The Weekly Atticus (06/30/2018)

Start Something New, Something Radically Different | The Weekly Atticus

June 30, 2018

A recap of the week at Atticus Review, along with some extras.

Dear ,

See an image that inspires you to write a story. Be super excited about where this story might go.

The possibilities are endless!

you think with a cartoonish twinkle in your eye.

Sit down at your designated writing spot. Place a full mug of coffee at your side. Maybe light a candle like you're setting the mood for a hot date with your writing? What would that even look like and why does the personification of your writing look like Mr. Peanut? Get distracted by your own weird thoughts. 

Realize 30 minutes has already passed. Panic. Open your laptop and a blank word document. Frantically type out a few lines.

Read the lines you've written and realize they are the worst lines ever written in the history of literature. Internally apologize to every writer who's ever lived. Drink the entire mug of coffee. 

Decide the terrible sentences are staring at you and blocking you from writing something that doesn't make you want to walk into the sea. The sentences laugh at you. Delete what you've written. Cackle like you've won. Pour a second cup of coffee. 

Wait for the words to come. Any moment. Chug the coffee. Caffeine helps. Caffeine is the force that binds the galaxy together. Caffeine > midi-chlorians.

Decide you just need to take a quick break. Open the Twitter app on your phone.

Oh no.

Close the Twitter app. Consider deleting the app from your phone. Consider lighting your phone on fire. Google the flammability of your specific make/model. Wonder if the burning smell can compete with the near-constant smell of weed coming from your downstairs neighbor's apartment.

Pay your neighbor a visit.

Return to your writing spot and knock out several paragraphs. You're doing it! The words just flow, man. Feel satisfied and celebrate by eating half your weight in chocolate-covered almonds.

Read your work again when you're sober and the stomach ache has passed.

Oh no.

Reframe this as a learning experience. Part of the journey. You will be better for it. Someday. Somehow. Look to the horizon, wistfully. 

Start over. Write 3/4ths of a semi-lucid draft. See that's it just not working. Throw in a dragon. No. Death robots. Nope. Maybe try telling the story from the perspective of a depressed, chain-smoking French Bulldog? 

Decide you need some distance. Save the draft under the title "Am I Still High?" in the folder you've named "Complete Shite Drafts." Take another break and catch up on season 2 of

The Handmaid's Tale

.

Oh no.

Once you've climbed out of that deep, dark hole and passed through a substantial existential crisis—weeks (months?) later—open the "Am I Still High?" file because you've forgotten what's in it. Find a few lines that aren't so bad. Be inspired to start something new, something radically different than what you intended to write. Revise somewhere between 2 and 124 times. End with something you actually like and realize every second was worth it. 

Remember the only way to fail is to give up. Buy more chocolate-covered almonds.

Repeat.

Thanks for reading. We’re glad you’re here.Dorothy BendelManaging Editor 

ATTICUS NEWS

It's

June Author News, featuring Sheldon Costa, Stephanie Hutton, & Lana Spendl!

Congratulations to all! Keep those updates rolling in, AR writers🌟

THIS WEEK AT ATTICUS

FERAL TOWN by Adam Gustavson

BOOK REVIEW: RISING BEFORE SINKINGA Review of SKATING ON THE VERTICAL by Jan English LearyReview by Ashley Miller"And that is the lasting bruise that Skating on the Vertical inflicts on its readers: there are no sure things for anyone, there are no infinite moments."READ ON

FICTION: SNOWSTORMby Tara Isabel Zambrano"The walls of the house seem thin, shivering. There are sounds we’ve seldom heard before―the wood cracking, as if giving up, a constant drip of water from the roof."READ ON

POETRY: ODE TO MY UVULAby Gavin Gao"...At home, your uvula is a dagger shining with your mother’s blood. Its iron tongue has stung the bosoms of those you most love..."READ ON

CNF: TOSHIby Steve Chang"Ha-ha! It was funny and not funny all at once. We laughed for 200 years.Not surprisingly, Toshi laughed too. He would’ve done anything to be liked."READ ON

FILM: THE JOURNEY IS STILL SUBLIME2001: A Space Odyssey, 50 Years LaterEmily Moeck discusses the restoration and re-release of Stanley Kubrick's classic film.READ ON

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