Sometimes when I'm being really narcissistic + curious about the great
big world, I'll google myself, hoping to find some secret Pushcart
nomination I never knew about from years ago or another blog of someone who
read one of my short stories (it happens, but never enough), which
usually means stumbling on some insolent/ignorant comment from some
unpublished, superopinionated anonymous poster who doesn't have the
courage to use her/his real name but somehow knows everything about me +
the industry. But sometimes, self-googling reveals whispers of your
own existence you really want to believe in + also educates you about rad websites you didn't even know existed before you pushed the search button. The first is a review of my short story "30 Roofies" in the literary blog
The Review Review. This story was originally published in
Quarterly West + is part of my collection,
Atlas of Tiny Desires. In case you're not wearing your bifocals, here's a close-up of the paragraph about "30 Roofies":
While I don't find this blurbish story review to be particularly profound, I'm very grateful for the press + also appreciate the author's admiration. Really, I'll take whatever coverage I can get when it comes to my own writing. As Tom has told me many times, the only thing we're trying to do as aspiring writers is publish our shit + find our audience. Boom.
Another blog I discovered after self-googling was
Ruelle Electrique that reviews literary journals, books + video games, among other things (three things after my very own heart). Ruelle Electrique reviewed my short story "$67.00 for My Favorite Dictator," (retitled "A Full Cellar" by Howard Junker), which was published in the every-snazzy, always fantastic
ZYZZYVA. "$67.00 for My Favorite Dictator" is another story included in my short story collection,
Atlas of Tiny Desires. Again, if you don't have spidievision, feel free to read the follow close-up below. Or not:
And lastly, I discovered last month that I was included in an amazing, on-going project at
The Rumpus
to identify the blog or website of practically every writer of color on
the face of the earth, which is no small undertaking, let me tell you
that. While I know that I'm hapa, a lot of people I've met in my life
don't give me that honor. I mean, I still have Asian friends who think
they're the only Asian in the room. It just doesn't sink in for many
people because I'm not legibly Japanese-American. So, in a small, tiny
way, I found it both amazing + encouraging to see so many writers of
color in this world (+ growing all the time!), + I also found it
slightly empowering to get acknowledgment for who I am at such a great
literary website like The Rumpus, not just for what I look like to the world. Here's my name, in between Jabarsi Asiam and Jacqueline Woodson:
