Reader Meet Author: Matt Bell

Two words come to mind when I follow the activities of people like Blake Butler, Tobias Bengelsdorf, and others. Those folks running journals, publishing books, running blogs, and still finding time to write with style and intelligence. Those two words are, Stay Active. You have to be engaged, consistently interacting and always reaching for every opportunity you are offered. As you increase activity you will increase the number of times you make contact with readers and other writers.

Matt Bell is very active, and combines that activity with a high level of quality writing. This has translated into two sold out chapbooks in 2009, and next year he will release a full-length collection though Keyhole Press called, How They Were Found. In August he is launching an on-line literary journal called The Collagist in conjunction with Dzanc Books. He is an active blogger and book reviewer and an all around accomplished person.

Recently, Matt was kind enough to answer a few of my questions.

OA: How They Were Found is currently in production by Keyhole Press and is due in the Fall of 2010. How did the book land with Keyhole, and are there any stories that have already been published in the collection?
MB: Keyhole was the first press I sent the collection to, and my first choice to publish it—I can’t tell you how lucky I feel to have that actually work out! Peter Cole and the other editors at Keyhole do an amazing job, and I really respect their work ethic, their design abilities, and their great choices of writers to work with. I’ve corresponded with Peter through my involvement in issues five and six of Keyhole, and I knew that we shared a lot of philosophies related to publishing, and that working with him would be a really positive experience. We’re only just getting started, but so far so good.

The fact that they’ve recently published William Walsh’s Questionstruck and are doing his collection next year was also a big factor for me, as he’s one of my favorite writers. His novel Without Wax from Casperian is one of the best novels I’ve read in recent years, and I can’t recommend it enough. I’ve very excited to be published alongside him and the other truly amazing writers that have books forthcoming from Keyhole, like Stephanie Johnson, Shellie Zacharia, Thomas Cooper, and Aaron Burch.

Ten of the stories in How They Were Found have been published or are forthcoming, and the last three are sent out right now, with hopes that they can all get published in magazines before the book comes out next fall. Some of the stories have appeared in Conjunctions, Meridian, Storyglossia, No Colony, and Keyhole. Others are upcoming in Gulf Coast, Hayden’s Ferry Review, and PANK. “The Collectors” is also included in the book. Since it’s sold out as a chapbook, it’ll be good to have it back in print in the collection.

OA: You have had a remarkable year so far and it is only half way over. You have released two chaps in the last two months and they have both sold out. This may be a question with no answer but is there any secret to that type of small press success?
MB: It has been an amazing year, and I can’t tell you how lucky I feel, and how thankful I am to all the people who’ve helped me throughout it. I’ve got a great group of friends and peers that have done so much for me, and I can’t say enough how grateful I am to them for their friendship and support.

The chapbooks were interesting from a promotional point of view, because I had to do so little to get them out there—They really did almost sell themselves, at least in part because there’s a really great group of very supportive, very talented writers and readers online right now, all centered around ever-widening circle of great magazines and websites and social networks. Through word of mouth, blog posts, and general enthusiasm, this great indie lit scene can make it really easy to sell out a small print run of books like mine. It’s an exciting time to be a small press writer, I think, just because there’s so much good will and also good writing and reading going on all around us.

The other thing that made the chapbooks a success was the hard work of the two presses I worked with. Molly Gaudry at Willows Wept was a phenomenal editor and promoter, and she really got the word out about the book early. As for The Collectors, Joseph and Amanda have built up a tremendous amount of goodwill through their efforts at Caketrain, and my book certainly got to ride that wave. It also helped that their book design is among the best in the business. Finally, they ran a great promotion for my book by pairing it with Tina May Hall’s phenomenal All the Day’s Sad Stories, which everyone should be reading. It’s a truly brilliant novella, and one I was very proud to be published with.

OA: Your blog is well respected and through it you have gained a reputation as a valuable book reviewer. Do you think it is important for writers to maintain active blogs?
MB: I don’t know if all writers need blogs, but I’m very glad I have one. One of the goals I have for my website is to have it be about me as little as possible—I certainly blog about my publications and such, but I’m happiest when all the info about me is relegated to the sidebars and I’ve got ten posts in a row about other writers and their stories and books and events. I really love getting the word out about writers I’m excited by, and the blog format makes it easy to meet people with similar tastes. I only wish I could do more of that sort of work—There’s only so much time in the day, and I never get as many books reviewed or stories blogged as I mean too. I’m actually very, very behind on it right now, and need to get back to work on writing up all the stories and chapbooks and so on that I’ve wanted to mention.

OA: The Collagist sounds like an exciting new project. How is it shaping up and what will your role be in the literary journal?
MB: I’m very excited about The Collagist, and so far it’s going really well. We just announced the magazine a couple weeks ago, and submissions have been pouring in. There’s so much great writing coming our way, and I’m very appreciative of all the people who have trusted us with their work without us having published an issue yet. That’s the real benefit, I think, of being backed by Dzanc, whose reputation gives us a nice boost getting started.

In any case, it’s great to have so much to read, and my only regret is that I’ll get to publish so little of what comes in. I’m turning down a lot of work that is really interesting and well-written, because I simply don’t have the space to publish all of it. That said, I’ve got my fingers crossed for every story and poem and essay that comes our way, whether we publish it or not. I’ve always enjoyed seeing something I first read as a submission get published elsewhere, and with the quality of work I’m seeing at The Collagist, I’m sure that’s going to become a very frequent phenomenon.

As far as my role, I’m the primary editor, and will, among other things, be reading all of the fiction and non-fiction submissions. As of right now, there isn’t anyone else reading but myself, and even though it’s a lot of work, it’s also really fulfilling. I’ve been trying to do my best to write as many personal notes as I can in response to submissions, and while I know I won’t always be able to do that, especially as submissions pick up, it’s important to me to try and respond to the friendliness of submitters with the same.

Besides myself, Matthew Olzmann is editing the poetry, and Dzanc publisher Dan Wickett is coordinating book reviews and the novel excerpts we’re publishing every month. Like most of the projects I’ve been involved with at Dzanc, it’s a very communal affair, in that everyone there collaborates and pitches in with lots of shared knowledge and opinions, lots of gracious gifts of their time.

OA: I have to imagine that you are a master of time management with everything you are able to accomplished. Do you ever feeling overwhelmed and how do you handle it? What is you typical day like?
MB: I always feel like I’m not getting enough done, or that I’m wasting too much time, so I don’t know that I’m quite as great of a time manager as you might think. Mostly I’m gifted with a lot of time right now, and I’m doing my best to make the most of it. That said, I used to work fifty to sixty hours a week, and I managed to write and edit and review then too. Sometimes the worst curse in the world is too much time, at least for me—It makes it easy to think that you’ll do something later, only to let the whole day get away.

This summer, I try to get up and write every morning for several hours, and then I spend the afternoon reading submissions, working on editorial projects, writing book reviews, catching up my e-mail, and so on. Evenings are free for reading, spending time with my wife, and so on.

This generous schedule will get disrupted by school restarting in the fall, but for now, it’s pretty perfect. I realize most people don’t ever get this sort of time gift, and it’ll be short-lived for me too. I’m just trying to make the most of it.

OA: What's next for Matt Bell?
MB: I’m drafting a novel right now, so that’s the only fiction project I’m working on. Otherwise, I’m just looking to have a great first issue for The Collagist in August, and to keep moving forward with everything else I have going on. Mostly, I’m just enjoying being a part of so many great communities of readers and writers, and having access to so much of the truly excellent work being produced and published. I’m just hoping to get to read and promote as much of it as possible, and also to contribute in my own small way.

Bonus Questions:

OA: If you could sit down to coffee with anyone (alive or dead) who would it be?
MB: This is probably the question I’ve spent the most time on, because it feels like the kind of thing you’re supposed to be clever with. Unfortunately, I’m not very clever, so perhaps I’ll go for heartfelt instead: My wife has been working from 6am to 8pm in her lab at the university every day, working on her PhD, and I don’t get to see her a lot during the week. A cup of coffee with her sounds pretty great right about now.

OA: What type of music do you enjoy and who are a few of your favorites?
MB: I could talk about music all day—My wife and I go to a lot of shows, and love a lot of music. Some recent favorites include the new albums by The Thermals, Wilco, Sunset Rubdown, The Dirty Projectors. I’ve been listening to a lot of Yeasayer lately. We’ve seen some great live shows this year too, like The Handsome Furs, Man Man (three times!), Franz Ferdinand, and White Rabbit. At the end of last year, I got to Jeff Mangum sing a couple songs at the Elephant Six Holiday Tour, which was pretty amazing. In the Aeroplane Over the Sea is my favorite album of all time, and even though he didn’t sing any of his own songs, it was still pretty amazing to be five feet away from a guy whose songs I’ve listened to hundreds and hundreds of times.

For more information on Matt Bell please visit his blog.