Wednesday, March 31, 2010

headed to AWP – two events to share

This will be my last (planned) blog post until I return from my AWP road trip. With planned stops in Illinois, Nebraska, Kansas, Missouri, and Indiana, I have somehow made the few days of conference time into a lengthy journey—and I can’t wait. While I anticipate blogging, tweeting, and adding Facebook updates while on the road, I won’t be posting my regularly scheduled Mon-Weds-Fri routine until my return.

If you are going to AWP, please let me know if you’d like to meet up at some point.

Also, I have two events to share and hope you’ll plan on visiting:


Poetry West / Colorado College
On Wednesday, April 7, I am a Poetry West guest speaker at Colorado College, in Colorado Springs. While the manuscript consultations scheduled earlier in the afternoon are filled up with pre-registrations, I’ll be doing a book signing, reading, and general meet & greet that’s free and open to the public:

Weds April 7
7:30-8:30pm
The Worner Center
Colorado College, Room 213
902 N. Cascade Avenue
Colorado Springs CO

For information, contact me at lori@loriamay.com

For more info about Poetry West, visit http://www.poetrywest.org/

*****

AWP Book Fair


I will be signing copies of stains: early poems at the Marick Press book fair table during AWP 2010. The official signing takes place on Thursday, April 8, from 10:30-11:30am, but I also plan on being available Saturday morning for the public book fair.

Pre-signed copies of stains will be available all week at the Marick Press table, but do drop by during my scheduled ‘appearance’ for in-person signings, questions, and writerly conversation.

Thurs April 8
10:30am-11:30am
AWP Book Fair
Colorado Convention Center

Questions? Email me at lori@loriamay.com
*****

See you in Denver!

spring issue of PoetsQuarterly.com online!


I’m pleased to announce Issue 3 Volume 1 of Poets’ Quarterly is now online: http://www.poetsquarterly.com/.

This issue celebrates National Poetry Month and includes reviews of several new works from poets including Phoebe Tsang, Sarah J. Sloat, Mark McMorris, and a special review of Lucille Clifton’s, Voices. Also in this issue are interviews with January O'Neil, Robert Fanning, and 2010 Donald Justice Prize winner Ned Balbo. In a special two-part feature, Kate Durbin is interviewed by Jill Crammond Wickham (with Part II to follow in the next issue).

Poets' Quarterly is published online during the Fall, Winter, Spring, and Summer of each year. PQ welcomes contact from authors and publishers. We are also seeking additional writers to contribute reviews and conduct interviews. Please review the Submission Guidelines for more details.

Monday, March 29, 2010

two contest deadlines approaching

Spring is flying by so fast, be sure to make a note of the submission deadline dates if you plan on sending your work out for these two fantastic opportunities:

*****

Stephen F. Austin State University Press Fiction & Poetry Prizes
Submission Deadline: March 31, 2010
One winner and up to three finalists in each category will be published in 2011.

Stephen F. Austin State University Press invites submissions of manuscripts each year for its fiction and poetry series. We are committed to publishing diverse kinds of fiction and poetry by a diversity of writers. The only criterion is excellence.

Submission Requirements:
1. The series is open to all book-length manuscripts by a single author of at least 150 pages of fiction or 60 pages of poetry. Stories or poems previously published in periodicals or anthologies are eligible for inclusion.
2. The editor requests that faculty, staff, and current or former students refrain from submitting to the series.
3. Submissions will be accepted from January 1 through March 31, 2010. Please do not send revisions once you have sent a manuscript. Up to four manuscripts will be chosen in each category by July 31, 2010, one of which (in each category) will win the $1000 prize.

Visit the Stephen F. Austin State University Press website for complete guidelines.
http://sfapress.sfasu.edu

*****

2010 Hudson Prize – Black Lawrence Press
Submission Deadline: March 31, 2010

Black Lawrence Press is now accepting submissions for the 2010 Hudson Prize, an annual award that is given for an unpublished collection of short stories or poems. The winner of this contest will receive book publication, a $1,000 cash award, and ten copies of the book. Prizes are awarded on publication.

The entry fee for the prize is $25 and the deadline is March 31, 2010.

Visit the Black Lawrence Press website for complete guidelines.
www.blacklawrencepress.com

*****

Good luck!

Friday, March 26, 2010

AWP 2011, CircleShow, NPM giveaways

A few things to share today….

Planning for AWP 2011

I’d like to organize a low-residency MFA discussion panel for the 2011 AWP Conference in Washington DC. The deadline for proposals is May 15, 2010. If you are an administrator in a low-res writing program and are interested in participating in a panel discussion, please email me at lori@loriamay.com asap to discuss your interests.

From the AWP website, the description of any incoming Program Development sessions should reflect the following: “The presentations focus on the elements of good program administration: admissions, state and regional accreditation requirements, curriculum development, recruitment of faculty, fundraising, alumni development, marketing, and strategic planning.”

Again, if you’re interested in participating on a low-res discussion panel, send me an email at lori@loriamay.com.

CircleShow Volume 3

Earlier this week, I was delighted to receive my contributor copy of CircleShow, Volume 3! What a lovely collection of poetry from 19 poets including William L. Alton, Tobi Cogswell, Heather Ann Schmidt, William Doreski, and Bruce Lader. It’s an honor to be included amongst such talented voices. Please visit the Seven CirclePress website and order a copy: http://www.sevencirclepress.com/apps/webstore/

National Poetry Month Giveaways!

The lovely Kelli Russell Agodon initiated this fantastic and infectious plan of action. In celebration of National Poetry Month – April is just around the corner, after all – a number of poets are offering up a few freebie giveaways on their respective blogs. You can read all about the initiative and see the list of participating poets here:
http://ofkells.blogspot.com/2010/03/poetry-book-giveaway-for-national.html

Phew… so much to share! Have a great weekend, all.

Wednesday, March 24, 2010

National Poetry Month launch event: MI


I’m pleased to share the details of a National Poetry Month launch event. On Thursday, April 1st, Literary Life Bookstore & More in Grand Rapids MI is launching National Poetry Month with a reading by Linda Leedy Schneider and myself.

Linda Leedy Schneider is a poetry and writing mentor, psychotherapist in private practice, and recipient of a Pushcart nomination. She has taught at Aquinas College and Kendall College of Art and Design. Her poetry has been published in over 200 literary magazines including Rattle Magazine, The Spoon River Poetry Review, The Pedestal Magazine, Perigee, and The Ambassador Poetry Project. She has written five collections of poetry including Through My Window: Poetry of a Psychotherapist and edited two collections of poetry by writers she has mentored. Mentor’s Bouquet was just released this March by Finishing Line Press.

Lori A. May is a part-time writing instructor and a frequent guest lecturer and workshop presenter at writers' conferences and graduate writing programs. Her creative works have appeared in publications such as The Writer, Two Review, Tipton Poetry Journal, and anthologies such as Van Gogh's Ear. She is the author of two novels and a poetry collection, stains: early poems. May is Associate Editor for Northern Poetry Review and Founding Editor of Poets’ Quarterly. More information is available online at www.loriamay.com.

Please join us for the launch of National Poetry Month:

Readings by Linda Leedy Schneider & Lori A. May
Thursday, April 1st – 7pm
Free, open to the public
Literary Life Bookstore & More, Inc.
758 Wealthy Street SE


For more information about National Poetry Month, click here.

Monday, March 22, 2010

free access to WriterMag.com!

Until Friday, March 26, all visitors to WriterMag.com receive free access to all the web content on The Writer’s newly redesigned website. This extended content is normally accessible only by magazine subscribers, so be sure to take advantage of this great opportunity while you can.

WriterMag.com includes more than 3,000 searchable market listings for your work; links to hundreds of literary publications; complete articles from The Writer magazine archive; exclusive online-only articles about craft and freelancing; and a whole lot more.

Use this link to access the WriterMag.com content for free – until Friday, that is!

P.S. I’ve just updated my own website with a bunch of news, upcoming events, and links: http://www.loriamay.com/.

Friday, March 19, 2010

Reading Today: Poetic Travelers

Now that spring is making an entrance, the monthly Poetic Travelers series is starting back up!

Poetic Travelers meets every 3rd Friday at Lawrence Street Gallery, 22620 Woodward Avenue, Suite A, Ferndale, MI. Poetic Travelers is co-hosted by poet Tonja Dudley Bagwell and Ron “Cat Listening” Lavigna.

Today’s reading features Kristine Uyeda and Tina O'Brien. The event takes place from 6:30pm – 8:45pm. The event includes an Open Mic and is free to all.

Wednesday, March 17, 2010

Q&A with author Gabrielle Burton

Gabrielle Burton has quite a story to tell. So, I'm going to let her tell it...

Hi, Gabrielle! What can you tell us about your new novel, Impatient With Desire?
It's known from history that Tamsen Donner, the pioneer heroine of the ill-fated Donner Party of 1846, kept a journal but it was never found. Impatient with Desire is her lost journal as I imagined it, particularly during the more than four months she was trapped in the Sierra Nevada mountains with her dying husband and five starving daughters.

At the heart of it, what’s this story really about?
Several things: (It has a big heart.)
--Endurance. Why and how do some survive terrible adversity and others just lie down and die? I've always been deeply interested in survivors: Terry Anderson, Brian Keenan, Jacobo Timerman, refugees--how people maintain hope in wretched circumstances. I was a crisis counselor in a Vietnamese boat people's camp in Malaysia, and am presently making PSAs about human trafficking in the U.S. with my daughters' film production company (Five Sisters Productions).
--It's also about the struggle between a woman's being adventurous and her responsibility to her family. I think most modern wives and mothers throw in the towel on the adventure part, never even considering it, but face the same struggle between work and love.
--And ultimately, it's about hope and love.

You’ve been reading about Tamsen Donner for over thirty years. Why are you so drawn to this woman and her story?
I never thought once about that until a reader at U of Nebraska Press asked: What drew you to such a disturbing remote character? I was taken aback: Disturbing? Remote? News to me. Considering the question, I had to dig deep, and I came up with a lot of answers.
--In the early days in the women's movement, we were all searching for heroines--for ourselves and for our daughters--and Tamsen Donner was a remarkable woman. Born in 1801, she taught school, spoke French, wrote poetry, botanized, and was eager for adventure, traveling alone at a time when women didn't travel alone. She endured personal tragedy--losing her first family in a 3-month period--and tragedy on a grand scale, really symbolizing the price paid for our being able to sit out here in CA.
--She had five daughters as I did and, although 2 of hers were stepdaughters, that parallel carried me quite a while.
--My Catholic upbringing had made me comfortable with gruesome martyr stories, so the cannibalism and gore that typically predominate in stories about the Donner Party neither repelled nor intrigued me deeply.
-- I've always been interested in survival stories, wondering how I would fare in a similar situation.
--In those early days, I felt that we--my "sisters," my family, and I--were also pioneers, searching for new ways to work and love.
--And maybe this most of all: The common representation of Tamsen as a "heroine" because she stayed with her husband until death did they part at the cost of her own life, rankled me and scared me because I was afraid that an authentic part of me, my writing, might be sacrificed to marriage and motherhood.
In the beginning, because so little was known about Tamsen, I think she was a blank page I was trying to write my story on. As my personal story got more fleshed in, my goal evolved to find the real woman behind the myth and honor her, and honor all pioneer women whose stories we too rarely hear.

Why thirty years? Can you tell us about your process and journey as a writer, and how it came to be that you finally came around to telling her story?
Well, I didn't work on her story consistently for thirty years--a lot of other writing and life intervened.
--I published a non fiction book in 1972, I'm Running Away From Home But I'm Not Allowed To Cross The Street, subtitled A Primer on the Women's Movement--the story of a traditional housewife and mother joining the Women's Movement for my five daughters and finding out it had come in time for me.
--I was writing a lot of poetry then, but I started writing a short story that turned into a novel--about a modern woman, but having a small fraction of Tamsen and her lost journal woven into it. I worked on that novel seven years, finally deciding that the raised and dashed hopes connected with it were taking too large a toll on me and my family, and I put it away. By the end of this period--we're up to '79--my sensibility, my eye, my whole take on things, had completely changed from poetry to fiction.
--My next novel, Heartbreak Hotel, took another seven years and twenty-eight rejections before being published by Charles Scribner's in 1986.
--In 1987-88, I was living in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, and in between taking wonderfully exotic trips, I transcribed all my tapes from my family's retracing the CA/Oregon Trail ten years before, and wrote a non-fiction book. My editor wanted more personal revelations than I was willing to write, so I put that away.
--In the mid 90's, I was in film school in L.A. and, after my family badgered me to attend the Donner Party Sesquicentennial, I wrote a screenplay about the Donner Party. Now there are 87 characters in the D.P., and countless drafts and some years later, I realized that I didn't want to write about the Donner Party, but about Tamsen Donner, and not in a historical way, but to be true to her spirit. Easier said than done. I kept at it, and also wrote other screenplays, articles and reviews.
--In 2002, my daughters' film production company, Five Sisters Productions, made my screenplay, Manna From Heaven, and I was heavily involved in the filming and editing. Our family traveled with it for nearly a year from Branson, MO to Juneau, AK.
--In 2006, feeling the pressure of age and time, I got out that non fiction draft of our Donner Trail trip, and was horrified to see that my editor had given me notes in 1988! Like an Irish warrior, I bled a while, then rose to fight again. Oh, that's just Irish bravado; in fact I was sick that so much time had passed and I felt sorry for myself and quite despairing. Then I talked sternly to myself and made a plan, working like crazy with a laser focus on rewriting that book. After 19 rave rejections by agents--"love it, but who's the niche?"--the part history/part memoir, Searching for Tamsen Donner, was published by U. of Nebraska Press in 2009. While that had been going through the rigorous screening process of a university press--outside readers, committees, boards, a rewrite--I wrote the novel, Impatient with Desire, which Hyperion bought (March, 2010).
So ultimately, my writing about Tamsen Donner went through as many metamorphoses as I did and, of course, they all informed the book. Probably a half dozen women wrote those two books, and I'm glad I'm alive to see them come to fruition.

Success after sixty! Tell us about where you are now and what your writing plans are for the future.
Now I'm crazy busy with marketing Impatient with Desire. So much is in the author's ballpark now, and of course with the internet and blogs it's an entirely different world. An exciting world, and one we've barely begun to tap.

How has your family played a role in your writing journey?
They have supported me and sustained me and continue to do so in every possible way. In a real way, the publishing of these two books about Tamsen Donner are a family triumph as well as a personal one. Tamsen Donner was practically a member of our family. Even our dog was named Tamsen.

Where can readers learn more about you and your work?


*****
Thanks for stopping in for the weekly Q&A!

Monday, March 15, 2010

random things

Just a few bits of random literary news to share, because sharing is fun:

The Spring 2010 issue of Rain Taxi is available this week, available for purchase here. www.raintaxi.com. Read all kinds of fancy stuff by Megan Staffel and Alfredo de Palchi, and reviews of books by Lydia Davis, Eddie Campbell, Valerie Martin, Georges Perec, Christine Hume, Sherry Wolf, Norman Finkelstein, and many more. Visit www.raintaxi.com.

The Collagist has a new submission manager: thecollagist.submishmash.com
This fantastic zine is published once a month, and includes fiction, non-fiction, and poetry, as well as book reviews, novel excerpts, etc.

If you're in the Concord NH area, stop by Patricia Fargnoli’s reading with Tim Mayo. It’s at Gibson's Bookstore 7 pm Wednesday / St. Patricks Day. An open reading follows. You can find Patricia on Facebook here.

This week’s author Q&A is with Gabrielle Burton. Stop by the blog on Wednesday for the interview.

Have a great Monday….

Friday, March 12, 2010

flash non-fiction at The Smoking Poet

I’m pleased to share this link to The Smoking Poet, where you can read my newly published super short piece, “Salt & Vinegar.”

While visiting this amazing journal, please be sure to read selections from other contributors such as Cameron Conaway, Elyse Draper, and Kim Teeple.

Enjoy the read and have a great weekend!

Wednesday, March 10, 2010

Q&A with poet Bella Mahaya Carter

Today we’re welcoming Bella Mahaya Carter, author of a new poetry collection, Secrets of My Sex.

Hi, Bella! What can you tell us about Secrets of My Sex?
Hi Lori. Thanks for hosting.
Secrets of My Sex is a collection of 71 poems written in simple, straightforward language. The narrative style appeals to a broad range of readers, from those who have never read (or liked) poetry before, to the most ardent lovers of the form. Each poem stands alone, but is linked to the whole. The collection reads like a memoir or novel, creating a portrait of my intimate experiences as a girl, woman, wife and mother. When I was writing it, I imagined that this book would appeal mostly to women, but I've received a tremendous response from men as well. They seem hungry for candor where women's sexual experience is concerned. Many people--both men and women-- have said this book liberates them, and helps them accept themselves (and their sexuality) more fully. I received an email recently from Peter Levitt, a wonderful poet, who had this to say about the poems: “There is a human tenderness in them, a way of seeing/experiencing the world, that loves it, and proposes that love as a way to heal what has been hurt.” In the end, it's all about healing, acceptance, growth--and of course, love.

Tell us about your revised definition of ‘good’ and how this is expressed in your work.
I have redefined the word "good" to mean that which is truthful and authentic; that which inspires growth and heals. This is what I tell people who ask if what I'm writing is pornographic: my intention is not to arouse, but to understand, release shame and evolve as a divine being having a human experience. I hope the poems in this book are distinct and powerful, that they convey aspects of the feminine as well as the masculine. And I hope readers recognize themselves in these pages, that the work illuminates moments, conversations or events in readers' lives that may have been relegated to dark corners. I try to be bold and intimate, honest and loving as I celebrate the remarkable journey that is our lives. What is "good" is saying "Yes" to myself and my creative process--and the need to say "Yes" to one's self is like the need to bathe--it has to be done on a regular basis. I hope that my doing this inspires others to do the same.

What was your goal with dividing the book into four sections? How do they signal a shift in themes or, perhaps, the development of the feminine?
The sections created a way for me to organzine the material. Every poem I wrote fell into one of these four categories: Girl, Woman, Wife, or Mother. They represent a natural progression of life experience, and each section builds on the previous one.

On your website, you have a quote from Anais Nin. What other authors do you admire?
My favorite poets include Sharon Olds, Molly Peacock, Billy Collins, Charles Bukowski, William Blake, Anne Sexton, Pablo Neruda, and Sufi poets, Hafiz and Rumi. I also love prose written by Isabel Allende, Barbara Kingsolver, Dorothy Allison, James Baldwin, Alice Walker, Margaret Atwood, Gabriel Garcia Marquez and many others.

You also write fiction and non-fiction. How do you balance all of your writing interests?
I don't balance them--they balance me! I find it helpful working on several projects simultaneously. If I'm stuck on one I go to another. The important thing is to keep writing. Sometimes I need time and space away from a piece in order to gain perspective and clarity. My poems are narrative, so fiction and creative nonfiction don't seem like much of a stretch--it just depends on how much territory I want to cover. A poem can be about something miniscule; an image or a moment. It can even tell a story, but its scope tends to be small. When I have something larger (or longer) to express, it usually takes the form of fiction or creative nonfiction. When I was growing up as a dancer, my teacher encouraged her students to study various techniques: ballet, modern, jazz, flamenco. She used to say, "a dancer is a dancer is a dancer," which meant that properly trained dancers should be able to perform many techniques, because each one is a tool that enables greater artistic expression. Those were the days when Mikhail Baryshnikov blew everybody away dancing Twyla's Tharp's "Push Comes To Shove." It's the same with writing; each genre offers the writer a different tool and expands possibilities for creative expression.

You studied dance at Juilliard. How does your education in performance play a role in your writing?
Well, it definitely helps when I give readings, which is part of what I do as a writer. I'm comfortable and at home on stage or at the podium. Readings are performances on one level, but also I've had to learn how NOT to perform--how to be centered and grounded in my heart and in the truth of my words--and let them speak for themselves.

Where can readers learn more about you and your work?
My website has writing, photos, video, interviews and more: www.secretsofmysex.com. Please stop by for a visit. Books are available on my website, through Bombshelter Press and also on Amazon.

Thanks, Bella!
Thank you, Lori.
*****
Thanks for stopping by for today's Q&A!

Monday, March 8, 2010

Spring Issue – Ambassador Poetry Project

I’m pleased to share the link to Issue 3 Volume 1 of The Ambassador Poetry Project. This online journal features poetry from and about Ontario and Michigan and Issue 3 has more than 20 poetic voices to enjoy. Contributors from ON and MI, as well as VT, OH, and IL, have made an incredible contribution to the spring issue. Please do visit the website http://www.ambassadorpoetry.com/ and share the link with friends.

Friday, March 5, 2010

backlogged

I really did mean to post something for Friday--other than this fly-by comment--but I've been caught up in a few deadlines and have to excuse myself from the blog until Monday. Here's to a relaxing weekend!

Wednesday, March 3, 2010

Q&A with author Kristin Bair O’Keeffe



Please welcome Kristin Bair O’Keeffe for today’s author Q&A! Kristin’s debut novel Thirsty (Swallow Press, 2009) tells the story of one woman’s unusual journey through an abusive marriage, set against the backdrop of a Pittsburgh steel community at the turn of the twentieth century. Her work has been published in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Poets & Writers Magazine, San Diego Family Magazine, The Baltimore Review, The Gettysburg Review, and many other publications. She has an MFA in Creative Writing from Columbia College Chicago and has been teaching writing for almost fifteen years. Kristin lives in Shanghai, China, with her husband and daughter.

Welcome, Kristin! At its heart, what is this story really about?
You know, when I give the “elevator pitch” for Thirsty, I say, “It’s the story of one woman’s unusual journey through an abusive marriage, set against the backdrop of a Pittsburgh steel community at the turn of the twentieth century.” But at the heart of it, Thirsty is an intense family saga that explores how being the victim of domestic violence is passed down in families from mother to daughter and how f’ing hard it is to break that cycle.

Is it true that a poem you wrote in 1987 was the inspiration for Thirsty? Tell us a little about this.
Before I wrote fiction, I wrote poetry. In fact, I was rather obsessed by it. (Spent a good part of my adolescence reading Sara Teasdale’s work—angst, heartbreak, kissing, romance, etc.—perfect stuff for a preteen girl hitting puberty.) In 1987 as an undergraduate at Indiana University in Bloomington, Indiana, I wrote and published “Crumbling Steeples,” a poem about how the crash of Pittsburgh’s steel industry affected its steel communities (and in particular, my grandfather). After I wrote it, I thought I was done writing about Pittsburgh and steel. But around the same time, this woman started floating around in my head (the woman who eventually became Klara). I didn’t see her clearly for a number of years, but she was always there, giving me small glimpses of her life and her struggles.

When I started graduate school in 1992, I took a creative nonfiction workshop in which one of our first assignments was to choose a topic to research. Still driven by my experiences as a kid in my grandparents’ steel community—Clairton, Pennsylvania—I chose the steel industry in Pittsburgh. That’s when Klara and the setting of Thirsty began to take shape.

You grew up in Pennsylvania and now live in Shanghai. How does travel and culture influence your work?
As a writer, I’m deeply inspired by place. Certain towns, geographic nooks and crannies, countries…places where as soon as I step a single toe for the very first time, I feel something. A kind of magical, mystical roaring in my soul. A roaring so insistent that once it starts, the only way for me to quiet it is to write about the place that triggered it.

Pittsburgh, the setting of Thirsty, was the first place to inspire me. I grew up there, in the shadows of the mills along the Monongahela River, and from an early age I was hooked.

After that it was a 588,000-acre ranch in New Mexico.

And now, China.

Something good happens on the page for me when I’m nudged (pushed/shoved) out of my comfort zone, plunked down into a culture about which I know little or nothing, and get to discover a place that encourages (forces) me to reexamine who I am and how I define myself in the world.

You also write non-fiction and are quite the freelancer. How do you balance your various writing interests?
There’s an optimistic assumption in your question that I do a good job of balancing my writing interests (thanks for that). Some days, that’s true. Other days, I’ve got less balance than an egg trying to stand up on one end.

To have more good days than off-balance egg days, I try to work on my fiction (at present, my second novel) early, early in the morning before my daughter wakes up. I’m a much happier (or as my husband puts it, much less grumpy) person if I can squeeze an hour or two of writing in before the sun rises. There’s nothing better than waking up, rolling out of bed, and working while in the creative state of mind I call “Writerhead.” That’s when I do my strongest work.

During the afternoons when I have childcare help, I work on essays and articles. One of my balancing strategies is to write nonfiction only about the things I’m passionate about: place, travel, nature, weird stuff in China, mamahood, writing, and a few other bits and pieces. If someone asks me to write a piece about, say, child-friendly restaurants in Shanghai, I shake my head and say, “Oh, no, no, no. I’m not the writer for you.”

What can you tell us about your experiences with writing workshops?
As an undergrad at Indiana University (Bloomington) and a grad student at Columbia College in Chicago, I spent a lot of time in writing workshops. Some terrific; some god-awful. I’ve also been teaching writing workshops at the college level for the past fifteen years. Overall, I’m a big believer in the benefits of being in a workshop with a good teacher. A strong workshop can (and should) help you recognize and connect to your own voice, help you discover the driving thread of your story, and provide you with loads of helpful feedback. But while I do believe that there are times in a writer’s life when she should be in a workshop with a built-in, constant audience, I also believe there are times when she should be hunkered down on her own in a private space. Before diving in to a workshop, it’s important to figure out where you are in your process and your writing path.

Where can readers learn more about you and your work?
Visit Thirsty’s website at http://www.thirstythenovel.com/ and my blog “My Beautiful, Far-Flung Life” at http://kristinbairokeeffeblog.com/. You can also follow me on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/kbairokeeffe and friend me on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/Kristin.Bair.OKeeffe.

*****

I hope you’ve enjoyed today’s Q&A. Be sure to come back next Wednesday for the Q&A with Bella Mahaya Carter.

Also, check back in for Friday’s blog as I have a lot of great writing news to share. Until then….

Monday, March 1, 2010

Willow Springs Fiction Prize

An opportunity worth sharing…

From: http://willowsprings.ewu.edu/contests.php

Willow Springs invites submissions for The Willow Springs Fiction Prize, $2,000 plus publication in Willow Springs.

Submission deadline: March 1, 2010

Submission Guidelines:

  • Include a $15.00 entry fee. Submissions without an entry fee will not be judged.
  • Send only one story per submission.
  • Use a check or money order only; cash will not be accepted. Please make the checks and money orders payable to Willow Springs.
  • Submissions should be typed. Handwritten submissions will not be judged and the entry fee will not be refunded.
  • There is no word limit for submissions.
  • Submissions for the prize are accepted in hard copy only. Do not use the online submission manager for contest entries.
  • Your name, address, phone number, and e-mail address, as well as a short bio, should appear in a cover letter included with your submission.
  • Do not include indentifying information anywhere else in your submission.
  • Submit only original, unpublished work. Contest entries may neither be previously published nor simultaneously submitted elsewhere.
  • Do not send an SASE. If you would like confirmation that your work has been received, include a self-addressed, stamped postcard instead.
  • Don't send us your only copies—manuscripts will not be returned.
  • Entries must be postmarked by March 1, 2010.

Please send entries to:

The Willow Springs Fiction Prize

Willow Springs

501 N Riverpoint Blvd, Ste 425

Spokane, WA 99202

All contest entrants will receive a one-year subscription to Willow Springs, including the issue containing the award-winning work. We look forward to receiving your entries.

Good luck!