Who We Are

El Balazo is a small press and funky fresh literary blog. We crave new, original writing and aren’t afraid of the wacky stuff that usually gets passed over. We want to help obscure, interesting, unique books find a place in the sun. To read more about why we do what we do, read this!

What We Do

1) Publish print books! To submit your manuscript, email elbalazomedia@gmail.com.

2) We publish original content on our blog. We accept poetry, short fiction, essays on culture or music or literature or the Internet or TV or [fill in the blank]. You are cordially invited to get weird and funkadelic.

What We Think

1) We’ll meet you in the here and now.
Literature, art, and music are undergoing massive changes — not only how people make money off their stuff, but how people conceive of creative projects. New forms and far-out ideas are encouraged!

2) No writerlyness.
Writerly writing is smarmy and toxic. It exists to cue the reader how educated, clever, thoughtful, and big-hearted you are. Please send it elsewhere.

3) We're not dazzled by your MFA.
Don’t have an MFA? That probably just means you haven’t been taught to write Raymond Carver rip-offs. We don’t discriminate. What do you have that’s new?

4) No forced outcomes.
Anything can happen. Don’t moralize or shove in a happy ending. And, if you’re writing a short story, it doesn’t have to culminate in violence.

5) Genres are for marketers.
We don't discriminate on genre, length, audience, or other superficial categories that speak to how to market the book, not to the worth of the book itself. If a book of any kind strikes our fancy, we'll publish it.

Vibin’?

Submit your book manuscript! Please NOTE: we are still accepting manuscripts, but due to our hiatus we will likely not be able to respond until 2017.

About the Editors

Tori Balazo

Tori Balazo writes and creates books, products, and content.

Kevin Funkhouser

Kevin Funkhouser designs for digital media, print, and physical spaces.