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About the Collection:
The collection is thematically linked by both the characters—who are struggling to realize their Hollywood dreams and the setting—Santa Monica, California. A seemingly peaceful seaside city, Santa Monica is also a purgatory where the characters must face failure and loss—as well as their demons and ghosts. Family and ritual are consistent motifs throughout the collection, as are the themes of escape, addiction, redemption, reparation, religion, and death. Whether it is a young couple looking to buy their first home or a man returning to his hometown for a funeral or a baptism, readers will find the everyday rituals in these stories identifiable in many ways.
Michael J. Atwood is a fiction writer and weekly opinion columnist for the North Attleborough Free Press (Massachusetts). His work has appeared in a number of literary magazines and online journals.
Visit the Publications & Store page to order this title.
Look for new books by Aaron Polson, Heather Fowler, Mel Bosworth, Alec Bryan, Corey Mesler, Fred Skolnik, Barrett Hathcock, J.A. Tyler, Glynn Custred, and more. We offer you a preview of the cover art for the forthcoming publications: Heather Fowler's short story collection Suspended Heart (cover artwork by Siolo Thompson), Mel Bosworth's Grease Stains, Kismet, and Maternal Wisdom, and Alec Bryan's Night on the Invisible Sun...
Aqueous Books publishes well-written literature--novels and short story collections--that are unique, unusual, or magical in some way, whether by way of theme, language, or some other trope. We are open to various genres: literary, magical realism, speculative fiction, slipstream, and memoirs.
Who are your favorite fiction writers?
AB: Margaret Atwood, Herman Melville, Peter Ackroyd, Flann O'Brien, Thomas Wolfe, and Annie Dillard.
What is the best advice you can give people who are considering submitting work to your publication?
AB: Proofread your work first and make sure it is the best it can be. A lot of publishers say "read what we publish," but for us, what we've published in the past is not a clear indicator of what we may publish in the future. The bottom line is to make sure your work is the best it can be before submitting it, and that will increase your chances of acceptance.
What is a day in the life of an editor like for you? Please give us a glimpse into your behind-the-scenes submission reading process.
AB: Normally, I print out the first 10-20 pages of every manuscript and sit down with a large-ish stack that's good for the better part of a day. I carefully consider each one. As I read, I go through and make editing marks on each document as though I were going to accept it, because at that stage, I don't really know what I will and will not be publishing. Once I get to the stage where I determine it's not right for Aqueous Books, I place it gently in the (you guessed it) rejection pile. The pieces that do not make it into that pile are generally those that I have read through stage one and still remain interested in. If I'm still wanting to read more after the initial printing of 10-20 pages, I'll print the next 20 or so pages, or if a short story collection, the next couple of stories. And it goes from there. If a manuscript is accepted, I contact the author and offer him or her a contract. There is often a lot of back and forth Q&A regarding the sample publishing contract I send out, and its terms, marketing and distribution, POD, and so forth. Once we get to a stage where the author understands our processes and the contract, I'll send the contract, both parties sign, and then we go through the editing and graphics stages before printing. My editor Erin McKnight is the co-editor for Aqueous Books. Generally, I'll send her a document with my edits, she adds hers, and then it's off to the author for revision.
How important do you feel it is for publishers to embrace modern technologies?
AB: I feel that it's vital. I'm the editor of a journal, Prick of the Spindle, and I made sure we were the first literary journal available as a Kindle magazine. I carry that same philosophy over to Aqueous Books: every book we publish has been and will be offered in electronic format. Right now, that includes a Kindle edition for every book published. We are also a Print-on-Demand (POD) publisher, so really, our entire printing and publishing process very much hinges on modern technology. Prick of the Spindle is, as of now, an online-only journal, accepting submissions (primarily) electronically, and which has a Kindle component; Aqueous Books is a POD publisher with a Kindle component, so it follows that social media outlets are important to us. Both the journal and the publishing company have a strong social media presence.
As a writer, editor, and publisher, I am heavily invested in utilizing modern technology for publishing. I have good reasons for this. Due to opportunity, or socioeconomic standing, or myriad other considerations, there are some publications and publishers that simply would not exist without technology like the Internet, POD, and desktop publishing. We're one of those. Technology levels the playing field in so many ways--you aren't required to have had wealthy parents or be a graduate of Emerson's publishing program, or have connections to one of the major New York publishers in order to become a successful publisher. The same technology is also leveling the playing field for writers. With so much opportunity just waiting to be seized, what makes those writers and publishers stand out is the quality of their work. That is what I love about technology: it provides an opportunity to put your talents to use and provide high quality work with a minimum of financial investment. My goal for Aqueous Books is to stand out based on the quality of the work we publish, and on a longer-term basis, to play a part in unseating some of the current notions about POD publishing.
Read full interview here.
[7/18/2010]
We are pleased to announce Michael J. Atwood's (and our) debut collection, HiStory of Santa Monica. It is available direct from us, from Barnes & Noble, from Ingram Distribution, on Amazon.com, and as a Kindle edition. If you are a library or bookseller interested in stocking this book, please contact Cynthia Reeser at pubs@aqueousbooks.com
HiStory of Santa Monica is available from the following booksellers:
Shakespeare & Co. - Paris, France
Books on the Square - Providence, RI
Brown University - Providence, RI
Baker Books - Dartmouth, MA
Brookline Booksmith - Boston, MA
Village Books - Pacific Palisades, CA
Boston College Bookstore - Boston, MA
We the publishers at Aqueous Books realize that the online versus print debate is stale. Yes, we are well-read and up-to-date. We read HTML Giant. And such. However. We have been primarily, over at Prick of the Spindle, online-oriented. That is to say online-only, with a few mad forays into the likes of Office World* [*Note: Change World to depot and capitalize that D and you get what I mean].
What we're really saying here is that we're excited, and have been prepping the files to send to the printer, and now they are with the printer, and the proof copy is on its way, and those of you who have ordered will soon receive a work of art, sans such run-on sentences as this one: it will have been crafted by the author over many years, and edited, then edited again, then edited still again, then proofed, then re-proofed, then prepared for print publication...we realize we may be preaching to the choir, but we take such pride in our work that we are ecstatic to finally have arrived, that is, at the pre-publication stage.
This may be the pride of the noob; so be it. We are print noobs, and proud. We would jump up and down, and gently press ad copy before you, and then we would shake your hand and hope to see you again. Perhaps at our home for tea.
[ 5/7/2010 ]
So you may not know this, or care really, but we have missed AWP for the past years in a row. Have we been to AWP, ever? Um, no. We hang our heads and sadly sigh. Why is this; how could we possibly miss such an event so consistently? And still call ourselves publishers/writers/editors? Are we shy? (Yes, very.) Are we poor? (We are rich in spirit.) Do we hate to fly? (Yes. Definitely. Omigosh don't even get us started.)
Well, we here at Aqueous Books would like to wish all of our friends, associates, acquaintances, and peers a nice flipping time at AWP this year. That's right—we sincerely hope you all have a great time and get to meet all the writers, editors, and publishers we've always wanted to meet, but have been too busy or poor or lame to get out there and just do already. Have a great flipping time, people! UGH!
[
4/2010 ]
Ad copy here.
