Short-Story Month 2012: Day 5, The Brewsters by Laura Ellen Scott

Room with a View by Rick Kempel,
Used under CC license

"We always called that rusty metal shack the Brewster house."

In continuing the celebration of National Short Story Month, today's selected story is this linguistic beauty:

"The Brewsters" 

by Laura Ellen Scott, 

from her collection Curio
(2011)

Short-Story Month 2012: Day 4, Diagnostic Drift by Michael Martone

Transparent by Kasia,
used under CC license

Since 1996, April has belonged to the poets.  But it has only been a few years, at least in her memory, that May has been unofficially officially declared National Short Story Month.

So, to celebrate the art of the short story, each day of May a story will be selected and posted at What She Might Think.

Since we're four days in, rather than catch up with four different stories, here's a lyrical short story in four parts:

 "Diagnostic Drift" by Michael Martone  

The End of National Poetry Month, 2012

Hyacinth Happiness by Lachlan Rogers. (CC)

We are at nearly the end of April, which means it's the end of this year's National Poetry Month.  


And, so, a bit of a medley to celebrate poetry month in a single shot, if you haven't already been celebrating. 


One passage like a poem, one poem, one poet, one excerpt.


A passage like a poem:

1) “Once a little boy sent me a charming card with a little drawing on it. I loved it. I answer all my children’s letters — sometimes very hastily — but this one I lingered over. I sent him a card and I drew a picture of a Wild Thing on it. I wrote, “Dear Jim: I loved your card.” Then I got a letter back from his mother and she said, “Jim loved your card so much he ate it.” That to me was one of the highest compliments I’ve ever received. He didn’t care that it was an original Maurice Sendak drawing or anything. He saw it, he loved it, he ate it.”    —Maurice Sendak

A poem:
2) Eating Poetry by Mark Strand 

A poet:

3) Also, if you haven't read the Interview with Laura Read, a poet, then there's this, too.

An excerpt from a poem.

4)

“You gave me hyacinths first a year ago;	35
They called me the hyacinth girl.”
—Yet when we came back, late, from the Hyacinth garden,
Your arms full, and your hair wet, I could not
Speak, and my eyes failed, I was neither
Living nor dead, and I knew nothing,	40
Looking into the heart of light, the silence.                                              (from The Wasteland by our man T.S. Eliot)

How the Sun Burns: Forthcoming in The Minnesota Review

Rock Quarry
by paparutzi (CC)

 The minnesota review has just accepted her story "How the Sun Burns Among Hills of Rock and Pebble", which will be a story in her next book Midwest in Memoriam. 

The story is slated for Spring 2013 publication.

Cheers!

To Shift & Grit: New Review of The Floating Order

"It’s Pringle’s ability to get inside the mind of a child and see the adult world from their perspective that is the real strength of this collection. Another is the shifting nature of reality from this perspective."

Faye Through Glass
by Aislinn Ritchie (cc)

~writes John Kenny, in a new review of The Floating Order. Kenny is a writer, and co-editor of Dublin's Albedo One and Aeon Press. Please find the full review at his website.

One Bull-Running Over: 2012 Pulitzer-Prize Winners Announced

Pulitzer Prize Medal

All those running in fiction were trampled, no one survived.

The announcements might get a bit more press this year since, of the list of winners, the winning work of fiction is a blank space--the committee decided that none of the finalist-books in the fiction section merited the Pulitzer.  Finalists, but not fine enough, evidently for more than that.

According to the administrator of the prizes (via the L.A. Times), This isn't the first, but eleventh, time to happen in the fiction side of the Pulitzers.

No doubt this decision will raise a flurry of discussion in the fiction world--among writers, editors, publishers, and readers.  For, while we've gotten the memo that there was no prize, now it's time to decide, or consider, what the memo means in terms of what the committee is suggesting about quality.

Picasso and the Bull Out of Light, in Life

And, perhaps, another sort of discussion will occur from this in regards to the $50 "handling" fee that must accompany each work (and four copies of each book) submitted into the running for the Pulitzers.  A $50 fee that is hardly a scratch on the bucket for the large presses, but the weight of a brick in the bucket for small presses.

For a list of all the winners, visit the Pulitzer website.

***

The next running of the writers is for The National Book Award. Deadline for submission is June 15, 2012 (postmark date).  Works published between December 1, 2011 and November 30, 2012 are eligible . . . but with eligibility also must come a publisher who can afford these conditions (among others) of the prize:

All publishers submitting books for the National Book Award must agree to:

• Contribute $1,000 toward a promotional campaign if a submitted book becomes a Finalist.
• Inform authors of submitted books that, if selected as Finalists, they must be present at the National Book Awards Ceremony and at related events in New York City.
• Cover all travel and accommodation costs for Finalists and provide them with seats at the Awards Ceremony.
• Purchase from the National Book Foundation, when appropriate, medallions to be affixed to the covers of Finalist and Winning books. [bold, mine] The Foundation will also license the medallion image artwork for reproduction on the covers of Finalist and Winning books.
• Inform authors that, if selected as Finalists, they must agree to participate in the Foundation's website-related publicity.

Emrys Issue 2012 Now Available

Her short "Skydivers" is in the new issue of Emrys Journal (Volume 29), which is now available for purchase. 


Emrys Journal is a part of a large-scale arts group out of South Carolina that supports writers and artists through scholarships, activities, lectures, and much more.


Cheers!

Literarily Speaking: GetLit! in Spokane, 2012

A strange phenomenon is currently happening in Spokane. The readers have crept out from their reading chairs, the writers out of the coffee shops and studies, and the libraries are empty for a different reason.  Even the airport is taking part, in its way, bringing us a Poet Laureate, Ted Kooser, and Lois Lowry, award-winning writer of children's literature.

A festival is upon us, friends!  It's time for the Spokane, WA annual event: GetLit!

All week Spokane is celebrating the word--spoken and on the page. Today, for example, there are poetry slam competitions happening, from grade-school-age to college-age.  On Saturday, workshops and panels all day, and then, a play that night.  On Sunday, Kooser will read and be interviewed by the poet Christopher Howell.  And, of course, much, much more!

From the 10th to the 15th, writers and readers will mingle among words and, sometimes, wine.  From one side of town to another, it's true: Spokane believes in writing.

*

For the calendar of events, please visit the GetLit! website.

**
Update: She read as part of the Inland Northwest Faculty Reading at Barrister Winery, and was quite glad to be a part of listening and sharing work in such a lovely space.

Butterfly Fears Heights

Photographers Kirby and Cindy Pringle have finished their third Happy Tails children's book, The Butterfly That Would Not Fly.  Main characters, Earl and Pearl, discover an acrophobic butterfly and attempt to help the butterfly migrate to Mexico.

To pre-order a copy of The Butterfly That Would Not Fly, go to the book's page on kickstarter.com.

Kickstarter is a website where artists post either project ideas or completed projects in order to  find funding.  Sometimes, the artist(s) asks for a partial amount necessary to fund the project, outside of other funding that they already have; or the artist(s) asks for full funding.  

The Pringles are offering pre-order of The Butterfly That Would Not Fly through Kickstarter in order to help defray the printing costs for the 32-page, full-color book. Readers may contribute any amount to the project; with a $20 donation comes an autographed, and paw-o-graphed, copy of the book.

From the photographers: "We're very excited about the new book. We also hope to inspire people to grow flowers and milkweed to help the butterflies."

For more information about the Pringles, outside of their Kickstarter page, please see their website, Dogtown Artworks.

Story Forthcoming in Glint: The Midwife

Barber Pole
by Sally M,
Used under CC
license

Her story "The Midwife"
will be is published in the
May June 2012 issue of Glint.  

"The Midwife" will be
in her next book
Midwest in Memoriam.

Story Summary:
Susan has inherited
the barber shop
business that has
been passed down
through her family
for several generations.

She has also inherited
the delivery end of the
business.