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I’ve been packing my house again for the second move in 12 months and I’ve been using two years’ worth of submissions and proofs from Blood Orange Review to cushion my knick-knacks. Trust me, it’s a higher calling for old submissions to cradle a fiddle-playing koala bear than to be sitting untouched in my file cabinet. Plus, it gives me a chance to revisit the work that has formed a major part of my reading life these past two years.
Though this of course slowed the progress of my packing, browsing through old submissions showed me how much I remembered, not just from the work Heather and I accepted, but from the work we almost accepted and the work we didn’t. I found myself rooting for the same writers but finding them, again, slightly off mark. I came across writers who we’d rejected repeatedly, but who are now in this current issue. Lucky us that they didn’t get tired of our No’s.
I’ve gotten so comfortable with reading unpublished work, the manuscripts of friends and the submissions for this magazine, that I’ve been reluctant at times to pick up a book because, well, it’s done . I like having a part in the creation of new work, my "yes" stamp hovering over each new submission. I read, eager to hold it up to the light and say, look what I found!
Heather and I take turns being grumpy and generous, and for two years, it has worked again and again, producing issues that we’re proud to have assembled. In this issue, we got to dig through the past year’s fiction submissions to nominate three writers for the Million Writers Award by StorySouth. It was tough to choose, mostly because every acceptance is our way of nominating a writer, our attempt to give a leg up to writing we like and think others will appreciate.
Heading into our third year, Heather and I are looking forward to finding more writers like the ones in this new issue, including Rebekah Judson who explains: "I write because I’m addicted to the idea of translation. I’m fascinated by this cycle that occurs when I translate images or concepts into words, only for these words to be translated back into the mental imagery of the reader. I’m constantly trying to better understand this process, to become more intimately aware of the nuances, the gradations, the shades of meaning that become magnified within this sequence of transformation."
Yes .
Stephanie Lenox, Editor
Blood Orange Review
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