Alt Lit Gossip

Sunday Confessional: I fucking love UP

so it’s sunday and i am feeling really good about the world and about writing and about writers. and today i am feeling really good about editors too, specifically the editors of the litzine UP…

UP is my idea of a perfect litzine.

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It is clean and readable

Essential to online publishing is readability. You are asking extra of your readers when you decide to publish writing on a glowing blue electric rectangle. UP provides comfortable online reading. It makes use of whitespace and it doesn’t have any clutter. Everything is arranged bento-like.

The zine has a character: it craves ‘bodily fiction’

”We want your tortured bodies, happy bodies, laconic bodies, hurried bodies, dripping bodies, fat bodies, thin bodies. Bodies that move and bodies that sit. Bodies that fuck and bodies that sleep. Comfortable bodies and contorted bodies. Above all, give us your sexual bodies. We are motivated the most by sexual bodies.”

It isn’t overstuffed with too many authors per issue

Sometimes I find it hard to devour a litzine because it has too much content. If an online journal publishes 25 authors I might only read 5-6 of those pieces. UP doesn’t load your plate. Instead it truly features its contributors by keeping a tight selection.

The writing is always solid

…and interesting… and funny…and I always see writers I know and love while simultaneously getting exposed to strong new voices in alt lit, in literature in general.

The zine is forward thinking

I feel like if you are an online publisher you should always be adding new ingredients to your site otherwise people forget about you or you become bland. At that point litzines run the risk of becoming just a bunch of old postings. UP is forward thinking. They started out with a solid layout and concept, the themes of their issues continually varie. They are exploring E-books recently. It seems they are doing it in an interesting manner. Issue by issue I always feel interested in what new spins may come to the place

Nothing is in your face, everything has tact/is-ness

I don’t know, I like the way the intent is presented. I feel like a customer here and I feel like I am in a very special store. Everything is pretty and free and exciting.

Anyways, check the whole picnic right here. Issue 4 is fresh out and there’s gold from michael koh, jesse prado, chad redden. art by omar de col. awesome poem by ‘ofelia’. interview with scott mcclanahan. other great stuff too.

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