Subscriber News: March 2015
Recent Honors
Congratulations to Jeff Walt. His poem "In the Bathroom Mirror This Morning" won the 2014 Red Hen Press Poetry Award and will be published in the Los Angeles Review. Over 650 entries were received for this $1,000 prize, whose next deadline will be September 30. Jeff was also a finalist for the 2014 Paumanok Poetry Award. The next deadline for this $1,500 prize from Farmingdale State College will be September 15. Visit his website to read sample poems and order his chapbook Soot (Seven Kitchens Press, 2009).F
Congratulations to Dawn Schout. Her debut poetry collection, Wanderlust, was published in January by WordTech editions. The book is illustrated with her original photographs. She kindly shares a sample poem here. Amorak Huey says of this book: "There is a physicality to these poems, a sensuality revealed through hunger, fear, desire. We wander because we lust—and what we learn in the end is at once unsettling and uplifting." Read more poems on the publisher's website.
Congratulations to Gil Fagiani. His poetry collection Stone Walls was recently published by Bordighera Press. The book focuses on the poet's relationship with his father and growing up in Stamford, Connecticut in the 1950s-60s. He kindly shares a sample poem here. Edvige Giunta, author of Writing with an Accent, says of these poems: "[Fagiani] zeroes in on the odd, the paradoxical, the grotesque, the irrevocably defamiliarized familiar. This evocative collection gives us front-row seats, and we feel the heat of the bodies on this stage of Italian American life captured with documentary precision and bitter tenderness."
Congratulations to Elizabeth Varadan. Her middle-grade novel Imogene and the Case of the Missing Pearls was published by MX Publishing, a London-based press specializing in new fiction about the Sherlock Holmes series characters. Visit her website for more information on her books and reviews of children's and YA literature. Her other blog, Victorian Scribbles, reviews books about 19th and early 20th century characters and settings.
Congratulations to Charlotte Mandel. Her ninth poetry collection, Through a Garden Gate, illustrated with fine art photography by Vincent Covello, was recently published by David Robert Books. Read sample poems here. Covello is known for his expertise in Japanese rock garden design, which he has used to create and photograph his own gardens in Japanese, Chinese, Himalayan, French, and Italian settings. From the publisher's blurb: "The poems and photographs offer sensory experience as seasons change—water falling over rocks, sunrise aglow between standing stones, flash of lightning in a night sky, summer blossoms, winter icicles. This book opens the garden gate—enter."
Recent Publications
Tom Taylor's (a/k/a The Poet Spiel, Thoss W. Taylor) art show "Consider Your Confine" is on display through April 8 at the San Juan Gallery, Pueblo Community College, 900 Orman Avenue, Pueblo, Colorado. The show celebrates the 45th anniversary of this conceptual art collection of 100 pieces created by Taylor. Museum director Blake Milteer says of this exhibit, "Consider Your Confine is...a work of art, an extended poem, and an intensive inquiry into the meaning of who we are and how we're limited (or not) by confines imposed by ourselves, others, and society. This body of work is also now a snapshot of the West Coast art scene of the late 1960s and early 1970s." See sample work and more information on the show's website.
Dianna Mackinnon Henning's poems "The Step Into House" and "House of Umbrellas" were published in the quarterly journal Main Street Rag (Winter 2015). Visit her website to find out more about her poetry and fiction, including her young adult novel Seasoning the Blade.
Charlie Bondhus's poems "Sunday in the Panopticon" and "The Satyr Proffered" were published in Poetry.
Trish Hopkinson has several poetry publications to report. "You'll Feel Unstoppable", a homosyntaxism poem, appeared in The Rain, Party, & Disaster Society, Vol. II, Issue II: January 2015. "Footnote to a Footnote" appeared in the January 2015 issue of Burningword Literary Journal. "How D'ya Like Them Apples?", a found-poem based on the movie script for The Man Who Wasn't There by Joel and Ethan Coen, appeared in JAB. "A Leveling", "Diamond-Shaped Shadows", "Prima Facie", and "In a Room Made of Poetry" appeared in the January 2015 issue of Verse-Virtual. Her poem "Waiting Around" appeared in East Coast Literary Review (Winter 2015). "Whimper" and "Barbershop Protest" were published in Vagabonds: Anthology of the Mad Ones Vol. 4, Issue 1 (Weasel Press, 2015).
E.C. (Gene) Ayres relaunched his blog to announce his forthcoming novel Red Tide, an environmental murder mystery set in Florida.
Tricia McCallum's poetry collection The Music of Leaving (Demeter Press, 2014) was favorably reviewed in Contemporary Verse 2: The Canadian Journal of Poetry and Critical Writing. From the review: "Her writing is simple, observant, and strongly narrative...The Music of Leaving is a fairly quick read, but its influence is sudden and just might just catch you off guard." In other news, her poem "Enough" was featured on the website Every Day Poems.
Billy D. Mitchell's e-book Corky Comic Book Yorkie is available through Amazon.com. It is the latest in his series of picture-book readers for elementary school and homeschooled students in grades 3-5.
Marla Alupoaicei's e-book Shine: 12 Inspiring Ways to Be the Light & Love of Jesus and her poetry collection How the Light Gets In are available at Flourish, the website for her ministry as a Christian public speaker and writer.
Lesléa Newman's essay "Parting Gifts" appeared on the blog Jewesses With Attitude. The author describes taking her terminally ill mother to see her play "A Letter to Harvey Milk" and the transformation of their relationship at the end of her life.
Ruth Hill's poem "An Occasional Poem" will be published in the anthology In Memoriam from Thynks Publications.
Tim Kimbirk, poet and fiction writer, launched his new blog, which will feature writing advice, flash fiction, contests, and reviews.
Published: March 9, 2015
