Slice Literary Inc

Slice, a literary magazine founded in 2005 by myself and two of my colleagues in the New York commercial publishing world.We decided to startSliceafter witnessing firsthand just how difficult it is for new writers to break into mainstream publishing, and because we were confident we could offer writers unique chance to get their work published and, more importantly, noticed by commercial book editors and agents.  Over the past five years, we have strove to establishSliceas being uniquely valuable for several reasons:

Industry Knowledge: Our founders and our volunteer staff is composed entirely of current and former publishing professionals.As such, our readership and donor base is composed of a high percentage of agents, editors, and others who notice and contact our writers.We do not want Slice to publish new authors in a vacuum: we want to expose them to opportunities that help them earn a living through their creative work.

Publicity Potential: We publish the creative work of our new writers alongside interviews about the craft of writing with some of the most successful authors of our day.In past issues, we have interviewed authors such as Junot Diaz, Paul Auster, Haven Kimmel, Salman Rushdie, R.L. Stine, and Jonathan Lethem. These in-depth interviews focus on the craft and career of creative writing as opposed to pop culture or personal dramas, and our published authors have expressed to us consistently how inspiring and informative they have proven.Moreover, they give us the cache to place Slice in bookstores throughout the country and expose our authors to a broad reading audience.

New Media Savvy: Slice understands how the Internet is transforming writing, and our young staff is fluent in social media.We maintain an active Facebook and Twitter feed, and are soon debuting a brand new website at www.slicemagazine.org that we are confident will establish our Internet presence as a best practice among our peers. We recently established a Twitter and Tumblr feed,Coverspy, that has already garnered attention throughout the world.Aside from earning several international and dozens of New York City blogs,Coverspyhas been written up in theNew Yorkerand Cnet.com and spawned a subsidiary twitter feed,Coverspy London. Coverspy’s mission is to use new media to honor the old-fashioned printed novel: we post dozens of observations each day about what we see locals reading.We see this merging of old and new a reflection of Slice’s broader mission to unite writers of the Internet age with the old-line book publishing world.

Mission Focused: Slice is not a magazine meant to promote any particular academic, literary, or political agenda.Our sole mission is to create a strong platform for emerging English-language writers of quality who may not be noticed elsewhere.We have a diverse committee of volunteer publishing professionals who meet on a regular basis to select the submissions we publish:we are dedicated to objectivity throughout this process.We are rewarded for these efforts by an active community of influential readers in the publishing industry, who see us as a first resource for finding new voices.

Fundraising Ability: Slice has proven over the past five years that we have the ability to fund our magazine far into the future on the commitment of our staff and creative fundraising methods.We host a “Literary Game Show” fundraiser for each issue that pits local authors, from Jonathan Lethem to Chip Kidd, against local editors and agents.At these fundraisers, we raise enough money to fund publication costs and spread publicity about and sell the magazine.The events have been covered byLibrary Journal,Media Bistro, theNew Yorker, andPoets & Writers, among other publications.