Mik Everett's Blog

Mik Everett is a 22-year-old writer living in Wichita, Kansas with her daughter. She is a staff editor at Kleft Jaw Press and co-founder of Syntactics Literary Development Group.

[mikeverett]

It's been a year since I quit being Mik Everett and it's very nice not sharing my life with a crazy author any more. If you need to reach me, I can be found at karenfelloutofbedagain.

[bookriot]

But now I have twins. They’re three years old. The judgey stuff has changed from “You’ll never find time to read once you have kids!” (except I did and do) to “How do you have time to read with twins?” and still, no one is saying those things to my husband. So, I’ve come to this conclusion: the idea that you can’t find time to read once you have children is bullshit if reading is a big priority to you, your kids are healthy, and you have a partner to help you, and it’s mostly sexist bullshit.

from Have Babies, Keep Reading by Amanda Nelson (via bookriot)

[homoscope]

Fiction gives us empathy: it puts us inside the minds of other people, gives us the gifts of seeing the world through their eyes. Fiction is a lie that tells us true things, over and over.

Neil Gaiman- Fahrenheit 451 Introduction (via dortheaisles)

[whereareyoupress]

Where Are You Poet and Where Are You Artist is here!

We are looking for poets and artists to become a part of the Where Are You Press line up! Are you a poet? We want to publish your chapbook! Send us your manuscript before August 22nd to be a part of our second annual submission contest! 

Are you an artist? We’re launching our first annual Where Are You Artist submission contest! Have your art be sold as a poster or sticker in the Where Are You Press etsy store! Submit before August 22nd! Rules and guidelines can be found here!

Good luck and we are stay posted for new updates and other Where Are You Press events! It’s a busy and sunny summer for us here and we’re so glad for y’all to be a part of it. Sincerely, The Press

[mikeverett]

Aside from Tumblr, where else do you go to fight for your advocacies? I mean, do you join street protests and pickets?

Not usually; I work forty-hour weeks and have a young child. I'd take her to those kinds of things if I knew for a fact they'd remain peaceful and she'd be safe, but that isn't guaranteed. I advocate through communication: Yes, in real life as well as on the internet, with anyone I meet. Discussion is what brings about understanding.

[thommquackenbush]

How to Quit Amazon and Shop in an Actual Bookstore

[mikeverett]

And why you damn well should

[theparisreview]

“Writers ever since writing began have had problems, and the main problem narrows down to just one word—life.”

William Styron (via theparisreview)

[kleftjaw]

Coming Soon from Kleft Jaw Press...

Coming Soon from Kleft Jaw Press…

July:

View On WordPress

[maxkirin]

Stories may well be lies, but they are good lies that say true things, and which can sometimes pay the rent.

Neil Gaiman (via topazwoods)

[bookriot]

Do you have a bias against self-published books? One of our Rioters talks about an encounter at Book Expo America with a self-published author and how he’s glad he took a chance.

[therumpus]

I remember someone in class, one of my friends, a guy, saying, “You know, you’re writing stories about women for women,” and it had never dawned on me. It was so insulting—and now I’m like, You know what? Maybe I am writing for women. Not just for women, but I am a woman! And the fact that that’s something that literary women writers don’t talk about…I find that a little confusing, and I wonder if that makes younger literary women writers feel like there’s something less valuable to that.

The Rumpus Interview With Julia Fierro (via therumpus)

[theparisreview]

“You’re…writing for other writers to an extent—the dead writers whose work you admire, as well as the living writers you like to read.”

Raymond Carver (via theparisreview)

[micdotcom]

Of the 3,200 kids’ books published in 2013, only 253 were about people of color 

Enter the #WeNeedDiverseBooks campaign. 

Launched on May 1, the campaign’s plan is a two-day hashtag and photo barrage in order to wake up the publishing world, or as they put it, to turn their voices into a “roar that can’t be ignored.” They’re campaigning, yes, for diversity in children’s books but also acknowledgement of the diverse authors who are already writing those books. Book fairs and panels often highlight exclusively white writers which feeds into the larger problem. In fact, the event that inadvertently caused this uproar was the readers’ convention BookCon which featured an all-star line up of 30 children’s writers. All 30 of them were white. 

Read more | Follow policymic

[mikeverett]

in my fantasies, i have written

a very famous book

and i speak at universities

and i am thin.

in my fantasies, i have a big house

& a garden & honeybee hive

i am self-sustaining

and i am thin.

i take my daughter to the museums

&i can afford dance classes for her

i am the spitting image of selfless motherhood

and i am thin.

i get a raise, i am charitable, i am respected

but only if i take up less space.

my fantasies are weak things. insubstantial

like my body in my visions

i want a fantasy where i accept a nobel peace prize

with bulging thighs

i want a dream

where i build houses for the homeless

and my body can lift the weight

of conflict and shingles and hate

where no one looks down on me

i am like a mountain

unmoveable and unstoppable and permanent

but

i do not have these dreams.

if only i took up less space.

i have fantasies where my daughter is beautiful. 

[viperslang]

complicate language. implicate language. subvert language. assert language. convert language. use language. diffuse language. refuse language. invent language. dissent language. devastate language. coronate language. detonate language. celebrate language. 

[lady-adventurer]

Just a reminder that since #weneeddiversebooks, we also need to buy the diverse books that are already out there. That’s how publishers know we mean it.

[mikeverett]

The day after Imogen was released from Prairie View Psychiatric Hospital, she called the Homeland Choice grocery store to ask about a job. This was all part of the plan. The plan was new; scrawled into worksheet pages from Prairie View. As long as Imogen followed this plan, everything would be okay.