Instant City is now accepting submissions for a genre issue: science fiction, speculative fiction, magical realism, westerns, mystery, cyberpunk, horror, steampunk, or whatever else your creative juices churn out—we are interested in reading it all! The only stipulation is that the story must be set in San Francisco, past, present or future. Please keep submissions under 4000 words.

Deadline for genre submissions is August 30, 2010
Don’t worry if genre ain’t your thing. We are still reading “straight” submissions.

General submissions should be under 3000 words. We prefer to receive print submissions in word (.doc), but you’re welcome to send us them as plain text files as well. Be sure to include your name, email and any other contact info in the body of the text.

Please note that we do not publish every submission we receive, either in the magazine or online. Submissions will be considered for both print and online unless you tell us otherwise.

We’re also interested in submissions of video, audio, and flash format for the site… but please let us know what you have in mind first before uploading a file.

We do accept simultaneous submissions, just let us know. For more info or to submit a story, see our submissions page

Let’s hook up!

Instant City is dedicated to creating community through our website. We’d like to include links to blogs penned by Instant City contributors past and present. Please drop us a line with a link to your blog. And we’d be ever so tickled to appear on your page.

Shaken and stirred: Litquake’s Epicenter presents: Instant City

Get shaken and stirred by Litquake’s latest pairing with literary magazine Instant City!

Hosted by Instant City & Litquake in conjunction with Gypsy Honeymoon a Heart Wine Bar
1266 Valencia St SF CA
Sunday, July 18 6-8 pm

Mingle with Litquake cognoscenti and Instant City wits inside a real-life cabinet of wonders—Gypsy Honeymoon. Heart Wine bar will be offering an event wine pairing at a special price. Writers LJ Moore and Joshua Citrak will be sharing work. Serenade by Angus Martin & Gabrielle Ekedal.

Writers:

L.J. Moore’s poetry, essays, photography and reviews have appeared in Spectrum, Midnight Zoo, Danse Macabre, Coracle, 14850, 14 Hills, Limestone, Jacket, Kalliope, Transfer, Goetry, Sidebrow, Instant City 6, The Sidebrow Anthology, The Chiron Review, and We Still Like. Her book-length poem, F-Stein, based on science, family, pop-culture, and the paranormal was published in December, 2008 by Subito Press. L.J. is a co-founder of bay-area-based Small Desk Press, and was an Artist in Residence at Headlands Center for the Arts in 2010. L.J. reviews books for Publishers Weekly and the San Francisco Examiner.com.

Sixteen in the clip and one in hole Joshua Citrak’s ’bout to make all the people say, ‘oh!’

Gabrielle Ekedal is a singer, poet and songwriter. Some of her past projects include Handmaiden America, Extraordinary Forest, The Moontraps and Radius. She lives in San Francisco.

Angus Martin is a Soluna Records recording artist with two releases, Presqu’ile (2005) and Le Demimonde (2007). He sings in French, Spanish and English and plays accordion, guitar, piano and percussion.

Heart Wine Bar is located just two doors down from Gypsy Honeymoon at 1270 Valencia Street, Heart is a chaotic wine bar, restaurant and art gallery that’s all about enjoying great wine, not bowing down to it. It serves its artisan, esoteric, natural wines in mason jars, plays hip-hop and blues and helps you make friends at communal tables.”

http://thebolditalic.com/KevinThomson/stories/251-chute-em-up

Release party for Instant City 7 “Bad Behavior.”

There is more to life in San Francisco than sex, drugs and bike riding, but to judge by the stories in the most recent issue of Instant City, not much more. Join us for a live reading of hair-raising tales about behaving badly in a city where bad behavior is the best kind.

Plus, following the success of last year’s trivia event…
San Francisco is a city notorious for razor-sharp wit and cutting-edge lit, what better way to celebrate the release of Instant City 7 than with a reading and game show! Impress your friends and community. Match your knowledge of San Francisco history and literature against your peers. Plus enjoy a selection of awesome tales from Instant City and get the chance to smooze the authors!
Monday, May 17
The Elbo Room 647 Valencia Street, SF CA
Doors open at 7pm. Game begins at 7:30 sharp.
Readings by: Charles Gatewood, Amanda Davidson, Andrew Dugas, and Sherilyn Connelly.
-and-
Game show: Test both your literary knowledge and your San Francisco history. Prizes awarded.
Cost: $5.00-$10.00 sliding scale. $10.00 admission includes a copy of Instant City 7

Issue 7 “Bad Behavior” will finally see its release in April 2010. Thank you all for your patience and support.

Instant City is now accepting submissions for Issue 8 & Issue 9. One of these will be our first genre-only issue: science fiction, westerns, mysteries, etc. all set in the San Francisco Bay Area.

Spring is coming and so is Instant City

3/6/10, 7pm Cantina SF, 580 Sutter Street, San Francisco

Join editor Gravity Goldberg and writer Matt Stewart, whose debut novel The French Revolution was released on Twitter.

Writer, agitator and provocateur, Kristina Marusic, will be reading from her work.

Reading begins at 7:30.
Featuring

Peter Orner, Toni Mirosevich, & Kemble Scott

Peter Orner wrote the best-selling novel The Second Coming of Mavala Shikongo and Esther Stories. His work has appeared in Best American Stories, won two Pushcart prizes, and has been a finalist for the Pen Hemingway Award. His story “The Raft” is being made into a film starring Ed Asner.

Toni Mirosevich is the author of Pink Harvest, (First Series in Creative Nonfiction Award) and four collections of poetry including Queer Street, and My Oblique Strategies, winner of the Frank O’Hara ward. She’s a Professor of Creative Writing at SFSU.

Kemble Scott is the bestselling author of the novels SoMa and The Sower which premiered as an exclusive e-book and became the first novel sold by Scribd.com. The Sower is now available in hardcover through Numina Press. He writes for the New York Times.

We are in the final stages of finishing Instant City issue 7. Stay tuned for new events and another Instant City: the game show.

Come cheer on the amazing Jim Nelson who will be reading for Instant City!

June 12:
LDM SF Ep. 19
When: Friday, June 12; Doors at 6:30, show at 7:15 p.m. (sharp)
Where: Elbo Room, 647 Valencia St.
Cost: $10 (and an issue of Opium 8–$2 off the cover price!)
Hosted by: Todd Zuniga & Alana Conner.

Readers: Michelle Richmond (No One You Know), Katharine Noel (Halfway House), Eric Puchner (Music Through the Floor), KM Soehnlein (The World of Normal Boys), and Jim Nelson (Instant City).

Judges: Ayelet Waldman (Bad Mother), Josh Kornbluth (Haiku Tunnel), and Peter Sinn Nachtrieb (T.I.C.–Trenchcoat in Common).

Meet us at Dog Eared Books on Valencia Street to celebrate the release of our 6th issue. Readings by L.J. Moore, Tiny Grey-Garcia, Pei Wang and others TBA!

Thursday, April 16th, 8 pm
With: L.J. Moore, Tiny Grey-Garcia, Pei Wang and more
Dog Eared Books
900 Valencia St. (@ 20th)
San Francisco, CA 94110

Tiny(aka Lisa Gray-Garcia) is a poverty scholar, revolutionary journalist, poet, spoken word artist, teacher, welfareQUEEN, and the co-founder and executive director of POOR Magazine. POOR is a grassroots, arts-based organization dedicated to giving a voice to those struggling with poverty, racism and disability. Tiny is author of Criminal of Poverty: Growing Up Homeless in America published by City Lights. She has innovated several revolutionary media, arts and education programs, for youth, adults and elders including the first welfare-to-work journalism program in the country for poor mothers transitioning off of welfare. This year she launched The Race, Poverty and Media Justice Institute at POOR Magazine (www.racepovertymediajustice.org)

Pei Wang was raised in southern California and completed her bachelor’s at UC Berkeley. Since then, she wandered through careers in advertising and non-profiteering before earning her MFA at San Francisco State. Her work has been published in Transfer and Instant City, and she is currently working on a novel and sundry short stories.

L.J. Moore lives in San Francisco in a basement by the beach. Her interests range from martial arts to taphophilia. L.J.’s poetry, essays, photography and reviews have appeared in Spectrum, Midnight Zoo, Danse Macabre, Coracle, 14 Hills, Limestone, Kalliope, Transfer, Goetry, Sidebrow, Instant City, and Jacket. Her work is included in an upcoming book of poetry based on found photographs entitled Shadows: The Disappearing Woman. She is a co-founder of Small Desk Press.

Come join Instant City at the Booksmith bookstore to celebrate the release of Issue 6, with readings by Jim Nelson, Alia Voz, Matt Stewart, and others TBA!

Tuesday, March 10th, 7:30 pm
The Booksmith
1644 Haight St
San Francisco, CA 94117