The one thing you can do is write a really good book—a book that’s good enough that somebody will read it, and at the end, turn to somebody else and say, “You have to read this one.” So I think it’s empowering; the best marketing you can do is write a good book.
Interview
Interview with Tin House Publicity Manager Sabrina Wise
By Nada Sewidan
Sabrina Wise, publicity manager at Tin House, explains how her work is similar to “literary matchmaking,” connecting the right book to the appropriate audience. Her days consist of crafting pitches, communicating with her in-house team, and searching for a potential audience to help authors build their platform. For anyone who has ever wondered about the […]
How to Create a Peculiar Transmedia World
By Pam Wells @wellsworld
I caught up with Randall Jahnson recently to talk about the world of transmedia storytelling—or, as it turned out, the peculiar world of transmedia storytelling. First, a bit about Randall. He’s taught film and new media classes in Portland for several years, including one coming up at the Northwest Film Center in early 2017. A […]
Interview with Alumnus Melanie Figueroa
By Nada Sewidan
Melanie Figueroa, an Ooligan Press alumnus, explains how the press influenced her career following Portland State’s graduate program. At twenty-four years old, Figueroa moved to Southern California to pursue a job with Quarto Publishing Group, where she learned what it means to be part of a medium-sized press working as an editorial project manager. Figueroa […]
Interview with Author Marian Pierce
By Douglas Moak
In Narrative Design, Madison Smartt Bell charges that the environment of the Iowa Writer’s Workshop fosters a “group mind” that produces “well-tooled, inoffensive, unexceptional, and rather dull” writing. Marian Pierce is a Portland-based writer, editor, and professor of Creative Writing at Marylhurst University. She graduated from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, so I took this opportunity […]
Interview with Author Kali VanBaale
By Corinne Gould
Kali VanBaale’s debut novel, The Space Between, earned an American Book Award (the Independent Publisher’s silver medal for general fiction) and the Fred Bonnie Memorial First Novel Award. Her short stories and essays have appeared in Numéro Cinq, The Milo Review, Northwind Literary, Poets & Writers, The Writer, and the anthologies Voices of Alzheimer’s and […]