An anthology of true stories about sex, edited by Melissa Gira Grant and Meaghan O’Connell.
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I’ve been published in various venues before, including websites and magazines and books (yes, books sold in Barnes and Noble, not books I wrote and handbound myself and charged family members $5 for, although maybe some of those as well.) I grew up thinking of myself as a writer, assuming I would make a life as a writer, and that “writer” would be my name in the world. I expected I’d feel a certain way (breathless, teary, ecstatic?) upon seeing my full name in magazine print, in book print, upon receiving my first real check for something I’d written, but I didn’t. Which is part of how I learned that I truly love writing, the process, and not writing, the finished product.
But I am so excited about this. Near giddy excited. I have never been so eager to hold a book in my hands or to immediately read it from front to back. For the first time, I feel the way I thought I would feel. So thank you, M & M. I cannot believe you are making us wait until September.
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on Jez, because sometimes we all just need to weigh in, clearly.
Yesterday I wrapped up work on Coming & Crying, the Kickstarter-powered first release from Melissa Gira Grant and Meaghan O’Connell’s Glass Houses Press. The perfect cover photograph is by Nikola Tamindzic, and I handled design duties inside and out.
There was nothing about this whole process that wasn’t a total joy (despite some contradicting claims). Melissa and Meaghan are two of the most enthusiastic, appreciative people you could hope to work with, and I feel totally privileged to be at least a tiny part of their incredible project. It’s the first hardback I’ve worked on, and it’s being printed by Oddi, who you may know as the printers behind some of McSweeney’s most beautifully finished books. It should be available in the next couple months.
Oh, also - Dolly is a hell of a typeface.
I can’t really explain how cool it was to just email a person whose work you (really really, hang up in your apartment- level) admire and say, HEY I KNOW THIS IS CRAZY, BUT DO YOU WANT TO DESIGN OUR ENTIRE BOOK? AND IT’S DUE TO THE PRINTER IN A FEW WEEKS?” and have him write back in a series of all caps and exclamation points, saying YES!!! before we even worked out any details.
We’re so excited and so grateful to be able to work w. Jez. It takes a special (patient, compassionate, forgiving) type of person to deal with two people making their first book—frantically flipping through my bookshelf at 3 in the morning wondering what exactly goes on the colophon and engaging in a 3-hour debate about the Table of Contents. Dots? No dots? Italics, all caps?
It’s so fun and it means so much.
And yes, Dolly is one goddamn sweet ass typeface.
Jez is godsent. He took to all of my attempts at design direction — “You know me, I’ll always go for more muted” / “I’ve been listening to a lot of 4AD stuff right now” / “You know that cool machiney New Order record cover thing” / “I defer to you” / “I defer to you” / “I defer to you” / “Pink? Really?!” / “Okay, so. Magenta?” — and still wrote us back every time. Our transatlantic work sessions made the last two weeks melt by like the salt on my brow and bottom of my chair. God it’s still done, isn’t it? Now that his work is being hammered into metal by wonderful machines, and we can’t take any of it back.
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HOW I LEARNED TO STOP WORRYING & LOVE THE BOMB, by Tess Lynch
Here is how the first conversation went.
Me: Hey you guys.
Mom: Hey.
Dad: Hey.
Me: I got asked to be in an anthology!
Them: What! That’s great news!
Me: Yes! It’s an anthology about the human experience!
Mom: Wow…that’s so exciting.
Dad: Really? What about the human experience?
Me: Some of the parts of the human experience that you and I don’t often chat about!
Them: [dead silence]
Me: It’s a non-fiction sex anthology! Now don’t say anything yet.
Dad: That sounds cool!
Me: Wait, excuse me.
Mom: Can we have a copy? What are you going to write about? Oh, this is just great!
Me: Now I know you probably have concerns…
Dad: Wow, a book!
Me: Dad. It’s a sex book. Mom. Hello. Non-fiction sexy-time book writing. Now before you protest, let me —
Mom: Oh, stop that. Who cares.
Dad: Don’t be a prude. You’re not writing for your parents. Chill out.
Me: Well, it’s called Coming & Crying.
Mom: That’s funny!
Dad: L-O-L!
Me: Okay, this went better than I thought. I’m going to go tell Peter.
Mom: Yeah, sure!
Dad: [to my mom] It’s like she thought we’d be uncomfortable. I mean, we read her blog. Ha ha ha. Ha ha ha.
Mom: Ha ha ha.
[they laugh at me as I hang up, confused]
This is how the second conversation went:
Me: I have some good news, and I have some complicated news!
Peter: Ooh, good news!
Me: I’m writing for an anthology!
Peter: That’s great! What about?
Me: Oh, just some non-fiction, nothing fictional at all. Just about, you know…well, it’s called Coming & Crying.
Peter: You’re not going to write about me, are you?
Me: No, I felt like that would be a little too weird.
Peter: You’re not writing about someone else, are you?
Me: Strictly speaking no, not anybody in particular.
Peter: What’s the complicated news?
Me: That was the complicated news.
Peter: Oh. Can I get a copy?
Me: Why aren’t you squirming uncomfortably?
Peter: Why should I squirm?
Me: I just want to make sure that you understand that the “coming” refers to —
Peter: Tess.
Me: Okay. So you know that when they say “coming” — I’m just saying this so I make sure you understand that what I’ll be writing about is —
Peter: Tess. Why are you being such a prude?
Me: So it’s perfectly fine for me to write about this.
Peter: You can write whatever you want!
Me: [really?] Oh, right, yeah, of course I can.
This is how the third conversation went:
Me: Hi Pam.
Pam: Hi.
Me: Good to see you here for a dinner of salad.
Pam: Let’s have some wine!
Me: You might want a lot of wine.
Pam: Why?
Me: Because…(bracing myself, talking fast) so like okay so I’m writing for this book and I didn’t ask your permission first so I changed your name, don’t worry about me having changed your name, which I did, but — let’s order wine.
Pam: You can’t start something like that and then make me wait for wine.
Me: Or can I? [we wait in silence for the wine. I wait as Pam drinks, pausing after each sip to let me talk except I won’t until the glass is empty and another has been poured] Okay?
Pam: That was a lot of wine.
Me: You’re in a story in a sex anthology and there’s nothing you can do about it because I sent it already.
Pam: Oh, sweet!
Me: Pam, don’t freak. Look. We were really young and nobody will know it was you. Except Lucy, if she reads it, she’ll know it’s you.
Pam: I don’t talk to Lucy anymore, she weirds me out.
Me: Great, then only you and I will know. And I have like a hundred friends named Pam so there’s some ambiguity. But let me buy you dinner. I feel horrible. I should have asked you first.
Pam: Oh, shut up, who cares. Can I get a copy of the book?
Me: Here’s what I did: I tried to keep you in mind as a reader. I tried to set boundaries. But I kind of ended up saying “fuck the boundaries.” I’m infinitely sorry. Maybe I can buy you a cashmere throw or something. God, I’m sorry.
Pam: What’s the matter with you? What’s the book called?
Me: Coming & Crying.
Pam: Ha! That’s a great name!
Me: Forgive me Pam!
Pam: You’re coming off as strangely prudish. I don’t get you.
Me: I’m only prudish in retrospect.
I’m really excited for this book. It’s the first time I’ve been in a book. It’s the first time I’ve written non-fiction about sex. I’m glad my first was with two ladies I really trust.
(via tesslynch)
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Finished.
(“and then they slept.”)
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“Coming & Crying” is coming out in September 2010.
Cover photo of Melissa by me — see it larger, and with a little more blood under the skin at Home of the Vain. (And while you’re at it, see other photos from this series.)
Book design by Jez.
““They needed to print copies of their sex anthology and to pay its writers.”
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[our writers, they meet!]
For those who are wondering, Danny in person is tall, sweet, and exceedingly easy to be around. (Example of how great he is: “I feel like I should ask you something really invasive…. When was the last time you had a lot of fun?”) I wish we lived in the same city because I suspect he is an excellent friend to anyone lucky enough to call him so. And his town really is beautiful, even if in certain lights it makes me sad.
Nightmare Brunette is also tall, sweet, and exceedingly easy to be around. I felt at ease during our splendid conversation and during our silent pauses. I had a great time and am also sad that we don’t live in the same city. Basically, what I’m saying is “right back at you,” Nightmare Brunette.
(via sexartandpolitics)
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“978-0-615-38494-8”
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I saw, or we saw, some mockups of Coming & Crying laid out today and it was very overwhelming. I don’t even write about this on the Internet because I am not sure where to begin? Also it means too much and I have no critical distance. I know. I didn’t even pay anyone to help me realize that; not in any traditional sense, anyway.
The book looks fucking good, I might add. Damn fucking good. Seeing my name laid out all book-like is new and surreal. I have never been in a book and you might say this one doesn’t count but to me it counts much more.
We printed out pages with different LEADING which is pronounced like LEAD like LEAD PAINT as Peter and Jacob were very excited to tell me about 3x each as I continued to mispronounce it and squint at the pages, trying to tell the difference between 14 and 14.5. 14 what, you might ask, but I couldn’t tell you except that 14.5 won. That means there will be more space between the lines for us to underline and circle and draw little hearts and OMGs, which is my favorite thing about books and why I don’t want them to ever end.
Seeing my story all laid out all book-like makes me instantly see every word that should be changed as if my brain is connected to the Platonic ideals of all sentences and all possible stories. I imagine I am taking some philosophical liberties here but in some superstitious, secret, stupid part of me I believe in that—that the perfect sentences are out there. I think fucking Katie Holmes said that to Michael Douglas in this movie tonight, even, which is beyond appropriate, excuse me while I jump out this window, et cetera.
Anyway it is ALL WRONG, my story, but I am comforted by the fact that at least three different of ‘my’ writers said the same thing about their stories when I emailed them with a Final Pass (Melissa and I kind of split the book in half and have teams; hopefully one day we will compete against each other in a three-legged race or something else less entendre-y in some way I don’t even understand).
God damn I want to punch my story in the face. But it is still good; not perfect but good. You’ll like it I think.
When I was home for this wedding, I met one of my mom’s good friends and she said that my mom knew she wouldn’t like all of the book but that she was really excited to read it. I think that was when I realized my mom might read my story.
Maybe I will glue the last few pages of it together. Not in a WINNNK way. In a literal way.
My new apartment has a fake fireplace and exposed brick and the sink has a soap dispenser built into it. The camera on my phone is broken so you’ll just have to trust me that it is empty, but nice.
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Bookmaking among friends.
It has been awhile, hasn’t it?
Well the book is written. It has been edited many times over in parks and coffee shops and bedrooms all over New York. We have learned a lifetime’s worth about publishing, and reinvented half of it.
I just finished sending all of my writers the final drafts of their stories so we could get approval and send them to “design” (I like to say it like it’s a department and not an amazing human being we are so humbled to be working with).
We are definitely to The Fun Part now— dreaming up infographics, a mini book tour, a ‘ZINE, and The Best Book Party Ever™.
I’m not gonna lie to you guys, because you are my safe space: writing a story that is in a BOOK with your name on it, while managing the production of a book, while working fulltime and trying to find a place to live is A RECIPE FOR CRYING TO YOUR MOTHER.
There was a weekend where my prospective landlord was all, “You have bad credit,” and I still hadn’t found the time/mental space to sit down and finish my story, and we had a meeting with these totally amazing letterpress people (eeee!) and I was crashing at my friend’s apartment and- well, I kind of almost crapped my pants on the street. LITERALLY. Okay!
Then I found the nearest bathroom and stopped crying and got in a cab because I was late to this meeting and met Melissa then we walked in to this huge warehouse filled with ancient printing presses and the guy sat us down and gave us fizzy water and put Nina Simone on the record player and got so excited hearing about our project that i cried happy non-Mom-breakdown tears while “Ooh Child,” played in the background.
(Please don’t tell anyone about the near-pants shitting).
(Okay whatever, you can).
Then the next week we recorded our stories in this little recording studio for our first private event (and first debut of our stories!) that Melissa and Nikola Tamindzic dreamed up. Called C&C:ip (ip stands for in person) (guess IRL was too cheezy? :D), it was held in New York at Cindy Gallop’s otherworldly apartment, where 5 of us writers stood before an audience as our stories played and Nikola took our portaits. The media from the event should be, overwhelming.
The night of the recording I had finished about the 37th draft of my story the night before and had just run from another reading and ran into this random Williamsburg sort of communal loft thing to see Tao Lin coming out of the back room and to meet one of our dear writers, William Ball, for the very first time. When my turn came and I finished giggling and drank some water and read it aloud, all the way through, I realized it was finished. And I LIKED it. I liked it even more when the sound engineer walked us to the train and told us all about his screwy relationship— this practical stranger whose name I did not even know— opening up and relating it back to what I had just read, saying that if his ex-girlfriend read my story she would ‘bawl crying.’ That’s that thing that happens sometimes that reminds us that ‘the sex book is working.’
The event, C&C:ip (in person), was…the scariest thing I have ever done? New? Indescribable? We stood in front of 30 or so people who supported us— financially, emotionally, creatively (most all 3)- in no makeup, in some crazy muslin thing Melissa made us wear (ha!), under bright white light, while our stories rang out in a dark room in our own voices. What was so amazing- and challenging- was that we had recorded them beforehand, alone, just like how we wrote them. It wasn’t performing, it was listening, with the audience. There were no chances for little jokes and asides and self-deprecations. You just stood there and couldn’t take any of it back. I cried. Running theme, see. Afterward someone asked me if I could feel all the compassion everyone in the audience was sending us. I don’t think we could have ever done this if we didn’t know that was there.
One of our writers, Will, brought me his copy of The Wonder Boys to borrow. I am reading it now. I want to hang out with everyone and trade books and stories and be people together.
What will we do when this is over? (Do it again, most likely).
Last weekend we got the entire manuscript (That’s industryspeak for Word Doc That Crashes Your Computer) back from our copyeditor. Yes, we have a real live, professional copyeditor, and she is amazing. She edited out many of my commas- if you can believe it!!!- and just generally turned the book into something we know has all the right spacing and consistency. We established some house rules: for instance, blowjob and website are now one word across the board!
Having the book back meant one very specific, wonderful thing, and that is that while I was moving (I strongly advise anyone who is considering making a book and moving into an apartment at the same time to RECONSIDER), Melissa printed the whole thing out in a fancy Kinko’s way that costs more than an actual book. Which means that for the past 10 days or so I have been walking around town, hugging an actual physical object to my body, flipping through it, reading little pieces of it, and realizing just how goddamn good this thing we all decided to fucking go for really is.
There are 24 stories, and so it is about 24x more powerful than regular books (or so I like to think). 24 human beings pretty much spilled their guts (or various other bodily fluids) out onto the page for you and Jesus, I am in awe of it, as a reader. That is so wonderful to me.
I’ll never forget my first day with the thing— this Kinko’s thing!- getting out of the train, walking up the stairs to go home and realizing it was OUR BOOK that I was holding under my arm. I did not come, but I certainly cried (this joke will indubitably haunt us forever. “How’s it COMING along?” etc. To be honest, it never really gets old).
Right now our DESIGNER is working on it. I can’t wait to tell you guys who is doing it. I have been a major #1 fan of his for awhile now. Also, Peter, my coworker, is making our website, where we can keep up with all of you very soon. You can see all (most?) of this content over there now: comingandcrying.tumblr.com, but it will look really different soon.
We have really missed updating you guys— I know we have said little things on our own Tumblr and Twitter accounts— and we are looking forward to doing this more often again. We, and maybe you too, originally thought the book would have been in your hands by now, but early on we had this moment, I think it was over a shared beer with Tao Lin, where he looked at me and said, Make it good. Don’t rush it.” As antsy as we have been to get it to you, I think we did the right thing. It’s a fucking book. It takes a couple months.
SOON, THOUGH. SOON. Someone asked me what the “pub date” was last night at an Internet party. I was like, “Um? As soon as we finish it and get it back from the printer?” We should know soon, though. And you guys will be the first to know and the first to have it.
I can’t wait for you to hold it in your hands!