Shorten the Odds (Michael Intro) (07/20/2019)

This letter is a recap of the week at

Atticus Review

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Last month, visiting Las Vegas for the first time, I developed a mini-addiction to slot machines. Now, that came as quite a surprise to me, since I’d always thought of myself as having a non-addictive personality. But there was just something about those bells and whistles, the occasional spray of digital coins in an oversized room of crowded desperation and solitude, that shut down whatever part of my brain kept trying to tell me that I was playing a losing game.Then a couple weeks after that, I found myself in southern Illinois, in a bar brightened by Cajun music, talking to my old friend and mentor, Allison Joseph. Turns out she has a touch of slot machine fever herself, and we got to speculating on where that comes from. We reasoned that slot machines are actually the “perfect” addiction for writers because they dole out to us the small confirmations we crave but so rarely get, while simultaneously mirroring the long odds we face in the real world. (Also, they’re bright and flashy.)But there’s something that writing requires that slot machines don’t: skill. Fortitude. Persistence. Okay, that’s three things, and we could probably name a dozen more, but you get the idea. The point is that as writers, we often focus on the justice/injustice roiling all around us, not to mention the obvious element of chance woven through all our successes and failures. We forget (maybe because so many of us suffer from a tinge of self-doubt) that if you really want to compare writing to gambling, a closer analogy would probably be poker.  Skill is required. There are rules, matched by a nearly equal number of exceptions. Talent matters, but chance certainly makes things interesting. And it’s the one game in which the house doesn’t necessarily always win. Put another way, in a universe structured around change, loss, and mortality, in which nothing good is guaranteed and “fairness” is about as tangible as candle smoke, writing is one of those few professions in which you get to live forever. But luck alone won’t get you there. You have to work for it. You have to study. And when you feel ready, you have to be willing to bet it all.Thanks for reading. We’re glad you’re here.Don't forget: This weekend is the last weekend to submit your work to our CNF Contest! Submissions close Sunday at midnight pacific time. Michael MeyerhoferPoetry Editor 

ATTICUS NEWS

ONLY TODAY AND TOMORROW LEFT!!Submit to our 2nd Annual CNF contest...Subs close Sunday at Midnight Pacific Time. First prize is $400!Judge: Ira Sukrungruang.

THIS WEEK AT ATTICUS

Send a harsh rebuke to this hot-ass weekend.Read Feral Town by Adam Gustavson ... BREE

BOOK REVIEWA GENRE-MIXING COLLECTION TO RIVAL YOUR STREAMING OBSESSIONA Review of THE CLASSROOM by Dana Diehl & Melissa GoodrichReview by Bailey Drumm"...the authors lured me in with ... good hooks, vibrant characters, and simple language; kept me reading with the intrigue..."GET THE BOOKREAD THE REVIEW

FICTIONHALF MOONSby Jen Corrigan"It wasn’t the absence of the soft-lipped boys whose mouths stung with whiskey and who undressed the girls like tearing the wrapping off a gift that caused sorrow. It was that they’d left only one note for the twins to read together."READ ON

POETRYHOLIDAY OFF NASSAU ISLAND, BAHAMASby Sonja JohansonA finalist in our 2019 Poetry contest"besides the afternoon I got too drunkat the beach and floated for hoursin the rollers, letting the oceanfill my ears while I waited for youto be done talking to that girl"READ ON

POETRYBECAUSE I LOVE YOU, EMILYby Sonja JohansonA finalist in our 2019 Poetry contest"Every page is a blank – zero bone,loaded gun, and yes, I am scalped,the millworks of my brain laid open."READ ON

INTERVIEWPRESS FOCUS:IN CONVERSATION WITH DEAD RABBITS BOOKS"We want our press to be a place where folks can find books that mainstream publishing is too afraid to publish." - Katie RaineyREAD ON

MIXED MEDIAHER ANIMAL INHERITANCEAn on-going poetry collaboration between Alissa Hattman, Sara Jackson-Holman, and Tai Woodville, exploring themes of memory, emotional inheritance, and wild femininity.READ ON

FILM REVIEWCELEBRATING THE MOON LANDING IN 2019 AMERICAA review of HBO's re-release of FROM EARTH TO THE MOONReview by Alison Lanier "It makes sense why the monumental series was re-released ... It’s good business. But sitting down to watch it now feels like a rebuke."READ ON

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