Subscriber News: April 2025
Recent Honors
Winning Writers Editor Jendi Reiter received a $5,000 poetry fellowship from the Massachusetts Cultural Council in their 2025 Grants for Creative Individuals funding cycle. In other news, their novel Origin Story is a finalist for the Foreword INDIES Award for LGBTQ Fiction. Winners will be announced in June. Their poem "These Characters and Themes Cannot Exist" was published in Exist Otherwise, Issue #14 (April 2025).
Congratulations to Judith Barrington. Her eighth book, Virginia's Apple: Collected Memoirs, was published in October by Oregon State University Press. This collection explores pivotal moments in Barrington's eight decades of life, including the loss of her parents when she was a teenager and her friendship with fellow lesbian poet Adrienne Rich. Read an interview with her in Sinister Wisdom.
Congratulations to Alice McVeigh. Her Jane Austen retelling, Pride and Perjury, was shortlisted for the adult fiction prize in the UK Selfies Book Awards in March. The novel is also currently a finalist for the Chanticleer International Book Awards' short story volume award, to be announced later in April, and a finalist for the Foreword INDIES. Visit Alice's website to learn more about her award-winning series of Austen-inspired fiction.
Congratulations to Chen Du. Middle-Aged Man's Self-Portrait, a chapbook with a set of poems from Rock Arrangement by Yan An, translated by Chen Du and Xisheng Chen, was accepted for the 2025 Toad Press International Chapbook Series and will be published this summer. The most recent submission period was October 15-December 31. Additional Yan An translations by Chen Du and Xisheng Chen that have recently been published or accepted for publication include: "Territory" and "Empty Train" in Flyway Journal (Fall 2024), a literary magazine from Iowa State University; "Discovery by a Mirror Image Researcher" forthcoming in Poetry Northwest; and "Encounter With an Enigmatic Fish" and "Legendary Red of the Qin Mountains" forthcoming in Notre Dame Review.
Congratulations to Geoffrey Heptonstall. His fifth poetry collection, What We Do Well, was recently published by Cyberwit. Jeff Kalis, poetry editor of Mill Valley Review, says, "You may find something delightfully theatrical and classically elegant about Geoffrey's verse, while also acknowledging his admiration for Lawrence Ferlinghetti and John Berryman."
Congratulations to Christina Pickard. Her poem "ANZAC" was shortlisted for The Letter Review Prize, July-September 2024 contest cycle. This quarterly contest has a prize pool of $1,000 in each genre, shared among 2-4 winners. In other news, Christina's story "Memories buried in the hourglass" was published at Cafe Lit under her pen name, Louisa Prince.
Congratulations to Ellen Sazzman won the 2025 Bill Hickok Award for Humor in Poetry for her poem "A Garden of Remembrance". Allison Joseph made the selection for I-70 Review.
Recent Publications
Tobey Kaplan's poetry collection ritual desire: recent and selected poetry is now available on Amazon. A well-known performer and teacher in the Bay Area for the past 40 years, she was a leading organizer of California Poets in the Schools. She kindly shares a sample poem from her new book here.
Terri Kirby Erickson's poem "The Day I Got Fired from a Copywriting Job Because the Boss Said I was Too Good Looking" was published in March at One Art.
Charles Sartorius's horror story "Shadowed" was published in Metastellar. His song "Circus Politico" won first prize in the Rock/Alt category in the Great American Song Contest.
Duane L. Herrmann's story "The Fire That Escaped a Tree" was published in Masticadores.
Shanna McNair and Scott Wolven will be hosting a pre-launch reading on Saturday, April 26, from 6:00-10:00 pm at KGB Bar, 85 E. 4th Street, New York City, for seven books forthcoming in June from High Frequency Press, their hybrid-publishing imprint. Shanna's debut novel, Soul Retrieval, is among those scheduled for the launch. This book about a woman's journey to resolve intergenerational trauma includes original artworks by the author. Scott's forthcoming book is Hundred Proof (noir stories). Other featured authors will be debut memoirist Timothy Dyke, Backbends (trauma, LGBTQIA+ themes) and debut novelists Alexandra Addams, The Self-Made Saint (literary fiction), Melanie Anagnos, Nightswimming (crime), Julie Price Carpenter, The Last Train Out of Hell (fantasy/humor), and Eileen T. Lynch, Splenditude (literary fiction).
Published: April 4, 2025
