Shelf life

Putting out a literary magazine, especially one as widely revered as Other Voices, is something of a Herculean task for a small, unsung volunteer staff. The only thing more difficult may be running a small publishing press. Take on both tasks, which is what OV is doing with the launch of its book imprint on September 25, and the word goes from "unsung" to "insane."

"We're run by an almost identical staff, though we had to expand somewhat because we were afraid of taxing our volunteers," says Gina Frangello, executive editor of OV. "It used to be that I took the summers off to hang out with my kids and do my own writing, but this has really turned us into a yearlong operation." And when Frangello says "our volunteers," she can include herself and assistant editor JoAnne Ruvoli.

The short-story forum that has published literary luminaries such as Dan Chaon, Melissa Bank, Stephen Dixon and Wanda Coleman has carefully crafted an identity as a clearinghouse for top talent and diversity in authorship.

What's interesting is how the new press forces OV to reach out of its Chicago home. Although the mag has a national reputation, it throws most of its events in town. With the press, Frangello has to broaden the scope.

"It's really invigorating, to do book events on a national scale," she says. "We're doing a pretty extensive book tour and booking all kinds of things in L.A. It's really exciting to do that and be involved in every level of a writer's career."

Its foray into book publishing comes at a time when Chicago's literary scene seems to be expanding exponentially. Several local publishers and authors have gained prominence in the past few years thanks to big releases; local reading series have raised Chicago from its former status as a flyover city for book tours; and audiences at readings may now be referred to, without snickers, as "crowds."

What OV Books brings to the table is an intense focus on the short story, an embattled form that major houses are reluctant to publish and once-strong supporters among major national magazines—most prominently The Atlantic Monthly—have stopped running. But Frangello says OV Books stands firmly in the short story's corner.

"It grew out of an increasing concern about the future of the short story in the corporate publishing market," she says. "It bothered me that people at top of their craft are the people who the industry is least interested in. I didn't like that the short story was increasingly being viewed as the stepping stone to the novel."

Though OV actively courts minority writers and publishes a fair number of unknown authors, it still suffers from the mainstream idea that all literary magazines are the same. In that sense, OV is captive to the small audience who reads lit mags: other writers and literature fanatics.

"Few writers burst through that invisible-magazine feeling," says Frangello. "Books are easier to market, and easier to get out to a larger audience."

The magazine operates independently, but enjoys a symbiotic relationship with the University of Illinois at Chicago. UIC donates office space and services to the mag and UIC prof Cris Mazza serves on the OV board. But unlike many literary magazines tied to universities, OV survives off subscriptions and individual donors.

"When I was just a reader for the magazine, the idea for a press was swimming in my head," says Frangello. "But I had to make sure we had the financial solvency and didn't jeopardize the magazine."

OV held a contest in 2004 for a book-length manuscript, charging a reading fee to cover the cost of publishing the book. California writer Tod Goldberg's Simplify won. Goldberg's work is an eclectic collection of realist and surrealist storytelling, from a brother's difficult return from the first Gulf War to a kid who turns invisible after witnessing his father's infidelity.

When talking about the magazine, Frangello says, "We favor a little bit edgier work than what's featured in traditional magazines. And on a smaller, craft level we're very interested in publishing both experimental and traditional stories that are also very focused on scene."

Goldberg's book reads like a capsule of the OV agenda. The overheated suburbs of southern California and the crazed, sun-scorched roads through the outlying deserts are the perfect settings for Goldberg's characters. In a story that exemplifies his skill for blending the unreal with the everyday, a dyslexic kid creates his own language as a way to deal with life's stresses. As he witnesses a brutal act of violence against a fellow student and his careerist father becomes more and more aloof after a move to L.A., the kid fills binders and binders with his personal alphabet, a secret distress code. It's a startling and shuddersome story, with the kind of atmospheric tension we've come to expect from the new wave of Japanese horror movies.

"One of the things that I loved about Tod's book is the fact that each story felt really fresh to me, it didn't feel like I was reading the same story over and over again," says Frangello. Though Goldberg had published with OV before, the judges read every story blind. "I read it and thought, 'This is phenomenal; this writer's great.'"

Goldberg's book, however, seemed destined to lose. The final judge, author Pam Houston, had to read five manuscripts, four of which were by women.

"He was the only guy, so I didn't expect him to win when we sent the manuscripts to Pam," she says. "It seemed like the deck was stacked against him."

Literary contests have earned a bad reputation in recent years, with many presses bailing on publishing after collecting the reading fees. Stunned by the response to their call for submissions, the OV editors found their second book through the same contest that producedGoldberg's: a collection by Maryland writer Kate Blackwell to be released next year.

"You keep hearing these stories about presses that hold contests, and then keep the money, and say they couldn't publish anything because they didn't get anything good," Frangello says. "We received dozens of books that were perfectly publishable. To think you couldn't pick a winner is completely absurd."

OV Books launches September 25 with a party, reading and silent auction at the Chicago Cultural Center.