The literary journal Contrary celebrates its fifth anniversary this month, just after winning four awards coveted in the online publishing industry."We're very happy to be recognized like this," said Jeff McMahon, Contrary's editor. "There are so many excellent literary journals online now that we're surprised to win anything in competition. All we ever wanted was to put good writers in front of good readers."
An independent journal of fiction, commentary and poetry, Contrary was founded five years ago by a team of editors who met in graduate school at the University of Chicago. They published its first issue in September 2003.
In the past year, Contrary won a 2007 "Best of the Net" award from Sundress Publications for the poem "Snapshots of the Epic" by Gregory Lawless. The poem was Lawless's first publication. The story "Household Poisons" by Thomas King won a 2008 "Best of the Web" award from Dzanc Books. And Amy Reed's short story "How You Remember Her" was honored as a notable story by both Dzanc Books and the Million Writers competition. Reed subsequently signed a book deal with Simon Pulse, an imprint of Simon & Schuster, which will bring out her debut novel "Beautiful" next fall.
In addition to promoting new writers, Contrary promotes established writers who its editors believe deserve more attention. It has published commentary by the late columnist Heywood Broun, poetry by the late screenwriter Ben Maddow, author of "The Asphalt Jungle," and some of the first literary fiction by Andrew Coburn, the author of 13 mystery novels. Contrary published Coburn's short story, "The Heir," and his lyrical commentary, "Plum Island."
Contrary's anniversary issue features these and other selections of the journal's best work from the last five years. It can be viewed at http://www.contrarymagazine.com/.
