Green Light Press

[greenlightpress]

Lidia Yuknavitch, the author of the memoir chronology of water (which should have won a goddamn pulitzer) talks about her latest book, the female body, and just why you should take a crap on a table in a fancy restaurant.

Read it.

[greenlightpress]

Pirating isn't something we do often at Green Light. One, we are not savvy enough to understand how the more complex torrents work. Two, we have no real desire to take the things that are up for the taking. We are pirates who don't want the booty. That doesn't mean that we don't have a stake in the future of file sharing, just like everyone else.

Paulo Coelho has joined forces with Pirate Bay so that you can- yes, that's right- pirate his books. Coelho believes that when someone reads a piece of his work online, then they will feel a desire to buy a hardcopy, and he has the sales figures to prove it.

So what do you think? In an age where 'there's no such thing as an original idea' (debatable) and the internet provides a hive mind for people all across the world, does it make sense to make the work you slaved over available to virtual readers, in the hopes that they will like what they see enough to purchase a copy in real life?

[greenlightpress]

We at Green Light will willingly admit to being highly adverse to change. We don't like bluray DVDs, we aren't a big fan of phones that also play music, and we hate ereaders. However, one must admit when the future is looming, and in the case of the publishing industry, it is looming fast and hard.

The transition from print to ereader is not going to be easy. There are a lot of people who will not go gently into that good night. It's something to think about- what are the ereader's cons? It's pros? how are they changing the industry?

This article isn't about that. This article is about Barnes and Noble, that last of the book retail giants, and how it is fighting a somewhat noble and tiring battle with Amazon, utilizing its ereader- the Nook- in an almost literal fight to the finish. Who will win in the end? How are books going to change? Well, who knows. But right about now, we're living on a prayer.

[greenlightpress]

"Pedestrians at a Crosswalk," "After Eight Hours of Factory Work," "A Bath in Six Parts," "A Young Woman, A Straight-backed Chair, and a Tarnished Mirror," and "After 'Las Calles' by Jorge Luis Borges"

Pedestrians at a Crosswalk

When you halted at the pedestrian crossing 

we had finished sharing our stories, had four kids 

and a lack of sex. While I, too, waited for the light to change, I held you close, 

although a complete stranger. I grinned at the thought of your mouth crinkles, 

as they had always appeared like crepe paper when one of the kids 

made us proud. But when I reached toward my bun to release 

my still-wet scent in your direction, you had already averted your eyes.

After Eight Hours of Factory Work

It wasn’t until the ringer sounded like an anvil drum 

on a slave ship that we stampeded through 

the cafeteria, not registering the yellowed walls 

and stacked chairs. In a stupefied rush, we grabbed lunches 

and keys, jackets and cigarettes. Tromps of thunder had ceased 

rattling car windows. We were buffalo herding 

toward our cars, inhabiting a plain conquered 

by industry. The rain continued to drizzle. 

Coworkers lit up complaints and exhaled. 

Each person’s stare reflected the night, its walls, 

a person remaining in a job they despise. 

Trompe l’oeil (how concrete steps 

and conveyor belts create a factory, a method, a desire 

for more). How walls stem from air and illusion.

How just getting by is never enough.

A Bath in Six Parts

I

It’s because there’s no vent. 

The steam creates mildew, perhaps 

it’s mold, either way, it’s my first 

time living on my own. 

II

There are six moldy mildew spots. 

I still can’t decide what to call them. 

Several I can barely see beyond 

the fig plum scented foam. Two I wiped 

away with a toilet paper square

before relaxing in a bath. But

of course, mildew grows from residue,

a simple wipe means it will grow back.

III

I plugged the drain so the water 

would not leave. It drains anyway.

IV

My nose is the only part of me 

above water, still, I smell the mildew

as strong as spilled nail polish on a carpet. 

Dew settles in my nose, hanging photos 

of snotty relatives on the walls of my nosehairs. 

I wiggle my nose. They turn on the TV.

There’s no getting rid of them. 

V

Only when I’m in the bathtub

can I hear my neighbors. Footsteps, 

murmurs, bootsteps. No groans. 

I mourn as I lie on the bottom 

of my tub with no control over 

the receding water, my draining 

love life, and the neighbors 

because they, at least, have each other. 

VI

While I wait for the moment when

they tire of pacing, and shouting, 

my eyes turn more grey than blue. I don’t

have to look in a mirror this time to feel

my optimism plummeting. I can hardly 

stand the smell of mildew, so I unplug 

the bath and it slurps down the drain.

A Young Woman, A Straight-backed Chair, and a Tarnished Mirror

As she was told, 

she looked ahead. 

Did not turn 

to either side. 

A maroon ribbon hugging her hair. 

Over and again 

the ribbon twirled 

between fingers, lingered 

on the desk, knotted 

a single braid, and 

ended up tied 

to the engraved chair. 

It had been nine years. 

  She could not 

place the language of loud, 

but longed to decipher 

the thwumps that trilled 

her awake. Birds 

threatening to slam through 

her privacy, her velvet drapes, exposing her,

shattering the glass, shattering—

Someone rapped on the hollow door.  

She could not move. 

It echoed. 

She blinked,  

tenderizing trenches 

in the chair’s arms. 

He had reassured 

her this was not

punishment. “Just 

an experiment,” tapping his cane 

on the wooden floor.

He brought her meals, 

savored her skin

of ivoire, like the tusk 

he gilded for his mantel.

The man with the monocle 

had impressed upon her 

the importance of obedience 

with darkened blinds 

and the luxury of a toy.

This was the only person

she had known. His affection,

damp and heavy like his suits

or the velvet drapes 

or the fragrant musk 

rich in the dank room.

She awoke from a day-

dream—she had slapped

the lechery right out of the man! 

Her ribbon was missing.

On the floor, 

he held it. 

She could not reach.

She decided.

It had been long enough. 

She left the ribbon.

The rapping grew impatient.

An officer kicked the door 

off its hinges. The ribbon, 

left fluttering in fresh air.

After “Las Calles” by Jorge Luis Borges

Buenos Aires calls to me, enticing 

myself and my son. The wind speaks in vicious lashes 

the size of violet despair 

in barracks. Buildings looked upon 

as invisible, by habit. 

Barracks so small as to allow 

the wind more adventure. The wind lives 

immortally over great distances and becomes 

a permanent vision of movement. 

My son stands solitary beneath ponderosas, while 

the military signals to him—hurry up, 

you are precious to us. 

Even now, my son travels West, 

North and South, after speaking with his father. 

(Contributed by Dawn Coutu)

[greenlightpress]

Green Light Interviews: Eric Pinder

Green Light Press has known Eric Pinder- children's writer, occasional fleer of bears, and bike rider extraordinaire- long enough to tell you this: you will never meet a man so kind. You will also never meet a man so focused on the art of writing. It was in Mr. Pinder's class that wee little Green Light first came to understand the somewhat staggering odds stacked against all aspiring writers. Here he answers some important (or at least, we thought so) questions about writing and submissions.

1. How long did it take you to publish what you feel, to date, is your most 'successful' book?

Success comes in many flavors. The book that earned the most money up front didn’t sell the most copies in the end. The one I liked the best didn't get the best reviews. The book that still sells the best isn't the one I'd consider the most literary. So there are several ways to judge success. I'll use "successful" here in the sense of "which one are you proudest of?" The answer: either my newest picture book, If All the Animals Came Inside, or the nonfiction/memoir about teaching that I just finished. I bet a lot of writers would say that their latest book is their best, because we always keep improving. There are exceptions, of course. Sometimes a person's first novel is their personal masterpiece, and they never write a better one. Joseph Heller and Catch 22 come to mind. If All the Animals Came Inside took about three years from first draft to publication. Another book took several years to write and then another 10 years to find a publisher. 2. How easy or difficult do you feel it is to take criticisms meant to improve your work? Writers can be lousy judges of their own work, at least when the work is brand new. What seems like a masterpiece to us the day we write it might make us cringe two weeks or two years later. So it's helpful to get other people's input, to catch the typos and continuity errors and awkward sentences we'd miss. After revising the same scene 3,987 times, it's easy to forget how it might look to someone reading it for the first time. That's where workshops and critiques come in handy; they force us see our work again from that fresh perspective. Does criticism hurt? Sure. But it's necessary. 3. Do you prefer online or physical submissions? Do you feel one is superior to the other, and if so, why? Online submissions streamline the process. No stamps, no running to the store to buy new ink cartridges because the ink started to fade halfway down page 30. Pretty soon no one will know what a SASE is anymore. That said, you miss the actual paper rejection slips with helpful comments scribbled on them. Whenever I give my publishing pep talk at Chester College, I always bring in a big folder full of rejections slips in all sorts of sizes and colors, and let it fall on the table with a resounding thump. A student recently lamented the loss of the rejection slip. "I won't be able to have a collection like that," he said. I suppose you could print out email rejections, but it's not the same thing. 4. Roughly how many rejections do you think you received before your first acceptance? A round number is fine. Dozens, probably. I started sending off manuscripts in high school, and my first paid acceptance (a whole $80, almost enough to pay for a science textbook) came during college. 5. What traits or cultivated habits do you think would best help the aspiring writer? Persistence. The words won't write themselves. As author Jane Yolen says, if you want to be a writer you need "butt in chair!" To get the work done, you have to treat it as work. You have to write even when you're not in the mood to. 6. What is your favorite world myth? I'm a fan of Prometheus. He got a raw deal in the end with the torture-by-bird thing. But, hey, Prometheus, thanks for the fire. 7. If you had to pick one writer you were incredibly jealous of- and I mean punch in the face steal their girlfriend beat them in a car chase jealous- who would that writer be? I'm a painfully slow writer, so fast writers—the ones who can crank out a good book or two every year—fill me with envy. John McPhee, for example. I wish I'd written Encounters with the Archdruid. 8. True or false: you are your own worst critic. I'm going to be ambiguous and say "maybe." You're your own worst critic (i.e. "least likely to make good critical choices") while looking over a new rough draft, because you're too close to the work at that point. And you’re your worst (i.e. harshest) critic at other times, or at least I am, because I'm a perfectionist who never achieves perfection. It's frustrating. 9. How important would you say writers are now, as opposed to ten years ago, taking into account the sudden onset of e-reading technology? Words are still words, whether they're etched in stone, written on scrolls, printed in books or typed on a screen. Movie directors need screenwriters, politicians need speechwriters, and everybody needs or wants storytellers. Technology may change how our writing is presented, but writers will always be around. 10. What is your actual writing process like? For example, do you prefer longhand or typing? Desk or bed? Outdoors or locked in a car? I leave my laptop on next to a plate of cookies overnight, and hope little literary elves will finish the story for me. When that doesn't work, I eat the stale cookies and force myself to sit in front of the computer for at least a couple hours a day. I hate the actual process of writing, especially at the start of a new project. It takes a while to gather momentum. After that, it gets fun. But staring at that first blank page is torture. So I have to force myself to do it. I put on two CDs of background music, something non-distracting like Bach, and say, "Okay, you can't get up from this chair till the music stops. No emails, no games, no Facebook. Your only choices are write or do nothing," Usually out of sheer boredom, that forces me to write. And sometimes I get on a roll. Sometimes I look up after dozens of pages and realize it's dark out and the music stopped hours ago. Other times the music plays for a couple hours and I've still written nothing, so I go take a bike ride instead. Out hiking, I'll write longhand in a notebook. I think that's a good way to write first drafts, because the brain works differently that way. Most of the time I'm typing, though. 10. Finally, what is your advice to any aspiring writer? Don't hurry, and don't give up. Like many aspiring writers, I was eager to get published, in a rush. Some of those early works embarrass me now. They could've used another six months of a year of revision before the printing presses rolled. So don't hurry. That story you finished last week will be even better a year from now. Don't give up. Everyone gets rejected. The most successful writers are the ones with the thickest skins.

Eric Pinder is the author of several books across genres, including Tying Down The Wind: Adventures In The Worst Weather On Earth and North To Kathadin. His newest children's book, If All The Animals Came Inside, will be available from Little Brown Books in April of 2012. Eric Pinder spends some time teaching fledglings at Chester College of New England and some time getting lost in the Great North Woods. Visit him at www.ericpinder.com.

[greenlightpress]

While Green Light Press still seethes in jealousy that he managed to use the 'pumpkin with a gun' line first, there's no denying that Neil Gaiman has done amazing things for speculative fiction, fantasy, science fiction, and the 'nerdres' in general. However, while he is made of awesomesauce with a quaint British cherry on top, that's not the reason he is a link to save your soul.

There is an idea among those of us who struggle to gain any kind of commercial or critical success with our writing that writers who have achieved these things are untouchable. And, admittedly, some of them are, by their own choice or by the suggestions of their agents. However, you'll find that often enough, if you want to ask questions, they are good and nice people and will give you answers. Don't be afraid of the people who have made it to the top, or even nearish to the top. Be happy and be curious. Sure, you might find out Brett Eason Ellis is an asshole, but you never would have known if you hadn't thought to inquire, would you?

(kidding, Brett. We already know you're a polished asshole.)

The great writers are people, too. They put on their pants one leg at a time in the morning, they occasionally have to visit the bathroom, they stand in line at the bank. They even have tumblrs. Just like you.

[greenlightpress]

We here at Green Light Press are on rejection number...twelve? Thirteen? It's hard to keep count when they're online submissions. Anyway, we keep sending our work out and people keep politely telling us that it just isn't for them.

Rejection is every writer's fear. It is your mother telling you you're wasting your time, that jackass at the party last night who gave you a superior little smirk when you told him what you did for a living, your coworker at the job that actually pays asking you about your 'hobby'.

It is also as writerly American as apple goddamn pie. Or, you know, writerly French, British, Bavarian, whatever floats your boat. Chuck Wendig, of the blog Terrible Minds, gives you twenty five facts to keep in mind when you're getting those tiny slips of ambition-crushing paper in the mail. Or your inbox, depending. Wendig is good people, we promise- and there is a little light at the end of the tunnel.

[greenlightpress]

It's okay, Snoopy. We've all been there.

[greenlightpress]

In case you've ever wondered what the books do when the shop doors close.

[greenlightpress]

We at Green Light Press will willingly admit to having a bit of a crush on Steve Almond. He is one of the most sincere, kind, and forthright men in the world of literature today, and when he has something to say, he says it in a way that resonates with you. Steve Almond does not bullshit. Steve Almond tells it like it is. And there isn't a goddamn thing a lobbyist, a politician, a president or a hate mailer can do about it. 

[greenlightpress]

The Rumpus is an online journal dedicated to culture- and not the kind that makes you fall asleep in an over starched suit. They publish book reviews, weekly columns, comics and weekend links, among other fun things. Check that shit out.

[greenlightpress]

Minus The Queen

          I want to cut off my lips and rip holes through my cheeks. Maybe then I wouldn’t be a definition. Yes, I’ll cut off my lips and rip holes in my cheeks because no one wants to look at a girl who looks like that. No one wants to photograph a girl who looks like that.

            I wish I had a dick, and surrounded by my friends, I would hold up a magazine containing a picture of myself and say “I don’t see what’s so great about that chick.” And I would fall in love with that man, myself with a dick. I would get on my knees and suck out the emptiness of the man that gave me the best compliment I had ever received.

When I was six years old and attended private school, a girl named Susie invited me to her birthday party. She stood with her hands behind her back and she tipped back and forth on her heels and addressed me with rosy cheeks. I smiled and said yes.  Later on when I told my father he said I could not go. He said I was far better than that; I was the jewel of the family after all. His little angel would not be seen at a party so small and unimportant. He gave me a father’s smile and said, “In a few years you won’t even know that girl, she won’t be important to you.”

Daddy with his millions, daddy with his world wide hotels, daddy with his princess of gold, she never smiles.

I cried and told Susie I couldn’t go. When she asked why I walked away without answering. I see Susie sometimes, an apparition in a white house with the white picket fence, her husband carries kisses home from his long day at work and she is in the yard with the kids. She had told me once; back when we were six, as we swung back and forth on the wooden swing set and our dresses parachuted in the wind like careless ghosts, that she was going to name her son Michael and her daughter Sophie.

            I want to puncture my eyes just enough, not to blind me but to make them bleed. And when the blood dries I will walk down Rodeo Drive with crucified eyes and people will see me then look the other way and say, “That girl’s mascara is running, that ugly girl.” And the men with cameras will flash away because they care that I am walking down this street. Then he will walk up behind me with his muscular arms and say jokingly, “I didn’t know Jesus was inCalifornia.”

            And me, I’ll say back, “I don’t mind, Jesus was an ugly man.”

            Afterwards the magazines will be on the stands and the people will mourn, the people will cry. The front cover is their only window, their only light that has just burnt out.

I lay naked beside him, his dick erect and standing as proud as a child admiring their art on the fridge. He moves the hair covering my ears and whispers, “How about this time Diamond?”

            “No,” I say. I speak in blood clotted words and the syllables leak through the holes in my cheeks. I cannot pass this burden of beauty onto another, “No, not this time.”

            Me with a dick, he begins to masturbate and looks over at me, my breasts rising with each breath and the silence blankets us both. He reaches his left hand over and strokes my chest, his finger rolls down past my belly button and ends at my pubic hair then starts over.

            “That feels good,” I say.

            He smiles into the darkness, “I’m glad.” He’s done pleasuring himself and turns to rest his chin on my shoulder.

I cup my breasts and I say, “I hate these.”

“Why is that?”

“Look at how stupid they are,” I hit them and they bounce, “men love them.”

“I love your cheeks,” he says and sticks his finger into the hole and feels around the edge. My tongue darts up and licks his finger, a playful gesture.

“Did I ever tell you about that girl that drank the bleach?” I ask him.

“No,” he says and touches my breasts to feel their pointlessness.

“Her father had always told her boys were the devil; sex a one way ticket to hell. She went down on her boyfriend and felt so dirty afterwards. She drank bleach to wash out her mouth, the stupid girl.”

His dick shrinks and rests on my thigh and he’s still cuddling me and listening.

“The girl drank bleach because she felt like she failed her father. I want to fail my father.”

He takes his hands and covers my cheeks then bends down and kisses my scabbed mouth. I close my male eyes and my female eyes remain fixated on the dark ceiling. I can’t count the bumps.

There was a beach I used to visit with a boy, free from flashing cameras and the eye of the world. The waves reached out for only me, tickling my toes and I let the boy bathe in my ocean. We scaled the rocks in search for snails and crabs, hands locked and smiling. I felt as though I was six years old again, in my summer dress and when I talked to him I would sway like Susie did. The sun went down and still we did not leave, we spoke better under the moon. We danced and our pattern was mapped out in the sand. I came home early that morning and felt like a mermaid. Sand stained my hair and my body smelled of fresh ocean air. My father was furious and destroyed the beach, he revealed my secret. Like machines hidden under the shore, the cameras plagued my solitude and I never returned.

One day I wake up and there I am naked, spread eagle for everyone to see. My head has been super imposed onto another women’s body, her breasts as dumb as mine. All the men and boys will be staring, wondering what my pussy tastes like. And me in male form, I know what it smells like and I have tasted it with my tongue. The smells and tastes men imagine are not mine and I laugh because they do not know.

I’m looking at myself in the mirror and this is real and I’m beautiful. There are no holes in my cheeks and my lips are puffy and red. My father is downstairs waiting for me; another shoot for another magazine cover. Click, click, flash, flash, ooh, the endless parade of me, me, me.

“Give me some advice,” I say.

Me with a dick, he says “I left something for you in the dresser drawer.”

Last year on my birthday there were thousands of people I didn’t know, but they all knew me. They were so sincere and polite, all of them. Balloons covered the ceiling and colorful streamers hung down and touched my shoulders like the boy from the beach. The cake was the biggest cake I had ever seen, and the knife to cut it was the biggest knife I had ever seen. After I had blown out the candles and they began to dissect it, I expected the cake to bleed.

When I open the drawer there is a knife, the same knife that cut my cake last year. I reach inside and pull it out. I examine it and it gleams in the light as if to say “Hey there! Remember me?”

I unbutton my shirt and bra. I’m looking at myself in the mirror and this is real and my breasts are meaningless. When I punch the one covering my heart, I can feel a jingle of satisfaction pump through my blood. Daddy’s little angelic baby doll, she smiles.

I seal my princess-lips tight and hold in the screams as the knife cuts into my stupid fucking mountains of skin. I wonder what pain sounds like when it pours out of a cheek-less face.

The large wooden door to my room opens and my father walks in. “What the hell is taking you so long?”

I whirl around, and splatter the walls and carpet.

“Diamond!” he cries, as one my breasts hits the floor, just flat skin. “What have you done? You’re killing yourself! You’re killing me!”

I turn and look at myself standing beside the mirror, myself with a dick. The boy from the beach is there too, smiling, and his teeth sound like the waves crashing on the shore. And so is the girl. She is standing softly with a cup of bleach held out towards me. I take it and swish it down fast, my insides happily burning. Today I killed my father. Today I killed the world.

(contributed by Alexaro)

[greenlightpress]

The Night I Met Tom Waits (a one-minute stage fantasia in b-flat)

(to be read with a slow blues playing in the background and an air that says, "Why yes, I embrace the cliche and overwrought metaphor of detective novels--thanks for asking.") THE NIGHT I MET TOM WAITS               a one-minute stage fantasia in b-flat 

So, there I was. The sound of the sax made the smoke in the air part, as though Moses was coming through to order a beer and a bump. It was one of those little bars in Lowell whose better days had been even worse, and whose plywood paneling had long since turned a mildewed smoky gray.          ...and in a corner near the kitchen he sat, pouring over the scrapes and scars in an old wooden table that Kerouac himself might have used to wage his battle against the liver. I sat down, and ordered him a drink.

The visiting waitress, who seemed to frighten my friend with the size of her hair, confirmed the Kerouac legend. She lumbered on about local lore until the old man at the bar demanded further libations. As she walked away, my friend coughed out a laugh and muttered something like “Big tits and bad teeth,” then returned to contemplating the table.

Hour-long minutes dragged by, and the sax player’s fingers were the only movement in the stale, alcoholic air. I turned and asked my friend the meaning of it all. He reached into his pocket and took out a pack of Lucky Strikes – his muscle bulged as he crooked his arm, grown strong under the weight of so many tattoos. He lit it, and then looked at me through the smoke and over the burning ember between us, and said, “I jumped the shark when I put my trust in a crow named Sorrow.” Then he sat back in his chair.

He made no move to explain, and I didn’t ask. 

Staging notes: I always envisioned this as happening exactly as it reads. The narrator is able to walk through the events, narrating them as they occur, and is the only person on stage that can interact with the audience. Tom Waits merely sits at the table, hunched over. When the narrator quotes him, we can barely hear Tom speaking the line in unison--however his trademark gravelly voice is so overdone that, were it not for the narrator, we wouldn’t be able to understand what he had said. The waitress, when at the table, murmurs in some sort of gibberish language – sort of like the teachers in the old Peanuts cartoons. It is extremely important, however, that neither Tom nor the Waitress ever become louder or distract from the lines of the narrator, for it is truly him telling a story, and us witnessing the shadows of his tale.

 Also, while the “old man” and the “musician” can certainly be played off stage, there absolutely should be minimally a recording of a solo, dirty saxophone (if you choose not to go with a live musician), as the music very much represents much of the Tom Waits mystique. Also, while one certainly can’t expect a whole set to be built for a 1-minute play, small attempts to set the scene go a long way. A single neon beer sign flown in, for example, would do wonders in an otherwise “black box” setting. As far as finding an actor that looks like Tom Waits – I wouldn’t worry too much about it. During this era, he often wore beat up fedoras and pork pie hats pulled down low – so with the right “dark room” lighting, a hat, etc., anyone with generally the right build and medium to dark brown hair would probably do just fine.

(contributed by john michael sefel)

[greenlightpress]

Oh Snap It's A Blog

Hello, all, and welcome to Green Light Press. It is a tiny tumblr which yearns for submissions- yours, in point of fact.

Green Light wishes to act as a haven for artwork, in all of its forms. Sometimes submitting your work to a journal, magazine or a website can be utterly nervewracking. Green Light aims to give you a taste of the process without really forcing you to jump in the deep end. Think of us as the attached kiddie pool. The badass kiddie pool. We can't promise we won't be wracking some nerves, but we're hoping we make the experience a little simpler to ease into.

Here's how we do: Green Light Press is a submit blog. If you wrote something you think we'd like, then you use the handy submit button. If your piece makes it onto our tumblr, then you've been accepted. If not, buck up and try again- the average freelancer gets 200 rejections before their first acceptance.

To help you out we've posted submission guidelines and an FAQ under the pages subheading. Want a question answered we haven't put there? Ask as you would on any other tumblr.

Green light's on. Ready- set- go.