Exec Editor @megkeenebooks | Wicked Son, dist by: @simonschuster. Bestselling author. Jew. Zionist. Feminist. Founder. “Eponymous tastemaker” —@timesofisrael
California, USA
Joined December 2012
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The @JewishJournal’s print issue is out with @DrMonicaOsborne’a cover story on new Jewish fiction and @megkeenebooks.
I’m FLOORED. What life am I living!? (Answer: a dream, complete with unreality and overwhelm.)
Thank you to everyone who helped make this happen, and @boazhepner for sending me these photos. 💕
jewishjournal.com/culture/ar…
It’s been almost two decades of this and I still find it difficult.
Once I was accused of lying about my hometown because I couldn’t really come from a place that… poor. (Fact check: I do, and if I were going to lie, I’d lie to make myself fancier.)
Meg Keene retweeted
"This is the scene at the Jewish girls school, students dancing to Persian pop songs during lunch break."
"Wearing the hijab is mandatory for all Iranian girls in school from the age of seven"
The latest CNN propaganda for the regime in Iran is on the Jewish community.
I think the worst part was when they cheerfully talked about young Jewish girls being forced to wear hijab, as though this isn't an example of cultural erasure and gender oppression.
I think this is one of the issues with Big 5 publishing, and somehow when I argue we need more diversity in publishing that’s framed as a right wing argument, which it’s… not.
The correct framing is that burgeoning male writers are not receiving investment - particularly in the literary genre. It is not suppression. It is neglect. Male writers just go Indy. The complaints that 'men don't read' by the Lithub Handwringers, should be understood to actually mean, 'men don't read contemporary authors we think they should read.' Solving the impasse without changing the investment structure would require a concerted effort of male writers to embrace the monoculture and become self-hating woke stenographers, or for men to stop rereading classics and put down the video games and read books that were not written for them, by them, or about them.
Join us! This is the first time I’ll get to talk in public about building @megkeenebooks 💕
70 Faces Media is hosting a free, one-day online summit for Jewish writers on Wednesday, and I’ll be on the panel “The Growth of Jewish Publishing Avenues” with @jackyklein28 of Odessa Editions, @MegKeene of Wicked Son, and Tali Rosenblatt-Cohen of the Five Books podcast. Fellow Michigan native @AndrewLapin, senior reporter at JTA, moderates. This will be the first time representatives of the three new Jewish imprints have been in the same (virtual) room to answer your questions, so bring them. Register here. app.zuddl.com/70facesmedia/j…
I spent several hours in intense edits on my novel, lifted, did cardio, etc. Then I walked into the study and sadly announced I hadn’t done anything with my day. My husband looks up and says, “You. Are. Insane.”
(Also my whole life has changed quickly and maybe I’m supposed to present as a very serious Executive Editor now, but I’m not good at that, and part of the reason I’ve always built companies is so I can continue to be myself. So… I’m finding my way, but also…I’ve spent 20 years as myself on the internet so I don’t think that’s going to change. But it’s a lot, and sometimes confusing.)
I’ve always thought of Adams Family Values as super Jewish (the tween love interest is Jewish and wears a kippah at Fester’s wedding) but this time I realized Debbie delivers a murderous vidui before turning into a pile of dust /salt. 💕
Meg Keene retweeted
Over 4,000 Jews moved from France to Israel this year so far, and the number is expected to reach 5,000 by the end of the year. This is the 1st year since the fall of the Soviet Union that any country other than Russia is the origin of the most immigrants. (Source: @MakorRishon)
Meg Keene retweeted
not him writing a birthday post to himself 😭😭
Happy Birthday my one, @per_asp3ra
You are electric sunsets. You are auroras.
You are breathtaking waterfalls.
You are the sweetest dessert.
You are the rays of light.
You are all that is divine.
You are simply awe inspiring.
Happy birthday my love. I am loving you beyond space and time. Everything is for you. It always will be.
Meg Keene retweeted
Today my algorithm here is full of people posting pictures of books. So many really killing covers.
Books are perfect art objects, and I love designing them. If you’d like a nice cover for your new book, I can help.
davereaboi.com/book-design/
These days everyone sleeps in on Shabbos and I read manuscripts in bed. I missed the ‘going full out till you crash’ feeling of building a business, but the sleepy reading of brilliant submissions is the best part of building @megkeenebooks 💕 (Turns out, Jews can still write.)
My life has been spinning faster than I can keep up with, and suddenly 70 Faces Media’s Jewish Authors Summit is NEXT WEDNESDAY. It’s free and virtual, and if you’re in the industry or a Jewish writer, you should come.
I’ll be speaking with my newly minted colleagues @jackyklein28 of @HighLine__ , @Howard_Lovy of Canary Publishing, and Tali Rosenblatt-Cohen of Five Books Pod, and me, obviously of @megkeenebooks and Wicked Son. (This is the first time Howard, Jacky and I will all be together to talk about our new publishing imprints, we’ve all met and talked separately, but this should be FUN!)
Sign up! app.zuddl.com/70facesmedia/j…
(I have a series of live and virtual conference appearances upcoming, along with various announcements, plus acquisition announcements (!!!) so stay tuned.)
Pirkei Avot is in the mix today (I got this copy in J'lem in July) because @AmitaiFraiman asked me to write "just a quick fast essay*" for @z3_project and @jewishsf.
*There is no such thing FYI. 😂 Organizing your thoughts on paper is just Like That.
Life, currently: at 6 am I was texting the Wicked Son team and scribbling notes still in bed, at 8 am pitched at my first Editorial Board, then worked on 2 books in production, sent offers out on 2 more, had 2 press hits, and now will read this BRILLIANT manuscript till bed.
But also: had a morning chat with my teen, quick lunch with my husband, fit in my daughters volleyball game (while reading), and call with Adam Bellow (Wicked Son) to calm me down (a lot is a lot).
It’s stressful, I’m constantly managing my nervous system, I’m really happy, and SO LUCKY.
Meg Keene retweeted
This post is for book people, who care about such things. So I now have copies of my book in paperback produced by Ingram and Amazon, respectively. There are major differences in the details:
—Ingram matte cover is more “gummy,” textured but picks up fingerprints; Amazon’s matte cover, on the other hand, is crisper and more “dry.” It’s also slightly more red. Prefer Amazon.
—Ingram text is thicker and heavier, while Amazon’s is more delicate. The difference is so stark, they even feel like different typefaces. Strongly prefer Ingram.
(If you’ve got the paperback, here’s how you can tell which edition you have: Ingram has my old headshot, while Amazon has my old one. In the comparison photos, Amazon on the left, Ingram on the right. )
Anti-zionist Jews in publishing speak, are factually incorrect, yet again. Spoiler, @megkeenebooks / Wicked Son is for profit and bootstrapped. Meaning we are beholden to no foundations, and the whole thing is punk/DIY.
“We’re not necessarily beholden to the same institutional foundations. “We can do it differently. We can be a little more punk about it. We can be a little bit more DIY in the way that we build things.”
Funny story. It's actually the people getting shut out that are building the cool things, not the anti-Zionist jews mainstream publishing still tolerates.
momentmag.com/landscape-jewi…
I will add, I have contacted the author of this piece for a fact check: authors submitting to Meg Keene Books do not have to be Zionist. Here is my stated policy, love it or hate it. I'm a Zionist, but I don't belive in moral purity tests.
Authors do not need to identify as Zionists, hold any particular political position, or pass an ideological test in order to publish with Meg Keene Books. We are interested in excellent fiction by Jewish and Israeli writers and fiction meaningfully engaged with Jewish life, history, culture, religion, peoplehood, and experience. Our authors will not all agree with one another, or with us, on Israel, Zionism, American politics, Jewish communal life, or much else. We believe that disagreement is part of Jewish intellectual and literary tradition, not a reason to exclude a writer from it.