PICK ME. CHOOSE ME. LOVE ME.

on the New York City of it all. (I didn't say south one time in this post, so I guess I should slap it here--publish southern writers!)

If we’re going to talk about hating big four publishing (I don’t! I read lots of books!), we have to talk about New York City, and the belief that the culture that happens in New York City is Culture, and not subculture (subcultures all the way down). I, too, watched every episode of Girls, so I have a right *nay* an obligation to talk about the Brooklyn of it all.

I read The Cut piece on “a voice my generation could be proud of…” And of course, in the sea of hate-clicks and quote tweets, there was the magazine who shall not be named (a magazine editor who once posted a collage photo of three freelance publicists and one stock image of a woman none of us know to complain about the fact that outside publicity costs money)—being a typical “devil’s advocate” to say “i mean, it’s a style like any other and isn’t this how publishing and publicity work? am i missing something? i don’t get the *boring* part. have you read the book?”

And let me tell you what’s boring about it, to someone like me. It’s boring because ten bucks says a person in New York who names a few streets, a few intersections, approximately two restaurants, and maybe a quick subliminal message about one specific theater department where everyone went to school in their novel is going to have a higher chance of selling said novel (whether it’s the “voice of a generation” or not) because it’s familiar (and maybe aspirational depending on career-length) to every editor working in big four (re: New York City) publishing.

Is this the part of the newsletter where I tell you that I have no idea where or what Dimes Square is, and to me Lower East Side is a three word phrase I heard a lot when I was trying to figure out who was behind “xoxo Gossip Girl”—it’s synonymous in my brain with plaid school girl skirts and white button-ups, thick velvet headbands, and concrete steps.

And maybe an MFA from Columbia will guarantee you a book deal (I’d love the numbers on this one, alongside how much the books sold for), but most writers can’t afford the 100k a year price tag even with the 30k fellowships.

And there are even enjoyable forms of New York City privilege, take Walk It Off with Issac Fitzgerald. He mostly walks with writers in New York City because that’s where he is, so although he’s not meaning to perpetuate that what is “literary” is “New York City,” the narrative remains—the best writers reside in the city, are made by the city, and thus the city celebrates.

That’s boring. That’s limiting. That garners a Dwight Garner New York Times book review when quite literally the rest of the world exists. We can say all day that it’s the *New York Times,* thus it supports *New York* authors, but we all know that The New York Times sees itself as the bastion of both national and international news, and so it could expand its page space beyond the expected.

If a metaphor was needed I would say, in a game of Chutes and Ladders, New York City writers would be chutes all day, and the rest of the world would be ladders.

Here’s why: there’s an easier case for an in-house team (an acquiring editor) to be made for a writer who lives in New York City. A few reasons: an editor can have lunch with the author and their agent, the author is likely to have agent connections (even run in the same circles) as said-agents, the editors also live in the city so they’re familiar with the landscape—they might have a nostalgia for the places in the book even (Think: Cordelia Street by Taylor Swift), the publicity machine is easier if you’re mingling with Nylon’s book editor at Drift parties (which The New York Times can’t stop covering), it’s easier to make the connections necessary to get into editorial roles at said publishers (almost always built on networking—they call it an apprenticeship business), obviously, they’re easier to get when you know somebody (somebody in New York is the underlying messaging here)—overall, authors in the city can connect easier with each other—be in conversation, support one another’s work, share writing groups, attend similar workshops, and all other forms of the mingle. Authors in the city are more likely to get space for events at the New York City bookstores, and they’re better attended because they have an actual audience in the city (so fair point there). Imagine a popularity contest, that’s the vibe.

But I’m going to be real with you, usually if a book mentions New York City in the copy, I don’t read it. Most of your favorites, lost on me. (Shout out to Lilly Dancyger’s First Love though because I would never miss a Lilly Dancyger essay, let alone book).

But I’m kind of tired of the trope, yes, I said it TROPE, of New York City as the “stalwart” of all culture, and I’m really tired of the conglomerates not offering remote internships and jobs in the age of the fucking internet. Book designers need to be in-house, but almost every other role in publishing can be done remotely. (It’s the buildings though, Jack, never let go of the buildings. What would Flatiron be without The Flatiron Building). And I understand camaraderie, I miss it—the woman who cut my hair a few weeks ago was saying how jealous she was that I worked from home, and it is such a gift especially while my children are small, but I miss talking about our stupid little shared shows, and gossip that has nothing to do with me, and eating a yogurt at the speed of light between meetings (though sometimes I still just spoon peanut butter into my mouth or throw back a handful of popcorn and slather on some tinted lip balm instead of showering).

As much as an MFA is a privilege, I don’t hear enough talk about the privilege of location. The conglomerates keep their job applications high and their salaries low by not offering accessibility, by requiring the expense of the city. The idea of the impoverished artist continues to proliferate because people think they need to live in a city that often impoverishes. They keep their books mid (I’m a millennial, am I using it right?) by continuing to publish the same Brooklyn sisters story, and they miss books that are “diverse” simply by deploying regional stereotypes as a merit of whether a book is good or not. This is how we get stuck with Hillbilly Elegy as the face of a region, read these instead (PLEASE) and definitely this one:

Not purposefully attempting to expand books you publish based on location threatens a single-story narrative of place that New York City will never be bereft of. And it’s lucrative, substantial, satisfying, successful to imagine place (in and of books) beyond the major cities, Hanif Abdurraqib could tell you so. Being specific about where you are and who you’re writing for produces sales. It’s inherently an intersectional buying practice. Place sells, and sells well.

Dedication in There’s Always This Year

(AND HERE IS THE BLARING REASON WE NEED SMALL PRESSES TO EXIST BECAUSE THEY DO THE WORK OF PUBLISHING REGIONAL AUTHORS, AND UNDERSTANDING PLACES BEYOND THE CITIES).

The other side of this narrative, which is also a part of the New York City narrative (subculture / subculture / subculture) is the appeal of the “Literary It Girl,” (yes I’m still talking about it because it continues to proliferate online)—the consensus on the model seems to be Joan Didion, but my girl TRAVELED. She had day notes. She left the place that felt safe in order to look at it anew from a road trip, from leaving.

It’s true anyway that we see more of a place sometimes when we visit rather than exploring the pieces we live daily—we’re routined creatures. Didon’s appeal is that she left. Woolf’s appeal is that she walked. They got into the honey between themselves and the place. Sometimes I wonder, like Tyra Banks often did on America’s Next Top Model, if the model is wearing the dress or the dress is wearing the model. Is New York City truly where the greatest living writers reside, or are the writers just stuck in the garment—reiterating and reiterating, turning New York City on spin because it’s what they know, so it’s what they like. New York City is choosing itself over and over and over again at the expanse of literary expansion. I get it, it’s where tradition lives, but isn’t the world so tired of tradition yet—when will tradition be boring? Just because something starts somewhere doesn’t mean it has to end there too.

(Queue all the agents saying, “I just couldn’t connect enough with the book to bring it to market”—connect is doing a lot of work here).

Didion remained unknown beyond what she put on the page and so people applied their ideas to her, they still do. Our current incarnation is the opposite, author branding—the character who speaks for the book rather than the book speaking for the writer.

The labels, the categories, have become more important for the book publicity machine than the writing itself (I can’t say this word without thinking of the diving board game where someone treading water yells a category as you jump and you must yell something that fits. Ice cream! Mint chocolate chip!). The tropification of book publicity (the campus novel, enemies to lovers, dark academia, a #metoo book)—it’s like commercial fishing vs. standing at the edge in waders for hours hoping something bites. It’s the fast fashion of book publishing. It’s the itemization and clearance bin of ideas. It, too, is boring—and I’m going to be honest, the shrinking down to tropisms makes a reader just as likely to turn down a book they could love as they would pick it up.

My favorite books, the books that last (and not every book needs to last, the book in The Cut seems to be specifically made for Gen Z which is an interesting endeavor in itself, and I do wonder if the author will continue the schtick and have the next book be, My Second Book), but not everything can be a schtick, and not fitting the brand (to me) is far more interesting than minimizing the human experience to do it. We can’t live in the schtick forever without losing the pulse.

You must know this by now, but I’m always choosing the box-less books. I’m always choosing the books made like little safes for unlocking—what it does / what it does / what it does?

I’d rather tell you what it doesn’t. Not this, babe. Not this.

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ICYMI: View the exclusive cover reveal of Christian J. Collier’s Greater Ghost in Electric Literature, read Jason K. Friedman on Cormac McCarthy in Literary Hub and checkout his interview with Savannah Morning News, a long tail review of Bianca by Eugenia Leigh in Massachusetts Review, a review of Jessica Jacobs’ unalone in Tablet Mag, two new reviews of Lady Wing Shot by Sara Moore Wagner—one in Rhino Poetry and one in Harbor Review, Jessica E. Johnson was on KBOO talking all things Mettlework, Susan Ito is up for the 2024 William Saroyan International Prize for Writing, Kristine Langley Mahler was interviewed in Full Stop about A Calendar is a Snakeskin, Kelly McMaster’s The Leaving Season reviewed in MER Literary, Tatiana Boria-Johnson and Rosanna Young Oh were both on the Ms. Magazine National Poetry Month list, and so much more on our Twitter & Instagram.