Subscriber News: November 2018
Recent Honors
Congratulations to Howard Faerstein. His poetry collection Googootz and Other Poems was published in September by Press 53. He kindly shares a sample poem here. Award-winning poet Jay Udall says of this book, "Even as Faerstein confronts the worst of our current moment, these poems 'never refuse love’s lure,' never forget 'the great glory' of creation. Googootz is a large-souled book that gives courage to 'go on living.'"
Congratulations to Dean Kostos. His memoir, The Boy Who Listened to Paintings, will be published in 2019 by Spuyten Duyvil Press. Award-winning poet Molly Peacock says this memoir "tells the incredible story of a young middle class gay boy of Greek heritage who catches his beloved, imaginative mother's 'crazy germs.' Ostracized in the wake of her breakdown, this son from a prominent family (his father is the town mayor) spends two years in a mental hospital. All alone, he has to reckon with his gun-toting brother, the fierce prejudices of mental health professionals, the intense bullying in schools, and the drug culture peer pressure in the 'toot,' as he calls the hospital where he manages to survive. All that is thanks to a slow realization that art itself is health." Ploughshares founder DeWitt Henry calls it a "harrowing and redemptive memoir". Kostos will be reading with Charlie Bondhus and Kevin Hinkle on Friday, November 30, at 7:00 pm at the BGSQD Bookstore, 208 W. 13th Street, Room 210, New York City. See the Facebook event for details.
Congratulations to Kaecey McCormick. Her debut poetry chapbook, Pixelated Tears, was published in October by Prolific Press. She kindly shares a sample poem here. Kaecey was recently named the 2018-2020 Poet Laureate for the City of Cupertino, one of the founding cities of Silicon Valley in California. Her poems "How to uncouple, in brief" and "Ferris Wheel on the Santa Monica Pier" will appear in the Fall 2018 issue of Levee Magazine.
Congratulations to Gary Beck. His poetry collection The Remission of Order was published in October by Winter Goose Publishing. From the book blurb: "In this ever-changing world, it becomes more and more difficult to sift through events and recognize what is truly relevant. Poet Gary Beck once again shines a light on the uncomfortable abuses and deceptions that keep us opposing one another, believing people with different opinions are the enemy, while we are all victimized by a common foe." Beatnik Magazine says of this collection, "These poems are great. Knocked me sideways."
Congratulations to Diane Lockward. The Practicing Poet: Writing Beyond the Basics, a book of craft advice that she edited, was published in September by Terrapin Books. The book's craft essays, poems, and top tips lists feature the work of 113 contemporary poets, including Christopher Bakken, Traci Brimhall, Patrick Donnelly, Marge Piercy, Martha Silano, and Maggie Smith.
Congratulations to William Huhn. His essay "Grave Ivy", which was published in Flint Hills Review #22 (2017), was listed as a "Notable Essay" in the Best American Essays 2018 edited by Hilton Als.
Congratulations to Robert Walton. His story "Do You Feel Lucky, Punk?" won third prize in the 2018 Dialogue Contest from the literary journal Bartleby Snopes. This award for dialogue-only stories has a minimum top prize of $300, with prizes increasing if more entries are received (2018 first prize was ultimately $525). The most recent deadline was September 15.
Congratulations to Roberta George. Her novel The Day's Heat won the 2017 Impress Prize for New Writers and will be published this month by Impress Books, a project of Exeter University in Devon, England. The most recent deadline was June 29. She discovered this opportunity at Winning Writers. Roberta is the editor of Snake Nation Press, a well-established literary press with annual poetry and fiction manuscript prizes. Set in the early 1960s in a small south Georgia town, The Day's Heat follows a dark-skinned Catholic Lebanese young woman as she contends with racism and limited opportunities for women's self-actualization.
Recent Publications
Winning Writers contest judge Dennis Norris II's story "Last Rites" was published in the anthology Everyday People: The Color of Life (Simon & Schuster, 2018), edited by Jennifer Baker. Notable contributors to this book include Alexander Chee, Yiyun Li, Nelly Rosario, and Brandon Taylor. Reviewing the collection on the Ploughshares blog, Rajat Singh observed that Norris "created stunning characters" that show how "queerness becomes a means of living outside one's own body."
Winning Writers Editor Jendi Reiter's poems "Of Mice and Women", "October Creed", "50 Years Later, a Poetry Critic Blogs About Fingering His Girlfriend", and "Rubber Poem" were published at Poetry Hotel. Poetry Hotel is a project of Yossarian Universal News Service, a "professional parody news and disinformation service" co-founded in 1980 by poets Paul Fericano and Elio Ligi.
Reggie Marra's fourth book of poems, Killing America: Our United States of Ignorance, Fear, Bigotry, Violence and Greed (From the Heart Press, September 2018) was mailed to each member of the United States Congress, Supreme Court, the President and Vice President on September 4, 2018.
Judith Barrington's Long Love: New & Selected Poems (Salmon Poetry, 2018) was favorably reviewed by Sara Gregory at Lambda Literary: "There is a delicious simplicity to Barrington's political edge. As a collection, Long Love has a quiet pulse on the culture, and is an impressive, expansive read."
Cady Vishniac's story "Girls Girls Girls", first published in Salamander, was chosen by Antonya Nelson for inclusion in New Stories from the Midwest 2018, forthcoming in late 2018.
Jennie MacDonald's short story "Clean Cup" was recently published in Shhhh...Murder!, an anthology of short cozy mysteries centered on libraries, now out from Darkhouse Books. "Clean Cup" is set in a fictional branch of the Denver Public Library called the Mary Chase, after the author of the play "Harvey" (about the six-foot-three-and-a-half-inch-tall invisible rabbit). Mary Chase was a Denverite and received the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 1945 for "Harvey", so the story is a celebration on several levels. Denver's theatre company PHAMALY is currently presenting "Harvey" at the Olin Hotel. Visit MacDonald's website for more information about her writing and photography.
R.T. Castleberry's poem "Among the Missing" was published in September in The Rye Whiskey Review. His poems "Pleasures of the Street", "The Winter Alliance", "Another Style of Blue", "The Lawman Ventures South", and "The Night Canvas" were published in November in Adelaide Magazine.
Mike Tuohy and Susan Zimmerman co-authored a novella, "Negotiating the Narrows", that was published online at The Write Launch. It is based on her experiences working on the Verrazano Narrows Bridge in NYC in the early 1990s. The pair are working on a novel-in-stories that will include this piece and their co-authored story "Capisce?" that was published in 2014 in Scribes Valley Publishing's anthology The Reading Place.
James K. Zimmerman's poem "Listen to the Deer Tick Sing", originally published in American Life in Poetry, has been posted to the website of the Poetry Foundation.
Judy Juanita's book De Facto Feminism: Essays Straight Outta Oakland (EquiDistance Press, 2016) was favorably reviewed at Online Book Club: "The familiarity I found within Juanita's compilation narrative is invaluable to me. I was able to find myself again and again within her stories as a black woman, as a feminist, as a human being."
Published: November 8, 2018
