WE HAVE A MAG

Thank you to everyone who submitted and especially to those that were accepted. Congratulations. Two complimentary Copies of the magazine will be mailed to those of you whom were accepted for poetry, fiction and visual art. If you haven't recieved your acception/rejection letters, they will be sent out as soon as possible. Thank you for your patience. I'll be keeping everyone up to date on the magazine up until and through Spring 2012. Thank you once again and PLEASE keep writing and submitting to this magazine, without you WE ARE NOTHING!

Deadline is GONE

That's right ladies and gentlemen, writers and artists, the deadline for the Suisun Valley Review 2011 edition has passed. Please do not attempt to send in anymore submissions of poetry, short fiction or visual art. We are currently critiquing and editing written submissions for inclusion in the SVR 2011. If any writers are wondering if their piece has been accepted or not, I cannot tell you, but towards the end of the semester we will be sending out acceptance and rejection letters. Those that are accepted will be invited to verbally present their work at a poetry reading.

I'd like to speak to the rejection letters for a second. Don't be discouraged if you recieve one. On average a writer will recieve fifthteen rejection letters for each acceptance. We're not saying that your piece is bad, or cannot be published, simply that it didn't make the cut for the Suisun Valley Review. We would strongly encourage you to keep writing and keep submitting, not only to the SVR, but to other magazines as well. There are literally tens of thousands of literary magazines out there and you never know when one of them might publish your piece(s).

The discussions in class have been very lively and brought up many good points about a lot of different pieces including what is working and what isn't working as well as whether a piece should be included in the magazine or not based on the craft of the piece.

I'll keep you updated on our progress as we continue our towards our eventual goal of a complete magazine.

Fiction...yep, it's for real!

Ok so first off we'd like to thank anyone who submitted to the Quinton Duval Award. The deadline of March 15th, 2011 is now passed and we wish you all the best of luck. However, ***the deadline for the Suisun Valley Review is set at April 1st***, so pleeeeeaaaasssseeee all you writers and artists get your poems, short stories and visual art pieces in ASAP. 
Now on to the class this week which was all about fiction. We had a short packet of short fiction assigned to us. The goal: to determine what makes a good piece of fiction worthy of publishing in the Suisun Valley Review. Overall it was a very successful week and the lessons helped me personally to take down a few notes on what makes a good fiction piece. I know for the most part we all feel pretty comfortable critiquing fiction now as well as poetry and artwork.

Now it's a good thing we're comfortable and confident because we were assigned our first real packet this weekend. That's right, we're already looking at and critiquing pieces for inclusion in the magazine. Of course that isn't to say we don't want more, cause we do, we want A LOT more, so make sure you submit! Remember you can submit two ways, electronically and by mail. The email to submit is suisunvalleyreview@gmail.com. The address is:

Suisun Valley Review
English Dept/Humanities
Solano Community College
4000 Suisun Valley Road
Fairfield, CA, 94534

Also remember that your submissions must include a cover letter with your name, phone number, address, email and two to three lines about the author. Also if you send by mail you must include a self addressed stamped envelope. Good Luck to all who submit!!!

Deadlines and Censorship

Hello creative world. I'm coming to you once again to tell you a few important things. First off, deadlines are fast approaching. Today is March 11th which means you have only 4 days a.k.a Wednesday the 15th to submit your poems or short fiction for the Quinton Duval Award (only open to SCC students.) Also, the deadline for the SVR is April 1st (open to anyone and everyone.) We have around 100 submissions right now which is about 1/10th of what we estimated at the beginning of the semester. SO PLEASE SUBMIT ASAP (no not actors, singers, authors and professionals) AS SOON AS POSSIBLE.

Now on to censorship, which is primarily what this week in class was about. We had a nice long discussion on bias, morals and what would be ok to publish and what wouldn't. Overall I think the point was that there shouldn't be too much we don't publish because of content. Once again, like I said in the last post, we decide to put pieces (art, fiction, poetry) into the magazine based on the craft of the piece. The main thing is that we should BE AWARE OF our morals and our bias, not get rid of them completely. So yes u can cuss in your piece, but only if it enhances it somehow. If not then it will be obvious and won't be included not because we're censoring you, but because it didn't help the poem or story at all. One thing I think would be censored would be hate pieces, for example a piece from a member of the KKK with hate content towards African Americans or Mexican Americans.

Hello? Hello? HELLOOO????

Writers where are you? We desperately need your submissions. Without you we cannot exist (and I know that's a cheesy cliche line, but unlike most of the times it's used, this is actually true.) We need you to submit any poems, short stories, or artwork that you have ASAP. Yes I know the deadline isn't until April 1st, but the sooner the better!! We're on track to start reviewing pieces by mid-March. Don't make me beg (though in a way I already am.)

Now as for the class, (English 058) it's going along quite smoothly. Having reviewed and voted on our first practice packet, we're on to the second. The purpose behind the practice packets is to get the class up to speed on what makes a good poem or short piece of fiction, outside of just the content of the piece. By doing this we're prepping ourselves to read and effectively critique YOUR pieces (that you're emailing right after you finish reading this...) so that we're not overlooking any small details that would make us decide that your piece is an excellent one and worthy to be published in the magazine.

Now if you're wondering how we determine whether a piece is good enough or not, well that's simple. Each person reads, critiques and anazlyzes each piece individually, without any comparison to any other piece or any kind of bias whatsoever. Then, each student is allowed one vote for each piece. The votes are "yes" or "no". If a piece gets a seventy-five percent (75%) majority, then it is a definite answer. That is, if 75% of the class vote "yes" on a piece, it will definitely be in the yes pile. If 75% of the class vote "no", then it will definitely not be in the magazine this year. Now if we do not get a 75% majority either "yes" or "no", then it is considered a maybe. Each maybe is then discussed in class by each side (yes's and no's.) Each side is hoping to convince the others to vote their way and therefore get a 75% majority on their side. A revote is then held and usually a majority is determined. If no majority is determined still, then the piece will go back into the maybe pile to be discussed at another time. The final part is if there are too many pieces in the "yes" pile, then we'll have to raise the majority votes required to be submitted. Next would be 80% and so on until we get down to the number of submissions to be published in the magazine.

Now the only reason I posted that last bit is so that anyone submitting pieces can see that there is a rather rigorous process to determine whether your piece will be included in the magazine or not. It's not just one or two people who decide whether your piece is good or not. It's also not a bunch of students judging on how the piece's content made them feel.

SVR 2011 Has Begun

Hello everyone and welcome to the Suisun Valley Review blogspot for 2011. My name is Nick and I will be your blog "Master" for this year. My goal for this blog is to get potential students thinking about the Magazine and English 058 as a whole, to get them (and hopefully YOU) iterested in both, and to chronicle our experiences in and out of class as they relate to the 2011 edition of the magazine.

Things have gotten off to a bit of a slow start this year, nevertheless we're pushing through the obstacles and keeping on course. At the moment we're soliciting submissions for both the Quinton Duval Award and the Suisun Valley Review. Below is a jpeg of the submission poster describing what to, how to, and who can submit for each. We've also begun discussions on the overall quality and craft of poetry and short fiction. I know personally, and i'm sure others feel the same way, the discussions have helped me understand what makes a quality piece, outside of the actual content of the piece.

If there are any questions or comments about this blog, the poster, submissions, the class, or the magazine feel free to email us at suisunvalleyreview@gmail.com OR you can email me personally at klnickjames@gmail.com. We're also on Facebook, you can simply search Suisun Valley Review and on Twitter we are www.twitter.com/SVR_Editors

As a final word, I would highly reccomend getting submissions of poetry, short fiction and art in as soon as possible. Don't hesitate and don't second guess, just put it in an envelope or an email with the required information and SEND IT IN!!!! This especially applys to art if you want to be considered for the cover of the Magazine. That is one of the first aesthetic decisions we need to make, so the sooner the better!!