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The April Reader -- Information & Issue #2 Thread

Wildweasal !Gl2oEPzmZc Mon 02 May 2011 11:26:00 No.1740222 View View Reply Original Report

Dearest /lit/ --

You can find the latest collection of short stories, poems, and essays (including one by Wildweasal) at:
http://theaprilreader.org

We are always taking submissions. Email your creations to:
theaprilreader@gmail.com

The April Reader website has information that may answer some of your questions. If you would like to join the IRC chat, simply connect to:
irc.freenode.net
#TAR

All other questions can be asked in this thread. Criticism can be provided in this thread. Important information regarding this release and future releases will also be provided in the following posts in this thread.

Love,

Prole !XDERDXUpqQ

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Prole !XDERDXUpqQ Mon 02 May 2011 11:27:00 No.1740224 Report

Quoted By:

SPECIAL OSAMA IS DEAD EDITION

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 11:31:00 No.1740230 Report

Quoted By: >>1740232

You guys rejected my story and didn't even email me back. Not cool.

Prole !XDERDXUpqQ

Prole !XDERDXUpqQ Mon 02 May 2011 11:32:00 No.1740232 Report

Quoted By: >>1740237

>>1740230
What was the submission name?

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 11:37:00 No.1740237 Report

Quoted By:

>>1740232
Nevermind, it was crap.
I'm just saying so you won't do it again. Even an auto-reply is cool, though.

Anonymous

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Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 12:27:00 No.1740276 Report

Quoted By:

For those interested, here's a picture of it printed and assembled.

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 12:30:00 No.1740279 Report

Quoted By: >>1740295 >>1740296 >>1740923 >>1741189

>God tier: Blueberry Girl, Bored out of my mind, Loneliness
>High tier: Damaged Goods, Down the Hall, Objective Emission
>Mid Tier: Can't live with them, Rough Dogs, They Travel in Packs, Untitled
>Low tier: Loneliness
>SHITTIER THAN SHIT TIER: Autumn Redgate
Who wrote that last one and can we do to him what we did to bin laden?

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 12:41:00 No.1740295 Report

Quoted By: >>1740298

>>1740279
Agreed. Shallow and pedantic, like someone trying too hard to be The Da Vinci Code or The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. If this is what you guys open with, you fucking suck. Fire that hack.

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 12:41:00 No.1740296 Report

Quoted By:

>>1740279
Bump for more criticism, good bad weird it's all good, your comments are appreciated.

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 12:42:00 No.1740298 Report

Quoted By: >>1740304

>>1740295
We release alphabetically by title as to avoid favoritism and emphasis the work as opposed to the author, I don't think publishing through editorial rank would be very fair.

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 12:44:00 No.1740304 Report

Quoted By: >>1740308

>>1740298
Can you still fire the guy?

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 12:46:00 No.1740308 Report

Quoted By: >>1740313

>>1740304
We don't "fire" authors, submissions are taken in and considered as they are sent to us. Feel free though to write up exactly why you dislike this story and submit it as an essay, we would welcome critical examinations so long as they remain "academic".

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 12:47:00 No.1740309 Report

Quoted By: >>1740314 >>1740317 >>1740358

> nice looking ezine
> our new editor "Joebob"
> works by SOME PERVERT

There's a sort of uneasy balance between professionalism & stupid internetism
is this a /lit/ initiative?

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 12:48:00 No.1740313 Report

Quoted By: >>1740318

>>1740308
Writing style is painfully amateur. Characters are unlikable. Story is a fifteen year-old trying hard to be badass (and failing), the dad's stupid, the cop's retarded, the main character is bland and unlikable. I shouldn't even need to mention the fact that it's a story about a cult. That's the most shit-tier writing technique there is. If there's a part 2, I never want to see it.

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 12:50:00 No.1740314 Report

Quoted By:

>>1740309
What's wrong with joebob? I think it's a good, strong name, and yes, this was a /lit/ initiative.

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 12:51:00 No.1740317 Report

Quoted By:

>>1740309
Everyone whined like fuck so they could get credit, so don't rail on the editors for morons.

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 12:51:00 No.1740318 Report

Quoted By:

>>1740313
Just write that up in a more formal way and submit it, give your message bigger podium.

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 13:07:00 No.1740336 Report

Quoted By:

4chan lit get

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 13:11:00 No.1740345 Report

Quoted By: >>1740348

>I think anyone would agree tripfags are
the cancer

>Prole !XDERDXUpqQ
Wildweasal !FvTu.n1ohA
Luco !/.tVpzN9Qg

Welp

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 13:12:00 No.1740348 Report

Quoted By: >>1740376

>>1740345
I think that's so people don't impersonate them and go posting crazy untrue shit.

Prole !XDERDXUpqQ

[now with edithurr typos fixed]

Prole !XDERDXUpqQ Mon 02 May 2011 13:16:00 No.1740358 Report

Quoted By:

>>1740309
In response to your question: This is a net initiative, and as it happens our support base is almost completely 4chan

Agreed, what The April Reader represents is something a little out of the ordinary- but doesn't net culture have a unique character of its own which we should cater to as any publication should to an audience? Professionalism can stand alongside net culture in the sense people will always want good-looking publications regardless of the content. Personally, I'm okay with the direction TAR is taking.

/opinion

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 13:24:00 No.1740376 Report

Quoted By: >>1740385

>>1740348
Unsecured trips are easily enough broken if you want to.

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 13:26:00 No.1740385 Report

Quoted By:

>>1740376
Maybe, but it adds another layer of difficulty to deter shenanigans and besides, it is well intended, not for attention necessarily.

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 13:41:00 No.1740415 Report

Quoted By:

I'm going to go ahead and admit that I thought Redgate was okay. Not the standout piece, and not anything really stimulating, but it was good in a stupid kind of way, like the literary equivalent of an action movie.

Blueberry Girl is a fucking masterpiece though.

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 14:21:00 No.1740499 Report

Quoted By:

Down the hall is pretty damn good

just saiyan

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 16:05:00 No.1740557 Report

Quoted By: >>1740571

>>1740549
Hey it's Tai here. If you guys publish any of my stuff in the future can you leave me as anon please? I made that request in my emails but ya'll might have missed it. I don't want to be a dick about it, but I quite like the freedom of not being named - and I
don't want to be associated with some of my forever-alone stuff :s.

Also good job on the issue, much tighter editing than the last.

>>1740542
Are my opinions other people's work. The blueberry stuff gave me a little chub until it went weird.

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 16:05:00 No.1740558 Report

Quoted By:

>>1740549

pro-tip: feature the best piece first

Prole !XDERDXUpqQ

Prole !XDERDXUpqQ Mon 02 May 2011 16:15:00 No.1740571 Report

Quoted By: >>1740572

>>1740554
EVENTUALLY YES

>>1740557
My fault most likely, apologies for that.

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 16:17:00 No.1740572 Report

Quoted By:

>>1740571
No worries. Keep up the good work.

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 21:47:00 No.1740912 Report

Quoted By: >>1740943 >>1741421

A polite bump.

First thoughts (skimming through; not reading anything): the layout gives me a chubby in my trousers, so great work on that! Dropping the forced anon thing was also a good move. The call-for-printing kind of irked me at first, but then I figured I might as well print out a couple of copies and just leave them around my campus in random spots (a treat for a bored university student).

Anyway, after I get back from talking about dead jews to my professor, I'll be sure to read and critique this issue further. Cheers!

Deep&Edgy !pSkjEcB9sQ

Deep&Edgy !pSkjEcB9sQ Mon 02 May 2011 21:53:00 No.1740919 Report

Quoted By: >>1740992

the essays are terrible, a real step down from noam chomsky

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 21:59:00 No.1740923 Report

Quoted By:

>>1740279

Hey, you put loneliness into God Tier as well as Low Tier. Which one is the mistake?

Looks good by the way guys, a lot of improvements. Looking forward to issue 3!

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 22:07:00 No.1740933 Report

Quoted By:

I read a few poems, some were pretty good, I'll return to them later. I also read the last piece by Wildweasel, which left me a little confused to be honest. I also read the part about the cost of the website, and the idea of advertising. I say absoultely post some ads up there. They won't interfere, I'm sure.

And good work with this issue.

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 22:11:00 No.1740940 Report

Quoted By:

do you pay for printed things?

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 22:13:00 No.1740943 Report

Quoted By:

>>1740912

Leaving them around your uni is a good idea. I'll print a few copies out too and place them around my campus, maybe leave one in a bar or cafe too.

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 22:17:00 No.1740947 Report

Quoted By:

I have to say I'm impressed that 4chaners can get together a well-put together ezine. My hats off to you.

also, I love you /lit/ :3

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 22:17:00 No.1740948 Report

Quoted By:

I really like the fact that I have more than one prose piece to read now. That was something that really stuck out in the last issue, the lack of short stories.

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 22:22:00 No.1740951 Report

Quoted By: >>1740964

I notice that there is an .epub version in the works, is this true for a .mobi version too? I'd love to have all the issue available on my kindle.

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 22:32:00 No.1740958 Report

Quoted By:

Why not some e-reader-friendly format accompanying the pdf?

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 22:36:00 No.1740964 Report

Quoted By:

>>1740951
Epub would be perfectly convertable to Mobi.
But Pdf remains a bit harder...

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 22:40:00 No.1740967 Report

Quoted By:

Unmitigated garbage.

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 22:42:00 No.1740972 Report

Quoted By: >>1741195 >>1741285

I've just finished the Blueberry story, There were a few funny moments, a few steamy ones too (:D) but I was left pretty empty towards the end. I just didn't feel like it came together. I expected some vindication, for Sarah to become a blueberry or something, but it didn't happen. Plus, with what started out as a story about (forgotton her name already, the Sagan girl) I don't feel like the ending treated her fairly. It basically cast her aside, resolved nothing for her. The same is true for Sarah too really, she's suddenly thrown in to conclude the piece and she can't carry it off.

On the whole though, very good. The descriptions were excellent, I really felt like I could see everything that was happening. There weren't many tedious abstractions, and I like that a lot. Try and imagine a different ending though, as a reader I felt cheated out of seeing Sarah's sexy and terrible demise. I want two erotic blueberries.

Wildweasal !00Up2u/cfo

Wildweasal !00Up2u/cfo Mon 02 May 2011 22:51:00 No.1740992 Report

Quoted By: >>1741005

>>1740919
Bah. You are only saying that because I quoted you in my essay.

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 23:02:00 No.1741005 Report

Quoted By: >>1741046 >>1741088

>>1740992

What the hell was that essay all about anyway?

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 23:18:00 No.1741038 Report

Quoted By:

Wow the first story, it's so, so EDGY

Also, your editor needs to be shot
>The point I'm trying to make is It's a ways down the hall
>It's
>a ways

>I was dulled enough that I could ignore him

>I came back to find he hadn't said 'screw it and left. As we spoke I cleaned up the glass
>'screw it and left

>I'm no good at none a' this thinkin crap
>All fiction is autobiographical to some degree, is it not?

Prole !XDERDXUpqQ

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Prole !XDERDXUpqQ Mon 02 May 2011 23:26:00 No.1741046 Report

Quoted By:

>>1741005

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 23:31:00 No.1741054 Report

Quoted By:

>>1740222

Cool trips, brah

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 23:53:00 No.1741079 Report

Quoted By: >>1741085 >>1741100 >>1741273

I considered submitting an entry, but as was pointed out earlier your editor needs a hot lead-ucation.

>Bored Out of My Mind in PSYC305
>She confessed she was barren, she'd never bread
>bread
>lol

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 02 May 2011 23:59:00 No.1741085 Report

Quoted By:

>>1741079

They've made a considerable improvement upon the first issue though, and I think the improvements will continue, as long as we all support it.

Wildweasal !00Up2u/cfo

Wildweasal !00Up2u/cfo Tue 03 May 2011 00:00:00 No.1741088 Report

Quoted By:

>>1741005
It's about me starting a new, competing, publication.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 03 May 2011 00:02:00 No.1741090 Report

Quoted By: >>1741100

1. Whoever typeset this should be kicked out. My guess is that you don't have anyone that knows how to typeset shit and just winged it. Please read up a bit on that stuff for future issues, it's not hard to make it look presentable.

2. If possible, some real editing would be nice.

Prole !XDERDXUpqQ

Prole !XDERDXUpqQ Tue 03 May 2011 00:13:00 No.1741100 Report

Quoted By:

>>1741079
We left that in because it was hilarious. But you're right, we'll fix it

>>1741090
>1. Whoever typeset this should be kicked out. My guess is that you don't have anyone that knows how to typeset shit and just winged it. Please read up a bit on that stuff for future issues, it's not hard to make it look presentable.
As always, please be specific about what you think would be better

>2. If possible, some real editing would be nice.
Do us a favor and point out the errors

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 03 May 2011 01:20:00 No.1741168 Report

Quoted By:

This issue is much better than the last, congrats. I especially like the blueberry story. A few of the poems were pretty good too.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 03 May 2011 01:49:00 No.1741189 Report

Quoted By:

>>1740279
>God tier: Blueberry Girl, Bored out of my mind, Loneliness
>High tier: Damaged Goods, Down the Hall
>Mid Tier: Can't live with them, They Travel in Packs
>Low tier: Rough Dogs, Untitled Loneliness
SHITTIER THAN SHIT TIER: Autumn Redgate, Objective Emission

Fixed that for you

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 03 May 2011 01:54:00 No.1741192 Report

Quoted By: >>1741200 >>1741208

Redgate's writer here.

I kind of fucked up huh? It was the first thing I ever wrote for publication, so I'm not surprised it's trash. If anyone else wanted to say -why- they didn't like it, I'd appreciate it.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 03 May 2011 01:54:00 No.1741195 Report

Quoted By:

>>1740972

More criticism along these lines would be great...

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 03 May 2011 02:01:00 No.1741200 Report

Quoted By: >>1741201

>>1741192

So many abstractions, very little goiing on. The first real action, the brick being thrown through the window, could have been interesting and exciting if you hadn't slown it down and taken me out of the action by inserting flashbacks and quips. I'd much rather read a straightforward story 'I stood here. I saw this. I heard this. Then this happened. I felt this. Etc'. I think that's why the blueberry story has been so well recieved. It describes events well enough for us to lose ourself in them, rather than cluttering up our imaginations with author inserts and abstract language.

Does that help?

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 03 May 2011 02:01:00 No.1741201 Report

Quoted By:

>>1741200
I see. Okay, thank you!

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 03 May 2011 02:10:00 No.1741208 Report

Quoted By:

>>1741192
the scottish father was so bad I wanted to cry

also, explain what is actually happening in a way that the reader can follow. The opening sequence for instance is really jumbled

'course, it actually gets better once after that first sequence. The detective scene was good, as was everything after it

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 03 May 2011 03:05:00 No.1741251 Report

Quoted By:

I'm glad to see you guys dropped the force anonymous nonsense. I really enjoyed a few of the pieces in there. However I'm disappointed to see that you guys are doing a poor job at actually editing the work, which is doubly annoying since several people (including myself) with editorial experience have offered to assist and have essentially been brushed off. I'm also disappointed that an essentially digital publication isn't releasing in proper digital formats. The printable version is unappealing to read online, and as a few others have mentioned epub or mobi version would be great.

It may seem like I'm being too critical with your deadlines (monthlies are hard) but you need to streamline your process.

Example:
Week 1: Accept submissions
Week 2: Send submissions back to approved authors with corrections (if they don't send them back they don't get published, if it takes too much time there is always next month)
Week 3: Copy editing/Do all your typesetting (pdf)
Week 4: final proofing/epub & mobi conversions

oreo !!peQoYBwPn7U

oreo !!peQoYBwPn7U Tue 03 May 2011 03:16:00 No.1741265 Report

Quoted By: >>1741272

NO ONE FUCKING READS THIS PILE OF SHIT GET OUT OF MY BOARD YOU GOD DAMN NUT GOBBLER

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 03 May 2011 03:20:00 No.1741272 Report

Quoted By:

>>1741265
Calm down and just learn to hide the threads you don't like, it's only one after all.

Fucking tripfags, man.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 03 May 2011 03:20:00 No.1741273 Report

Quoted By:

>>1741079
That 'typo' was sort of intentional. Initially I wrote the thing as a poem and bread occupied a single line at the time; there was quite a lot more stuff about cooking and missionary in toilets which followed on from it. Eventually however I cut a bunch of stuff and the formatting too but I missed a few things in the process. That's actually the reason there are a lot of random capitals as well.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 03 May 2011 03:31:00 No.1741285 Report

Quoted By: >>1741297

Blueberry Girl author here... wow. It looks like some people enjoyed the story, which makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside. I'm only sorry there wasn't quite enough blueberry-related content to appease
>>1740972.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 03 May 2011 03:40:00 No.1741297 Report

Quoted By: >>1741315 >>1741339

>>1741285

Next time I want at least two blueberries.

I was so sure she would swell up after she got the juice in her mouth. I thought the juice would be like a virus, and soon the entire world would be blueberries...I was disappoint.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 03 May 2011 03:45:00 No.1741302 Report

Quoted By: >>1741315 >>1741405

you seriously included an inflation fetish story?

jesus fucking wept

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 03 May 2011 03:48:00 No.1741310 Report

Quoted By: >>1741350

"Many of the idea's in objectivism are that of my own, to some extent."

i want to die irl

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 03 May 2011 03:51:00 No.1741315 Report

Quoted By: >>1741339

>>1741302
The guy who always requests blueberry stories (might be this guy>>1741297, can't really tell) posts often enough that it's become part of /lit/'s wonderful and diverse culture.

But yeah, shit's weird, yo :/

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 03 May 2011 04:02:00 No.1741339 Report

Quoted By:

>>1741315

>(might be this guy>>1741297, can't really tell)

Nope. I actually avoid all the blueberry threads, I've never been interested enough to read them, but that story was still pretty cool. Good enough for me to get a couple of boners anyway.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 03 May 2011 04:07:00 No.1741350 Report

Quoted By: >>1741358

>>1741310

Author here. I probably should have said some but i don't actually advocate objectivism. It doesn't work. The essay talks about that, but more so why the pairing of capitalism and objectivism don't work.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 03 May 2011 04:14:00 No.1741358 Report

Quoted By: >>1741373

>>1741350

i got that dude it was the misplaced apostrophe and spastic construction of the sentence that raised my ire

get a proofreader, tar

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 03 May 2011 04:18:00 No.1741373 Report

Quoted By:

>>1741358

Don't blame the proofreader for that. Blame me. It's how i write and while it's a bad mark to take some pride in how awful my use of grammar is. I still can't help using more fucking periods.

Malavox !1CuTO6dxKo

Malavox !1CuTO6dxKo Tue 03 May 2011 04:24:00 No.1741385 Report

Quoted By:

>>1740542
>Said my poem was cute
Yussssssss lolol

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 03 May 2011 04:29:00 No.1741405 Report

Quoted By:

>>1741302
But before he wept, he read the zine

SUCCESS

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 03 May 2011 04:33:00 No.1741416 Report

Quoted By: >>1741427

how long until we see someone read and respond to our short story?
sent mine in today

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 03 May 2011 04:35:00 No.1741421 Report

Quoted By:

>>1740912
Back. Time for some criticism (this will take multiple posts):

>Autumn Redgate
This piece has already been picked apart quite a bit, so I'll try to avoid being redundant. To put it bluntly: I did not like it. The protagonist feels like an extremely cliche character, but I later realized (on a second re-read) that it was because you simply tried to push too much characterization onto the reader too quickly. The first person narration and intrusions of narrator commentary can work really well, if you try to keep it in moderation. As the reader, I pretty much know everything about Autumn (in terms of the type of character she is) from this first part, thereby making her a pretty flat character for the rest of the story.

On the contrary, Autumn's sister (the catalyst of the plot) receives very little insight into what sort of a person she is, thereby not making her a person at all. Hell, even Autumn's boss, a very minor character, elicits more sympathy from me! As a result, there just isn't any incentive for me to want to continue the story.

I hope you take these criticisms to heart (I know quite a few are harsh) and continue to improve your writing for the next issue.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 03 May 2011 04:38:00 No.1741427 Report

Quoted By:

>>1741416

Wow. Less than a day ago? You'll have fun if you ever submit to a professional publication...

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The April Reader -- Information & Issue #2 Thread