What She Might Think: Wares and Words at Spokane Zine Fest 2017

Friday, October 13, 2017

Wares and Words at Spokane Zine Fest 2017

Sewing the cover design for digging

I am so very excited to take part in the Spokane Zine Fest this year. Spokane Zine Fest is a day-long event in which people creating zines, printing with small presses, and selling chapbooks and other handmade word art gather up and share their work with the community, and much of the work, if not all, is for sale. So, basically, the most awesome event ever.

As long as I've been making stories, I've been making little books to put them in--so, I mean, let's go back all the way to age three? Four? I know I have a copy of the book somewhere, as my mother just sent it the other day or month. Therefore, you can imagine my delight!--my absolute delight!--when I learned of the festival and then learned I could have a table at it.

Delightful!

While I will have the more traditionally printed copies of my books for sale, The Floating Order, The Whole World at Once, and the two story chapbooks from The Head and the Hand and Awst----that didn't seem quite enough. My rumbling brain rumbled. And as it rumbled, I began to imagine handmade ways to take part. And then I began making a mental list of supplies. And yesterday, I started printing and cutting and pressing the pedal of the sewing-machine.

Now, I'm happy to reveal some of the results that I've made, and will be for sale at my table.

1. A Mourning Story

This is a newly written piece made especially for the Zine Fest. It hasn't been published. I've printed it on transparent vellum and quilted that to the image of a crazy quilt that's housed in the Indianapolis Museum of Art and from 1885. So, the story, the image, the sisters in the story, and the writer are Midwestern. I really like how this turned out.

Close-up of one quilted corner of A Mourning Story

Close-up of a quilted corner of another quilted
version of A Mourning Story

2. Digging

Digging is one of my favorite stories, and definitely one of my best read-aloud stories. I wrote this in San Marcos, Texas, originally published it with Lake Effect, and included it in my first story collection, The Floating Order (Two Ravens Press 2009). The history of the story nearly contains the history of my writing career. The story is fairy tale set within a war zone, in which only two children remain alive.

Covers for the story "digging" before tying loose ends

First page of the story "digging"

3. Why Jimmy
The story received second-place in the Austin Chronicle Story Contest, years ago. This is the other story that I read aloud when I'm asked to do so because of the narrator's captivating and energetic voice. The story also appears in The Floating Order. It follows a child's recollections of how she and her cousin Jimmy came to live with their grandparents, and how it happened that her cousin melted to the roof of the house.

Cover of the story Why Jimmy

First page of Why Jimmy; pages are stitched into the cover

4. Trolls
This is one of my lost stories, in that while it was published (Whistling Shade 2007), I didn't include it in The Floating Order, and just left it to the wind, and the wind and time took care of tending it until now. This seems like a good opportunity to bring its life back to awareness. One day, a soldier appears at the narrator's house, as he is being pursued by trolls.

Production line

Cover of trolls

First page of Trolls, book complete and story stitched into cover

In sleepless and grand conclusion, I look forward to meeting everyone tomorrow and the experience of participating in the festival. (My own table! My stitchery!) Come by for a visit and to purchase my wares and words for your favorite people, including yourself.