Flung is back! If you are reading this, you may have already noticed the completely redesigned website. Among the design improvements are a better mobile experience, enhanced presentation of photographs, a new logo, and a more streamlined reading experience overall.
But more significant changes will be found in the content priorities of the new Flung. Gone will be traditional travel writing—the kind that relies on lists of recommendations, or roundups of the best, say, romantic hotels in the U.S. Instead, look for a greater emphasis on long-form creative essays, industry news and analysis, and books coverage. What is travel, what should it be, how does is really factor into our lives beyond our Instagram feeds, and how are we writing about it?
At some point in the future, Flung will likely bring back popular features like hotel reviews, flight reviews, and the Bar Diner restaurant reviews—content with which we have occupied a unique space by reporting on travel-related businesses with a truly critical eye. Someday, we feel certain that readers will once again want well-written, unbiased accounts of the places and things on which they are considering spending their money. Flung has always thrived on a healthy dose of skepticism mixed with an eagerness to report on joyful experiences when they genuinely emerge; that will not change. But in the age of Covid, going to hotels and judging them as if this were normal times for them and for us no longer makes sense.
What does make sense is a reconsideration of travel. Long before Covid, travel had grown into an unwieldy, environmentally problematic, non-inclusive industry. To continue writing about it in gushing terms feels not only wrong, but dated.
For writers wondering about pitching guidelines, we are currently looking to commission long-form essays by submission only. For an idea of the kinds of essays we are most eager to publish, see these examples on U.S.-Mexico border towns, Instagram’s influence, a romance-gone-wrong in Bali, and passport photo fails. We will still be commissioning book reviews and other coverage of the literary sphere as it touches on the concept of travel. For all other pitches, please hold off.
Bottom line: Flung is approaching travel as a concept, not as an activity that readers need help engaging in. We continue to emphasize great writing that skews literary. We look forward to engaging with our audience in this context. As always, thanks for reading.
