn’t know what to expcet, having really liked Me You and Everyone We Know, and kind of getting the Miranda July backlash. She’s kind of twee and anti-twee at the same time. Very heart-on-sleeve but also dark. I thought it was strange that on the cover of the dvd it says The Future is laugh-out-loud funny, because about the only thing I did out loud was sob. I felt it pushed at the viewer in a very sensitive way to make you uncomfortable but also, like, alive. I liked it.

Please talk about your press, your work, what you are working on now.. anything related to something new or forthcoming… or just out!

I publish chapbooks through Turtleneck Press. Our latest release is THEN by David Greenspan, which is a collection of linked prose poems. We have a number of other titles available which all tend to push the boundaries of genre and category. At the end of the year we will be publishing a poetry chapbook by Gabby Gabby.

On a personal publishing note, my ebook, Shotgun Torso, is slated to come out from Up Literature sometime in the near future. This is interesting, as I have never done anything specifically for ebook. I also have a novella that is being read by editors for hopeful eventual publication.

I think it would be cool if someone wanted to write a comparative essay on all of my stories which are linked here.

The Fictionaut Five is our ongoing series of interviews with Fictionaut authors. Every Wednesday, Meg Pokrass asks a writer five (or more) questions. Meg is the editor-at-large for BLIP Magazine, and her stories and poems have been published widely. Her first full collection of flash fiction, “Damn Sure Right” is now out from Press 53. She blogs at http://megpokrass.com.

Formerly of Montreal, Quebec, Gita M. Smith is now housed in Montgomery, AL, where she helps students at a university become better writers. At least, that’s the plan. She is a journalist and magazine editor who is new to fiction. Her work appears on MiCrow, MudJob, LitFire, MudSpots, The Sphere, Scissors and Spackle, 6S and T-10. She blogs at Ohfinejustfine.blogspot.com.

Q (Meg Pokrass): Gita, you have been with us for a long while at Fictionaut. It’s been great getting to know you and your work here. What originally brought you to Fictionaut?

A highly sociable writer named Michael Solender invited me to join.  Michael is good at bringing people together. Of course, later on he exacts his price, which means contributing stories to MiCrow and sending him latkes at Hanukkah.  But I must say that answering these questions feels a little like we’re on ‘Inside The Actor’s Studio’ except you’re  much, much better looking than James Lipton, and I’m nowhere as wealthy as Meryl Streep.

What do you find to be of value (if you do)  in the online  writers world you have encountered here at F-naut and elsewhere?

The really helpful and honest criticism — like the kind that gives you the courage to take a story apart at the seams and re-stitch it –-  comes from a few people who will comment back and forth with you at first on site and later maybe via email or even telephone.

My favorite example of the good that has come out of the online writers’ world is this: A group of people over at 6 Sentences  started meeting annually (the first gathering was in New Orleans in 2010), and the events – open to anyone who wishes to attend – go on for about 4 or 5 days.  We’ve had writers from Britain, Mexico and all over the USA come to these meet-ups, none of whom had met before except as pixels on the screen. The amount of trust involved in such an undertaking is huge, really.

But we have brought our short stories, poems, novels-in-progress, and flash, and we workshopped with real generosity. It doesn’t hurt that we tended to bring beer and wine and take turns cooking meals for each other. And when these gatherings ended, every year so far we have made a book out of the writing and photographs and art that resulted from the gathering.

What do you value most in writing, yours and others’?

In no particular order, neither alphabetical nor importance, nor astrological nor caloric, I value clarity; breathtaking use of the English language such that I am immediately delighted and also envious; novelty in the sense that my Inner Critic (a bitch in a green eye-shade) says “Oooh. This is fresh!” and shuts up. An example of a book that gave me a real rush was The Shipping News by E. Annie Proulx.  An example of voicing that opened my eyes to possibilities was Barbara Kingsolver’s Poisonwood Bible. She told that story using five different narrators and yet – YET – it was seamless.  Recently, I experienced Red Grass River by James Carlos Blake as one of those exciting, bracing novels you could compare to mango chutney – a hot and sweet-sour combination that engages all your senses.
Back to clarity for a second: I come out of the nonfiction discipline —  newspaper writing — and one gets to really value clarity in that setting. I was in the middle of piecing together a difficult, multi-layered and long article for Atlanta Magazine. I didn’t know how to make so many facts and players clear to the readers. The editor on that piece, Rebecca Burns, looked at my first draft and said, “Rewrite it as a narrative.” Sure enough, it unfolded its contorted self and read like a mystery novel. In the process the story went from murky to clear.

Please tell us about your experience transitioning from reporting to fiction-writing? What have you had to re-learn and what skills from your previous life have been the most useful?’

This is really a trick three-part question masquerading as one. Very clever of you, Meg Pokrass, if that is your real name.  Okay, last part first:  A helpful skill from my previous life would be careful research. The Fictionaut story, “Falling Man,” a bit of flash about the building of the Golden Gate Bridge, contains facts such as 600,000 rivets per tower and the name of the actual foreman, Smiling Joe Strauss.  Or, if I am writing about the landscape in eastern Kansas, I’ll research the names of specific grasses because someone in KS might read the piece and think, “Wait a minute, we don’t have little blue stem around here,” and I’m busted. I have a huge fear of being busted.

Part two of your question – I had to re-learn letting loose, letting go. Nonfiction requires restraint – unless you want to end up in the headlines like Jayson Blair.

As to making the transition to fiction:  I’m still making it, every day on every page.  I have monster Imposter Syndrome. Like, who the fuck am I to be here answering Fictionaut Five questions?

Of the pieces I’ve put on Fictionaut, Gossip is possibly most illustrative of fiction that reads like truth. To me, that means the transition is working.

What books and music do you love the most, and return to over time?

When I need to re-wrinkle my brain, I read poetry.  I go to my bookshelves and read whatever poetry book my hand falls on. I never tire of Yeats. I love and return, time and again, to Pierre DeLattre’s exquisite Tales of the Dalai Lama.   As to music, I’m old school R&B all the way, but you can’t beat Rachmaninoff’s piano concerto number 3 or Afro-Cuban jazz. Oh, and please make sure they play “A Whiter Shade of Pale” at my funeral. It contains references to Chaucer and sex.

What is next for you?  

In terms of my life, I recently quit smoking, so my future is uncertain because I may yet commit homicide and end up in Alabama’s Julia Tutwiler Prison for women.

If not, I’ll probably win the POWERBALL lottery within the next year, and I will set up a huge writer’s commune/retreat/retirement home.  It will have everything we need to be able to continue writing as we grow old, including massage therapists on the property. When you or Steve Gowin or James Claffey or Gessy Alvarez go out on book tours, I’ll take in your mail and water your plants.

The Fictionaut Five is our ongoing series of interviews with Fictionaut authors. Every Wednesday, Meg Pokrass asks a writer five (or more) questions. Meg is the editor-at-large for BLIP Magazine, and her stories and poems have been published widely. Her first full collection of flash fiction, “Damn Sure Right” is now out from Press 53. She blogs at http://megpokrass.com.

Happy Fall Fictionauters! Jane Hammons’ story “Lettie in the Ozarks,” first published at Fictionaut, is included in the anthology Protectors: Stories to benefit PROTECT, ed. Thomas Pluck. Jane also reviewed Austrian writer Wolf Haas’s novel Brenner and God for Grift Magazine and has work forthcoming in Metazen. James Claffey’s two shorts, “The Scrap Iron Man,” and “Pretzel Logic” are upcoming at fwriction : review; “Losing my Voice” at the Blue Fifth Review’s Blue Collection 2: Music; “Ashtray Gravestones” at A Baker’s Dozen; “The Green Hairstreak’s Death” at Elimae; “Blood a Cold Blue” at Word Riot; “Valvic” at Bong is Bard; “Extreme Unction,” “Small Bites,” “Mangled Fingers & Country Music” at Connotation Press. James has new stories at Word Riot, Connotation Press, Elimae, and The Molotov Cocktail. Pure Slush Vol 3 comes out on October 15. Marcus Speh’s “The Serious Writer Occupies Wall Street” is published by Santa Fe Literary Review; “Demons,” at Bluestem Magazine (with audio); his flash “Symphony” is at Blue Fifth Review’s Blue Collection 2: Music. Christopher Allen also has a story in Blue Collection 2: Music, and his story “When Chase Prays Chocolate” is forthcoming in SmokeLong Quarterly’s 10^th anniversary anthology, The Best of SmokeLong Quarterly. Jim Davis’s “Knitting the Unraveled Sleeves” has been selected for an Editor’s Choice Award in the Eric Hoffer Prose Award competition and will be included in the annual anthology of short prose, Best New Writing 2013. The book will be available in early October. Linda Simoni-Wastila’s poem “Greetings From Motel 6” is published in Poet’s Market. Bill Yarrow’s Pointed Sentences (BlazeVOX 2012) is now available from Amazon in a Kindle edition, and his poems have recently appeared in Otoliths, Moria, and Short Fast and Deadly. Andrew Stancek’s story “The Legacy” appears in the new issue of The Windsor Review, Fall 2012. Gessy Alvarez’s “Sassy Wench” is in Apocrypha and Abstractions, and she has four pieces forthcoming in Connotation Press on October 15.

Marcelle Heath is a contributing editor for Fictionaut and Editor-at-Large for Luna Park Review. Her stories have appeared in PANK, Wigleaf, Snake Nation Review, Matchbook, Necessary Fiction, and other journals. She works as a freelance editor in Portland, Oregon. She blogs here.

Review by Christopher Allen

I’m off to Zurich for the weekend, but I’ve brought along some work for the ride. Jürgen Fauth’s Kino arrived yesterday. I’m apprehensive. Jürgen is the co-creator of Fictionaut. What if I don’t like the book? Until I open it, I have no idea what it’s about—except for the word Kino, which I know means cinema in German.

My apprehension does not last long. In the second paragraph of the novel, I have found myself in an action-packed mystery thriller, a page-turner with a gutsy, young and less than perfect woman in the leading role. I am curious, even excited. Later in the evening as I’m exploring the old town of Zurich, my thoughts keep turning to Kino—a story destined for the cinema.

Returning home from the hospital where her husband is languishing with dengue fever, Wilhelmina Koblitz (Mina) stumbles over two mysterious metal cases left on her doorstep. The contents of the “cans” turn out to be her grandfather’s long-lost film Tulpendiebe (The Tulip Thief), which can only be viewed on a special projector in Berlin. So the action begins—and this is only page 4.

Kino is, however, much more than an action-packed mystery page-turner. At its core, Kino is a complex family drama, a story of how the excesses—the sins?—of one generation poison those to come. Mina goes to Berlin with the hope of selling her grandfather’s films, of paying off student loans, of buying a house. She is not motivated by the need to resurrect her grandfather’s work or by a mission to wash the Nazi smear from his name; but through twists and turns, canyons and even a sauna, Mina finally becomes her grandfather’s savior.

Kino is also the nickname of Mina’s grandfather, an infamous German filmmaker from the Weimar Republic and later Nazi Germany. Parts of the story are told through Kino’s journal, which is handed to Mina by a stranger who stalks her through Berlin. This multi-voice layer of Kino takes the story on rails back to the Weimar Republic and the Third Reich, but the reader is never quite sure if the ramblings of Klaus Koblitz are true or the lies of a man ruined by his own twisted vision. He writes the journal in a mental hospital in 1963 after being committed by his wife, the Weimar Republic filmstar Penelope Greifenau Koblitz, who is without a doubt the most colorfully drawn character in the novel. When this book is adapted for film, elderly actresses will be climbing over one another to grab this role. Once a beautiful ingenue, Penelope is now a bitter drug addict with a foul mouth. Kino and his movies have ruined her, or maybe she ruined Kino?

Penelope is convinced that her husband had the ability to anticipate real future events through his films. And she’s not the only one. The Nazis and the US government are also interested in getting their hands on Kino’s films. An intriguing aspect of the novel, mind control, on one level, is a comment on the power of film; on another level it’s a deconstruction of the relationship between cause and effect. Kino keeps asking the question “who ruined whom”? Who is responsible for the deterioration of this family? The Nazis? Penelope? Kino? Drugs? And then who will redeem it?

• Read “Lang’s Dragon,” an excerpt from Kino, on Fictionaut

Christopher Allen, a native of Tennessee, lives in Germany. His fiction and creative non-fiction have appeared in numerous places both online and in print. In 2011, Allen was a Pushcart Prize nominee and a finalist at Glimmer Train. He blogs at www.imustbeoff.com.

Richard Peabody is the founder and co-editor of Gargoyle Magazine and editor (or co-editor) of 21 anthologies including Mondo Barbie, Conversations with Gore Vidal, and A Different Beat: Writings by Women of the Beat Generation. The author of a novella, two short story collections, and six poetry books, he is also a native Washingtonian. Peabody teaches fiction writing at Johns Hopkins University. He has two new books due out this fall–a book of poetry Speed Enforced by Aircraft (Broadkill River Press) and a book of short storiesBlue Suburban Skies (Main Street Rag Press).

What is your feeling about having mentors as a writer? Talk about the mentor relationship if you will, its importance to a writer…

Wish I’d had one. I have an MA and never attended an MFA program so missed out on that apprentice situation.  I have played mentor for a number of students through the years. Helped edit their work, helped steer them to markets I thought would appreciate them. I think it’s one of the most important relationships in this tribe. But do I think it matters? Dunno. One of my biggest regrets is not handing a novel-in-progress to John Gardner when he asked to read it. I was way too chicken and shy at the time. And then he was gone.

In terms of editing though I’ve been fortunate to have exchanged letters with Paul Bowles, Guy Davenport, and Edouard Roditi, all of whom read Gargoyle and steered people our way.  The publishing side of the writing world is just as important to me as the writing side. People wear a lot of hats in this biz. And when I started out I did seek out the editors who’d come before me. I wanted to know why they’d quit. They gave me encouragement and a quick course in the REALITIES of the biz. Something I share to this day despite raining on a lot of writer’s parades.

What do you do when you feel stuck or uninspired when sitting down to write… Anything that you can suggest to awaken creative thinking?

I have a couple of poets and writers who can always shake out some sparks. But mainly I listen to music.  I tend to gravitate to jazz, classical, and soundtracks. Lyrics seem to block my brain at writing time. Easier to drift away to instrumental works. And once everything clicks I don’t even notice when the music stops. Entry to the imagination is always the toughest part for me. Once I’m there I’m clocked out.

How did Gargoyle begin?

Three of us began the mag in 1976.   I’d just returned from hitchhiking the USA and had gone to a reading in Madison, Wisconsin by Jon Tuschen and Warren Woessner.  My buddy Russell Cox and I were both writer wanabees and so when I came home and discovered his marriage had fallen apart that seemed like the now or never time to start something.  We enlisted Paul Pasquarella, a buddy from where Russell worked, at Brentano’s bookshop in Chevy Chase, and the rest is history.

We knew nothing and actually started as a newsprint monthly. Did 3 issues in 4 months and then they both quit and I somehow managed to keep it going ever since.

What have been your favorite aspects of editing this wonderful literary magazine over the years?

Hey thanks. It’s always been a blessing and a curse. My self-created deadlines are rarely very realistic. And yet Gargoyle has been my conduit and connection to the lit world. I’m just as much into creating print objects, buying books, as I am writing. Lucinda and I owned our own used book and music shop on U Street in DC in the mid ‘90s. And I do miss having a space where I can arrange readings for lit friends who are passing through town.

You really have to love doing a mag to keep going. I do love meeting new writers, reading their work, and connecting. We started out printing 3,000cc, which was insane. At our peak we did 5,000 before we took a hiatus in 1990. By 1997 when we came back things had changed so much that we’ve never been close to those kinds of numbers again. We’re lucky if we move 1,000cc these days.

Why do I bother?  Both Lucinda and I still believe that writing matters. That the right combination of words at the right place and time in your life can alter your world, your way of thinking, or being. That’s something to strive for isn’t it?

And having great students whose work I could feed into Gargoyle was great fun.  I try to teach them self-reliance and steer them where I can. And getting them into print has always been a goal.  Friends keep telling me to write a memoir about my experiences with the magazine. Dunno.

I guess I’ve always been as much a fan as a writer and having the magazine has allowed me access into the same world as T.C. Boyle, Kim Addonizio, John Gardner, Allen Ginsberg, Kathy Acker, Margaret Randall, Julia Alvarez, Lucia Berlin, and so many others we’ve published through the years.  I wouldn’t change that aspect or wish at all.

When I was a kid reading Evergreen Review, Plimpton’s Paris Review, City Lights Journal, and New American Review, I dreamed about being in those pages and being part of that community.  What I discovered through the years is that editing a magazine is a ready-built community-building enterprise.

That’s the pay-off.

And if you do something long enough, you get noticed, if only for longevity, in a biz where most mags have the lifespan of a May Fly.

Talk about the pros and cons of online lit journals here, if you like.

It’s always $. Our most successful issue was #51 which featured a great UFO cover by Canadian artist Patricia Storms. Sold like gangbusters. Our distributor sent us the info and we’d sold hundreds of copies and of course they went belly-up and we didn’t get a penny. Such is life in the lit world. Right now we have a tiny distributor. We have a tiny online presence. And we don’t have the backing to update our site every single day with new info. Nor do I have the tech savvy. Sucks, but that’s reality. And with more and more mags bagging print editions —  Shenandoah, Triquarterly, et al. — I have to wonder why we don’t follow suit and become an online-only mag, or else add that Lulu or Blurb print your own copy kind of mag.

The biggest change has been the evolution of computers. Back in the day the computer printer spit out one long line of print, that you had to cut and paste into galleys. Now they can do anything. Our printer is in Charlotte, NC and owns POD equipment. That changes the game. He prints copies as I need them on a short turnaround and I don’t have to go broke paying off storage facilities for inventory. Though I do still have a lot of old inventory I’d love to move.

Please talk a bit about your new collection here. Anything related to writing and birthing these books! Speed Enforced by Aircraft (poems) & Blue Suburban Skies (short stories.)

My last collection of poems appeared in 2004 and was something I threw together before embarking on a reading tour of the Rust Belt after a basement flood wiped out a lot of my possessions.  So it was time. Broadkill River Press in Delaware was interested and I’d struck out with the local Washington Writer’s Publishing House contests over the past several years.  It’s a real combo of poems from the past decade, with a lot of newer poems written on a stay at Blue Mountain Center a couple years ago.  They expanded it way beyond the 64-page manuscript I first showed them and for that I’m extremely grateful.

re. BSS. M. Scott Douglass at Main Street Rag actually prints Gargoyle down in Charlotte, NC. We’ve paled around at a couple of books fairs, AWP, and read together. After banging my head against the wall for a few years, I turned to him and asked if he’d have any interest in publishing a collection, since his mag had been first home for two of the stories. I get approached like that all of the time so figured he’d say no. But Scott is real folks and even though he made no promises he wound up responding to the work and bingo.

I worked particularly hard to land them all in print beforehand. Scott wasn’t focused on that aspect but it made me feel better about the entire project. Two of the stories in particular are LONG in these days where Flash and Nano fiction rule the online roost.  They’re also the oldest in the book. I haven’t had much time the past 12 years with my daughters to write anything long. So it’s satisfying to gather those along with the newer works.  I see now, from my older perspective, that what I once thought of as range, is again just time in action.  The way I used to write, the way I write now, have evolved and shifted. Matching a bunch of stories together from different strata of your writing life enhances the overall effect in way I don’t think I understood when I was an angry young brat. I’m finding it very satisfying to have a plethora of voices and styles bound together in there. Particularly since I seem to be much more of a figure it out as I go writer and less of an organized entity.

What is next for you?

I’ve taught writing workshops of various kinds at various levels for 26 years and I think I’ve completed that particular marathon. I’m spending a lot more time on my own work and 2012 has been my best year in the past decade. By year’s end I will have 2 books out, and have landed 23 stories, plus another 50 poems, and the odd nf piece in various print/online journals.  I do still teach the odd workshop. Lately people have asked me to teach nf writing workshops. Not really my thing in the past though I’ve written a book on being a Stay-at-Home Dad that nobody wanted. But I do find I’m saying NO to more and more requests for panels, or workshops. I think the politics of the system and the art orgs has killed a lot of my passion where workshops are concerned.

I do have another book of poems in the can as a second possible volume for Broadkill River Press. Jamie Brown and Sid Gold cherry picked my existing manuscripts for the latest book, and expressed interest in possibly doing another volume down the road.

I have two very different collections of stories that are also in search of a home. One is bent narrative realism and includes stories that were recently up at The Literarian and Connotations Press.  The second is shorter and more experimental, primarily a Flash collection.

Lately I’ve been salvaging old unfinished work, riffing on existing characters from published work, and working on a novel.

And a DC-based press is talking up a possible Peabody Reader, a sort of Best Of my work alongside some new unpublished stuff. I’ve considered assembling collections in that Viking Library style (Melville, Crane, etc.) of works by indie lit folks like D.E. Steward, Richard Grayson, George Myers Jr., Hugh Fox, and other legends. Never crossed my mind that somebody would think of doing one on my work.

The next two issues of Gargoyle are in the can. #59 is due in a month or so. Everything that could go wrong has gone wrong on that once. Every issue has its own particular journey and #59 was split-off of #58 when I realized how huge an issue it would have to be.

#60 will be desktopped in the spring and is due out summer 2013. We’ll begin reading for #61 on June 1^st. Beyond that I don’t know. Might be time to pack it in.  If Romney wins it might be time to move to Chile.

The Fictionaut Five is our ongoing series of interviews with Fictionaut authors. Every Wednesday, Meg Pokrass asks a writer five (or more) questions. Meg is the editor-at-large for BLIP Magazine, and her stories and poems have been published widely. Her first full collection of flash fiction, “Damn Sure Right” is now out from Press 53. She blogs at http://megpokrass.com.

Bonnie ZoBell‘s chapbook collection The Whack Job Girls is coming out with Monkey Puzzle Press in 2013. She has received an NEA for her fiction, the Capricorn Novel Award, a PEN Syndicated Fiction Award for a story later read on NPR, and a spot on Wigleaf’s Top 50 Very Short Fictions. Her work has appeared in numerous publications, including Night Train, The Greensboro Review, New Plains Review, PANK, Cosmopolitan Magazine, Prick of the Spindle, and Cutbank. She received an MFA from Columbia on fellowship, currently teaches at San Diego Mesa College where she is the Creative Writing Coordinator, and is Associate Editor of The Northville Review. More of her work can be found at www.bonniezobell.com.

What is your feeling about having mentors as a writer? Talk about the mentor relationship if you will, its importance to a writer…

 I do think it’s important for writers to have mentors, people they look up to, though the mentorship relationship can mean different things to different people. In my case, it mostly means it’s someone who inspires me to work even harder, who helps me see even better what beautiful writing is and what it can do. It means someone who really gets what I’m trying to do and can help me make it even better. When I was in graduate school, that was Fred Busch. Dorothy Allison has been my mentor by simply writing her astounding fiction and when I got to work with her at Tin House. “You need to have a goddamn motherfucker in that book,” she told me, which was absolutely true. Too much tiptoeing around. Kathy Fish told me you have to have surprises in your fiction, things that are completely unpredictable. Steve Almond is my mentor right now, and I’ve been fortunate enough to work with him several times at Tin House. “Slow down where it hurts,” he says.

I also consider writers I’ve never met before to be mentors by way of their amazing writing:  Flannery O’Connor, Dan Chaon, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Joyce Carol Oates, William Trevor, Toni Morrison. I could go definitely go on.

What do you do when you feel stuck or uninspired and does it work to trick the brain into working?

I either get away from writing entirely for a few days or a week, which usually makes me rearin’ to go when I get back to it. Or I work on a different kind of writing.

If I’m stuck on a particular work and trying to get back into it, sometimes I print out some of it and retype it. This gets me back into the voice and mood, invariably I start doing some editing, and with any luck I’m able to forge ahead in the work from there.

Are there favorite writing exercises or prompts which you use regularly & will share? (if this replicates the previous question, ignore…

I don’t have regular prompts, probably. Answering my email in the morning gets me warmed up to talk in a regular voice to other human beings, which is what I strive to do in my fiction. I do like to write to other people’s writing prompts. The Flash Factory on Zoetrope Virtual Studio is a wonderful place for exercises. Many of the ones I’ve written there have turned into flashes or full-length short stories. If I’m stuck on a particular work and trying to get back into it, sometimes I print out some of it and retype it. This gets me back into the voice and mood, invariably I start doing some editing, and with any luck I’m able to forge ahead in the work from there.

Suggestions for making characters live?  Do you know who they are before you write or do you find out who they are in the writing?

I may have some ideas about characters before I write, which contributes to my wanting to write a certain piece, but I really don’t know who they are when I start out. I find out as I start writing. Probably what helps me make them live the most is trying to be as loose as I can be in the writing without being overly critical or cutting a lot of things yet. This way weird details about the person spill out, quirks, that hopefully I can go back in and milk for more for some defining characteristics of the person.

Please talk a bit about The Whack-Job Girls here. Anything related to writing and birthing this book!

The Whack-Job Girls & Other Stories (Monkey Puzzle Press 2013) was a pleasure and fun to write. None of the women in the stories quite fit into society the way they’d like to. Some are profoundly disturbed, like the first one who sees the Madonna on her living-room wall. Others are off-beat, but not quite so worrisome—like the girl in the last story, a hotel maid, who’s taking anthropology at a community college and can’t help trying to interpret what the bizarre details left behind in hotel rooms say about the humankind.

Most of us have worried at one time or another about being “normal,” but we keep it in check, so this was fun because I didn’t have to keep anything in check while writing this chapbook.

What is next for you?

I’m finishing up a collection of connected full-length short stories, What Happened Here, about a neighborhood living on the site of a major airplane crash in San Diego. After that, I plan to work more on a novel I’ve started.

The Fictionaut Five is our ongoing series of interviews with Fictionaut authors. Every Wednesday, Meg Pokrass asks a writer five (or more) questions. Meg is the editor-at-large for BLIP Magazine, and her stories and poems have been published widely. Her first full collection of flash fiction, “Damn Sure Right” is now out from Press 53. She blogs at http://megpokrass.com.

“Projects from the Bleeding Edge” — that’s us! Fictionaut co-founder Jürgen Fauth contributed a chapter on our community to Book: A Futurist’s Manifesto, a collection of essays about the state of publishing edited by Hugh McGuire and Brian O’Leary,  now available from O’Reilly.

McGuire explains:

The “idea” of this book was to explore “the idea of a book.” We wanted to get away from the abstract or philosophical, and make a practical guide for the publishing world — for someone just starting a publishing enterprise today, for people in the business already, and for authors and self-publishers who want to think beyond “upload my book to Kindle.”

In his essay, Jürgen talks about his first steps on the literary Internet in the nineties to Fictionaut’s conception, launch and beyond:

Would we really be able to run an online magazine that allowed anyone to post? We weren’t sure, but we were going to try —after all, on the Internet, if something is possible, somebody is going to do it sooner or later, so why not us?

You can read the essay online for free. Other contributors to Book: A Futurist’s Manifesto include Jacob Lewis, Valla Vakili, Travis Alber, Aaron Miller, Kassia Krozser, and Brett Sandusky. Book: A Futurist’s Manifesto is availble in print from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, and O’Reilly, as well as online in its entirety. Thanks to Hugh McGuire and Brian O’Leary for having us!

Ilie Ruby is the author of The Salt God’s Daughter (September 4th, 2012) which Kirkus Reviews just called “a bewitching tale of lives entangled” and the critically-acclaimed novel, The Language of Trees (2010). She is the winner of the Edwin L. Moses Award for Fiction, chosen by T.C. Boyle; a Kerr Foundation Writing Scholarship, and the Phi Kappa Phi Award for Creative Achievement in Fiction. Ruby is also a recipient of the Wesleyan Writer’s Conference Davidoff Scholarship and the Barbara Kemp Award for Outstanding Teaching and Scholarship. Ruby is a contributor to the New York Times Motherlode and CNN. She is also a painter, mother to three, and currently teaches writing in Boston.

What is your feeling about having mentors as a writer? 

I have always had mentors; I think they are incredibly helpful at all points of one’s career. As with anything, when venturing into uncharted territory it is invaluable to have someone to ask all those questions that you’d otherwise end up sitting with for days, months, years. And it is a good and lovely thing when mentors say, for example “Work around that in an interview,” or when they say, “Yes, this is the way to go,” or even better yet, “Let me introduce you to … say, Peg Mokrass, for example. Now she’s someone every aspiring writer needs to meet, though I hear her client list is full up.” When I was in a writing program twenty years ago (yes, I’m old) the director of my program was my mentor and he was just fabulous to me. Then, I found mentors in two professors. Now, having published two books, I have mentors who are novelists—well, some of them found me. Being a writer today is like venturing into the Wild West—we all have to look out for each other and help and support each other. I also mentor a couple people, too. So it goes and comes around, like all things.

What do you do when you feel stuck or uninspired and does it work to trick the brain into working?

Oh, gosh, yes. I have a long and intense relationships with the page. Tricking the brain is what it is all about. Yes, yes and yes to this question. I’ve been writing for most of my life and have a long, complicated relationship with art, too—my mom is an artist and raised my sister and I in a household where art and writing were the focus of our activities—I developed a real reverence for the creative process and I appreciate creativity on a very deep level.  I don’t think there was ever a time when I wasn’t writing or trying to write. Painting is a helpful trick because it uses quite a different part of the brain and gets the body moving; it frees up all those little writing molecules in your brain that have your designated stories in them. I also recommend purchasing a lucky hat (mine is a cowboy hat but it may as well be a combat helmet) because it tricks you into thinking you’re putting on your thinking cap (recall those days of yore). Another thing I do is to read poetry when I’m stuck—this is my absolute ammo. Jack Gilbert, Louise Gluck, poets whose last name start with G just have some magic for me. I’m not a big coffee shop writer but if I change my location in my house, say from my office to my porch, it opens up a whole new vantage point. Usually during a day of writing you can find me walking around my house with my computer. My last trick is music. Music always helps. When I was having trouble with one section of my new book, somebody made me a “mixed tape”, which was a compilation of songs that were thematically tied to the book — I played it nonstop in my office for three days. Specifically, it was the music of Tori Amos that completely unlocked this story and I finished the novel.

Are there favorite writing exercises or prompts which you use regularly & will share?

I’m not using writing exercises right now, but I have in the past and I’m sure I will in the future. Right now, the book title is the prompt, and then chapter titles too though I usually don’t end up publishing the chapter titles. The title of the book comes to me long before I sit down towrite the book. For The Salt God’s Daughter, the title came to me one night when I was working on my previous book, and I just stopped and wrote it down and pinned it to my bulletin board. I stared at it for months and started sort of downloading the story in my mind. I did my research,  letting it all percolate. When I sat down to write the book months later, I pretty much knew how the story was going to work and what was going to happen. It’s a strange process for me but I like having time to think about ideas without writing them down at the beginning, which makes me feel a little bit locked in.

Suggestions for making characters live?  Do you know who they are before you write or do you find out who they are in the writing?

I discover my characters wholly through the process of writing. I used to try and sketch them out first, make lists of their qualities, etc. but that didn’t work so well for me. I need to fling them into a situation to see what they will do—I really like what happens during the organic process—you have the characters interact with each other and they begin to show who they are. So I suppose it’s a little like putting people together when you have a dinner party. You seat them all at one table and things start to happen. Conversations, reactions, love at first sight… Well, love has happened. I fell in love with my husband at a dinner party.

What’s the best writer’s advice you ever got?

THE BEST REVENGE IS REVISION. Pin this to your bulletin board on your wall. This was told to me 20 years ago after a professor in a writing class tore my short story to pieces and I left a little teary. My friend David took me out for a drink and I’ll never forget him saying that to me. I made a few tiny revisions and a few days later I submitted the story to a contest at USC. None other than T. C. Boyle chose the story for a huge literary award. That, I suppose, was a sweet victory.

No joke! That is a wonderful story! Please talk a bit about the creating of The Salt God’s Daughter, your new book.

Oh, this story had me by the throat from the get-go. It was inspired by my research into cyber-bullying — I came across the stories of young girls who’d been bullied with tragic outcomes. I wrote their names out on a piece of paper late in my office one night and I knew I had to tell the story.  I knew this was the next book I was meant to write. But I’m superstitious that way. The story is quite personal in some ways, as all stories are in one way or another. I had to really get clear with myself about how deep I wanted to go. Did I really want to talk about what happened to girls growing up in the 70s and 80s? About the plight of adolescent girls? Did I want to delve into the broken bonds of motherhood, to the condition of being motherless, all those things? I had to find out how far I would go. But at this point in my life, I sort of have to go deep if a book is going to hold my interest for 365 pages. My formal blurb: The story is about the American loss of innocence as told by Ruthie and Naida, a mother and daughter who experience violence, family secrets, and towering acts of love. They live within an oceanic wilderness where identity is as changeable as the ocean. They face gritty rites of passage (love, sex, virginity, motherhood) and find in themselves an incredible resiliency. What I really wanted to show was the divinity of those people we don’t often notice—the marginalized, the homeless, the grieving, the isolated—and illuminate those periods of time when we ourselves enter darkness—when we don’t see the light, and the transcendent beauty as much as we should. I wanted to show that light, to shine it even in the darkest of places. I wanted to capture what is not only difficult about the female experience, but also lovely about it. All this required that I delve in to the past and really work the material to find those images, experiences and emotions that would ring true for the reader, and that I was okay discussing.

How do you feel about the way writers relate to each other?

Other writers—I have met wonderful people who I just love cheering on. This is a very competitive business and I think you have to choose your friends wisely but I’ve developed such a beautiful group of solid supportive authors, some that are more experienced than I am, and we are really there for each other. You can’t let the negatives taint the water for you, and now, I can help other people deal with some of these things because of my own experiences. I really love this process and I don’t ever want to lose my passion for creating beauty. There are so many books and too little time.

I agree wholeheartedly with you here. Ilie, What is next for you?

I have just started a new book that is set in the jungles of Guatemala. I’m looking forward to some travel research! And maybe a little vacation while I’m there. Of course, I’ll bring my laptop. Thank you Meg Pokrass, or Peg Mokrass—I am wild about you both and I think you are hilarious and so so talented. You brighten my day! Thank you for having me on Fictionaut!

The Fictionaut Five is our ongoing series of interviews with Fictionaut authors. Every Wednesday, Meg Pokrass asks a writer five (or more) questions. Meg is the editor-at-large for BLIP Magazine, and her stories and poems have been published widely. Her first full collection of flash fiction, “Damn Sure Right” is now out from Press 53. She blogs at http://megpokrass.com.

Jeff Hansen’s review of Larissa Shmailo’s poetry collection In Paran is at the Altered Scale. Matthew Hamilton’s chapbook, The Land of the Four Rivers, is available at Cervena Barva Press. Walter Bjorkman’s Broadsides are available at Thrush Press. Darryl Price’s When John Fell has been published by Thundercalp #9. Kate Hill Cantrill has an interview at Press 53. James Claffey has recent stories at The Molotov Cocktail, NAP, Tampa Review, Press 1, Orion Headless, Salt, Unshod Quills, Scissors and Spackle, Revival Literary Journal, and Eunoia Review. Christopher Allen interviewed Marcus Speh at I Must Be Off! Christopher’s book Conversations with S. Teri O’Type (a Satire) is forthcoming in September. A-Minor’s flash fiction/prose special issue features Tawnysha Greene, Charles Rafferty, J. Bradley, Tantra Bensko, Rebecca King and Jamie Grefe.

Marcelle Heath is a contributing editor for Fictionaut and Editor-at-Large for Luna Park Review. Her stories have appeared in PANK, Wigleaf, Snake Nation Review, Matchbook, Necessary Fiction, and other journals. She works as a freelance editor in Portland, Oregon. She blogs here.