Thoughts on the Midnight Circus Reading

So Midnight Circus had its first reading, and it was glorious.

For those not familiar with Midnight Circus--not enough are--it is EAB Publishing's flagship publication, a quarterly literary mag that attracts talent from around the world. That's no joke; the submissions have come from a worldwide pool. It's awesome.

I happen to be the Production Manager of this fine publication, which is a pretty simple job despite the fancy title. All I do is make sure that every submission received is reviewed by people far more qualified than me. Well, those types of people are easy enough to find. Once the stories and poems are whittled down, I format the interior so that the scattered and various submissions become a book. It's fun. I get that little thrill that comes from creating a new piece of art without all of the torture and agony that often accompanies such an endeavor.
 
When it comes to the reading, I wasn't sure what to expect. As mentioned, this was the first one. Things usually go wrong the first time you try something. Would anybody show? Where was this UNO-Kaneko Library? Or is it the Kaneko-UNO Library? What was EAB thinking with this? Do people really come out to hear writers read?

Turns out, they do. Indeed they do. Somehow or another, I ended up with the job of adding chairs. Seems like a very Production Manager-y thing to me, so I was all for it. Seats would fill up, new arrivers wouldn't have anywhere to sit, and so I'd go to the back and grab more. Easy enough-- people seemed to arrive in pairs, so I'd grab a couple, set them up, and then grab a couple more, just in case, knowing nobody else would show up because we were already pretty full.

Then I'd repeat the process.

I think we added an extra 25 chairs to the 30 or so initially present--the people kept coming. It was great.

And why wouldn't they come, because the lineup was fantastic. Let's run it down. These aren't all names you might know now, but with any luck, you will soon. A.E. Stueve was killing it as MC. The readers: Jeff Lawler. Carrie Helmberger. Liz Kay. Kristen Clanton. Jeremy Johnson. Barbara Schmitz. Julie Rowse. Karen Shoemaker. All of them have appeared in Circus. Lots of talent, which was evident from the first reader, and they kept on coming. Honestly, this was the first reading I've ever attended, it always seemed to me that it would be a little awkward to hear writers read because it feels awkward for me to share my stuff. Well, I get it now.

Myself, I went through a bevy of emotions. This piece isn't about me, it's about a great night, but I can't help myself. As these creators kept reading, and knocking the breath out of the room, my thoughts went something like this:

This is great. Good stuff. Wow, great writing. This is really good. Ha ha, that was funny. So was that. Holy crap, I can't take it anymore--stop being good, people, you're making me feel bad. I call myself a writer? These are writers. I quit. I retire. Finished! Done! Matter of fact, I should just leave the room and return as a simple observer, because who am I to pretend I can lick these people's boots? Go out a wannabe writer and come back as whatever the hell I am.*

And so on. You know, self-doubt and all that stuff. But then something shifted, and while this great writing continued to come at me, I had a realization. An epiphany, if you will. I began to think crazy thoughts, like, well, maybe I do belong here. I thought of things I had written that might lack in certain areas, but can hang in others, and I thought, you know what, I could do this, too. My work could share the stage with these insanely creative people. Maybe I don't, um, suck? (Hey, why don't you buy my new short story collection The Legend of Hummel Park and find out for yourself, huh?)

So that was fun.

Great night.

*This presents a problem, because if writing isn't about figuring out who the hell you are, and who we are, then I don't know what it is.

A Year of Midnight Circus

With the announcement that EAB Publishing will soon be cutting off the further publication of the first four issues of Midnight Circus in order to release a collected anthology of all of the contents contained in those issues, it seems to me that it's a good time to take a look back at both the issues themselves as well as my experiences in working on those issues. Naturally, we'll start with the beginning!

New England Fear started things off right and I believe it let people in the literary community know that this was a magazine to look out for. I had heard the plans from people involved, and it sounded exciting, but the truth was plans like that always sound exciting. I could sit down right now and tell you some grandiose ideas, and you could do the same to me, and it would sound great. But when I had the journal in my hands with a collection of great stories, well, I had to acknowledge there was something here. I was intrigued.

I can find something of value in every issue, but I think my favorite in this issue was The Dullahan's Curse by A.E. Stueve and Britt Sullivan and it's tie-in with the Titanic. I also thought Christopher McLucas did a nice job with his brief story The Man. Good stuff all around, and with that I decided to look into the theme for the second issue to see if perhaps I would submit something.

Aw, the second issue. Classic Lit on the Side. Different perspectives of classic stories from the public domain--a necessary evil to avoid evil lawyers, but a limiting one to a degree and so this was a risk, because it was drawing close to fan fiction. fan fiction has its place, but probably not in a serious journal.

Yet I believe that was avoided, and spectacularly. You be the judge, but I think the pieces were of merit and avoided that label nicely.

Furthermore, while the first issue was great and set the template, I thought this represented a giant leap in some ways. In this issue you could really see that the mag was branching out with a host of new faces writing material. They even published a piece by some guy named Jeremy Morong. . .

So about that. It's no secret to anyone that knows me that Adventures of Huckeberry Finn is my favorite book. I've probably read it twenty times, and that is a conservative estimate as I first cracked it open at the age of six. If you want to debate its merits or discuss the racial aspects of it, I'm your, well, Huckleberry. So this was my chance to play in that sandbox and while it was daunting, I thought I was able to have just enough of a different approach to keep it fresh. I wrote in the second person in order to put the reader in the shoes of Jim, who had to leave behind his family to attempt to secure his own freedom. I'm my own worst critic, and my story could have used a little more punch I think, but overall I'm pleased with it and I'm honored that it was chosen.

Again, I enjoyed all the stories, but my favorite (including my own "Jim") was David Atkinson's brief "The Side Grind." I don't want to spoil it for anyone who might read it, but I've always thought of fictional characters of having a degree of sentience (News flash: I'm weird) and this story took that approach. A Christmas Carol is another of my favorites and I enjoyed this take on the old classic.

Issue number three was a milestone of sorts for me, because I was asked to do some copy editing. I had never done copy editing before and truth be told, I was not looking forward to it, because obviously I have to edit my own stuff--and it's painful. Yet I agreed because I believed in what EAB was doing and wanted to help in anyway I could.

And so I learned something interesting: editing other people's stuff is not painful. In fact, it's downright fun--you sort of get the satisfaction of creation without all the pain, torture, self-doubt, and agony that often accompany that creation process! I had a blast and I believe it was of use to the group, who I know had spent a lot of time editing this issue.

Hard to pick a favorite in this issue, as always, but "Degenerating" by Megan Mealor was quite powerful. "The Hearthrob and the Ladybug" by Jeremy Johnson was also a lot of fun.


Now to the fourth issue. I did not get an opportunity to do any editing on this one as there were some deadline issues, and truth be told, I was a little bitter about it as I had so much fun with the prior issue. But I eventually got over it, sucked it up, and cracked the issue open, where I could view it as any other reader would.

And the issue was great. Invasion and Occupation. To me, the theme implies war, and yet the submissions were so much more than that, which says a lot about the creativity that goes into Midnight Circus. I read this issue in one sitting and enjoyed it all, as usual (sense a theme), but the standout for me was again from Mr. David Atkinson, who scored with "Home Invasion: Single Guy Problems." I enjoyed it so much that I actually emailed him and suggested expanding the story to a full novel, for I think it has that much potential. Of course, a writer has to write what they want to write, as a novel is a huge undertaking (trust me), and so it was only a suggestion. But I really did enjoy it and would love to see those devilish children antagonize Irwin the single guy for another 200 or so pages. I have this feeling that he might even start to like the little bastards by the time it was all over. . .

And so that's where Midnight Circus took me through it's first year. I've done quite a bit more work on the first two issues this year, which have all been outstanding, and will be doing even more work on future issues, which I am looking forward to. Yet I know that thanks to the work that has been done, there is an awfully high standard to fill.

Finally, there is one elephant in the room I should acknowledge: Midnight Circus is not only made up of short stories, but also poetry. I enjoy many of the poems, but the truth is, I often could not tell you what makes a good poem and what doesn't. I even get confused when sentences don't rhyme, if that tells you anything. While it is an important part of Circus, I don't feel qualified enough to even comment on the pieces to pick out faves. So let's just say I like them all, equally. ;)