KATIE MANNING, AUTHOR OF 28,065 NIGHTS AND MORE
The Light Bulb is an interview series by The Lumiere Review. We’ve interviewed several authors of chapbooks to shed some light on the process of finding inspiration, drafting, revising, and publishing a chapbook. We believe in amplifying a diverse range of writers in the ever-expanding literary scene through this series. For writers who have their eyes set on publishing a chapbook, we hope that these conversations can bring you one step closer to a completed manuscript or a home with a press.
This time round, we have Katie Manning, author of 28,065 Nights (River Glass Books, 2020) and Tasty Other (winner of the 2016 Main Street Rag Poetry Book Award) amongst others. Support Katie’s work by ordering a copy of her recent chapbook here.
I. MOTIVATION
First thing’s first, what got you motivated to write your most recent chapbook, 28,065 Nights?
I began writing these short prose poems about/to my Granny after her death as a way to grieve and to preserve her. The title refers to the number of nights she was alive, and I created the title poem in response to a call from NonBinary Review for their 1001 Arabian Nights issue. Since I was already working with storytelling and the idea of stories keeping us alive (those of us who tell the stories and those of us who appear in the stories), linking my deeply personal project into a larger narrative about storytelling and survival felt right.
What keeps you going when you lose the willpower to continue writing and drafting?
I just remember that there are lots of phases in the writing process, and I don’t always have to be drafting something new. I can be reading, researching, revising, editing, or submitting for publication. I can be observing or experiencing something that will be useful for writing later. Sometimes rest is necessary too. I think we too often pressure ourselves to “write” daily, by which we mean “draft something new” daily, and that’s the kind of pressure that leads to loss of willpower and the infamous writer’s block.
II. EXECUTION
Tell us about the way you sequenced the prose poems in your chapbook. What are some tips on finding a satisfactory order?
I printed out all of the poems, and then I took highlighters of different colors and highlighted the different recurring images and themes throughout the manuscript (children, birds, houses, etc.). Then I worked on arranging by color… it’s a bit hard to describe, but I imagine it’s somewhat like weaving different colors of thread together. I wanted the images and themes to weave together throughout the chapbook. I also paid a lot of attention to the opening and closing poems, of course. Then I did the best thing: I ran the manuscript by two trusted writer friends, and they gave me feedback about what was working and suggested a couple of order swaps, and the chapbook order is so much better because of their input! I guess my best tip is to find friends who can help with the order.
For ordering manuscripts in general, I find it helpful to zoom out and think of the book as a poem, and then the poems in the book are like lines, and I’m arranging those lines (or sometimes even cutting them out) as I would in any poem. I’m just working on a larger scale.
What’s your writing process like?
I often write messy ideas and drafts in journals. I keep those around my house and in my purse. Then when I actually get a moment to focus and work for longer stretches of time, I’ll lift ideas/drafts from those handwritten notes and type them into documents so I can begin forming them into poems on the screen. I tend to go through a lot of drafts for each poem, and I save them all so that I’m never afraid to revise wildly because I know I can always go back to the previous draft if my experiment doesn’t work out. I read aloud to myself a lot as I’m drafting and revising. I frequently do research in the process of writing a poem too. I end up reading all about mushrooms or listening to recordings of Eurasian collared doves. I learn a lot!
Do different poems play separate roles in your chapbook? Do they drive the storyline, serve as transitions, or converse directly with the audience?
Yes. I would say that the opening poem, “Your Death Explained in Birds,” functions uniquely to let readers into the world of grief and storytelling. Then within the chapbook, I think there are a few groups: poems of my Granny’s stories (such as “How to Use Vanilla”), poems that capture our stories together (such as “Nevermore”), and poems that tell stories to her after her death (such as “The Baby You Didn’t See”). Then the final poem takes a larger view of the nature of this storytelling and the way stories connect us. This overview probably oversimplifies things, but it’s the best way I can answer this question.
III. REVISION
Writing’s one thing, but editing is a whole other domain. Once the first draft is complete, what are some suggestions on transitioning into revision?
I already went into great detail about my revision process when I talked about my writing process. For me, revision isn’t an entirely different domain. Sometimes I’m not sure when I’ve moved from drafting to revising because of the way I handwrite, pull ideas and drafts from notebooks to the computer, run down rabbit trails of research, move things all over the page, add more language, cut half away… but if drafting yields whatever messy thing I scribble into a journal, then I think of revision as the phase when I actually craft a poem. Drafting is like obtaining a chunk of clay; revising is forming it into an interesting shape.
How do you know when you’re ready to move on from editing to publishing?
Once I’ve come back to a piece after at least a few days away, I will read it aloud, and if I feel pleased with it and don’t get snagged on anything, then I’ll know it’s ready to send out. I’ll do another close proofread for surface errors, and then I’ll add it to my submission list.
IV. PUBLICATION
Where can we start when looking for chapbook presses?
Trish Hopkinson has wonderful lists on her website, including this one of 20 No Fee Chapbook Publishers. I’d also suggest reading chapbooks as much as possible and to get a sense of which presses publish work that you love, both in content and in the chapbook design.
Do you have any words of advice on submitting manuscripts to these presses?
Definitely follow submission guidelines closely. Be friendly and brief in your cover letter; the work should speak for itself. I’ve found it really helpful to talk to writers who’ve previously published with a press, not always before I submit, but certainly before I sign a contract.
Following an acceptance from a press, what are the next steps?
This varies a bit by press, but they will likely send the writer a contract fairly soon after acceptance. For presses I’ve not been as familiar with, this is the stage when I’ve talked to other writers who’ve published books with them to make sure that the writers have had good experiences. I also have a few trusted friends look over the contract with me to make sure there are no red flags. I know some publishers will suggest manuscript edits, or some will invite the writer to make any desired changes to the manuscript at this time. I’ve gotten to have some input in my book covers, from offering suggestions to choosing the cover image myself. The wait time from acceptance to publication can be anywhere from a few months to a couple of years depending on how the publisher works. Then we could get into the steps of promotion, but that would take an entire book. In fact, Jeannine Hall Gailey did write an entire book about this, so I will leave you with that as a recommendation: PR for Poets: A Guidebook to Publicity and Marketing (Two Sylvias Press, 2018).
Katie Manning is the founding editor-in-chief of Whale Road Review and a professor of writing at Point Loma Nazarene University in San Diego. She is the author of Tasty Other, which won the 2016 Main Street Rag Poetry Book Award, and her fifth chapbook, 28,065 Nights, is newly available from River Glass Books. Her poems have appeared in American Journal of Nursing, The Lascaux Review, Kahini Quarterly, Poet Lore, Stirring, and many other venues. Find her online at www.katiemanningpoet.com.
Interviewed by EIC Jessica Kim