The Autoclave
Rebranding, Rainbow Rat, Mutual Support Networks, You May Need an Editor, Reading, and Stream of Consciousness POV flash
Welcome to the Autoclave
I recently read
’s post on professionalizing Substack. Before that I read a series of posts from that made me feel sparkly and happy about the future. recently started a section on his Substack for just writing out his thoughts. I’ve been rebranding (colors, theme, whatever) my shitshow over here because now it feels a little more established. Still, posting has been perilously inconsistent. Thanks executive functions, really doing me a solid.So for starters, since I primarily like to post fiction and editing I’m compartmentalizing off my psychotic rants, recommendations, and shilling for myself. This is the Autoclave. While my instruments from an autopsy are being burnt clean, I can sit around and sip and spill tea on my bloodied scrubs.
I need to pay my bills, and I make my money editing fiction mostly. It’s feast or famine and as an independent editor, I’m always hustling.
Short stories are $200 flat fee. Manuscripts are $.04 a word with flexible payment options. And if you don’t have a manuscript finished but want some help, I’ll be your private editor for $45 an hour, or $100 a month for two very intense hours of my time, or $200 for four. After that the price goes up. But so does the attention you get.
Why front this? I just closed payment on a lovely contract and I’m looking for short stories and manuscripts. Send inquiries to emilottoman@gmail.com and put EDITORIAL INQUIRY in the subject line.
Why should you? Oh, well sure, let’s just do that.
"Emil is The Editor, and wherever you are with your writing, having someone of his skills doing a pass over your work will 100% make you a better writer." -
"His work makes me want to write more, be more, do more, read more. That goes for his writing and his editing." -
“Emil is an outstanding editor, deeply informed on the history and the current state of contemporary fiction, and a great fiction storyteller himself.” -
“Emil has made me a better writer simply by being there whenever I feel brave… I didn’t know writers like Emil existed and now I can’t forget… we all must never forget.” -
S.M. Garratt“You've got a warlord's sense of tactical organization and efficiency” –
“you ARE the next iteration of [redacted]. I didn’t know much about him beyond reputation all I know is you got the goods.” -
(Will Christopher Baer, This one is super bombastic. Beyond the pale. A very cheap imitation, I could never be who he says that’s redacted, but I’m not turning down a compliment of that magnitude from someone like Chris Baer)“Emil has a detail oriented eye allowing for Extremely effective, nuanced edits both at the sentence and structural level. His editing services have been invaluable in helping me achieve better characterization and thematic resonance in my own work.” - B.R. Yeager author of Amygdalatropolis, Negative Space, and the short story collection BurnYouTheFuckAlive (Great friend too.)
“It’s amazing how much you support everyone.” -
(This is just to prove that at least one good person has said something genuinely nice about me out of the blue for no real reason, I keep a screen clip of this on my laptop desktop at all times.)And if you go to
, scroll all the way over to “Need Editing” on his absolutely packed top bar, it leads you to a direct referral from one of my favorite fellow Substack word nerds, Right hereI could go on but I’ll stop there and get to the bigger point.
Emil’s free editing series “Invitation to the Autopsy” has been described as “Substack’s rawest editorial series for writers seeking honest, expert feedback”
You want some testimonials? There.
Now you can feel better about reaching out.
The Rainbow Rat Review & Mutual Support Networks
AS PER
:It began with Nihilism.
Casual Nihilism, if you want specifics.
Trap threads in Casual Nihilism, to be precise.
Trap threads for bigots in Casual Nihilism, would be the most exacting explanation.
When you have a Facebook meme group of +170k people prone to staring into the abyss, you're going to collect some assholes.
The Admin team of Casual Nihilism handled them much the same way you've seen The Editor handle bigots here on Substack - with ruthless unapologetic precision. And a ban hammer.
Mind you, this was not a safe space.
The amount of threads hosting brutal arguments with 200+ comments is staggering. The Admin team once banned everyone with the first name Kyle. It was chaos.
Certainly not the setting where you'd expect a community to form.
And we didn't.
Not at first.
The idea of forming a community from that cesspool of humanity was laughable.
But about 75-100 of us were having far too much fun being absurd and nihilistic at each other, and a network of groups was formed catering to different interests; literature, art, music, sex, Lake Hepatitis, funeral potatoes, the list goes on.
More chaos.
Then COVID hit, along with isolation, cabin fever, and boredom.
Connectivity was at a premium.
In the Casuals, the group curation became a kind of social osmosis. A post leading to a comment leading to a new group leading to new connection. Friend requests were exchanged, bonds were formed, and we started to get to know each other as people instead of shit posting caricatures.
The trouble in seeing people is the knowing.
As 2020 wound down, it became more and more evident that one of our own was being abused.
We didn't know what to do.
I can only imagine how many private conversations were had without her knowledge. I was part of a few. We knew she wasn't okay, but she was also an adult who had to make her own choices and none of us lived nearby.
"I have a spare room"
Those are the five words from one man that were the catalyst for where we are now.
"I have a spare room."
The world had shut down, the shelters were closed, her husband had dragged her across the house by her hair for not making dinner on time.
"I have a spare room."
One man with just enough resources to scrape by, and a room with a bed where she could be safe. A woman he had never met face to face, a woman he had barely known a year. A woman who would be dead if it weren't for the kindness and humanity of a single human being.
We rallied.
She couldn't get there alone.
It's a long way from West Virginia to Louisiana.
That was December of 2020. Last year they celebrated their five year anniversary, having fallen in love before she got off the bus.
Six months later, another crisis.
An artist in Canada living with her partner found their apartment unlivable. Every effort to mitigate the emergency failed, and the only solution was thousands of dollars.
We rallied.
Again.
Despite our absurd, misanthropic origins, a community had formed.
It would take my dumb ass getting saved from domestic abuse for the lightbulb to go off - we had people who needed help, and people with the ability to help, and a void in between.
Not everyone is willing to air their personal life on social media. All the assistance had come from noticing someone in crisis. Who knows how many crises we were missing because there wasn't a safe place to go?
Casual Altruism was formed.
But it wasn't launched.
Because I'm a people too, I have doubts and imposter syndrome like everyone else, and I wasn't sure if other folks would be on board.
The group sat empty for four months, until two other members had a chat and came up with the same idea.
I told them there was a group ready and waiting, and we went live. It's been running for almost three years. We've fixed cars, paid rents, bought groceries, and saved Christmas.
When Emil and I hit Substack, I knew he'd make waves right away. It's his nature. I told him he'd build an editing empire because editors are the future (I'm not explaining why, those are paid services).
I did not know the house would come down on him two months later.
Our community stepped up as they always do, but the sheer magnitude of the expenses his family were facing shook me. Since I'm already a lunatic and very physically ill, it didn't take much to push my desperation and delirium into action despite my better judgment.
I asked Substack to help my favorite people.
You heard.
You answered.
Substack is not Facebook, thank fuck.
That's always been social media and this is a professional site wearing accidental social media as a straight jacket. What works for us there will not work here.
But we've now proven repeatedly that there's a communal foundation already here, ready and waiting for a reason to exist.
We aim to find that purpose.
END.
My ass was saved. It’s not always a fuckin’ smooth ride, but we got moved and we’re getting by. Without the community here, that would NOT have happened. I don’t know if anyone realizes but the fiction community on Substack by itself donated around TEN THOUSAND, I want to spell that out, TEN THOUSAND dollars to my family. It wasn’t the whole nut, we had to pull everything we could as well, but without that immediate intervention, I wouldn’t be sitting at this desk.
There is a core group of people,
created an initiative and an email thread in a hot minute without even telling Zani first. , , , , an email chain with nearly a dozen or more people on it was 70 messages long before I even knew about it. The network effect took hold and even though I paraded my trauma like a bull prancing around the ring with a matador gored on his horns, people kept helping. We call that a test case.Then
loses his job and boom, the thread for helping me is repurposed, shuttered, and revamped in HOURS by Tom with a whole NEW community initiative. This is self organizing mutual support. And this round is doing amazing things, it’s running smoother than the test case I presented as (probably because of my rampant neuroticism) Pablo is giving back, people are giving freely, I have drowned myself in short story edits so cheap you will never see those prices again, get a poem, get a nickname, get a fucking recipe, get good with your community.And I know the previous network is still running because I have venmo. I see the transactions every time I open the app. Gas, groceries, rent help.
If you’ve ever tried to get writers to do anything together in a group larger than TWO, you know how fucking miraculous both of these instances are. But I suspect they aren’t the exception to the rule. As a fast acting self organizing system a network has been built that can mobilize quickly, assess a situation, and offer immediate help and remediation, in concept and in reality. And it’s not just a few people. It catches. People give and you don’t see. People don’t always want recognition. But there you go. This moves the project out of the test phase. This is early operations.
Zani convinced everyone she’d convinced me to start a non-profit after I’d come up with the idea of the Mutual Aid Fund (Mutual Aid Mobilization Fund?) to be the driving force underneath The Rainbow Rat Review. And I immediately undercut the idea because Zani was like, “I’m no use to a non-profit.” Then she told me she’d just spent a lot of time convincing the people on that thread that I was convinced into starting a non-profit (I sorta was actually, runs in the blood) But I want to write. I’m an editor. But if there’s one thing my father has taught me by proxy, it’s that you can do a lot of things at the same time. Run a Bike shop, Run charities, Run a yearly food drive, Be a permanent fixture on the BMX scene until you break your neck. But why this, and why now? Because Mutual aid and community support doesn’t have to be local. And because writers in crisis, like anyone else, deserve dignity, and we don’t have a fucking union, we don’t have a broad coalition (but we COULD) and we are often running solo, looking at our brothers in the fight as competition rather than fellow travelers.
That’s a point of shame we all share at one point or another.
But more than this, it reminded me of Sarah, who always had a dollar, who always had narcan, who always had a spot in her car stuffed with cash for anyone who needed it.
Between us we always said, “when I’m down and you’re up, I know you got me. And when you’re down and I’m up, you know I got you.” Casual Altruism, our self organizing efforts this year so far on Substack, The Rainbow Rat Review, these are just proving that it doesn’t have to be proximity based, and it doesn’t have to scale.
So I’m going to introduce this again.
It is at 720 views. I want it to break 1k. Start sharing again.
A flash fiction letter I wrote in five minutes a few weeks back is sitting at 1,250+, and that’s bullshit.
We are working up a plan in our lair beneath the streets to stay agile, lean, and fast with help, while also eventually (think 2027) expanding into a 501c3 specifically for helping more of the community when they need it.
And if you think this is bullshit or it jades you, if you think it’s silly or you’re getting salty seeing it, I got a question for you.
How you livin’ fam?
What you doin’ for anyone else?
You lookin’ to die the richest motherfucker in the graveyard or something?
Tea Time & Errata
I Been Reading and Doin’
The impossible to imitate
has dropped a new piece of flash
Speaking of which, on the 30th is the last Stream of Consciousness POV Workshop shindig of the summer. Seats are almost full and she may have to call it. But the premise is simple.
You write a bunch of words, 60+ is what I usually aim for, cut them out, put them in a hat or something, and then pull them blind three at a time to give people generative and imaginative 3 word prompts to use in stream of consciousness fiction. You get three words from one person, that’s a prompt. You use those three words. Super simple stuff. And there’s usually time at the end to socialize! Check it out below.
(Admission: Edith is my fiancee and forever until the universe dies partner. I AM biased, but enough writers above my pay grade have called her brilliant that the label stands. You can say you don’t vibe with her style, but you can’t say she’s a bad writer or author. I mean, you can hold that opinion though, but like any or most opinions, it’s wrong.)
interviewed the undeniable about the future and it is worth listening to in full.’s first chapbook, Avarice, arrived on my doorstep, with a personal poem on a perfect postcard from Brixton (it’s like he understands me somehow.)
I broke a toe.
(another criminally underrated author on Substack) finished what is likely the most densely layered and “this isn’t what you think” short serial I’ve yet to see on the platform. I noticed the brilliance of it aside from the vivid imagery and apocalyptic Manifest Destiny vibes while reading, and indeed, they cascade in a particular cadence through the whole of the serial. It’s six entries long, each worth study, but you can start reading right now below. dropped a surprise entry in Charms on the 20th that needs more eyes on it. I worked with her on these, and every single one cuts like a knife. I warned you.
I have an inherent distrust of fantasy. Sorry, I can’t help it. I can edit it, but I can’t stand it not done well. Because of this I’d been avoiding reading
’s work for most of the year, which is criminal since he spearheaded the initiative to help me when my family was about to crash and burn.The good news is this is the best written fantasy I’ve found on the platform. (I said I don’t read it habitually, not that I don’t keep up with it…) If I picked this up at a bookstore, I’d buy it. Tom is one of the most generous members of the fiction community and always first with a plan to help. If you aren’t involved, you don’t even understand the role he plays. He IS the prime mover. He moved before Zani moved, and that’s unheard of. He ONLY has 248 or so subscribers.
What the fuck is wrong with you people? He’s released an entire novel on Substack already. He’s not in Tolkien’s sandbox playing with his own dick, and he’s a better writer than 99.998% of fantasy writers ON SHELVES. I came in fear, and now I’m hooked. Start reading his current in progress, Daughters of Vei, below.
(No, really, fuckin’ do it, and subscribe. The fiction tab doesn’t deserve someone like this in our collective corner when they’re essentially screaming into a void.)
and (Papi Boston to you motherfucker) have moved their experimental lit mag from concept to volume one, and it’s a fuckin’ heater. And it has the best fuckin’ name.
I got hypomanic and released something mid-week from my deep archives. This is like, maybe 20 years old and I was high and on tour when I wrote it, guaranteed. But check it out anyway.
The Broad Shoulders
I found this today, I don’t know how old it is. Maybe 20 years, most likely more.
In
’s Salon he stabbed in the front, but the crit was well taken. For craft advice, this is my article of the week to read that I didn’t produce. (Most often this is Thaddeus actually… Non-coincidence.)
Late there came
. Gone a minute, Noire Notes returned with a fucking banger, and I finally got cultural commentary on King Push. (It was so worth the fuckin’ wait.) ended an epic run of diss tracks with a self referential diss/mea culpa because he drummed up enough interest to get an advance on spec (I kid, I kid.) But seriously, I didn’t want that series to end. And don’t be hard on yourself Millennial Bret Ellis, if you ever decide to step back down with us peasants, there’s always ’s literary rap battles. got me addicted to fountain pens, and I really did break a toe.
Then
gave us the Great British Lull, which was short, pointed, and immaculate.
Charles Bukowski is now officially Charles Bukakke and you will never get me to believe otherwise, and Thaddeus made me cackle with a cartoon.
(accurate too)
I told
I was going to hunt them for sport, repeatedly. came in hot after I once again asserted I’m going in on a run at ’s undefeated streak in Rap Fiction Battles after The ARChitect, Fidel himself threw this on the table for Pablo:
Pablo and
, I wanna see this one.Meanwhile the youngster dropped this on me when I said I was gonna start hitting the speed bag again:
“Just starting?
Been hitting the speed bag and still don’t make a dime. I’m just reheating rhythms for the love of the grind. I got different cadences and rhyming. Let’s take a look at my timing,
Pack you up faster than Apollo, put down the heavy fist of Drago.
Look at who the head lobster takes a pinch at — because I’m ready for whenever —
Name a time and a place because I’m letting off six shots, no question, like this shit a western.”
A friendly riposte was in order:
“I’ve been bodying prompts on a timer since you’ve been making tacky half rhymes talkin’ bout Apollo Creed and Drago, like it’s not got me nodded on that 08 boy. But your cadence is good and timing is strapped, let me pull out my nod, retort and deploy.
but cultural references to the cold war just mean you bouta get clapped. The head lobster hit me up in a comment thread off the rip, and I couldn’t step on the hustle because my family was gettin’ hit. A loss at that point fucks my credibility, and without any buildup, who the fuck cares about ARC stompin ME?
So I politely declined and we kept it kayfabe. But if you’re going to play big dawg and throw around little baby bars and silly rage, don’t talk like you got a Colt Python steppin into a cage.
You bringin a fistfulla dollars to the table? Let’s rewind, this braggadocio and alpha dog shit don’t impress me young one. I’ve been around since Dirty said it better, so here’s an intermission, take some notes and take measure.
“Yo, silence on Smith with six shots, lick shots. Leave ya head like a Shaolin monk with six dots”
Now realize you just walked up to Prometheus with a lighter thinkin you could step to a god twice your age and say look dad I bring you fire.
Whatever tool you got letting off six in my direction. Kid I’ve been dodging bullets since you was two dry pumps from being a fuckin’ yeast infection. Is you here treatenin me with a good time on a Tuesday night? Because I live in ratchet city, Gateway to the west, six shots, a mag drop, or even a full polysymphonic dick tickling gun fight, yo just songs to lay down and get my rest. Six shots and no aim, you’ve not caught a case because you don’t pass that acid test. Here you worry about those one two pops past midnight then dead silence because that’s a body just got dropped, so pour one out because in this city we breed violence.
Yo, my nickname is the peacemaker, I only ever take one shot and make one kill. Don’t fuck around with talkin’ about how you’ll drill me anywhere you crossin’ a line, because son it’s your bed time, I did my FED time, your little woowop shit up there ain’t even a cheap thrill. Fiction rap battles aren’t about you bein’ shrill and playing dress up like we boxin. I don’t fight fair, fuck that I fight to win. it’s about telling stories, and yours already sounds real thin. Now gone step back down to the bush leagues before you comment on my shit again.
That’s bars. The end.”
Great fun all around.
And that’s bars on the Autoclave too, my tea is all drank.
No lie, this is my favorite social media experience I’ve ever had, and I was a college freshman the year they invented Facebook and put it on campuses and all anyone was using it for was hooking up.
It is an honor to be working and writing and reading alongside Emil and Zani and Andrew and Lord Muppet and Papi B and Pablo and all you beautiful knuckleheads. I love the shit out of this group.
If I did beat you but it would take a lot of effort. It would depend on the prompt. There are many prompts you beat me at. The most important thing is our mutual support networks within the competition and the love and camaraderie you are helping build here with the rest of us.