The New Oeste: Literatura Latinx of the American West in the 21st Century

Series Editors: León Salvatierra and Daniel A. Olivas

The University of Nevada Press announces a new book series, The New Oeste, which celebrates the outpouring of creative expression by Latinx writers in the American West of the 21^st century. In border-breaking literary arts informed by perspectives as distinctive as the American West, the authors in the series explore the artistic, cultural, and intellectual connections between the region’s complicated past and its diverse future. With a commitment to the power of prose and poetry to unite, educate, and enrich, the series editors seek to support projects from unique voices that invite connection and inclusion within the American West. Currently, the editors seek fiction, poetry, and creative nonfiction that expand conceptions of the West and its people.

To submit a book proposal to The New Oeste or generally to the University of Nevada Press, follow the guidelines at this link.

***

And just a reminder that on January 25, 7:00 p.m., I will be a guest of the Friends of the Alameda Free Library to discuss my short-story collection How to Date a Flying Mexican: New and Collected Stories (University of Nevada Press). I will be interviewed by the wonderful poet, León Salvatierra. The event will be streamed live, and you may register now at this link. It helps the event planners if you can register early, so if you have a moment, please do so. We will be discussing many things including the writing life, the creation of this short-story collection, and also preview the forthcoming Spanish translation of How to Date a Flying Mexican which will be released in May. I hope to see you (virtually) there!

Where Have All the Periodicals Gone, Long Time Passing?

August Reflections On the State of Literatura Chicana

Michael Sedano

Chicano Literature is the only world literature we can point to and say this is its first day.

 

In 1969, Quinto Sol Press published the first book, a literary collection, with the word “Chicano” in the title. It is the fifth printing of El Espejo: The Mirror. 

Initially subtitled as Selected Mexican-American Literature, the 1969 edition tosses numerous writers, adds a pantheon of soon-to-be household names, and now calls itself Selected CHICANO Literature, and just like that, Chicano Literature comes into existence. 

 Quinto Sol Publications also publishes a hybrid journal, El Grito, that combines criticism and scholarship with the literature that provides the raw materials for El Espejo as well as the heartbeat of a vital literary enterprise. Quinto Sol Publications creates Premio Quinto Sol, every other year honoring the best of Chicano Literature.

 

This foundational publisher selects Tomas Rivera, Rudolfo Anaya, Rolando Hinojosa, and Estela Portillo-Trambley the first four Premio Quinto Sol honorees. The honored works, along with El Espejo’s table of contents, and the ongoing intellectual ferment of the journal, set standards for writing defining itself as Chicano Literature and Chicano Scholarship.

 

Then there was pedo. People felt left out by left coast raza.

 

Scholars and creative writers said Quinto Sol and its enthusiasts are a bunch of cultural nationalists and they’re excluding everything else not Mexican. They formed a rival enterprise to publish their own journal. 

Quinto Sol dissolved in 1974 while Revista Chicana-Riqueña would die and get reborn under different titles and lasted years. Eventually an outstanding anthology comes of that multi-named journal, The Floating Borderlands: Twenty-Five Years of U.S. Hispanic Literature. (1988)

 

Those were the good old days of Chicano Literature. So many stakeholders risking time, money, and pedo to bring product to market. There was a need for those voices, even if they couldn’t all just get along. 

 

This nutshell history is the ongoing subject of academic inquiry and journal publications. For example, a quick Google search turns up a 2010 piece in MELUS (Multi-ethnic Literature in the US) “Good-Bye Revolution—Hello Cultural Mystique: Quinto Sol Publications and Chicano Literary Nationalism.” Literature historians will recognize Juan Bruce-Nova’s 1986 “Canonical and Non-Canonical Texts” as the first intellectual to challenge Quinto Sol’s universe. Bruce-Novoa started the pedo.

 

Thankfully, raza’s cultural rivalries settled down in favor of accommodation and a worldview based upon inclusion. The east coast tipos had a point, even if they can live with calling themselves “Hispanic.” Hijole.

 

Technology has also played an important role by making individual publishing more democratic—i.e., less expensive—enabling small publishers to reach a market that has always existed across a widespread geography, where access to booksellers, and distribution of product, add expense and nearly-insurmountable logistics hassles that a mass publisher handles in stride.

 

Small, entrepreneurial enterprises like Aztlán Libre Press, FlowerSong Books, and Golden Foothills Press, publish ever-growing catalogs without needing warehouses filled with unsold books and fat advances. Publishing becomes a matter of selling the book first. Marketing, getting out the word, becomes a publisher and author's only avenue to sales. A corollary of all capitalist enterprise takes hold: books won't sell themselves.

 

Any publisher, not just small enterprises, can advertise, market, and use print-on-demand to control inventory/consignment headaches. Readers no longer struggle seeking titles hard-to-find owing to a publisher’s small run of a few hundred books; any independent bookseller can order a POD title and deliver it as fast as the post office can run. Remember the frustration of going through Books In Print and lamenting the impossibility of getting a particular title?

 

El Grito and Revista aside, Chicano Literature’s two best literary magazines emerged in recent years. Sadly, Más Tequila Review and Huizache, have not published in years, perhaps won’t. The driving spirits behind the projects, Richard Vargas and Dagoberto Gilb, maintain their busy literary lives so their reluctance to put on their Editor/Publisher’s hat is understood.

 

That’s why it’s time for you to step up to the print-on-demand plate. I know the web offers a potpourri of raza-flavored places to visit, like La Bloga, que no? November 28th marks our eighteenth birthday. 

But I'm thinking of Print.

For all I know, there’s already a successor to El Grito, Revista Chicana-Riqueña, Más Tequila Review, Huizache, out there but it hasn’t crossed my eyes yet. If you know of such a resource, fix my eyes, por favor.

 

I nominate The Cheech in Riverside, California, to be the cultural centro that takes on a literary dimension. Imagine a monthly journal—print--a hybrid bringing original art and literature combining informed art history and literary criticism, serious stuff but written for general and YA readers.

 

Is Print dead? 

 

 

*** LA BLOGA INBOX *** JUST RECEIVED ***

Note: La Bloga-Tuesday usually doesn’t “rip and read” political copy, but this exceptional opportunity both to celebrate Pat Paulsen’s memorable 1968 presidential campaign, and to fix what’s wrong with LA, is too juicy to ignore, so with a sense of public service and not ignoring it, here's the release

 

Pat Paulsen Commemorative Write-In Mayoral Campaign Announces Candidate, Platform

**immediate release**

Credit: Campaign Portavoz. Contact: Rusty Cuchillo, Benjamin Dejo.

(Los Angeles, Aug2, 2022) Following weeks of intensive closed-door negotiations, the Pat Paulsen Commemorative Write-In Mayoral Campaign, PPCW-IMC, narrowed its choice to Galardonada García, a retired elementary schoolteacher, and the overwhelming choice, Michael Sedano, retired Vernon warehouse worker and United States Army Veteran. 

 

Sedano, who declares, “I’d rather be right, than Mayor”,when scoffers call the platform absurd, expects bruising criticism from the real estate developer and the career politician on the Ballot and supposedly the only choices in the race. 

 

"That’s why there’s a Write-In," Sedano reminds. 

 

García, calling for unity and jamas sera vencido politics, endorses Sedano wholeheartedly.

 

The single issue the PPCW-IMC runs on relates to the city’s new Sixth Street Viaduct, a bridge across the cemented channel of the Los Angeles river.

 

Cuchillo and the campaign already released the Platform, now tweaked by write-in candidate Sedano:

 

PPCW-IMC Campaign to Write-In Michael Sedano and Elect Him Mayor and Make the Bridge the People’s Puente Promises Your Write-In Vote for Sedano means
•Weekend closure to vehicles. 

•Free puestos for community vendors

•Thursday night drag races for troubled youth versus clean-cut youth.

•Saturday night all-comers quarter-mile championships

•Sunday menudo competition climaxing in a 4^th of July cook-off. Red only.

•Dam the LA River at 7^th Street. Fill the channel with water from Frogtown to 7^th.

•Divert funds from LAPD and eliminate other armed agencies to pay for the dam, water purification, lifeguards, and trout.

 

The Pat Paulsen Commemorative Write-In Mayoral Campaign urges voters eligible to vote in the Los Angeles Mayoral election to Register Today.

 

In lieu of campaign donations, which are refused, PPCW-IMC urges people support Planned Parenthood and GOTV, never vote R.

 

**Append**

Rusty Cuchillo apologizes for some reporters’ misimpression that Sedano disrespects LAPD handling of the first days of the new bridge, when police closed the bridge rather than shoot drag racers and vehicular hobbyists. “I credit their restraint,” Sedano says, “and you can quote me,” adding his platform reduces the department’s budget to pay for converting the Sixth Street Bridge into the people’s Puente with weeknight drag races and Sunday menudo sales, "but you gotta write-in Sedano" or it's S O S.

 

Chicanonautica: My Life as the Father of Chicano Science Fiction

by Ernest Hogan

It started out as a joke--the Father of Chicano Science Fiction. Yeah, I can go with it. Kinda describes me, kinda funny. It lets gente know that I don’t take things too seriously. Then, like a lot of things in my life, it took on a life of its own. Maybe it’s getting out of hand.

It ain’t so pinche dignified, but then neither am I. “Father” fits me. “Progenitor” sounds too pretentious. Just call me Papí Hogan.

What was once a fun and silly label has become a role I have to play in this bizarre stage of our civilization. There actually are duties that come with it.

Like Stan Lee said, “With great powers come great responsibilities.” Or was that the Bible? Marvel is becoming such a bigass chingadera these days . . .

As if publishing three novels and a whole lotta stories wasn’t enough for a born in East LA to accomplish.

This column is one way I can do my part, give back to the community, as some folks like to say. I can offer my opinions and experiences, for what they’re worth. It’s a non paying gig, but I do get to hijack it for self-promotion whenever I want to. And people seem to think what I have to say makes me worth hiring me (yes, for money) to do things like teach a master class in writing at UC Riverside.

Also through it, my publisher found me, which made it pay.

It also led to my judging the Somos en escrito Extra-Fiction Contest. (The deadline has come and gone, so it’s too late to send in an entry, so you’ll have to wait for next year.) I’m now waiting for them to send me the finalists, that I’ll be reading on my phone soon, while running around, making a living, and otherwise surviving in the not-quite post-COVID-19 world.

As El Papí, I try to keep up with what’s going on in the sci-fi, fantasy, and otherwise fantastical world of Latinoid culture. And it’s not easy these days. More of La Gente are getting published, and a lot of it is within my jurisdiction. I don’t have the money or time to buy and read it all, even though I know I’d enjoy sifting through it all.

It’s a good thing. The problem is--as I’ve learned in my nearly half-century literary career--getting published is one thing, getting through to an audience who will appreciate it is another.

And I’m not even getting near the whole issue of making money . . .

Yup, amigxes, getting your work published in one or more of the various forms that are available in these modern times isn’t enough. You have to make connections with the people who are willing to read, and are able to enjoy them. This has been a long, hard guerrilla campaign, because the New York-centered, Anglophone publishing tends to look at anything Latin/Hispo/whatever as a specialty item that won’t make them money. Maybe we’ll sell a few copies to barrio intellectuals, but aren’t they kinda rare, and those people don’t speak English, much less read, don’t they?

 

So we have to break that barrier (a HUI!HUI!HUI! To Silvia Morena-Garica who’s been making headway in this arena). Self-promotion and publicity is the name of the game here. We have to do what we can to educate a lot of people who already think they’re pretty damn smart, so we have to be sneaky, smart, and even entertaining.

So when I have a new story in one anthology (Speculative Fiction For Dreamers) and another coming soon (El Provenir, Ya!), I have to go out and tell the world. I end up rushing home from my job with the Phoenix Public Library to log in late for a Zoom party, doing interviews, both written and on video, and whatever else I can manage. My Hispanic/Latinx Heritage month has been crazy.

Sometimes I make a fool of myself. Stay tuned. I’ll be making announcements and posting links.

If we can just become profitable without becoming another corporate product.

Ernest Hogan wrote High Aztech, Cortez on Jupiter, and Smoking Mirror Blues, and is working on another novel that is already out of control.

Birthing a New Book

 

The typewriter owned by Michael Augustine Olivas

On Sunday, I received my copy editor's redline to my manuscript, How to Date a Flying Mexican: New and Collected Stories (University of Nevada Press), coming out in February 2022. The email included a lovely letter from my copy editor, Robin DuBlanc, that began:

“Congratulations on How to Date a Flying Mexican. Your stories are by turns intriguing, funny, poignant, charming, alarming, and above all human. I had to force myself to slow down while editing because I often had a tendency to rush to see what would happen next.”

And so, the birthing of my new book truly begins. This will be the twelfth time I’ve worked with a copy editor on one of my books (I’ve written ten books, and served as anthology editor for two), and each time, I get butterflies of anticipation. But this book is particularly special to me. As I explain in my introduction to the manuscript, my late father, Michael Augustine Olivas, loved the title story which is why I chose it to lead off the book and set the tone, if you will. I also dedicate the collection to him.

My father's declining health and my weekly visits with him inspired me last year to review my published stories of the last 20-plus years and choose my favorites for this collection. I then added two newer ones to complete it. My father, who passed away September 23, 2021, never lived to hear the news that a publisher enthusiastically accepted it earlier this year. But we had an opportunity to discuss my selection process which brought him great joy.

My father never got to publish his own fiction and poetry. He worked in a factory while he and my mother raised five children. But he wrote on a little manual typewriter when I was young and completed a novel and many poems. However, publishers rejected his submissions. I think my father was ahead of his time. Very few publishers would even consider a manuscript written by a Chicano who told stories and had themes that were not "mainstream."

He eventually destroyed his manuscripts and focused on getting his college degree and master's. So, when I became a published writer over 20 years ago, my father was so proud. Writing was our special bond. I miss him dearly.

Chicanonautica: American Dirty Secrets About Publishing

by Ernest Hogan

I started writing this as the American Dirt pendejada raged , giving impeachment and the coronavirus some serious competition. What’s with these death threats? What do we expect, attacks by vatos locos with obsidian blades and blowguns?

Since then,  #DignidadLiteraria  (Myriam Gruba, David Bowles, and Roberto Lovato) met with Flatiron Books/Macmillan. The publisher promised to “try to be less white.” Also, it was confirmed that Jeanine Cummins DID NOT RECEIVE DEATH THREATS . . .

Now my problem is to come up with stuff that hasn't done to death by the time this goes live. Luckily, being a long-time Chicano writer who worked for ten years for the corporate bookstore chain, Borders (awk! Am I going to have to explain what it was?), I've got some inside information that may help define this mess.

They won’t admit it, and cry if you accuse them of racism, but the Nueva York-based publishing industry thinks that books are a white people thing. Even in the futuristic year of 2020, when they see a writer or story that isn’t of the demographic of this planet’s English-speaking, Caucasian minority, they panic in fear of losing money. They are so sure that “the audience” won’t buy such things.

So if they want to sell the plight of folks who need to cross the border to the Oprah Book Club audience (which are almost exclusively middle class white ladies), they have to get an unthreatening, sorta Latina gal to do some research and come up with something that they can pimp the hell out of, while they keep on ignoring all of us Latinx (-oid, whatever) writers who have been writing lots of material about this subject for years. I could walk around my house and assemble an impressive pile of such books.

Yeah, I know, they aren’t “bestsellers”--that genre unto itself that are designed to be easy to read, and never quite take “the audience” out if its safe zone. But now and then they need to feel smart, they go for Oprah-type offerings that titillate but never go too far.

Also, the whole “bestseller” business is a fraud. It’s rare that a book comes out of nowhere, makes the lists and sells big. Usually, it’s decided which books are going to be “bestsellers” in advance. There’s advance media hype, a book tour is planned. The publishers pay the bookstores to display the books as “bestsellers.”

No matter how many times I’ve tried to tell this, book lovers don’t want to believe it, but I’ve unpacked the books, and put up the displays myself.

What’s really interesting is what usually happens afterwards. Most of these expensive hardcovers with discount stickers on them, don’t sell. After sitting there for a few weeks, the stickers get torn off, and the books are moved back to shelves, where they mostly sit until they are sent back for credit. Bookstores generate a lot of income through returns. And eventually, the books end up in the dumpster and the landfill.

A helluvalota money is wasted.

When I sold my first novel, Cortez on Jupiter, because of my name, the publisher assumed that I was an Anglo who did research on Chicanos. I was asked if I was willing to use a “slightly Hispanic” pseudonym. When I told them I was a Chicano, they started to act weird.

They sabotaged my  second book. The only ad had a blank space instead of text. No review copies were sent out even though my first book had a lot of good reviews. When I tried to get copies for a book signing, I was told that they had no copies left; when my agent asked if they were going to do a second printing, they said they didn’t sell, they were just, er . . . gone! For years I got royalty statements that claimed that practically no copies sold, but huge caches were being unearthed and returned for credit.

 

And somehow, High Aztech has acquired a reputation as a classic, and is discussed and taught at universities, nearly thirty years after its first publication.

I can understand these big-time publishers wanting to make money. I want to make money, too. It would be great if we could do it together.

And I can’t help but wonder how much money we would have made if they hadn’t treated me like the most talented leper they ever met.

Ernest Hogan, the Father of Chicano Science Fiction, is alive and well in the literary underground, where he keeps one foot, so that when the shit hits the fan, he’ll have a place to stand.

Poseurs in NY Editorial Suites

Limpia Contra Mugre Americana

Michael Sedano

Five New York publishing houses bid on the book, the mugre that says its name. One million dollars reflected an editor's confidence in the author. Four editors walked away empty-handed. I bet those four are thanking their lucky stars right now, and the winner has severe buyer's remorse.

Published and Banned in the United States.
Librotraficante smuggles books to children in Tucson.

Decisions have consequences and those five anxious bidders all need to be fired for cause. They're frauds.

Those editors and their entire staffs aren't earning their keep. They're the publishing industry's experts on United States literature, thus our culture's gatekeepers. Yet, it's painfully obvious these gatekeepers do not have a professional grasp on the field of Literature. They don't know who's out there being kept out.

If they knew, they would have given that money to someone who knew what she was doing. They could have produced the same book but it would have met a higher standard of quality. But that book, it has been done.

The Great "American" Immigration Novel was written by... At this point, the beseiged editors and staffs will be defenseless to contest any name to fill the ellipsis. NY Editors pose as literary experts but clearly they do not know the field. And the people they hire don't know what they're doing. Their literary compass has excluded an entire culture's writing, and they don't know it.

It's not their fault. They graduate from east coast prep schools, go to Seven Sisters or Ivy League colleges, and know British Literature and its descendants over here. Their 3 unit course on "world literatures" may constitute their sole exposure to the non-Western canon.  (Insert outrage at stereotypy. ¿Ves?) And they really don't have to work but they love books.

Until the publishing corporations bring in help who come with professional-level knowledge of United States Literature, raza and other readers will have to help the hapless staffs wipe the egg off their faces. 

Chicano author David Bowles(link) has una limpia contra mugre to perform in public. Trucha! Sabes que? the prospect of raza demanding dignidad literaria already led Flatiron press to cancel a La Jolla reading out of "safety concerns". 

An individual can take this action: pick up a good book by a Chicana Chicano writer, any raza writer, read it again and give it to a friend. If everyone did this, given the 3-degrees of separation rule, those beknighted NY editors and staffs will be flooded with books by raza writers in 29 days. Maybe 30.

Here are five titles illustrative of the immense breadth of raza literary production. If one were to compile a list of the Top 100 U.S. 20th Century Novels, these five would have their place:

Graciela Limon. Memories of Ana Calderon.
Benjamin Saenz. Carry Me Like Water.
Alfredo Vea. Gods Go Begging.
Alicia Gaspar de Alba. Sor Juana's Second Dream.
Ana Castillo. Peel My Love Like an Onion.

The Great "American" Immigration Novel is a memoir, A Dream Called Home. Reyna Grande, its author, joins the author of American Dirt, in conversation at the LA Times book club March 11. A ver.




#DignidadLiteraria: From David Bowles

NUESTRA GENTE:
Thanks to your passion, brilliance & drive, the US is beginning to see Latinxs differently, given our indignity in the wake of the unfortunate publication & marketing of #AmericanDirt.

We made our point--now we should pivot to something far more important than a single white woman who stole our stories: US, our voices, our power, our beauty, our historias, and our dignidad.

We call on Latinx writers, artists, & rebels to join us in staging actions this coming week: inspired, angry, beautiful actions that will draw the nation’s attention to a community of 60 million left off of bookshelves & out of the national dialogue, a community targeted because the humanity of our stories is still being muted.

NO MÁS

We ask you to organize actions in the streets and online under the banner of our DIGNIDAD.

#DignidadLiteraria

Interview with an Editor: Toni Kirkpatrick

Melinda Palacio

Toni Kirkpatrick

You may have met Toni Margarita Plummer at the National Latino Writers Conference in New Mexico and wondered what happened to that nice New York editor? Her last name may be different and she may have a different title, but she is still ready to assist you with your books. Since moving on from a position as an acquisitions editor at St. Martin's Press, Toni Kirkpatrick is still focused on helping writers with their book projects, but in a slightly different form. She has gone into business for herself as a freelance editor. Toni took time out of her busy schedule to answer five questions for La Bloga.

1. How is your new editing role different from what you were doing at St. Martin's Press?

I worked at Thomas Dunne Books/St. Martin's Press for over ten years, considering submissions, acquiring fiction and nonfiction, and editing my authors' manuscripts line by line to prepare them for publication. My job involved much more than just editing though. Now I am working for the writer and am focused solely on helping him or her to make their manuscript as strong as it can be. I am not an editor checking for commas and the like. My background is in reading for characters, plot, style, and setting. I still read and edit with the mind of an acquiring editor; I ask if this is something an editor would want to acquire, and something a reader would want to read. And if I see any issues there, I think about how those can be resolved.

2. Who are your clients?

They are writers of many different genres. Some are looking for agents and publishers, some plan to self-publish. Some are referred to me by agents who are interested in their work but don't have the time to help them revise. All my clients have written something they feel strongly about and want to put their best work out into the world by having a professional editor critique and edit it.

3. Who is your ideal client?

My ideal client is a talented writer who has worked very hard on a manuscript and is committed to making it better. They are open to my comments and expertise, and I in turn enjoy what they've written and am engaged by it. Hopefully something I say or question sparks their imagination and gives them a new way of looking at a character or a scene. I would love to get more Latino clients--I've a special interest in these stories and I want to see more Latino authors publish their work and find large audiences for it. 

4. In addition to being an editor you are also an author. How does one role affect the other? 

As an author I understand a writers' attachment to their work and their hopes and dreams for it. On the other hand being an editor has definitely helped me to see my own writing more objectively and I am very grateful for that.

5. What is your take on the current publishing landscape for Latino writers?

Getting published (and staying published) is a challenge for anyone. But what’s being discussed a lot now is the lack of Latinos working in publishing and how this affects the number of books by Latinos that are being bought and effectively promoted. I'm part of a fairly new group called Latinos in Publishing, which meets in Manhattan every month and whose goal, among others, is to increase the number of Latinos working in the industry. It's a group of extremely talented and passionate folks--keep an eye out for more from them soon. Sisters in Crime also just put out their Publishing Report about diversity in crime fiction which you can read here: http://www.sistersincrime.org/page/ReportforChange.

So there is increasing awareness about this and lots of authors and publishing professionals working to get more books by Latinos published. Keep writing. Do your homework. There are so many venues and opportunities to publish, even now, and I am very excited to be working with writers at this earlier stage in the process.

More about Toni: Toni Kirkpatrick was an Editor at Thomas Dunne Books/St. Martin's Press for over ten years. She acquired mostly crime, historical, multicultural, and women's fiction. Some of her authors included Michael Jaime-Becerra, Dahlma Llanos-Figueroa, M. Padilla, Irete Lazo, A.E. Roman, and Caridad Ferrer. A native Californian, she published The Bolero of Andi Rowe, a story collection set in the San Gabriel Valley of Los Angeles, under her maiden name Toni Margarita Plummer. She graduated from the Master of Professional Writing Program at USC and is a member of Macondo, the group of socially-engaged writers founded by Sandra Cisneros. Toni lives in the Hudson Valley with her husband and son. Check out her website www.ToniKirkpatrick.com for more information on her background and editorial services.

Coast to Coast Interview with Toni Margarita Plummer

Melinda Palacio

Toni Margarita Plummer at the Santa Barbara Writers Conference

On Tuesday, Michael Sedano wrote his review for The Bolero of Andi Rowe. I’ve also recently finished Toni Margarita Plummer’s book and relished each of the stories. What struck me was the outstanding way in which she portrays strong, female characters who are in control of their sexuality. These are not your abuela’s stories of rebellion and tortilla making, but contemporary coming of age stories, set in South El Monte, Plummer’s hometown. Of the Winner of the Miguel Mármol Prize and Honorable Mention in the Mariposa Award, Sandra Cisneros writes:

“Heartfelt stories of girls who ache to live in any other world than the one given them and who disastrously believe falling in love is the only way to get there. American tales for the new millennium.”

First Book Panel at the SBWC with Amy Franklin-Willis, Melinda Palacio, Ramona Ausubel, and Toni Margarita Plummer

Attendees at the Santa Barbara Writers Conference had the pleasure of hearing Toni Margarita Plummer both as an editor and an author on the first book panel, which included Amy Franklin-Willis (The Lost Saints of Tennessee), Ramona Ausubel (No One Is Here But All of Us), and Melinda Palacio (Ocotillo Dreams). This year the SBWC had the best first book panel, and the best looking bunch as well. Sure, I’m biased because I was on the panel. I’ve also had several people tell me they appreciated our candid words. I’ve been attended the SBWC for ten years and it was certainly the most packed first book panel. Our moderator was late and we took over. Judge for yourself and read all of our books and then you can add your comment of how great it was to read these four female authors in conjunction.

Interview with Toni Margarita Plummer

Melinda Palacio: After polishing these award-winning stories, what have you learned about yourself as an author and what surprises you most about your role as author?

Toni Margarita Plummer: Well, I know that I love being an author! Now that I have this first book done I want to write 10 more! What’s surprising is hearing how differently people can read the same story. As readers, we seize on different things, connect with different aspects. And some readers have made these really insightful comments, things I never even thought of.  So the writing and intention is one thing, and the interpretation is another. It’s fun that we can discuss these stories. I’m the author, but that doesn’t mean I’m the only one who has anything to say about them. I revised them a lot. So it’s also great to know that they’re being well-received. I feel my instincts were right.

MP: How do you know when to end a story? Do you change your mind often about the ending?

TMP: The ending is usually the one part that stays the same! It’s more likely I’ll decide to begin in a new place or play around with the middle.  I usually know where I want to go. It’s getting there that can be tricky.

MP: You write about women who own their sexuality, such as Inez Suarez. Who is your biggest influence in writing strong women characters and why is this important to you?

TMP: I think of Inez as not really knowing what else to do with herself, or how else to express her sexuality, and so she’s in this pattern where she moves from guy to guy and does the whole club scene. But strong women and women exercising their sexuality is very important to me. I don’t think that comes from any particular influence, but more from just my experiences as a woman and hanging out with other women. A woman’s sexuality is a key part of who she is. So it’s really more about capturing the reality that I’ve seen and writing women who are as true-to-life as possible.

Melinda and Toni in Manhattan two weeks ago

MP: What is your favorite thing about being an editor in New York?

TMP: It’s finding authors whose work I love and connect with. I get to share that work with my colleagues and ultimately with the larger reading public. Your whole self goes into selecting the books you acquire. It can end up being quite personal. What’s really gratifying is hearing that other people love it too. I guess that’s more than one thing!

MP: Since your life allows you to see both sides of writing, what advice would you offer to begining writers.

TMP: So many writers focus on just getting that first book published. Of course that’s important, but it’s just the beginning! Set long-term goals for your writing. Remember that a career is usually built over many books. Be a part of the literary community however you can.

MP: What else would you like to tell readers of La Bloga about yourself?

TMP: I recently joined the board of Kweli Journal, an online literary journal for writers of color. We’re always looking for submissions, and we’re especially in need of nonfiction. Check out the website: http://kwelijournal.org. You can also read a short story of mine there, about Andi Rowe!


MP: Read more about Toni Margarita Plummer on her website: http://tonimargaritaplummer.wordpress.com/