Success Secrets Of Expert Author 4

26 Years old expert author shares his success secret. You will gain tips and tricks to also help you succeed in your writing career from his insights.
Jackie Corley reveals everything without holding anything back as reported by Tina Crandell...


'Jackie Corley is the publisher of Word Riot, an online literary magazine that receives hits from every "continent except Antarctica." She has a short story collection, The Suburban Swindle, due out later this year (So New Media). Or you can find her now at www.wordriot.org. The almost 26-year-old discusses experimental writing, what it takes to be a good writer, and how to start your own independent publishing press.

Word Riot advertises: "good writing. no remorse." What is good writing?

To me, good writing takes a risk. It should make you uncomfortable, forced to confront and question the world around you. I think, with enough practice, anybody can turn themselves into a solid wordsmith-- somebody who can write that immaculate sentence. But it takes something more to be a writer. It takes cajones.

How would you categorize the reader-base?

Our readers are office slaves and blue collar stiffs with a love of good writing, soccer moms and college kids who have an open mind and like to be intellectually challenged. Hipsters, punk rockers, grandpas, lawyers, accountants-- they're all represented in our readership. What our readers have in common is a passion for good writing and a fierce curiosity about the world around them.

It seems your readers are your writers and your writers are your readers. In other words, there is a certain sense of camaraderie when you visit the site-- like you are a part of something. Describe that something.

I don't see the need for a sort of hierarchy in art like "The Lord came down and said, 'You in this clan are the writers and you in this clan are the readers.'" Any good writer needs to be a good reader. They need to appreciate what makes something good fiction. I don't trust writers who don't read (and there are more out there than you would think).

There's this tendency to put high-profile writers on a pedestal. I just don't see the point in it. It creates this unnecessary divide between reader and writer. Online and small press writing has created this community that really blurs those lines. And this online interaction has transferred into the real world. I love going to a reading event and grabbing drinks with writers whose work I enjoy.

Word Riot is host to experimental forms such as "Flash Fiction" and "Novular." But tell us more about "Stretching Forms." This is a genre that even Wikipedia has yet to define.

Word Riot's first fiction editor, Jordan Rosenfeld, mentioned that we were receiving a significant number of experimental submissions that didn't quite fit neatly into a short story category. Some of these works employ stream of consciousness. Some take advantage of the seemingly limitless structural formatting the digital screen provides (as opposed to the very concrete boundaries of a sheet of loose-leaf). Just throwing these stories under an "Experimental" category didn't seem to do them justice. She suggested putting these works into a category she termed "Stretching Forms." It's stuck ever since.

You were born in 1982. This makes you 26, which is impressive enough but Word Riot was created 5 years ago in 2002, when you were just 21 years old. Did I do my math right?

Yes, I'll be 26 in a few months and I started Word Riot when I was quite a young 'un. I've always had a strong interest in fiction, in the power of the written word. I was the kid who would sit in the hammock at a family party and just devour novels. I'd always been too intimidated to try to write my own fiction, but by high school I realized writing was something I could do and I finally just went at it. I think the fact that I consider myself a reader before a writer has something to do with why I decided to start Word Riot. I like being a part of bringing good writing into the world; whether it's mine or somebody else's doesn't really matter to me.

Less than a year after the launch of the website, the independent publishing press, Word Riot Press, was born. Will you elaborate on the conception?

When I started working on the online magazine, I'd look at the small press publishers like Akashic and Soft Skull with great admiration. And then I saw what this micro press, So New Media (http://sonewpublishing.com/) was doing -- putting out chapbooks, using various websites to promote their authors, etc. I realized that was something I could do, that it was within my reach to put together an actual plan to produce books. I started researching paper, hardcore desk printers, saddle staplers -- everything about desktop publishing. I found a paperback printer that could handle short production runs at a price I could handle and with the quality I wanted. We've been putting out paperbacks ever since.

Any advice for our readers who would like to earn a by-line from Word Riot?

Read the magazine. Get familiar with the kind of work we publish. That's pretty true for every magazine, I guess. Don't play the whole spray-and-pray game (when you send submissions everywhere and hope somebody decides to publish your work). Editors hate that. At Word Riot, we like gritty subject matter, bizarre humor, and anything with an edge.

As a writer, what impresses you about editors/publishers?

I like editors and publishers who aren't thrown off by difficult subject matter. I respect editors who take a chance on pieces that have a certain emotional vulnerability to them.

As an editor/publisher what impresses you about writers?

I'm impressed by writers who aren't afraid to really expose their pathos on the page, to really dive into what makes them and the rest of us humans tick. I like writers whose work can speak to us in a quiet, naked moment.'
Culled From www.absolutewrite.com

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