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Autofocus Books

@autofocusbooks.bsky.social
362 followers 122 following 96 posts

A literary publisher of artful autobiographical writing. autofocusbooks.com

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Brad Listi @bradlisti.bsky.social · 28/10/2025
▶️ NOW PLAYING - #1000 (!!) 🎧 Available wherever you get your podcasts. #otherppl1000
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Abigail Oswald @abigailoswald.bsky.social · 16/10/2025
I genuinely think every writer today should listen to this new episode of @bradlisti.bsky.social's Otherppl—a frank conversation with Jeff Alessandrelli about the often sobering realities of making art today, and why we do it anyway podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/w...
podcasts.apple.com
What Does It Mean to Be a Minor Writer?
Podcast Episode · Otherppl with Brad Listi · 10/12/2025 · 1h 8m
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Split Lip Magazine @splitlipthemag.bsky.social · 13/10/2025
How about a memoir to close ACCOMPLISHMENT SUNDAY? Contributor Erin Slaughter’s memoir THE DEAD DAD DIARIES is out now from @autofocusbooks.bsky.social 💗 Get your copy now: buff.ly/gIYuqsL
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Brad Listi @bradlisti.bsky.social · 12/10/2025
▶️ NOW PLAYING
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Stanchion @stanchion.bsky.social · 10/10/2025
Last book of '25 is by @lindzmcleod.bsky.social + a cast of collaborators incl The Handmaid's Tale screenwriter Lynn Renee Maxcy, Sunday Times bestseller Thomas D. Lee & Nebula/WFA finalist Eugenia Triantafyllou. Pre-order now with UK Saver Shipping to save £! www.stanchionzine.com/product-page...
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Mike Nagel @misternagel.bsky.social · 10/10/2025
Got a little woo woo for the fine folks at @farewelltransmiss.bsky.social. farewelltransmission.net/2025/10/woo-...
farewelltransmission.net
WOO WOO - Farewell Transmission
By Mike Nagel My sister-in-law Molly grew up as a pastor’s daughter but at some point in her mid-thirties she became more of a witch. I thought that being a witch meant you invited the devil into your...
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Dave Housley @housleydave.bsky.social · 06/10/2025
The @barrelhouse.bsky.social conference is coming back to DC on April 18, 2026, and we're open for registration! It's $95, and that includes the one-day conference, 1 book, 1 meeting w an editor, and your choice of literary stuff from our partner presses. www.barrelhousemag.com/conference
The Barrelhouse conference, Conversations and Connections, is coming back to DC on April 18, 2026.
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DeepDive @deepdive.audio · 03/10/2025
'How to Write Autobiographical Fiction' with Hannah Pittard — a new 8-hour intensive course from DeepDive, available now. Feat. Michael Wheaton, founder of @autofocusbooks.bsky.social. Hosted by @bradlisti.bsky.social. Launch sale: 25% off. Limited time. 👉🏼 courses.deepdive.audio/autofiction
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DeepDive @deepdive.audio · 01/10/2025
🎉 Launch Day! Our new DeepDive course, 'How to Write Autobiographical Fiction,' is live! Learn from novelist Hannah Pittard + publisher Michael Wheaton. 👉 Launch Special: $147 (25% off) 🔗 courses.deepdive.audio/autofiction
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Ander Monson @angermonsoon.bsky.social · 30/09/2025
XNESS ESSAYS IN A BOOK???????
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niina pollari @niina.bsky.social · 29/09/2025
Since we're all talking about how book review culture is dying - I'd love to get a couple of younger/newer reviewers on at Zona Motel. Are you looking for a place to develop your review chops and engage with small press lit in front of an enthusiastic readership? Reach out. zonamotel.substack.com
zonamotel.substack.com
Zona Motel | Substack
Zona Motel is a web space and Brotherhood that exists to support good literature. Click to read Zona Motel, a Substack publication with thousands of subscribers.
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Sara Rauch @sara-rauch.bsky.social · 29/09/2025
Good mail day. @autofocusbooks.bsky.social
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Brad Listi @bradlisti.bsky.social · 27/09/2025
Tomorrow on the Otherppl show, a special sneak preview of 'How to Write Autobiographical Fiction,' the new course from @deepdive.audio, avail 10/1 & taught by author Hannah Pittard, whose most recent novel is called 'If You Love It, Let It Kill You.' 🎧 Listen wherever you get your podcasts.
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niina pollari @niina.bsky.social · 26/09/2025
Hello, are you a Literary Person in Philadelphia? Perhaps a Music Person? Come see me and @olgamikolaivna.bsky.social yap about both at @alinapleskova.bsky.social's reading series ✨️💿 Track Changes 💿 ✨️ on Oct 7. www.eventbrite.com/e/track-chan...
eventbrite.com
Track Changes: Niina Pollari & Olga Mikolaivna
Track Changes is a listening, reading, and conversation series where writers discuss their favorite records.
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DeepDive @deepdive.audio · 19/09/2025
🚨 Coming soon from DeepDive 🚨 'How to Write Autobiographical Fiction' — an intensive new course taught by acclaimed author Hannah Pittard ('If You Love It, Let It Kill You'). 📱 Streaming soon on the DeepDive app + online. Stay tuned.
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Piżama Press @pizamapress.bsky.social · 15/09/2025
5 novels, 3 books of poetry, 1 book of essays, & 1 hybrid assemblage 📚📚📚 #books #recommendations #novels
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Wild Roof Journal @wildroofjournal.bsky.social · 15/09/2025
From our new book review: wildroofjournal.substack.com/p/navigating... Organic Matter paints a luminous portrait of the rural ecosystem that feeds the city and explores one perceptive young woman’s relationship with faith, labor, love, family, the body, and the ground. @autofocusbooks.bsky.social
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Wild Roof Journal @wildroofjournal.bsky.social · 12/09/2025
Read our new book review: wildroofjournal.substack.com/p/navigating... Organic Matter paints a luminous portrait of the rural ecosystem that feeds the city and explores one perceptive young woman’s relationship with faith, labor, love, family, the body, and the ground. @autofocusbooks.bsky.social
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niina pollari @niina.bsky.social · 11/09/2025
By the way, some news! I have a book coming out with the wonderful @autofocusbooks.bsky.social. I'm incredibly excited to join the list -- I so admire the work they've been putting out.
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Split Lip Magazine @splitlipthemag.bsky.social · 10/09/2025
Contributor @ilanaslightly.bsky.social interviewed @ferrifrigida.bsky.social about her new book OUT THERE IN THE DARK for @lareviewofbooks.bsky.social! And you can read it all right here: buff.ly/8aebBZq
Out There in the Dark, Katharine Coldiron.
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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 10/09/2025
This book is fantastic! I'm not much of a film buff even & I still loved this. So sharp, well crafted, absolutely fascinating. I want to shove it into everyone's hands & shout "Read this! Read this!" So yeah, read this. @autofocusbooks.bsky.social @ferrifrigida.bsky.social #smallpressseptember
Photo of book Out There in the Dark by Katharine Coldiron
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Pool Party @poolpartymag.com · 09/09/2025
📚📚 ANNOUNCING: POOL PARTY BOOKS!!! 📚📚 Pool Party is open for book submissions!!! We will have two reading periods and publish two books/year. The first reading period runs from now until December 15th, 2025. Visit our website for details 🔥
poolpartymag.com
Pool Party - Book Submissions
Pool Party is open for book submissions!!! We will have two reading periods and publish two books/year. The first reading period runs from now until December 15th, 2025.
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Abigail Oswald @abigailoswald.bsky.social · 09/09/2025
Naomi Washer crafted a whole book out of her personal marginalia (out next week from @autofocusbooks.bsky.social), and I had a blast talking to her about it! writeordiemag.com/author-inter...
writeordiemag.com
Naomi Washer: On Writing in Books, Psychoanalysis, the Fiction of the Fixed Self, and Her New Autobiography ‘Marginalia’ — Write or Die Magazine
Abigail Oswald interviews Naomi Washer about her new book, Marginalia.
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Kristine Langley Mahler @suburbanprairie.bsky.social · 05/09/2025
I have no less than 4 calendars/planners open, indicative at how horrified I am to realize it is the time to put together a reading event sched for Teen Queen Training. It comes out with @autofocusbooks.bsky.social on Feb 17! Where are my fellow early 2026 authors and SHOULD WE BE COLLABORATING?
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Tom McAllister @tmcallister.bsky.social · 03/09/2025
Wrote for The Metropolitan Review about the pros & cons of working w/ small indie presses vs. big presses, the journey from almost being a big fancy author to being a medium unfancy author, and mid-career re-evaluation of what I want out of the writing life www.metropolitanreview.org/p/to-go-big-...
metropolitanreview.org
To Go Big or Come Home?
On the Writing Life With Major and Indie Publishers
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Dave Housley @housleydave.bsky.social · 04/09/2025
Great essay by @tmcallister.bsky.social at The Metropolitan Review about his experience with large and small presses, with a clear-eyed, experienced idea of the pluses and minuses. Also a nice confirmation that querying agents is awful for nearly everybody. www.metropolitanreview.org/p/to-go-big-...
metropolitanreview.org
To Go Big or Come Home?
On the Writing Life With Major and Indie Publishers
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Daniel Miller @danielmiller.bsky.social · 27/08/2025
some brief morning thots re @ferrifrigida.bsky.social's Out There in the Dark, which I finished last night! Who tryna watch Jeanne Dielman??????????????????????????????
Out There in the Dark is incredible. A collection of razor sharp, intelligent, funny braid essays about classic cinema and the usual CNF suspects-family, life, sex, the body, money. But there's nothing stale or old hat here. Coldiron leans into experimentation, finds through-lines where others do not see any, and, (especially important to me) can write like hell. The prose here is so smart without ever being pretentious or overbearing. Coldiron's voice soars. Even at its most vulnerable, it is resolute, the voice of a badass.

I admit I went into this one a little nervous. I've been a fan of Coldiron's for a while and I think she talks about film brilliantly, but I'm pretty green when it comes to classic movies. I have seen approximately 2 of the movies discussed here. And yet, nothing is out of context. Besides side-Googling (which I WANT from my CNF), I never felt like I wasn't getting the points Coldiron was making, even if I've never seen The Misfits or Mildred Pierce. On the contrary, these essays stoked in me a desire to watch all of these with my newly shaped understanding of them.

This book is doing pretty much everything I expect and want CNF to do. It makes me think, makes me research on my own. I'm able to make connections to my life and empathize with aspects that I can't. The writing is not preachy, Coldiron does not hold your hand, but rather extends her own for the reader to reach toward. While reading these essays, I contemplated on my own writing and creation of art. On my own experiences with film and how those experiences mesh with my life. Perhaps most of all, Out There in the Dark is a book that makes me want to write. It's inspiring to see such an incredible writer taking big swings here, whether in approach to the topic or literal formatting.

I can't wait for the next one.
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Abigail Oswald @abigailoswald.bsky.social · 27/08/2025
Y'ALL I still can't believe the way everything fell into place for this: I'm going to help @splitlippress.com give out-of-print books a new home!
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Kristine Langley Mahler @suburbanprairie.bsky.social · 27/08/2025
If your answer is not "Teen Queen Training, Kristine Langley Mahler's erasure essay collection forthcoming with @autofocusbooks.bsky.social on Feb 17" then IT SHOULD BE!
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Daniel Miller @danielmiller.bsky.social · 26/08/2025
my internet has been out and last night I spent the evening reading @ferrifrigida.bsky.social's Out There in the Dark (out now on @autofocusbooks.bsky.social) with a tiny cat in the crook of my forearm and the window open and (genderless) brother, that's the gd cure
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Stanchion @stanchion.bsky.social · 25/08/2025
First blurb is in for @lindzmcleod.bsky.social's collaborative craft writing book An Honour & A Privilege, from the great author & publisher Michael Wheaton of @autofocusbooks.bsky.social. www.stanchionzine.com/product-page...
"Equal parts engaging and instructive, An Honour & A Privilege presents a theory and practice of collaborative fiction writing that will inspire deeper craft and community in your own work. A must read for any writer interested in the creative process."

— Michael Wheaton, publisher of Autofocus Books
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Stephanie Austin @stephanieaustin.bsky.social · 23/08/2025
I don't think Erin Slaughter is on here, but her book about her father that's about to drop from @autofocusbooks.bsky.social is so insanely good. autofocusbooks.com/store/p/dead...
autofocusbooks.com
THE DEAD DAD DIARIES - Erin Slaughter (pre-order) — Autofocus Books
ABOUT THE BOOK Erin Slaughter's father was murdered by his newlywed wife the night before Erin's senior year of high school began. In the years following, her family was fractured by cancer, alcoho...
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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 21/08/2025
Really enjoyed this collection by @aaronburch.bsky.social from @autofocusbooks.bsky.social The thinking about how you’re going to tell the story while you’re still in the middle of living the story is deeply relatable.
Photo of the book A Kind of In-Between by Aaron Burch
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Diana Ruzova @dianaruzova.bsky.social · 21/08/2025
dianaruzova.substack.com/p/a-late-sum...
dianaruzova.substack.com
A late summer list of things that made me feel something.
This is Something-shka. “Shka” is a Russian diminutive suffix. It makes words softer, sweeter, more tender.
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Split/Lip Press @splitlippress.com · 20/08/2025
Big news for authors with out-of-print prose books looking for a new home: We're opening up submissions to our Lost/Found imprint on 9/3! We were so happy to rehome Brooke Shaffner's COUNTRY OF UNDER last year + now we're ready to rehome more. Full details forthcoming, but the pertinent ones are:
Lost/Found Submissions! Looking to home your out-of-print book? Try us at Lost/Found, a new imprint at Split/Lip Press. Rolling submissions begin on 9/3!
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Kirsti MacKenzie @keersteemack.bsky.social · 16/08/2025
Friday night plans ✨
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Kristine Langley Mahler @suburbanprairie.bsky.social · 11/08/2025
Finally, pouring one out for Synaesthesia Mag, apt., Atlas & Alice, The Collagist/The Rupture, cahoodaloodaling, and Gigantic Sequins--gone, but fondly remembered (especially on my Acknowledgments page in TQT--keep your eyes on @autofocusbooks.bsky.social to preorder! February 17, 2026!)
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GW @gwoltjer.bsky.social · 07/08/2025
Helluva reading streak I’m currently experiencing… @sandorfpassage.bsky.social @emilylauracosta.bsky.social @autofocusbooks.bsky.social @clairehopple.bsky.social @ferrifrigida.bsky.social
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Tom McAllister @tmcallister.bsky.social · 04/08/2025
Final ep of Book Fight went up today. 13 years ago when @mikeingram.bsky.social asked me to do a podcast with him, I thought it would be a little hobby for a few months but it's been the most fun & fulfilling work of my life. Thanks to everyone who followed along www.bookfightpod.com/episodes/end...
bookfightpod.com
Endings: The Final Episode — Book Fight Podcast
Well, friends, here it is. After 13 years, the Book Fight podcast is finally riding off into the sunset. Join us for one final episode, as we look back at what we've learned, read some listener tribut...
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Stanchion @stanchion.bsky.social · 01/08/2025
Happy publication day to Issue 19 of Stanchion Magazine and to the 22 talented writers featured within. Thanks to each of you for being a part of this tremendous issue curated by @fbereaud.bsky.social. Buy a copy today in print, from Stanchion or wherever you order books, or as a PDF.
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Autofocus Books @autofocusbooks.bsky.social · 31/07/2025
2027 is looking mighty fine already at Autofocus! Thrilled to be working with @lillydancyger.bsky.social on this absolute gem of a book.
Publisher’s Marketplace Deal Report. Author of First Love Lilly Dancyger's BALLET WILL HEAL ME, a novella-length essay about dance, chronic pain, and the mind/body connection that weaves together the author's lifelong relationship with ballet, her struggle to get treatment for unexplained debilitating pain, research into the effects of emotional trauma on the body, and the stories and histories of classical ballets, to Michael Wheaton at Autofocus, with Lena Crown editing, in a nice deal, for publication in February 2027 (world English).
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Lilly Dancyger @lillydancyger.bsky.social · 31/07/2025
Surprise! I'm writing a new nonfiction book!! About dance and chronic pain and the ways the body can both express, and be impacted by, emotion. Forthcoming from @autofocusbooks.bsky.social in 2027!
A Publisher's Marketplace book deal announcement, reading: Author of FIRST LOVE Lilly Dancyger's BALLET WILL HEAL ME, a novella-length essay about dance, chronic pain, and the mind/body connection that weaves together the author's lifelong relationship with ballet, her struggle to get treatment for unexplained debilitating pain, research into the effects of emotional trauma on the body, and the stories and histories of classical ballets, to Michael Wheaton at Autofocus Books, with Lena Crown editing, in a nice deal, for publication in February 2027 (world English).
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Split/Lip Press @splitlippress.com · 25/07/2025
Hey @autofocusbooks.bsky.social and @tahomareview.bsky.social, guess who's boothed up next to you at AWP26? SEE YA IN BALTIMORE! ❤️
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Lexi Kent-Monning @lexikentmonning.bsky.social · 24/07/2025
Some of the @rejectionlit.bsky.social fam (including photographer @squeakypig.bsky.social — I’m sorry I doubted your vision for this shot) at the @autofocusbooks.bsky.social reading last night! @dtrobbins.bsky.social & Sean Moeller and me!
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Barrelhouse @barrelhouse.bsky.social · 21/07/2025
Still open for pitches for short NF books!
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