Kaitlyn Andrews-Rice is the Editor-in-Chief of Split Lip Magazine. Her short fiction appears or is forthcoming in Indiana Review, Copper Nickel, Paper Darts, and Booth. Find her online @thelegitkar or thelegitkar.com.
Alex Quinlan: One of the things that was most apparent from your reading at AWP Tampa is that Split Lip has developed a community that is as strong, vibrant, and diverse as it is geographically widespread. How have you gone about cultivating this sense of community?
Thank you for noticing this! The writing community is an interesting thing, particularly when you leave academia. Since Split Lip Magazine is independently-run (e.g. not affiliated with a university), it was important to me that we build our own community and to do it differently. Post-MFA I took several years away from writing and worked as a marketing consultant, attending too many happy hours in uncomfortable shoes. About four years ago, I had the opportunity to blow up my life (it sounds terrible, but it was actually a good thing) and finally pursue writing and editing seriously.
I had been out of the writing world for so long, most internet literary journals were new to me (Am I dating myself? I graduated from my MFA in 2009 and back then there was no Submittable). And while I could see how the proliferation of online literary journals had opened up more avenues for publication, I could also see how many people were getting lost in the shuffle. Every week there are dozens of new stories, poems, and memoirs floating across my Twitter timeline, and I started to wonder how we could do better. It was part existential crisis (if no one reads, what’s the point of publishing), part practicality (how can we get people to read our journal?). So I had this wild idea to treat a literary magazine like I would have a client in my former life.
About a year ago, Split Lip transitioned to a less-is-more format. Online we publish one piece per genre for a total of four pieces per month. We also published our very first print issue in March of 2018. This scaled-down approach allows to give more time to each contributor, whether that be on the editorial side or on the promotional side. And this level of attention doesn’t end after publication. Our entire team keeps track of contributors, logging new publications and other publishing-related news. Becky Robison, our incredible Social Media and Marketing Coordinator, runs our social media accounts, where she celebrates achievements of current and former contributors. Becky’s work is integral to our community, and we want our contributors to feel like they’re a part of something long after they publish with us. It’s also important to me that we promote everyone equally. I’m pretty adverse to playing favorites with contributors, mainly because I’m sensitive to how that feels as a writer myself.
Internally we also discuss how to be approachable whether you’ve published with us or not. Ever gone up to one of those Very Important Lit Mag tables at AWP? It’s not always the best experience for an already introverted writer type, so we want Split Lip to feel like a place where everyone is welcome. To that end, we host frequent live FAQ Twitter chats where writers can ask editors questions and get real-time responses, and we welcome feedback on our submission process by surveying readers/submitters to get a better sense of how we can do better.
From what I understand, Split Lip began by publishing books and has since grown to include a print journal. Oftentimes, the development is in the other direction: a press will begin with a periodical and then add a book publishing arm to their operations. What is the story behind the growth and development of Split Lip?
Split Lip was founded by J. Scott Bugher in 2012. Scott was a once a top Nashville session musician and wanted to apply lessons from the indie music scene to publishing. The Press started small so Scott founded the magazine to put out work in the interim. And because of his interest in music the magazine also featured art, music, film, in addition to the traditional fiction, poetry, and memoir, giving us our pop culture twist. Amanda Miska, former Split Lip Magazine Editor-in-Chief and current Split Lip Press Publisher, took over Split Lip from Scott in 2014. Amanda really brought Split Lip into the spotlight, cultivating a community online and publishing creative, voice-driven work. In 2016 Amanda asked me to come on as Flash Fiction Editor, which was an entirely new genre for us. Although Split Lip had been publishing flash-length work, we really made it a priority in 2016 to publish unique flash that might not have had a home elsewhere.
A little over a year ago Amanda decided to step back from the magazine to free up time for her own writing, and she asked if I’d be interested in taking over the magazine.
How would you characterize your aesthetic with the journal? What kind of work are you most hungry for?
Voice-driven writing with a pop-culture twist is our tagline, but I’ve been wondering lately why “voice-driven” is such a hard thing to define. What do they say about love? When you know, you know? I feel this when reading submissions. My favorite pieces feel like one big inhale and ultimate exhale. I prefer writing with a POV and energy, work that could have only been written by the author, the kind you can pick out of a line-up, the kind where you know immediately who the work belongs to.
Our editors also have a soft spot for innovative work that is slightly rough around the edges. We love humor and sass. We prefer exciting, interesting voices over well-written competently plotted work, and we will often choose to work with a newer writer on edits over publishing a more established writer whose work feels stale or generic. It’s important that new writers know how much we want to pluck their work out of the slush, and we’re interested in publishing diverse work from writers across the globe. Recently we’ve published work by current high school students, U.S. Marines vets, and former Hollywood executives. Our contributors range in age from teenagers to retirees.
Who are your favorite editors?
The judicious answer is all of them. Anyone running a literary magazine in our current world is my own kind of hero.
I love Brigid Hughes and A Public Space. APS is one of the most beautiful, thought-provoking magazines out there. I’m also a longtime fan of the work coming out of the Indiana Review. Even though they work with a rotating team of student editors, the IR aesthetic is consistently interesting and entertaining from beginning to end. I love Paper Darts. Editors Meghan Murphy, Alyssa Bluhm, and the entire team put out gorgeous issues both online and in print, and their emphasis on art is unrivaled in the lit mag scene. The team at The Adroit Journal is putting out some of the best poetry and prose of any online lit mag, and I have a small obsession with Black Warrior Review. Samantha Edmonds’ “The Space Poet” from their most recent issue is a story I can’t stop thinking about.
This is obviously not an exhaustive list. Literary magazines are my one, true love.
Dorothy Chan: Hi, Kaitlyn! I’m excited to be continuing this great conversation with you. Building off Alex’s questions, I first want to say that I LOVE your statement on Split Lip Magazine’s website, regarding the type of work you’re looking for: “Voice-driven writing with a kick. A spicy margarita. A martini with extra olives. Side of guacamole. Send us your words, preferably your best words. When in doubt, send us words with character (and characters) over perfectly written yet boring work. We like to fish interesting work out of the slush. That’s the good stuff, and that’s why we’re here.”