Life at Open Heart Publishing

Posts Tagged ‘editing’

We here at Open Heart Publishing have had a ton of work on our plates but one bite at a time deadlines are being met and production is moving forward. With everything coming up on us in the next weeks I wanted to, halfway through; introduce you to our fearless leader, the Dictator of Deadlines, Debrin Case.

I remember when I first saw the friend request from An Honest Lie in my Facebook in box. I thought, “What the hell is an honest lie?” I’m glad I did the research because I was more than pleasantly surprised at what I found. There are so many small publishers out there, and I’m not one to point fingers, but Open Heart Publishing struck me immediately as one of the better ones. At the time Debrin was hiring and I was determined to get in on the Publishing business so I sent him an email. It wasn’t long before he got back to me and within a week he’d given me a call. I remember one of the first things he said to me was,

“I have to warn you I get a bit nervous around new people and when I’m nervous I cuss.”

It seems like such a small thing but it made him more real to me, more human, more accessible than the other interviewers I’ve had to deal with. I didn’t get the job then but Debrin and I remained in contact. When the time came he called me first and I appreciate it.

Debrin is a man with a focus and a plan and he does a fantastic job of bringing us all together to accomplish our goals. He may seem gentle and unassuming on the surface, but don’t be fooled he has an iron will and a remarkable depth of talent. He graces the Pages of An Honest Lie Volume 2 with a tale called Learning to Pray. today though we are going to talk to him about Open Heart Publishing and what exciting things are in store for us. But I’ll let him tell you about it.

Open heart Publishing: So you are the man who started it all. I feel I would not only be remiss if I didn’t ask, but I might get a few less than pleasant emails as well, so, what do you feel is a delusion of insignificance?

Debrin Case: I feel it would be a travesty for me to interpret the meaning of this year’s theme or the masthead . This is something I would rather leave to the interpretation of the individual reader as opposed to defining it and ruining all of the fun.

OHP: I can understand that. What is An Honest Lie?

D. C.: Like a Delusion of Insignificance, I feel it would be a travesty for me to interpret the meaning of this year’s theme or the masthead. This is something I would rather leave to the interpretation of the individual reader as opposed to defining it and ruining all of the fun.

OHP: Looks like we are going to be sticking with the party line on that one. But I asked him! No angry emails! Open Heart Publishing and the An Honest Lie anthologies are becoming pretty popular pretty fast; tell us something about where you are planning to take them in the future.

D.C.: AHL is heading into its second volume and wow what a great collection of authors we have found for our readership this year. It does my heart good to see a new cast of amazing authors to work with for volume 2, and as we get ready to embark on volume 3 it can only get better. As to what else to expect from Open Heart Publishing, the best advice I have is to keep checking us out. A wonderful collection of short stories from C.B. Calsing entitled All Along the Pacific will be available later this year, the winner of AHL Vol. 1 will be announced, yet another wonderful opportunity project, and of course Volume 2 of An Honest Lie should be available by late October.

OHP: I can hardly wait; it’s looking pretty good right now. Is your desire to publish other writers as strong as your need to write?

D.C.: Absolutely, in some ways it is even stronger. They are both important sides of me and my own personal missions of creating accessible fiction, and to promote and find new authors.

OHP: I’ve read some of your work and I know what’s waiting in the wings as far as Open Heart Publishing goes, I find your imagination fascinating. Where do you draw your inspiration from?

D.C.: Like all artists, and the rest of humanity, my inspiration is an amalgamation of everything I intake into my life. Whether this is through food, drink, music, movies, T.V., books, internet, conversations with strangers, moments of road rage… etc, in the end everything I do is a byproduct of everything I have consumed.

OHP: so many bathroom jokes and waste to writing comparisons to make, so little time. In your opinion, which is the more important discovery of humankind… plumbing or the written word?

D.C.: Definitely plumbing. Though I would like to believe that the written word has changed the world far more vastly than any other human invention, it has also brought about more debacles, damnations and epiphanies than any other invention before or after. Yet, it is in fact plumbing that has done more in the ways of health, safety and the unity of mankind than was ever dreamed of before. Just like pants that go on one leg at a time, so too do we discover that everyone goes to the bathroom and perhaps this could be the very medium by which world peace could be achieved.

OHP: People miss the simplest things sometimes. Are you a writer or a publisher first?

D.C.: I am dictator first, everything else is highly suspect.

OHP: Are there any authors, besides yourself, that you enjoy reading?

D.C.: There are thousands of authors out there besides myself that I love to read. Too many to list and to many egos to inflame or deflate by a mere mention or deletion from that list. I am a voracious reader, and in fact often read books without trying to discover anything about an author before I devour their work.

OHP: Who would you say is your writing mentor/ hero?

D.C.: My writing heroine is Ariel Gore, her book How to Become a Famous Author before You Are Dead is like a bible to me. I read it far more religiously than I ever read any assumed to be “Holy” text. If you are an author or a publisher and have not read this book, then stop reading this article now and hit Google, or whatever search engine you prefer, and find out more about this amazing book right this second. Seriously, you won’t regret it.

OHP: I haven’t read it yet … I know, I know. Do you have a writing nemesis?

D.C.: I sure do, and I have to see that bastard every morning when I get out of bed and wander my way into the bathroom. If you never realize that you are your own worst critic and at times your own worst enemy then perhaps you need to reexamine your artistic endeavors.
Being an artist is about introspection, and introspection is not as easy as getting your temperature taken, on the contrary it is more akin to exploratory surgery on a primitive battlefield where the doctors are still blissfully unaware of the concept of infections caused by dirty hands.

OHP: Indeed! I know how much work goes into producing an awesome literary product; do you have any advice for aspiring publishers out there?

D.C.: Keep to your deadlines. Nothing else matters above your word and keeping to your deadlines.

Is your life in shambles, can’t pay the rent, need a new car… tough shit, keep to your deadlines.

The world is doomed, the wrong political candidate won the election, there is a race of mutant rats overthrowing your city… ah well, stick to your deadlines.

An author needs an extension on their piece, an artist is having issues, your printer is going away on holiday, who cares… Keep your deadlines.

OHP: Why do you feel the need to write?

D.C.: Communication. Communication and communion with the rest of the human race is the endeavor of all people the world over. Whether this is via speech, interpretive dance, collages, decoupage, crochet or writing the need is the same it is in its presentation where we discover all of the dissimilar ways in which we are so similar.

OHP: Besides short stories what other writing endeavors are you currently engaged in?

D.C.: Tons of them. Currently I am working on 4 different books, and I am preparing 3 more volumes to be published this year by Open Heart Publishing.

OHP: It has been a pleasure picking your brain. Just a few more questions; what do you feel about the following quote “Imagination is more important than knowledge?”

D.C.: I believe Einstein was more accurate than he could have ever dreamed, and as the day’s move forward into months, then years, decades and eventually eons we will see just how far down the rabbit hole we can go while taking what we perceived of as reality along for the ride.

OHP: According to Anatole France “To die for an idea is to set a rather high price on conjecture,” in your opinion what do you believe is worth dying for? What do you believe is worth living for?

D.C.: I believe that everything is worth living for, I have yet to find one truly worthy reason to die and for this reasoning alone I am currently refusing any model of living which concludes with such an outmoded way of thinking.

OHP: Mark Twain once said that “You can’t depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus.” What do you believe he meant by that?

D.C.: There is a bigger picture in all things with which you may be blissfully unaware at any given moment. As such you aren’t always seeing or understanding what is actually going on at any moment. Pay close attention to everything and all of the details. No matter how unusual, bizarre or even downright ordinary things may appear… they aren’t. They never are.

OHP: Most people have two stories for doing anything… a plausible excuse and the real reason, why do you really write?

D.C.: I write, therefore I am.
Or is it; I am, therefore I write?
Or is it simply, I enjoy telling a story whether good or ill conceived and in the end I want to get paid for it?

Yes to all of the above, and then a whole bunch more that I am quite sure would quite easily become a philosophical debate about the existence of bubblegum on the dwarf planet of Pluto and how that is causing certain politicians’ to vote no to better funding for public education art programs.

OHP: There is a great deal of talking going about your book “A Children’s Book of Necromancy”, I hear that anyone that reads it can become quite powerful and even learn how to raise the dead. Is this true?

Absolutely, Davin. “A Children’s Book of Necromancy,” is absolutely the most important coloring book ever to be published, and I personally promise with absolute barnum sincerity that anyone who reads this book will be able to raise the dead.

If you want to know more about this amazing volume visit the official website here, and you can also visit us at Animefest 2010 in Dallas,TX where you can meet myself and Darcy Melton (the illustrator).

OHP: We are coming up on the publication day for An Honest Lie Volume 2: Delusions of Insignificance very fast. Do you have any plans for a third volume?

D.C.: Yes I do, but you will have to wait until next year to hear more.

Debrin Case has been making the story more interesting since 1970!
Debrin Case holds a B.A. in English Literature and is currently the founder/publisher of Open Heart Publishing, a company that promotes, showcases, and opens doors for new authors with its annual anthology
“An Honest Lie,” but also for children through its charitable project called, “The Opportunity Project.”
Additionally, Debrin oversees intuitive writing workshops, writes grants for charities (non profits and artistic endeavors), and is an experienced storyteller, ghost writer, and fiction writer.
Previously held the positions of editor for Hedge Wizard Press, and also co-editor for Red River Review.
When asked of the validity of his tales he will normally reply,
“My stories are 50% bullshit… and the rest is questionable, but at least they are honest.

http://debrincase.com/

It was recently brought to my attention that we here at the Jr. Editors Desk have made a serious mistake. It seems that we got our Jessica’s crossed somewhere. I’m not sure if you know but mixing Jessica’s can be a dangerous business. Your email boxes rebel, your Open Office documents vanish into the digital void, your credibility and self esteem are thoroughly challenged. Lucky for us all we are champions of literary might and we have once again, with the help of a few friends, and two Jessica’s, brought to you yet another compelling and thrilling Author Interview. The best thing about it is that you get to have not one, but two thrilling interviews in one issue.

Jessica Stilling was interviewed a few weeks ago. You can go check out what she really said here. http://debrincase.com/blog4/2010/08/02/talking-to-jessica-stilling/

Our other Jessica sent us a fantastically disturbing tale called Monkey Love. Monkey’s freak me out a bit, vicious dastardly little monsters. Jessica masterfully wound them into this twisted tale.

“Twisted? It’s just a little story about a man and his monkeys. But seriously, I actually started this story in a writing workshop at the local college. The professor gave us one of those exercises I always mock, like here are five words incorporate them in a story. The words were greasy, zoo and … well those were the only words I used so I forgot the others; turns out the class was full and I had to leave, but I took the first page of my story with me. See kids, you can get something for nothing. It also was inspired by my intense hatred of temping in poorly lit offices, after a few hours the fire ax starts to look pretty tempting.”

So I asked her a few more questions to round things out. Check out what she had to say, but be careful; don’t make the same mistake we made and get your Jessica’s mixed up.

Open Heart Publishing: Sorry about the mix-up. Can you ever forgive us?

Jessica Dunn: It’s all good; really not a big deal.

OHP: I always try to do my research. I had a difficult time finding you around the web. Start by telling us a bit about Jessica Dunn.

J.D.: As for internet presence, I do not have much of one. I know..bad writer…no milkbones. My reason, I am a bit of a misanthrope. I barely know what to do with the people I meet and know in person, much less the potential millions of cyberpeople out there. I have a blog on theicarusproject.net (which is a site that promotes radical mental health) under the name thebegnignconspiracy. Unfortunately, I do not update it as much as I should. Other reason, I am boring from the outside. I don’t do much that involves public, the most I have ever been in noticeably in public was when I dressed up for Otakon and everyone was dressed like a skanky anime chick with a giant sword and/or catears so I didn’t really stand out. Much of my day consists of grading papers, writing and cursing Resident Evil 4 when I have to shoot a zombie 5 times in the head with a shotgun before it dies. Occassionally I attempt to teach myself to play guitar and hope no one hears me.

OHP: The only thing better than killin’ Zombies is killin’ Nazis. But that may be an insignificant delusion. What do you feel is a delusion of insignificance?

J.D.: It is the belief that our choices are inconsequential. Like its misbegotten twin, this delusion is sadly often held by those to whom it least applies.

OHP: Yeah, some people just don’t know they have greatness right below the surface. What is an honest lie?

J.D.: The most effective kind.

OHP: An Honest Lie is a strange thing, but it’s a truth of our lives. Why did you submit your work to An Honest Lie?

J.D.: I had just finished editing Monkey Love and I was rather proud of myself (which in my world means reading it didn’t make me wish my eyes were bleeding so as to obscure the words) and I wanted to send it out into the world to be rejected over and over again and darn my luck, it got published instead. I also thought Andy would feel at home amongst the other delusions.

OHP: Are you working on anything we might get the privilege to read soon?

J.D.: Current projects include learning how to play Come As You Are, rescuing the president’s daughter (in Resident Evil 4, I promise Obama, I have never met your daughter), and a story I hope to finish soon entitled Everything You Need for Under One Dollar about a boy left to fend for himself in the wilds of the local dollar store.

OHP: Besides short stories what other writing endeavors are you currently engaged in?

J.D.: Besides this interview …? I am attempting to write some essays concerning mental health and capitalism as well as the life, works and philosophy of R.D. Laing. Maybe even a poem now and again.

OHP: Nice. I’m impressed. Who would you say your writing Mentor/Hero is?

J.D.: Albert Camus, he wrote the kinds of things that make you say, ‘I’ve thought this was so all my life but never had the words to express it.’ His writing is simple and poignant. It exposes the human animal in all its petty banality as well as exquisite dignity. All the important lessons of life can be found in his work: There is responsibility in freedom. There is a price for pointing out that the emperor has no clothes. And “none of your certainties are worth a single strand of a woman’s hair.”

OHP: You know many writers credit Earnest Hemmingway with being “the father of modern literature”; and that with the sort of simpering sycophancy that only aspiring writers can conjure. Do you think writers should call Earnest Hemmingway “Papa”?

J.D.: I think if they are looking for someone to fill the role of their father, they could do better, although depressive, alcoholic fathers never seem to go out of fashion.

OHP: Are there any authors, besides yourself, that you enjoy reading?

J.D: Albert Camus, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Gunter Gräss, R.D. Laing, Chuck Palaniuk, Kurt Vonnegut, J.D. Salinger, and Edgar Allen Poe, to name the first that come to mind in no particular order. (Well o.k., Camus is my groove; talk about “Papa.”)

OHP: Do you have a writing nemesis?

J.D.: Those people that write truly insipid children’s books; the kind that lower the IQ of both child and parent. You know who you are.

OHP: In your opinion, which is the more important discovery of human kind … plumbing or the written word?

J.D.: I’ll put it to you this way, I love to write, but I love not being covered in my own shit more.

OHP: Point taken. What do you feel about the following quote: “Imagination is more important than knowledge?

J.D.: Remember when you used to know that Pluto was a planet? Imagination is far more reliable.

OHP: Mark Twain once said, “You can’t depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus.” What do you think he meant by that?

J.D.: Eyes are good for the surface of things; the imagination is what lets us look inside them.

OHP: It’s post Apocalyptica, what would be your greatest asset?

J.D.: My post Apocalyptica skill is the fact that I can roof (shingles, tar, even hot tin). Because let’s face it, if life as we know it ends and we are all scavenging for food, ammo and shelter on high ground no one is going to respond to a “will write for food” sign. Also I have an intense hatred for the walking dead and won’t go all soft if my friends or family die and then get back up and try to eat me. Sorry guys, but it’s a katana to the brain stem for you. Hesitation is the number one killer in the post-apocalyptic world.

OHP: Awesome! Most people have two stories for doing anything… a plausible excuse and the real reason, why do you really write?

J.D.: I come by my writing obsession honestly, the result of old fashioned boredom, school-aged delinquency, and isolation. I began to write in detention, and it soon extended to lunch and recess. I scribbled poems and flash fiction in the margins of my notebooks, I wrote sonnets in lieu of essays on my AP exam. I like writing anything, as long as I am supposed to be writing something else.

Jess Dunn has been writing since she was a wee thing, who had still not quite mastered how to end an “s.” She received her undergraduate education at Goucher College and her M.A. in Clinical Psychology from Towson University. She is currently a lecturer at Johns Hopkins University. Although she went to school for psychology and got a “real job,” she continues to write compulsively. Besides writing and subversively influencing the still malleable minds of undergraduates, her interests include radical mental health, outsider art, cephalopods, and zombie hordes. She currently lives in Baltimore, MD with her partner and her cat.

Davin Kimble Jr. Editor

Hello everyone. It’s me … the new guy. I am sure that many of you are wondering who I am. I hope you all have visited my web sites, done your research and drew your conclusions; as all good writers should. I welcome your inquires and criticisms. You see, one of my guiding principles is being a better person today than I was on the day previous and, with much sweating and ponderous speculation I decided not to regale you with my greatness, instead I hope I can give you something I find much more important, how I see the art form we all share.

I see the art of writing much like I see the art of dance. Both are refined arts with years of preparation required before you are truly capable of producing a work of art. While the dancer spends hours in a studio practicing her steps, the writer spends hours spinning their words into sentences, those sentences into stories that grab, hold and dazzle the reader. I love that journey from the realization that the story is inside of you, to the finalization of the tale itself. You almost feel like you almost have to write “The End”, to close the door and free yourself to start again.

For me, there is no higher thing in a person’s life than to do something that has meaning to them. Many of us chase dreams, but few of us figure out that it’s better to put yourself in the path of your dreams so that they come to you. Your path, like mine is the path of the literate. It’s why you’re here; it’s why I’m here. The dance of the words across the page is just too mesmerizing to resist. So we don’t resist, we dance.

Here at Open Heart Publishing we are working to showcase the absolute best of those dances. We want to give our readers an experience that not only they will remember and tell their friends about, but one that they will return to on occasion. We want to create rainy day books, well thumbed and well loved tomes of “sacred texts”. In order to do that we realize that we have to work closely with our writers in order to produce a product that everyone can be happy with and proud of. We know, that this is not a dance we can do alone, this is an orchestra of creativity and it will only come together if we are all writing on the same page.

To that end, with the upcoming An Honest Lie Volume 2, we are going to be spending some time with the authors chosen for the book. We are going to find out some things about their craft, and the inspirations for their stories. We are going to find out what makes them dance across the pages one word at a time until the “The End”.

I hope you will stand by us as we move forward, turning Open Heart Publishing into a house you can rely on to provide you with quality literary entertainment, a serious and focused place you can trust your best work with, and a network that will work along with you to place all of us in the path of our dreams.

So, as I begin here with Open Heart Publishing, as we all continue into the great tomorrows in our lives, I would ask this of you, do your dance, incorporate it with ours if you can, if you dare to elevate yourself. With an open heart I welcome you all.

As some of you may already be aware our Jr. Editor, Erin Marissa Russell has decided to continue pursuing her education and honing her crafts of editing and journalism and has discovered much to her own dismay that she must relinquish her position at O.H.P. so that she may give her full attention to her education.

It is with a sad heart that we say goodbye to Erin, she is truly an amazing editor (as well as a myriad of other artistic talents (a fraction of which can be found in Volume 1 of “An Honest Lie”)), and writers of either a journalistic or literary nature would be wise to listen to her words of wisdom. We have learned a lot from her, and we believe that the same can be said from her about her time and experiences with O.H.P.

May your journey take you wherever you wish to go Erin; it has been a pleasure to have you with us at O.H.P.

Though we shall miss Ms. Russell, the presses at O.H.P. just do not stop, and there is a mighty large workload to take care of… so it is without further adieu that I am pleased to announce our new Junior Editor, Davin Kimble.

Davin Kimble

lives and writes from Fort Worth, Texas.
His writing career actually started when he learned to put words together. He remembers quite well the first story he ever wrote. Since then, his work has evolved into hundreds of short stories, poems, songs, essay’s and articles.

He is currently working on his first novel, tentatively entitled “Donovan,” a story about a 30 year old propaganda writer in a future war-torn America.

Davin also creates beats and lyrics for hip-hop and alternative music, and is an amateur photographer and digital artist.

His recent published works are “Stirrings in Hell” in the anthology, “The Devil Inside,” published by the House Of Horror Ezine ; “A New Way of Being”, published by House Of Horror Ezine in their anthology titled “House of Horror Best of 2009, Issue #2;” and “A Remarkable Picture” published by Twit Publishing in their anthology titled, “Twit Publishing Presents Pulp – 2010″. Davin is the Junior Editor for Open Heart Publishing.

To see more of Davin’s work, please visit www.davinkwriter.com.

Welcome aboard Davin, I can’t wait to start hearing about all of the wonderful things we are going to be seeing from Open Heart Publishing over the next few weeks.

From the presses at Open Heart Publishing in Dallas Texas, Happy reading all.

Debrin Case
Publisher: Open Heart Publishing