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At the NewPages Blog readers and writers can catch up with their favorite literary and alternative magazines, independent and university presses, creative writing programs, and writing and literary events. Find new books, new issue announcements, contest winners, and so much more!

Toad’s Museum of Freaks and Wonders

An albino woman, a dwarf named Toad, and two Italian prisoners of war on a rabbit-ridden farm in the nether reaches of Australia: what could be a better premise for a novel? Setting such a bizarre and unique concept at the center of a piece of fiction is a bold strategy, but Goldie Goldbloom’s debut novel, Toad’s Museum of Freaks and Wonders, never falls short of the mark. The winner of the 2008 AWP Award for the novel, it is apparent from the first few pages that you are in the hands of a master; Goldbloom writes with clarity and complexity, balancing abstract questions of identity, love, and value with a tensely developed plot and rich characters. Continue reading “Toad’s Museum of Freaks and Wonders”

Mattaponi Queen

In one of the many aching, tender scenes in Mattaponi Queen, a woman goes to Wal-Mart with her husband, who is dressed in drag. He’s about to have a sex change operation and the public shopping expedition is her way to support and process his decision. Later, she wonders: “How old do you have to be to understand how love works?” Continue reading “Mattaponi Queen”

Further Adventures in the Restless Universe

Dawn Raffel's newest collection of short stories, Further Adventures in the Restless Universe, is an intriguing look at relationships. The spare, unfussy prose explores familial boundaries, the complicated connections between mothers and their children, sisters, aunts and great aunts, husbands and wives. The mundane matters of every day existence – taking a child to a museum or carving a pumpkin, a phone call to catch up, a day spent at the beach, learning to drive – fill up Raffel's prose; each story occupies only a few pages (in some cases only one), but each moment captured by her prose completely fills up the whole space. Continue reading “Further Adventures in the Restless Universe”

Quotidiana

The gift that Patrick Madden gives us in Quotidiana is the gift great essayists have given us for centuries and that is the elegance of a mind at work. The essays Madden offers in this new collection are essays in the most traditional, classical sense. They do not traffic in the far-fetched or the bizarre, competing with reality television to hold our attention with a cacophony of sound, nor do they rely on the story to bear the weight of their subject, rather they investigate the way ordinary experience confounds and delights us, once we stop and pay attention. Continue reading “Quotidiana”

Bharat jiva

kari edwards’s last book, Bharat jiva, was published posthumously. The book represents a leap in style, control and application of language, and scope of address and content over hir earlier works, disobedience, iduna, and a day in the life of p. For example, whereas obedience continually lists and refines those lists, working from inclusion and exhaustion, Bharat jiva has a huge scope, a generous posing of questions against lists. Continue reading “Bharat jiva”

0º,0º

Scientific metaphors are invisible pitfalls for most poets, mainly because the average writer is unable to grasp how wildly ridiculous his or her musings and conjectures are. Reciprocally, poetry put forth by physicists, if sincere, can leave one rather cold. Fortunately, Amit Majmudar easily sidesteps both problems in this wonderful collection by having both a real scientific background and genuine empathy, creating a coherent work with sustained intellectual and emotional focus. Continue reading “0º,0º”

Lost Alphabet

Lisa Olstein's Lost Alphabet is a serious meditation. All 90 pages of poetry have the same short paragraph form with a bracketed title that informs and sometimes subverts the poems. The setting seems post-apocalyptic in a quiet sort of way. There are no Mad Max renegades, but there is an unnamed narrator who moves to the edge of some pre-industrial village of horse traders where people dance to music made with a “dull spoon on the side of a pig.” The narrator is obsessed with the study of moths. The goal of this study is at first unclear, but as the narrator focuses more on the project, more questions arise. Continue reading “Lost Alphabet”

A Little Middle of the Night

Of all of the Iowa Poetry Prize winners I have read, Molly Brodak’s A Little Middle of the Night may be the most stunning, the most complete and beautiful package; every poem in the book is a gem and they all fit together to form a simple and elegant volume that I am pleased to have in my collection. Continue reading “A Little Middle of the Night”

Life of a Star

Life of a Star presents itself as a series of short ramblings of the narrator, who is also the main character. The ramblings could even be called diary entries as they are the thoughts and desires of the narrator. The main character is a woman who imagines herself to be an actress, something that is evident throughout the book. Continue reading “Life of a Star”

Bookstore Destroyed & Bookstore Saved

Destroyed: Cover to Cover Books & Gifts, 202 West Wisconsin Ave., Tomahawk, WI was destroyed by fire last week.

Saved: “The Toronto Women’s Bookstore, which was set to close last Friday [4/16] if a buyer could not be found, will be staying open until the end of May, and perhaps beyond that, if one of two interested buyers comes through with a workable offer.” Quill & Quire

Back to the Future: TKR Adds Letterpress

The Kenyon Review Editor David H. Lynn’s editorial in the newest issue (spring 2010) comments on the “future of literary publishing.” TKR itself went part-digital a while back with KROnline to complement TKR in print, as well as adding a daily blog, online book discussions, and collaborating with JSTOR to complete an electronic archive.

Lynn comments, “It surely would have been easier simply to continue printing this journal four times a year and leave it at that. But I’m convinced that sooner or later, such isolated publications will come to seem anachronisms, curiosities, not vibrant players in the literary community.”

But far from being a full-fledged missive on going digital, Lynn recognizes the continuing place of ink and paper in our lives, its historical relevance, and its place in the lives of future readers and writers, which is why TKR will be launching a small letterpress operation. “Even as we develop literary media for the future, I believe it’s our responsibility to keep the old technologies, teaching our associates where all the current publishing structures originated. Letting them get their hands dirty.”

TKR is planning printing opportunities for their summer program, and looks to add chapbooks and broadsides in the future, “just for the fun of it.”

Scrabble Lets Nouns Play

“The rules of word game Scrabble are being changed for the first time in its history to allow the use of proper nouns, games company Mattel has said. Place names, people’s names and company names or brands will now count.” Hmph. Are they going to start including an apostrophe so McDonald’s can be spelled correctly?

Flyway Redefining Enviromental Writing & Contest Winners

Flyway: A Journal of Writing and Environment Managing Editor Liz Clift writes: “Flyway begins its 16th year, we reflect on the meaning ‘environment’ takes on for different people. Traditionally, environmental writing refers to writing about nature, often as an advocate of the natural world. With this in mind, it’s easy to view the manmade world as less important and thus deny it a place within the environmental literature canon. However, environmental writing now includes urban and other manmade environments as legitimate components of modern human experience. This issue of Flyway explores both human and nonhuman environments, because we shape the environment that shapes us.”

This issue also features winners of their “Home Voices” writing contest: Kathryn Sukalich (1st place), Kimberly L. Rogers and Rachael Button (honorable mentions), and their “Notes from the Field” writing contest: Cassandra Kircher (1st place) and Gabriel Houck (finalist).

Nominate 40 Under 40: the Future of Feminism

From the Feminist Press:

The Feminist Press is 40 years old in 2010 – what better way to honor the past than by celebrating the future! We are searching for 40 fabulous feminist women and men* to honor as the “40 Under 40” to pay attention to in the future.

Help us choose the women and men of talent and commitment who best represent what feminism is all about: gender equality and social justice.

We are looking for people in all fields: the arts, community organizing, social justice, medicine, law, politics, business, philanthropy, etc. Please be sure to include contact information for your nominee(s).

All 40 honorees will be acknowledged at our 40th anniversary gala at the Roosevelt Hotel in NYC on October 18, 2010. And when you send us your nominations, you’ll be entered in a raffle to win a ticket to the gala.

We’ve made history as the world’s oldest continuing feminist publisher. Send us your suggestions for “40 Under 40” and be part of the next 40 years and beyond.

Email your suggestions to Maryann Jacob Macias, Development Manager: mjacob-at-gc.cuny-dot-edu by Friday, May 14.

*Most of our honorees come from the northeast U.S. We wish we could fly people in from further away. Please donate if you can, to help us honor women and men from around the U.S. www.feministpress.org/support-us

Inkwell 2010 Contest Winners

Manhattanville College’s Inkwell Spring 2010 features a number of winners of their 2010 competition:

Poetry Winner: Starkey Flythe
Honorable Mention: Jim Knowles
Notable Finalists: Phillis Levin, Rachel Michaud, Dan Preniszni, Alinda Wasner (Fall 2010)

Fiction Winner: Aram Kim
Honorable Mention: E. B. Moore
Notable Finalists: Joan Corwin (Fall 2010), Starkey Flythe (Fall 2010), Daniel Austin Warren

Elizabeth McCormack Master of Arts in Writing Poetry Winner: Kristina Bicher
Elizabeth McCormack Master of Arts in Writing Fiction Winner: Terry Dugan

How Did You Meet?

Ploughshares, Spring 2010, edited by Elizabeth Strout, opens with her introduction, not just to this issue of the journal, but to Journals. She writes of her first awkward year away at college, where (like so many of us) she believed others to be so much more confident, comfortable, and learned. She slinks into the library and dashes to the first stacks, the periodical section, where she finds familiar magazines: “But I found a whole row of other things. Journals, some thick, others quite thin, lay on a tilting shelf with their faces toward me. Some had colorful covers, some had very simple and unassuming covers. Inside them–the type pressed into the paper, so that even touching them brought a certain thrill–I found story after story, poem after poem. Who knew? I had not known.”

Do you remember discovering literary magazines? It seems most of us do not know them until our college years, and often times by accident. I have made it my “mission” as a teacher to introduce my students to literary magazines, to make the introduction formal, purposeful, and as often as possible. To put a magazine into a young reader’s hands and say, “Read this, I’d like to know what you think of it.” And to be rewarded, time and again, as I was the time I put a copy of Agni into a student’s hands. She returned next class, looking at me wild-eyed, and said, “I never knew writing like this existed.”

And it is to the credit of editors as much as writers that this kind of writing “exists” and can be put into the hands of readers of all ages. New Red Cedar Review Managing Editors Ashley Luster and Emily Wollner comment: “As we embraced our roles as managing editors of Red Cedar Review, the journal that we had grown to love over the past few years, we made it a priority to define the nature of the material with which we were working. What does it mean exactly to be a literary journal? Associated commonly with dusty library tomes and complex pleonastic prose, the ‘L’ word is one that often frightens away people who lie outside of its writing communities and seemingly elite social circles. It seems, though, that the literary merit of a creative piece is not necessarily a consequence of its form or its language, but is something that lies within the way these factors work in tandem to present an idea. In this way, we strove to expand the definition of literary in this issue of RCR to include any spark of creativity that lends itself to ink and paper.”

Knockout LGBTQ Youth Suicide

Knockout is doing its part to fight suicide in the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and questioning youth population. Five percent of the proceeds from sales of the Spring 2010 (3.1) issue will go to The Trevor Project, which operates the only nationwide, around-the-clock crisis and suicide prevention helpline for LGBTQ youth. For more information, visit thetrevorproject.org.

Film :: Brontë Bonnet Dramas Forthcoming

From the TimesOnline: BBC Films, with the American company Focus Features, is first out of the traps. Jane Eyre is five weeks into a nine-week shoot in Derbyshire. Film4’s Wuthering Heights, made with Ecosse Films, the British company behind Nowhere Boy, is scheduled to start filming in Yorkshire next month…Alison Owen, the producer of Jane Eyre (and mother of the singer Lily Allen), said: “There is something about the current situation that the world finds itself in where the Brontës more suit the mood of the moment [than Austen]. Jane Austen is a lighter cut than the Brontës, who are much more brooding and bleak.”

Bellevue Literary Review Prize 2010 Winners

Bellevue Literary Review, Spring 2010, features the 2010 BLR Prize Winners in this, the fifth year of the literary competition. Selected from over 900 submissions by judges Phillip Lopate, Tony Hoagland, and Gail Godwin, the Marcia and Jan Vilcek Prize for Poetry was awarded to Amanda Auchter, the winner of the Carter V. Cooper Memorial Prize for Nonfiction was awarded to Joan Kip (Mark Holden, Honorable Mention), and the winner of the Goldenberg Prize for Fiction was awarded to Larry Hill.

Art :: Kara Walker

Visit The Georgia Review to view silhouette art by Kara Walker, featured both online and in the newest issue (Spring 2010). From the portfolio introduction:

Critics have assigned labels ranging from “provocative” to “exploitative” to Walker’s overall project. At the crux of this controversy is the silhouette itself, which reduces a subject to the least possible amount of information and forces the viewer to rely on stereotypical hints—clothing, hairstyle, exaggerated physical characteristics—leading toward two-dimensional “truths” that make explicit the work’s deep sense of ambiguity. Viewers must become (discomfortingly) reductionist themselves; Walker offers no choice but to understand and then implicitly to accept the stereotypes in order to identify her characters.

Ruminate Short Story Prize Winners

The spring 2010 issue of Ruminate (issue 15) features winners of the 2010 Short Story Prize, as judged by David James Duncan. First prize winner Shann Ray’s story, “The Miracles of Vincent Van Gogh,” and honorable mention Nels Hanson’s story, “Now the River’s In You,” both appear in this issue. “Nothing to Fear,” by Susann Childress received second prize, and publication will be forthcoming.

2009 Los Angeles Times Book Prize Winners Announced

2009 Book Prizes Winners:

•Biography: Linda Gordon, Dorothea Lange: A Life Beyond Limits (W.W. Norton & Co.)

•Current Interest: Dave Eggers, Zeitoun (McSweeney’s Books)

•Fiction: Rafael Yglesias, A Happy Marriage (Scribner)

•Art Seidenbaum Award for First Fiction: Philipp Meyer, American Rust (Spiegel & Grau)

•Graphic Novel: David Mazzucchelli, Asterios Polyp (Pantheon)

•History: Kevin Starr, Golden Dreams: California in an Age of Abundance 1950 – 1963 (Oxford University Press)

•Mystery/Thriller: Stuart Neville, The Ghosts of Belfast (SOHO Press)

•Poetry: Brenda Hillman, Practical Water (Wesleyan University Press)

•Science and Technology: Graham Farmelo, The Strangest Man: The Hidden Life of Paul Dirac, Mystic of the Atom (Basic Books/Perseus Book Group)

•Young Adult Literature: Elizabeth Partridge, Marching for Freedom: Walk Together Children and Don’t You Grow Weary (Viking Children’s Books/Penguin Group)

•Robert Kirsch Award: Evan S. Connell

•Innovator’s Award: Dave Eggers

Passings :: Alan Sillitoe

The Loneliness Of The Long-Distance Runner carried me through many a mile in my life: “Novelist Alan Sillitoe has died at the age of 82, his family said. The Nottingham-born writer, whose novels marked him out as one of the Angry Young Men of British fiction who emerged in the 1950s, died at Charing Cross Hospital in London…”

Glimmer Train New Writers Award

Glimmer Train has just chosen the winning stories for their Short Story Award for New Writers. This competition is held quarterly and is open to all writers whose fiction has not appeared in a print publication with a circulation greater than 5000. The next Short Story Award competition will take place in May. Glimmer Train’s monthly submission calendar may be viewed here.

First place: Selena Anderson [pictured], of New York, NY, wins $1200 for “Here Come the Brides.” Her story will be published in the Summer 2011 issue of Glimmer Train Stories.

Second place: Chase Dearinger, of Edmund, OK, wins $500 for “The Numbskull Piece.”

Third place: Brenna Burns, of New Haven, CT, wins $300 for “River Sans Prière.”

A PDF of the Top 25 winners can be found here.

Deadline soon approaching!

Family Matters: April 30

This competition is held twice a year and is open to all writers for stories about family. Word count should not exceed 12,000. (All shorter lengths welcome.) No theme restrictions. Click here for complete guidelines.

Win a Copy of Annalemma

Annalemma‘s issue six is the magazine’s first themed issue, “Sacrifice,” and features images of a variety of art forms by a variety of artists coupled with each written work featured. Want to free copy? Annalemma will give one away to the winner of their Twitter contest. Followers just need to tweet: “I’d be willing to give up (insert noun here) for the new issue of #Annalemma” The best tweet wins. Deadline: Sunday (4/25) at midnight EST.

The Future of Book Publishing

In case you missed it: Bob Edwards Weekend, April 24-25, 2010, features two interviews of interest to writers and readers, and is part one of a three-part series, so stay tuned!

“Publishing industry visionary Richard Nash, will kick off our series on The Future of Book Publishing. Nash is the former publisher of the independent Soft Skull Press and founder of the new social publishing house Cursor.”

“Peter Brantley is the director of the Bookserver Project at the Internet Archive. As part of our series on the publishing industry, Bob talks with Brantley about the effects of technology on the future of reading, writing, and selling books.”

The program is available for download.

Marina Abramović: The Artist Is Present

Currently at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in Chicago – Marina Abramović: The Artist Is Present – a live exhibition that can be viewed online during museum hours: “Marina Abramović will perform in the Marron Atrium at MoMA throughout the duration of the exhibition, starting before the Museum opens each day and continuing until after closing.”

Is Your Blog Lit-Worthy?

From Stephen Knezovich, Associate Editor / Mentoring Director, Creative Nonfiction:

Recently, the NY Times’ Paper Cuts blog ran an interesting piece about whether or not a blog could rise to the level of literature (http://tiny.cc/thr48). Their answer, ultimately, was no, but the editors at Creative Nonfiction are trying to remove this “less-than” tag many ascribe to the form. For the past three years we’ve been featuring blog posts in our publications, and we are currently seeking narrative blog posts to reprint in our next issue (#39: Summer Reading; forthcoming July 2010).

Though it would be great if you passed word along to New Pages’ readers, what we’d really love are nominations from folks, like yourself and the other NP contributors, who are truly plugged into the online literary community, and we hope that you will send us your suggestions.

What we’re looking for: Vibrant new voices with interesting, true stories to tell. Posts must be able to stand alone, 2000 words or fewer, and posted between November 1, 2009 and March 31, 2010. Deadline for nominations is 12 pm EST, Monday, April 26, 2010.

To nominate a blog post or for more info, go here: http://www.creativenonfiction.org/blog/blog_nomination.html

[Pass it on Bloggers.}

Women Writing on Today’s American Family

Submissions are being sought for an anthology about writing and publishing by women with family publication experience. Possible subjects: markets; using life experience; networking; unique issues women must overcome; formal education; queries and proposals; conference participation; self-publishing; teaching tips. Family in creative nonfiction, poetry, short stories, novels.

Practical, concise, how-to articles with bullets/headings have proven the most helpful to readers. Please avoid writing too much about “me” and concentrate on what will help the reader. No previously published, co-written, or simultaneously submitted material.

Foreword by Supriya Bhatnagar, Director of Publications, Editor of The Writer’s Chronicle, Association of Writers & Writing Programs, George Mason University.

Afterword by Dr. Amy Hudock, co-founder of Literary Mama, an on-line literary magazine chosen by Writers Digest as one of the 101 Best Web Sites for Writers.

Co-Editor Colleen S. Harris is a 2010 Pushcart Prize nominee. Her book of poetry, God in My Throat: The Lilith Poems (Bellowing Ark Press, 2009), was a finalist for the Black Lawrence Book Award; These Terrible Sacraments, is forthcoming in 2011. Colleen has a MFA degree in writing and has appeared in The Louisville Review, Wisconsin Review, River Styx, and Adirondack Review, among others. She’s included in Library Journal; and Contemporary American Women: Our Defining Passages.

Co-Editor Carol Smallwood is a 2009 National Federation of State Poetry Societies award winner included in Who’s Who of American Women who has appeared in Michigan Feminist Studies, The Writer’s Chronicle, The Detroit News. She’s included in Best New Writing in Prose 2009. Her 23rd book is Writing and Publishing: The Librarian’s Handbook (American Library Association, 2010). A chapter of newly published Lily’s Odyssey was short listed for the Eric Hoffer Prose Award.

Please send 3-4 possible topics you would like to contribute each described in a few sentences and a 65-75 word bio using the format like the bio’s above. Please send by May 24, 2010 using FAMILY/your last name on the subject line to [email protected]. You’ll receive a Go-Ahead and guidelines if your topics haven’t been taken. Contributors will be asked to contribute a total of 1900-2100 words. You may contribute one article 1900-2100 words or contribute two articles that combined equal 1900-2100 words. Those included in the anthology will receive a complimentary copy as compensation.

Kore Short Fiction Award Winner

Heather Brittain Bergstrom’s(Yuba City, CA) manuscript, “All Sorts of Hunger,” was chosen out of 250 submissions by readers and final judge Leslie Marmon-Silko as the winner of the Kore Press 2010 Short Fiction Award. Finalists were: “Return,” by Sharon May and “Mr. Smith’s Tip-Top Tale of Woe and Horror,” by Nancy Holyoke.

Job :: Waldorf College

Waldorf College seeks a full-time Assistant Professor of English to teach writing and direct first-year composition. A Ph.D. in composition / rhetoric is preferred, though a terminal degree in a closely-related field will be considered with extensive teaching experience and an evidenced passion for teaching first-year students. Responsibilities include directing the first-year composition sequence and (possibly) the campus writing center, as well as teaching developmental writing and composition. A secondary interest in introduction to literature, global literature, advanced composition, writing center tutor training, English secondary education, or online teaching is preferred. The position carries a 4/4 load, with release time depending on duties. Evidence of superior teaching is essential. Position begins August 2010. Review of applications continues until position is filled.

More information about Waldorf College can be obtained at www.waldorf.edu.

Application by persons in under-represented groups is particularly encouraged.

Send letter of application addressing the qualifications above, a current vita, teaching philosophy, teaching evaluation summaries (if available), three letters of recommendation, and copies of graduate transcripts to Dr. Robert Alsop, VPAA, Waldorf College, 106 S. Sixth Street, Forest City, IA 50436 or via e-mail to [email protected].

VidPoetry

You still have several days left in this celebration of National Poetry Month to enjoy Diesel Bookstores 30 Videos in 30 Days. Just like it says, each day for the month of April they are uploading a video reading. Selections range from Rumi to Roger Creely to William Blake to Molly Bendall. Sometimes you see the readers, sometimes you don’t – but the select non-traditional sceneries make for interesting interpretations of the works. My favorite so far is Anna Kaufman’s delivery of Philip Larkin’s “This Be the Verse.” Nice.

Jobs

Rowan University Instructor/Assistant Professor, Creative Writing, Full-Time Temporary. May 1

The English Department of Bowling Green State University seeks strong applicants for the College of Arts & Sciences Distinguished Visiting Writer. June 14

Teacher & Program Coordinator in Writing for UW-Madison Continuing Studies. Work in a team environment teaching and creating online and in-person workshops. May 7

The Liberal Arts Department at D’Youville College is seeking an Assistant Professor of English beginning August 2010. Linda Moretti, Office of Human Resources. May 1

McNeese State University‘s Department of English and Foreign Languages and the M.F.A. Program in Creative Writing seek an Assistant/Associate Professor of English and Creative Writing, Fiction. Amy Fleury, Department of English and Foreign Languages. April 21

The University of Wisconsin-Marathon County and the University of Wisconsin Colleges English Department invite applications for a position as full-time lecturer. Charlene Schmidt. May 16