In this post, we’ll be hearing from Garrett Souliere. He updates us on Quibble Lit Mag’s ongoing success and shares new developments, including his Author Up series. If you missed our original interview, check it out here: Interview with Garrett Souliere
Check out Garrett’s bio:
Garrett Souliere is a writer, editor, and publisher living in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia with his wife and four pets. He holds a BFA from VCU, and is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of Quibble Lit, an independent literary magazine and home of the Quippy Awards. He produces, edits, and hosts Author Up, a writing & publishing podcast, and Draft and Craft, a writing gameshow podcast. His poetry and writing have appeared in The Mid Atlantic review, The Big ?, Words & Whispers, trash to treasure lit, Rebel, and elsewhere.
Pauline: Your literary magazine, Quibble, is in its 5th year! What’s on your submission wish list for 2027 and beyond? How can interested writers or artists get involved?
Garrett: Thank you, Pauline, and thank you for this opportunity to catch up, I appreciate what you’ve done with this column. It’s hard to believe Quibble is nearly five years-old! We owe it to a great community of people who have been very generous and very eager to collect and nerd out about literature. Thank you, nerds!
And what a great question! I wish I were organized enough to have a real wish list. We have always been amazed at the variety and quality of art and writing that comes across our desk. We want distinct, unique, risk-taking writing that is convinced of its own composition. Writing that is incisional and intentional; work that stops us, that stays with us that moves some part of us.
P: Garrett, what did 2026 look like for you in your roles as a writer & editor? What’s next?
G: 2026 will forever be the biggest year in my life. Most importantly, I got married! My wife and I are very happy, and looking forward to what’s next (we’re still figuring all that out.)
At the same time, Quibble’s really found its voice this year, starting with The 2026 Ps and Qs Audio Poetry Contest. This contest came about through a lot of good luck and communal goodwill / generosity. I elevator-pitched the idea to Derrick Brown during an email exchange. His consignment meant the world to me, and encouraged me to just start reaching to make the contest happen as best as I could, and things kept snowballing from there. Looking to promote it, I put myself out there, in putting myself on camera. I was super lucky to be interviewed by Becky Tuch of Lit Mag News, which was incredibly affirmative and gave us a really big signal boost.
Our flagship production – Quibble Lit, our print and online lit magazine – now has this companion contest, the Quippys as a second branch of Quibble’s ventures… which led to this third newest branch, podcasting, but more on that later…
Lastly, a very recent development: I have a poetry collection together, which I’ll be working on editing and hopefully self-publishing in the near future!
P: Who are your mentors or role models? Tell us about one person who has supported you in your writing journey.
G: Most of my mentors have been family, or co-workers and supervisors in my real life, mostly in restaurants through my 20s. There’s something to be said about food service work being a study in humanities.
Poet-wise, Derrick Brown has been a big, direct inspiration. I found Write Bloody’s YouTube performances my freshmen year of college and it changed what I thought was possible with poetry. His attitude towards poets being rock stars is super important. The culture – and poets ourselves – don’t give us enough credit.
Donald Glover was also a huge influence on my artistic sensibilities during my formative years, particularly in his defiance of being narrowed into one lane of creativity. Chance the Rapper, as the first-ever independent artist to win a Grammy, has been a major role model in both his writing and community modeling and activism.
P: What inspired your Author Up series? Tell us about your vision and where this project is heading.
G: Great question, and one that’s hard to answer! To start, I’ve had podcasting in mind for 5 years, since the start of Quibble, but I never knew how I was going to make it happen. I always had another reason why it wouldn’t: I didn’t have the gear, the editing skills, or belief in what I would be bringing.
That last factor was changed with The Quippys. In April, at the end of this inaugural year, our expectations had been far exceeded with all of the amazing work submitted our way. We had set out to recognize 9 winners, but it felt a waste of all this collected talent and art to simply let it go away.
The Quippy Choice Award was created, to recognize 16 more poets from the contest who sent standout work, selected by Quibble (rather than guest judge panel vote.) AND as a way of deepening the relationship with each of these writers, we invited them onto our new podcast.
In February, I’d begun experimenting with “submit-along livestreams” as a way to push at a new skill and community engagement. I’d bit off more than I knew how to handle, with streaming software and live production being a bit much for me at the time. The idea was fizzling when I saw the opportunity to repurpose, and create a more comfortable, conversational space, as a way to spotlight the amazing work from The Quippys 2026 – as well as engage with other editors, writers, and publisher in the independent literature space.
And I have been learning so much from these editors, writers, poets, and publishers along the way. Like a lot of writing, a lot of the work I’ve done with Quibble has felt “in a bubble” – and it’s great to burst out and personally connect. Furthermore, I feel like I’m receiving a personalized coaching lesson and education each week. The bits of wisdom my guests each bring have really stuck with me and already bettered my own craft.
I’m still getting my feet under me, in terms of really grasping the full scope of producing, hosting, editing, but each week I try to get closer to the kind of writing show I would want to watch.
P: Who are your all-time favourite writers? What must-have resources do you recommend for new writers?
G: Some of my favorite writers include John Green, Chuck Palahniuk, Chuck Klosterman, Flannery O’Connor, Ursula Leguin, George Orwell, T.S. Eliot, Joyce Carol Oates, and J.D. Salinger (with a bullet).
Must-have resources is a great question! As far as getting writing out there, Chillsubs.com is maybe one of the best resources writers have ever had. I’d also recommend Building a Second Brain by Tiago Forte, for anyone in today’s climate of knowledge work. We all have so many notes and places to file – managing them makes us clearer agents. Getting a system started in my Microsoft OneNote was an important pivot that lead me to better writing.
My best recommendation for new writers, though, would be to remember the fun in what you do and read as widely as you can — short story and poetry anthologies particularly.
P: Garrett, do you prefer writing or editing? Tell us about your current work in progress.
G: Another wonderful question, and thank you again for this opportunity! That’s a really tough one to answer. I want to say writing – however, my initial answer to this question was about 4 paragraphs long, before finally my editor brain kicked on. Writing is rewriting, as they say.
Writing gets reduced a lot to be seen as just the generative, constructive act. I’m a huge believer in Betty S. Flower’s “Madman, Architect, Carpenter, Judge” framework. Editing, to me, isn’t about diction, syntax, and punctuation; it’s about answering the questions of “Is this as essential as it’s meant to be?” and “Does this belong here?”
I will be releasing a poetry chap book of my own very soon – possibly before 2027! I’ll be excited to share more about it when the time’s right, but it’s a secret I have to keep for now! (… but not for any cool NDA kind of reasons, I’ll just spoil my own appetite if I do.)
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