Featured Digiprove User – Katharine Valentino, SettingForth.org
Setting Forth–on a Literary Itinerary is an online literary magazine publishing short fiction, creative nonfiction and poetry. We create communities of writers and readers who interact with each other through the written word. We publish intelligent and creative writing that brings out the best in all of us.
We edit and publish new writers, giving them the opportunity to identify themselves as authors who contribute to their communities by telling the stories that not only make us who we are but that also encourage us to become who we need to be. We publish established writers as well, allowing them to become better known locally.
Well, that’s our “Editorial Focus,” anyway. So far, we have just one local community: Lane County, Oregon, with Eugene as its center. We are not paying anybody, operating expenses come out of our pockets, and we have such a small staff that we cannot take the time to become an official nonprofit association. But we have high hopes and not unreasonable expectations: Two years ago in July when we began, we published 12 works by 10 writers. As of today, 55 writers have joined us, we have published more than 250 of their works, and our readership each month approaches 2,000.
I, Katharine Valentino, am the editor and administrator of the magazine. I have to say that our success so far is due to a larger extent than you would imagine to Digiprove. Authors are understandably concerned about copyright protection, and my ability to offer this to a new writer in a way that both looks professional and is foolproof gains respect for the magazine and results in more submissions. When I have spoken to writers personally at writers’ groups and have gotten to the copyright-rights part of my speech, I have seen frowns and suspicious asides become smiles and questions about where to submit.
I’m convinced we have a good chance to move this magazine into a larger market, always staying local, but increasing the number of locales. Think Craig’s List applied to the literary scene. Here again, Digiprove will prove invaluable. Until the magazine has been funded sufficiently for me to purchase a Professional Plan, I will be using the Personal Plan to Digiprove up to 20 new submissions a day on up to 10 subdomains.
Meanwhile, thanks, Digiprove.
Check out the magazine at http://SettingForth.org. If you like what you see but don’t live near Eugene, Oregon, get in touch so we can talk about how to expand into your locale. (If you do live near Eugene, by all means submit something to us.)
About Katharine
Katharine Valentino, editor of Setting Forth—on a Literary Itinerary, is a mother and grandmother who has more than two decades of experience as a newspaper reporter and newspaper managing editor, a magazine features writer, a technical communicator, a memoir editor and a publisher. She has a bachelor’s degree in journalism “with high distinction” from Indiana University at Bloomington and joint IBM/Brainbench master’s level certifications in Written English and English vocabulary. Now retired from full-time work, Katharine stays busy editing everything from news articles to poetry. When she has the time and inclination, Katharine writes, mostly creative nonfiction.
Submitted by Katharine Valentino.
