Mark your calendars...

After some delayed planning, the first fiction dinner of the year is ON!

What: Fiction dinner with Susan Shreve
Where: Susan's house; details forthcoming on the listserv
When: Sunday, December 7th at 6pm
Who?: YOU (GMU MFA fiction people)

As always, it will be potluck. In a few weeks I'll ask for emails to let me know if you're coming and what you're bringing...

AND - anyone interested in helping to set up these dinners? It's super easy, fun, a way to get involved...email Priyanka.

Matt Bondurant at Politics and Prose, 10/25 1 PM

For anyone looking for an excuse to spend part of tomorrow afternoon in the city's best bookstore (oh yeah, and to hear great writing), check out Matt Bondurant's reading at Politics and Prose at 1 PM.

Not only is Matt's new novel, The Wettest County in the World, full of gunfights and bootleggers, it's been optioned by Paramount and Nick Cave is writing the screenplay. Also, he used to teach at GMU. For those of you who are still unsure, there's good pizza and free ping pong down the block at Comet-- make a day of it!

Congratulations to faculty member Helon Habila...

for being recently awarded with the 2008 Library of Virginia Award for his novel Measuring Time.

Our GMU MFA family had a good turnout: the list of nominees also included fellow faculty members
Alan Cheuse for The Fires,
Susan Shreve for her memoir Warm Springs,

AND

GMU MFA alum Dallas Hudgens for Season of Gene.

Congrats all!

The Writing Gap

Today's Post has an interview with author Marilynne Robinson who wrote a book (Housekeeping), took a 23 year break, and then came back with the Pulitzer Prize winning Gilead, and most recently, Home.

Interestingly, in Susan Shreve's Advanced Workshop class we were asked to think about the authors in our "club" - the authors we turn to when we're stuck, when we need inspiration or motivation, and when we just want to have a good time reading. Among the names that came up were McEwan, Chabon, Cheever, Bender, Hempel, and more.

And in Marilynne Robinson's camp? Calvin.

Go figure.

AC at P&P

That's code for Alan Cheuse reading from To Catch the Lightning at Politics & Prose this Saturday 10/18 at 6pm. Details here.

The Secret

In yesterday's Washington Post Magazine, Gene Weingarten tells us what we all want to know in his article "How to Get Rich Writing." Or something like that.

Halfway through the semester!

Porter Shreve at Breatrice.com

Porter Shreve is the guest author over at Beatrice.com. He has an essay posted about his new book When the White House was Ours.

Newish Post-MFA Blog out of Montana?

This blog is about life after the MFA.

"Musings on the daily travails of three MFA graduates. Faced with the unsettling future(s) of to-be-determinedism, we seek plans, jobs, and constant distractions. We hope to share the above in all of its uncensored glory here. For you."

Three recent MFA graduates host it: Trina, Kelly, and Laurie.

I scanned it for a few minutes and then looked at other websites also.

For Godot

I don't know if anyone has seen this, but I think it's really funny. I've been waiting who knows how long for an anthology like this to come out. And now I just can't wait to hold it in my hands. Unfortunately, they don't have any ordering information, so the wait could be very long. And I would also have to wait a long time to print the PDF, because it's over 3,000 pages long. So, yeah. Very cute.

Outrage and opinions and comments are in full swing over at the Poetry Foundation.

Join the fun.