Monday Morning Markets/Jobs/Opportunities for Writers

  • “Established in 1978, Loom Press publishes books by emerging writers and artists from the New England area. In addition to poetry, Loom Press titles range from documentary photography to cultural studies….Authors typically receive up to 30 copies of the finished book and standard royalties for trade paperback books.”
  • Attention, practicing writers in Maine: “The Individual Artist Fellowships reward artistic excellence, advance the careers of Maine artists and promote public awareness regarding the eminence of the creative sector in Maine.” Application deadline for Literary Arts fellowships is May 13, 2011. No application fee indicated. Fellowships confer $13,000.
  • Dixie State College (Utah) is advertising a faculty position in English-Creative Writing. “Responsibilities: Develop and teach courses in area of creative writing. Supervise students in the creation of department publications as assigned. Teach composition courses and literature courses as needed. Serve on college and departmental committees as assigned. Attend department, division, and faculty meetings; work with other faculty in program management; and adhere to college policies. Should be technology literate and/or willing to become certified and teach online or blended courses.”
  • The Djerassi Resident Artists Program (Calif.) seeks an Executive Director, Gettysburg College (Pa.) is looking for an Assistant Director of Annual Giving Communications, and Harvard University Press (Mass.) is advertising for a part-time Writer/Editor who will “produce descriptive copy for approximately 200 frontlist books that HUP publishes each year.” Note that for the HUP job: “The Press prefers an in-house copywriter but will consider highly qualified candidates who wish to work remotely, with multiple visits to the Press as required in the critical months of July-August and January-February.”
  • I’m still away today (long weekend in my much-missed Massachusetts). So please accept my apologies for the relative brevity of today’s market/job/opportunity listings. If you haven’t yet seen the May Practicing Writer newsletter, which went out to subscribers late last week, you’ll find plenty more (paying) calls for submission and no-fee competitions listed within.
  • Friday Find: “Looking Backward: Third-Generation Fiction Writers and the Holocaust”

    Today’s a very busy day. There’s a royal wedding, a shuttle launch, and, for me, a departure for Boston, where I’ll be leading a session tomorrow at Grub Street’s Muse and the Marketplace conference.

    This weekend also brings Yom Hashoah, Holocaust Memorial Day. Which makes it all the more important for me to share with you my latest essay-review for Fiction Writers Review, “Looking Backward: Third-Generation Fiction Writers and the Holocaust.”

    Have a good weekend, and see you back here next week.

    Thursday’s Post-Publication Post: Thinking About Sam S.

    There are many reasons that I’ve been thinking a lot about my grandfather lately. For starters, I’m hard at work on a talk that I’ll deliver next week for a conference here in New York on “German-Speaking Jews in New York: Their Immigration and Lasting Presence.” If you’ve been following my book-related blog posts for awhile, it’s probably not a surprise that I’ll be speaking about two German-speaking Jews in New York who meant a great deal to me: my paternal grandparents, whose lives and stories provided much of the inspiration for my story collection, Quiet Americans.

    My grandfather, in particular, has been on my mind because he passed away fourteen years ago this week. This means that at Sabbath services this weekend, his name will be read from the yahrzheit list, which reminds us of these anniversaries. He will be remembered as “Sam S. Dreifus.” In the family, he was frequently and affectionately referred to as “Sam S.,” with the invented middle initial serving as a reminder that his original first name, back in Germany, was “Sigmar.”

    Like the character of Josef Freibug, who appears in several of the stories in Quiet Americans, my grandfather had an unenviable childhood, and, for that matter, a not-so-easy life after that. He was  a “quiet American” in multiple respects. What seems most remarkable to me is that he never spoke about the challenges that he’d faced basically from birth. Which may help explain why I, blessed with a much more privileged set of life circumstances, have been so drawn to imagining fuller pictures of my grandfather’s background and experiences based on the available true-life details. (Some of this I’ve also written about here.)

    I suspect that some of my grandfather’s “quiet” was innate, but it seems likely that his reticence was at least partially due to his having begun learning English relatively late, as an adult who lacked a formal education even in his native language. Still, as I think you’ll see in this photo, which was taken during Thanksgiving a few months after I graduated from college twenty years ago (yes, that’s a graduation photo taped to the kitchen cabinet behind us), my grandfather’s goodness and love shone through even without words. (What you can’t see is that the exception to his quiet came in his singing, especially when he chanted the Hebrew blessings, prayers, and songs that he loved so much.)

    We miss you, Grandpa!

    The Wednesday Web Browser for Writers

  • The annual BookExpo America (BEA) extravaganza is coming up, and Publishers Weekly provides a guide for those who will be attending (or wish that they could).
  • April is coming to an end, and I didn’t write nearly as many poems as I wish I had. But I’ve bookmarked Robert Lee Brewer’s Poetic Asides blog’s April “Poem-A-Day” prompts, and I’ll be returning to them for inspiration. (Frankly, I think Brewer should collect them in a little book/ebook. I’d download a copy!)
  • If April is coming to an end, then May is just about to arrive. And that means that Fiction Writers Review will soon be celebrating Short Story Month. Check out the Collection Giveaway Project details here, and give yourself a chance to win one of Practicing Writing’s own giveaway offerings, too.
  • Poet E. Ethelbert Miller has created a forum for sharing writing wisdom from author Charles Johnson, and in this post, Johnson addresses the art of book reviewing. (Thanks to @mathitak for the find.)
  • If you’re interested in long-form journalism/narrative nonfiction, you’ll want to read all about Byliner, launching soon. (Thanks to @Kathy_Crowley for the find.)
  • Yet another example of ever-reliable, agent-focused advice from Nathan Bransford. (And if you’re looking for more resources re: agents, check those that I’ve listed toward the end of this page.)