"A Gentleman" by Frank Reilly / Cleaver Magazine
"Forget coke, forget a mosh pit, forget a firefight in Kandahar, even."
Full disclosure: I’m Frank Reilly, the writer who’s been knocking out these weekly short story appreciations, and yes, I’m putting my own wares on display this week. But there’s a reason for that! Beyond my standard issue aspiring-writer-cringey-need-for-attention…
Let’s hover over this self-inflicted awkward moment to note that getting a story published is an event that needs to be celebrated because they don’t come along often enough. So I invite all of you to pass on news of any upcoming publications of your stories with me so they can be shared with the larger Shoutout family.
I look forward to getting and spreading the word. Remember to include a link to the story if it’s available online. In doing so, I’m following in the footsteps of Janelle Drumwright’s Lit Mag Lounge, and her great Publishing Diaries series, which I can’t recommend enough for regularly putting the spotlight on up-and-coming writers.
“A Gentleman” (3,900 words) in Cleaver Magazine‘s latest issue is a story I was certain would never get published. I was certain because, in writing it, I followed what seemed like all the worst impulses if publication was the goal, including writing it in a voice that is one thousand miles from my own. Luckily for me, the editorial staff at Cleaver was willing to strap in for a bumpy flight.
A main character can be introduced in any number of compelling ways. They can be successful and self-confident, then suffer a set-back that compels heroic action. They can be meek and trepidatious and call on some reserve of courage to ascend. They can be malicious and deceptive and have a personal revelation that changes their motivations and their path. My goal with “A Gentleman” was to have the distance between personal low point and high point be as wide as possible, and to always have my MC’s “goodness” or “badness” be a bone of contention. The question “am I following a hero or a villain?” is one I would gladly turn pages to get an answer to.
In “A Gentleman,” we first meet our main character, Mack, at a very low point. He has inexplicably made a game of staring down random strangers on a commuter train—a brazen act of confrontation that practically promises a bad end. But when I initially had the idea, it also had me thinking what would a person have to have gone through to possibly end up doing something like this?
Clearly not likeable behavior, but hopefully intriguing enough that it presents as the kind of car crash you can’t not stare at as you roll past the road flares.
The stare-down situation provided the opportunity, through the weird circumstance of unbroken eye contact with a total stranger, for enough of a connection with a second character to be made. From there, an invitation into a larger story presented itself. And here’s my reason for wanting to write a column around this piece; it’s a story in which both the reader and the Main Character have zero understanding of what they’re walking into.
Usually we know right from the start of a story that we’re headed into a romance, or a family drama, or a police procedural. But when Mack is confronted with an old woman who won’t break his stare, and then wordlessly invites him to follow her off the train and back to her home, we could be walking into almost any genre.
There’s no need to sweat subverting story expectations (which is, I think, always our best path to captivating a reader) when there are no expectations to begin with.
From there, the story follows two tracks; the who’s the spider and who’s the fly? circumstances of Mack’s connection with the old woman, and Mack’s backstory, which explains what got him to the odd state we find him in.
I gave myself one more challenge with “A Gentleman” in the introduction of a third character—the teenage granddaughter of the old woman. The challenge was to provide as little information as possible about her, but still have her story live and breathe fully. She wound up becoming the heart of the tale, even though her “screen time” is a scant few pages.
“A Gentleman” was submitted to fifteen publications before Cleaver accepted it. The lesson here for me (and hopefully for you) is this: If there’s one prose realm left where there’s room for risky innovation (and which, unlike the novel, doesn’t require years of slow-build development) it’s the short story. Don’t believe a word of the scores of articles circulating that proclaim the “death of the short story.” It’s alive and kicking. Check out our archives for weekly confirmations.
Once you’ve gotten your story in fighting form, it’s just a matter of channeling your inner armadillo and submitting wide until you cross paths with your own personal angel in the haystack; a reader / editor who is aligned with your particular vision enough to advocate for it.
If you can spare the time, I hope you read and enjoy “A Gentleman.”
~*~
A big Short Story Shoutout to Cleaver for bringing “A Gentleman” to the wider world! And a separate Shoutout to Kathryn Kulpa, whose great flash fiction piece “Keep Your Visions to Yourself” was profiled here back in April. Kathryn is Cleaver’s Senior Flash Fiction editor (a great surprise for me when researching them), and her work continues to garner praise and awards—more about those on her website, so please give a visit (and take one of her Cleaver classes, see link below).
Founded in 2013, Cleaver—an independent quarterly online literary journal—publishes cutting-edge contemporary fiction, nonfiction, poetry, interviews, essays on craft and the writing life, and book reviews.
Cleaver exists to:
showcase Philadelphia’s literary voices among national and international literary artists.
represent the fullest diversity of literary art for all genres and content, advancing emerging contemporary literary forms.
elevate emerging voices, including young adults, alongside established writers.
present balanced, insightful book reviews promoting work published by small presses as well as often-overlooked works in translation.
develop the editorial skills of young writers through their selective internship program.
support the development of writers’ skills through a diversity of online workshops.
Word count limits for fiction submissions are 4,000 words for short stories, and 700 words for flash fiction. Submissions are accepted year-round and they prefer that they be single-spaced. There is a $5 submission fee to help defray Submittable costs.
Check out their fantastically wide-ranging library of free Writing Tips columns, as well as their on-going list of live & recorded Writing Classes to sharpen your writing…well, cleaver :)
One of the very cool things that comes with acceptance to Cleaver (beyond the publication’s great credentials and deep bench of talented editors) is having a bespoke graphic created that accompanies your story. These graphics are made by Co-Founding Editor Karen Rile! That’s a level of care and involvement that you don’t see every day from literary publications.
Many thanks to Cleaver for walking “A Gentleman” into the light of day.
Check out more of my work at my website.
Are you reading enough short stories to know what lit pubs are looking for?
Don’t have the time to search for them on your own and still get writing done?
Short Story Shoutout can help.
Subscribe (and check out our archives) to get introduced to the best online fiction weekly for the low, low cost of nothing.
Comments