Assignment #2 / Due Feb. 8th
Posted by kscott on February 1, 2007
Identify three professionals, publishing houses, journals or magazines, etc. in Chicago that you would be interested in learning more about and gather basic information on those three places/people (website? what kind of writing do they do, publish, edit, etc?), what’s their audience, etc.
Please post those three places and/or people HERE (name, company/mag/etc. name, website address, location) and then write just a very short bit about who they are and what they do.
February 6th, 2007 at 12:59 pm
Week three, or week two assignment, however you want to look at it. Thank God for high speed internet connections. The world delivered everyday. Makes homework so much easier.
So who/what are three interesting Chicago sites, people, magazines etc.? There are quite a few but here are three that struck me as worth a little further investigation.
1) Browne & Miller Literary Associates LLC. (browneandmiller.com). Founded by Jane Jordan Browne, who’s gone on to that big agency in the sky. They’re a literary agency based in Chicago. The interesting things are:
A) They accept new authors, although they admit up front that it’s a tough row to hoe. But
B) Check out their site because they do the get acquainted thing by inital query letter, and on their site they have a nice, concise section telling an interested author how to structure a good query, what not to do, and where to look to find more info. Worth a shot.
2)Can’t go wrong with the good ole Reader. Any place that advises potential freelance writers that “More than half the articles published each week come from freelancers and once or twice a month we publish one that’s come in “over the transom”… You have to take notice. And it gives you hope. Maybe a good place to get your toe in the water and build a few bylines for your portfolio. http://www.chicagoreader.com Plus there’s X-rated ads, some with pictures, if you get bored. What’s not to love?
3) One place I found that I didn’t know about was the site http://www.chicagowrites.org. Their mission statement declares them “To be an incubator for Chicagoland writers.” Okay, got my attention.
They have interviews with authors and industry folks. They list upcoming events of note. There are links to contests and jobs. Lots and lots more stuff for your roaming mouse to click on.
Speaking of which, that was the best SuperBowl ad, with maybe a close second being the Rock-Paper-Scissors Bud Light spot. But the hamster and guinea pig pumping and dragging the mouse through the litter was hilarious. Brought down the house. But that game sucked and Rex choked, big time.
So that’s it for now. From the corner of Sheffield and School, this is Ric Hess signing out. Good night, and good luck
February 8th, 2007 at 12:25 am
Howdy folks.
1) Here’s a “cool” magazine: Stop Smiling. I didn’t know about this magazine until about two/three years ago when a friend of mine invited me to go with him to Stop Smiling’s 10th anniversary party. It was a strange party – they charged $45 a head (but we got in on the guest list, because a friend of ours was interning at the magazine) – and the people were mostly hipster-types, wearing the kind of clothes they usually kept in the closet, but seeing them all dressed up betrayed their not-so-secret aspirations to be rich and famous. Ahem, anyway…
The magazine, as far as I can tell, interviews rising/aging music stars, has various foci on culture and arts, movie reviews etc. Basically, it looks like an indy version of Rolling Stone. And they’re conveniently located in Chicago’s own version of Williamsburg, Brooklyn: Wicker Park.
1371 N. Milwaukee Avenue
Chicago, IL 60622
(773) 342-1124
2) An infinitely cooler magazine is Venus Zine. It’s a quarterly magazine stuffed with DIY culture, articles about DIY artists (mostly women), and features tons of useful information. Most of the contributors are unpaid, and they have internships as well. While I was interning for Chicago Agent Magazine, the company bought Venus Zine and moved them into our office, so I got to move a whole lot of office furniture up two flights of stairs. The company is small (which I believe I described in my earlier post) and it’s a great environment to work in. Even if you can’t land a job there, it’s a great place to submit freelance work to (stories about DIY artists/things).
2000 N. Racine, suite 3400
Chicago, IL 60614
(773) 327-9790
3) The third choice is hard, because I have to eliminate all those little magazines that probably won’t succeed that I know of, and all the big ones that I just don’t give a damn about. Then I uncovered something unexpected: Independant Publisher’s Group, which isn’t actually a publisher, but a distributor. I searched their site for Chicago publishers, and what I got was a list of books, most of which are about Chicago. The interesting thing is, many of the “publishing houses” listed are one-shot deals (self-publishers). For example, “BYOB Chicago”, is published by BYOB Chicago, Inc. Another publisher under IPG’s wing is Chicago Review Press, which does a number of books, mostly nonfiction. In fact, Chicago Review Press is in the same building as IPG. Thus, my guess is that scoring an internship at IPG (which are available) means working closely with their parent publishing house (Chicago Review Press was first, they started IPG to help distribute independently published books).
814 N. Franklin St.
Chicago, IL 60610
(312) 337-0747 (Chicago Review Press)
As far as the Superbowl commercials go, my favorite was the two guys leaning over the exposed engine of a car, then eating both ends of a candy bar until they kissed. Well, that’s the one that sucked the least, anyway.
February 8th, 2007 at 5:50 am
The first one that I found by googling Chicago publishers was…Ivan R. Dee, Publisher…
According to their website (www.ivanrdee.com), they publish “serious nonfiction trade books in history, politics, biography, literature, philosophy, and theater.” I couldn’t find anyone’s name listed there except for Ivan R. Dee. They are located at 1332 N. Halsted.
…Book Deals, Inc….a literary agency. Caroline Carney is the president. They are in the Civic Opera Building Suite 1928, 20 N. Wacker Drive. Tel: (312) 372-0227…I thought it necessary to include the phone number because they don’t list a website, and after I googled it I came up with nothing, so they are intriguing because I have no idea what they’re about.
…I guess for my third I could always just list something like Other Voices literary magazine, or MAKE or the South Loop Review, but instead I wanted to post this website that I found…www.booktalk.com…on second look I almost want to retract the website. It’s sort of limited, especially in the number of publishers listed as well as everything else listed. They do have a decent amount of agents listed in a variety of locations. This is a break from the tradition they established under their publishers section of the website by only listing there, New York publishers.
February 8th, 2007 at 2:08 pm
Well, we just went over this in class this morning, but I’ll still put it up anyways.
1. The Reader – http://www.chicagoreader.com I love this paper. Perhaps starting off with a low-level copy-editing job? Then moving up and freelancing some feature-length articles.
2. The Trib – http://www.chicagotribune.com I hate this paper. However, I’d still like to work as a copy-editor. Journalism is weird, though. I don’t really get it. It’s sort of like writing with all the life sucked out of it.
3. I some fellas who work for magazines around town. I’ve burned some bridges with them but, hey, it’s always worth a shot. Otherwise, I’m just going to continue freelancing as an editor and seeing what sort of teaching opportunities I can latch onto.
February 9th, 2007 at 6:58 pm
sorry this is late, people. i’ve been a sicky since last week, and am trying very hard to be a healthy. okay. 1, 2, 3.
these ladies are pretty cool. a friend/teacher of mine was a poetry judge for them once and gave me a copy of the yearly planner they put together. that alone was a testament to their high quality of craft in visual art. looking over the website, i realize their only writing is poetry, yet they explicitly mention “writers” in the mission statement. this gives me, which is possibly false, for some kind of connection with them if only purely based on discrepancies.
this magazine has put together some really interesting cultural/political studies of our lovely city. it is lumpenesque but a lot less edgy and hip, and much more direct and accessible to bigger audiences. they don’t outright accept fiction or creative writing, but they seem to be a flexible organization. i think pitches and proposal letters might fare well with these peoples.
i want to know who the hell victoria lautman is and the details of how and why she gets to interview so many famous writers.
just missed their last installment, but am intrigued for various reasons. i am a firm believer in the importance of community to writers and am always on the look out for new places and people to connect with.
but more than all of this, i would like to meet or be met by some browner-skinned writers, maybe some ladies, who are garnering successes for themselves and their contemporaries. i have little to no luck in finding groups like this that last for very long or are looking for young blood. this is not to say that i don’t appreciate my peacher-skinned associates, but the fact is that i am not white and it shows. until we are all peaceful, identical robots, the things that make us different are important and must be embraced in like-minded settings and associations.
February 12th, 2007 at 4:10 pm
Well, I spent hours (literally) trying to find something different than what others had posted. Nothing is really catching my fancy. Being sick has made me sore, cranky and unable to focus on anything for too long before it gives me a migraine.
I looked up Akashic, but it turns out it’s a publisher in NY.
I guess the Reader, Browne and Miller and Make seem to be the most up my alley, though BnM seems a bit ’stuffy’ and high-falootin’.
(Cristina: Check out Marcella Landres (I think). She’s a Hispanic agent that represents anyone but prefers to see her fellow Spanish-speaking writers succeed.)