My Big Announcement; Stuck In An Elevator

A few weeks ago, I was driving somewhere and thinking about things, as one does, and I thought to myself, ‘I would love to start my own online literary magazine.’ And even though it seemed like something far-off and maybe not possible, I currently work/volunteer as a submissions reader for another online lit mag, and I had some knowledge of how it was set up. But it had always been a dream of mine to have my own publication, and I kept thinking and thinking about how cool it would be, and by the time I got home, I had pretty much fleshed it out enough that I could explain it to Ken, complete with the name. And then, I was talking to a friend who does website development, and she said she could help me set things up, including not just the website but all the social media (you can see her on the masthead). So now (drumroll please), I am super-excited to announce the launch of DarkWinter Lit, an online literary magazine for short stories and poetry. And we’re currently open for submissions (no fee). I know a lot of my followers and fellow bloggers are writers, and I’d be thrilled if any of you wanted to honour DarkWinter Lit with your submissions. In fact, I already have two pieces of flash fiction from a terrific writer friend of mine, Cecilia Kennedy of Fixing Leaks And Leeks—she graciously offered the two stories to me so that there would be something awesome to read when the site went live. And she fits our mission statement perfectly, which is this: “We want your weird, your traditional with a twist, your humour, your dark thoughts, or your elation. We’re open to anything—just make it interesting. Make us think.”

I won’t be publishing full-length books or chapbooks, or anything in hard copy—it’s strictly online, and you can find it, and the submission guidelines, here at darkwinterlit.com

And why ‘DarkWinter’? Because it’s a combination of the last two names of my characters in The Seventh Devil and the sequel The Devil You Know, as well as the name of their ghostbusting, demon-exorcising business. But more importantly, DarkWinter Lit is a beautiful dream of a cold, dark night, illuminated by hope and wonder.

Aside from that momentous announcement, I was also trapped in an elevator this week—well, at least for a brief moment. You see, Kate has started to work at the antique market with me, and on Wednesday, one of the vendors came to her and said, “I need my bins brought down from the third floor to the second.” So off Kate went, with me hot on her heels:

Me: You don’t know how to run the elevator—you haven’t been trained!
Kate: It’s an elevator, Mom. I think I can figure it out.
Me: It’s not an ordinary elevator. Let me show you. This is my wisdom!

So we went back to the freight elevator and she got the gate up, then we went inside.

Me: See? First you need to put the gate down. And now we push this button and hold it until it gets almost to the third floor and you hear a ‘click’. When you hear the click, you let go of the button. Don’t get close to the edge!!
Kate: Mom, calm down. I’m not stupid.

We got to the third floor. She opened the gate and we loaded the vendor’s bins. Then she closed the gate. I could hear voices below on the second floor—it was our second-floor staff member Vivian. “We’re on our way down!” I shouted. I pressed the elevator button to go down and…nothing happened. I pressed it again and still nothing. “Vivian!!” I yelled down the elevator shaft. “We’re stuck in the elevator!”

Kate: Sigh.
Me: Oh my god! What should we do?
Kate (lifts up gate and gestures): We should get out.
Me: OK. Thank you for saving our lives.

Apparently the gate wasn’t quite on the track and once we got out and Kate pulled the gate down from the outside, it went to the second floor quite easily without us in it, and Kate stayed upstairs to help the vendor while I fled to the safety of the main floor. Then later, Vivian came by the till on the first floor:

Vivian: Did they get your daughter out of the elevator yet? I hear she’s still stuck in there.
Me: What??!! Oh my god!
Vivian: Haha. Just kidding—she’s fine.

Moral of the story: I hate elevators and my daughter is a hero.

Also, our power has been off for 24 hours and I’m posting this from my phone before the battery di…

71 thoughts on “My Big Announcement; Stuck In An Elevator”

  3. Congratulations on the literary magazine! Thank you so much for inviting me to send stories–I’m thrilled 🙂 The site looks amazing!!!!! Getting stuck in an elevator is my worst nightmare. Apparently, it happens at my place of work all of the time in one of the buildings. I did get stuck in an elevator once during a very important curriculum meeting I was attending–so embarrassing to call down to the first floor with a panicked “Help!”–but a very funny story afterwards. Cheers!

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  5. This is so exciting! Being out of the elevator, I mean. The literary magazine is amazingly cool too and I look forward to reading all the great weirdness that’s going to appear there. That also reminds me of a story I heard about a young journalist who, as his first newspaper job, was assigned to write obituaries. His first one was a thousand words. The editor told him to cut it down. He cut it to five hundred words. The editor told him to cut it more. So what he turned in was “Robert Jones looked up the elevator shaft to see if the elevator was coming. It was. He was forty-seven.”
    I apologize if you never go near the elevator again.

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  7. DWL – fun play on words.

    In my day, the Web was my bitch and I had oodles of high hopes. The remnants of such still litter my list of domains that I hold onto with delusional delight, visions of grandeur.

    I wish you well in your endeavor and you know I’ll contribute what I can.

    -AM

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  14. I have always wanted to submit something to a literary magazine, but I have no last name (won’t share the real one and haven’t been able to come up with a fake one that I like that’s not already in use) and don’t know if I’m good enough. Also, I don’t think my fiction fits your mission statement. It’s too typical? Predictable? Not very twisty? Something like that.

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  15. Omg, omg, omg!! I’m so psyched that you decided to do this!! There are some great stories coming your way. Also Kate is awesome and lucky she was there when this happened. She is definitely a hero, yay Kate!! The building I work in has an old elevator that’s slow as hell. And our building is only three floors….I get down the stairs faster than that elevator 🙄

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  18. Awesome! The literary magazine is an excellent idea!

    I love hearing about the Elevator Adventures. One time someone told me a favourite way for the Mob to eliminate someone is to remove the floor from an elevator. Seems highly unlikely to me, but I always make sure there’s a floor in the elevator before stepping inside…

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  23. Hugs congrats on the Lit Mag idea, Suzanne, and the energy to get it done! I’m terrible at submitting pieces of writing to anything but will make a huge effort since I’m a fan of darkness. Hehehe. And I couldn’t help but laugh at the elevator adventure. I’m glad it ended well.

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