Roger Pincus in Kestrel’s Spring 2009 issue

GMU fiction MFAer Roger Pincus just received word from Kestrel that his short story “Detection” has been accepted for publication for its Spring 2009 issue, expected out April 24. Order issues or subscribe here. Congrats!

AIW Fiction Writing Seminar This Saturday

Speaking of getting in as much as one can, head over to the American Independent Writers’ Fiction Writing Seminar this Saturday (tomorrow, February 28), at the Johnson Center cinema from 8 am to 4:15 pm. Bill Miller and John Curry (of AIW) open the seminar, which includes plenary speaker Jeffrey Deaver; keynote speaker Marita Golden; and panel discussions on literary fiction versus genre fiction (with John Gilstrap, Donna Andrews, Alan Cheuse, and James Grady), novelists who write reviews and criticism (with Nandini Lal, Louis Bayard, Sudlip Bose, and Art Taylor); new media and publishing creative writing (with Reb Livingston, Mark Athitakis, Bernadette Geyer, and Laura Ellen Scott), and second novels (with Bill Miller, Andrew W. M. Beierle, Katharine Davis, Dallas Hudgens, and Alex MacLennan). A full program is available at AIW (it’s the third news item; click on “more”).

Members $119, Non-members $189, and Students $69.

AWP, Aggregated

Er, ah, so, I really did hope someone would lord their experience at AWP in Chicago over us, but, yes, irony isn’t the best means of inspiration . . . anyway, here, Dear Reader, flies a try at vicarious blogospheric connective tissue:

• For the live blog, see this here.
• For an aggregation of links, see one fell swoop at Rarely Likeable. With links to more links! And a small, mysterious helicopter . . .
• The Writer’s Center, briefly. Said to expand . . .

• To inspire anxious hope that Mike Scalise found his luggage and his reading went well . . . 
• From Work in Progress, the exhaustedness and the excitedness.
• Poet Sandra Beasley, highlightedly.
• For an incredibly cynical view of humanity, see this essay at Agni.
• For a better example of satire, see this.

• For Ryan Call’s response to said cynicism, see this.

• For a bit of a tangent, see UNESCO designates Iowa City a City of Literature. Note to self: Field trip to UNESCO HQ (Paris!). Bring Fall for the Book invitations.
• For a reminder to get back to work, see Katherine Mansfield (quoted here), “It’s always a kind of a race to get in as much as one can before it disappears.”

Cheryl’s Gone This Thursday, with Sara Hov

This Thursday (Feb 26), head to the Cheryl’s Gone Reading Series at Big Bear Cafe, 1st & R Streets NW, Washington, DC.

The night will include fiction from our 2007–2008 Thesis Fellow Sara Hov (get one of her stories here), poetry from Ryan Walker and Zein El-Amine (of UMD’s Jiménez-Porter Writer’s House), and music from Spoonboy (of the Max Levine Ensemble).

Starts at 8 pm. Great night, and it’s free!

Alan Cheuse on C-Span

This weekend watch Alan present his novel To Catch the Lightning from the 2009 Key West Literary Seminar on C-Span. Dates and times below...

Upcoming Schedule
Sunday, February 22, at 7:00 AM
Monday, February 23, at 5:00 AM
Saturday, March 14, at 4:20 PM

And you can watch the video here.

Nonfiction Visiting Writer on Thursday Feb 19

Alexandra Johnson, author of Leaving a Trace: On Keeping a Journal and The Hidden Writer: Diaries and the Creative Life, which won the PEN/Jerard Fund Special Citation Award for nonfiction, is reading at GMU on Thursday February 19 at 7:30 pm in Research I, room 163. A reception will be held just before the reading in the lobby area outside of room 163. Be there—her first book, The Hidden Writer, which brings to life diaries by Sonya Tolstoy, Alice James, Virginia Woolf, and Katherine Mansfield (to name a few) is excellent, and she is bound to be interesting.

One of THOSE

There's an interesting article in the Post today about Abraham Verghese, physician and author of the recent Cutting for Stone.

That's right. It's not enough that he's out there saving people's lives. He has to go and write books as well.

And apparently they're good books. His first, a non-fiction account of his time treating AIDS/HIV patients in Johnson City, TN (My Own Country)was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle award and is a regular on the reading list of doctors in training. He draws comparisons to the other guy who had to do it all - Chekhov. His latest novel is something he hopes to be his "epic medical novel."

The article is an interesting read because he specifically talks about that organic process of writing - of having only the beginnings of a scene and nothing more - and moving from there - inspiring for Verghese, but apparently not so much for his editor.

More pubs!

Congrats to Mike Maggio (poetry MFA 08), whose short story “Atelier” was recently published at languageandculture.net. Also, his translation of Syrian poet Nizar Qabbani’s “The Infuriated” appears at newamericandream.net.

And don’t forget to pick up; purchase online; or barter, beg, or wheedle at AWP for a copy of Barrelhouse number 7 (“The Future” issue), which includes Laura Ellen Scott’s story, “Wish Tank,” and poetry MFA, GMU faculty member, and Cheryl’s Gone coordinator Wade Fletcher’s poem, “Equiumlibri,” as well as more-than-forgiven-for-having-attended-AU D.C. poet Sandra Beasley’s “Antiquity”—and a whole slew of other great talent.

Requiem for a Newspaper Section

Along with the apparent demise of the independent bookstore (Go Politics and Prose!) and the near imminent (so they say) implosion of the newspaper industry comes the cutting of Book World from the Washington Post. The Post was one of few papers in the country to feature a separate section devoted entirely to books, but budget cuts dictated that the section get the ax. The same content will still be available online, but you know how it is.

Check out today's edition if you can still buy it, especially an excellent essay by novelist Manil Suri as part of "The Writing Life."

In happier news, this Sunday's edition of the Post Magazine is the Valentine's Fiction issue including the winner of the '08 fiction contest and the rules for the 2009 fiction contest.