Friday Find: Kelly James-Enger’s Query Checklist

I have enough on my plate for this particular weekend without sending out any freelance queries, but for those of you who may indeed be developing some ideas and pitches, I’m going to send you right over to Kelly James-Enger’s Dollars and Deadlines blog, where you’ll find a very sage “10-Question Query Checklist.”

Good luck with whatever projects are on your weekend agenda, folks. See you back here on Monday.

Friday Find: A Plethora of Prompts

Need a little something to help jumpstart your writing? Why not peruse this prompt-packed article of mine, which is part of the September 2010 WOW! Women on Writing “Creativity Carnival” issue. You’ll find plenty of recommendations for print and web-based exercises and prompts, plus some hints on how they can be helpful to your writing practice. It’s a pretty good article, if I do say so myself!

Have a good weekend, everyone. See you back here on Monday.

The Wednesday Web Browser

Welcome to our Wednesday online gleanings.

  • The film adaptation of Kazuo Ishiguro’s Never Let Me Go opens today. The novel was amazing (though it couldn’t top The Remains of the Day). I’m never sure about seeing adaptations of admired novels. The Remains of the Day-the-movie certainly didn’t disappoint, but that doesn’t mean this movie won’t. Plus, you have to admit that Never Let Me Go has a pretty creepy premise. I don’t know. Are you planning to see the film? Have you already read the book?
  • A new NPR column will track paperback releases. (via @book_tour)
  • Reported widely: The Wall Street Journal is launching a book-review section.
  • It is Book Blogger Appreciation Week (BBAW)! Thank you, book bloggers!
  • David Abrams is on to something (see his comment on this post). The Writer’s Almanac reliably presents accessible and strong stuff. Case in point: Monday’s “A Difference of Fifty-Three Years,” by Noel Peattie.
  • Looking for an academic job? Here are some helpful hints for creating and maintaining your cv.
  • Sometimes, that connection with a single reader really is what matters. During my senior year in college, I wrote an honors thesis that didn’t earn the best grades or win the top prizes. But somewhere along the way, it was read by David Riesman (then an emeritus professor), who found it interesting enough to write me a complimentary note (which I still have–this was before e-mail) and invite me to his home to discuss the issues I’d written about. So when I saw this appreciation of Riesman’s own magnum opus in The Chronicle Review this week, lots of fond memories resurfaced.
  • And while we’re combining writing and academics…here’s an intriguing “report from the borderland between history and journalism.”

Friday Find: Where to Publish Your Work

Maybe some of you are planning to spend time this weekend mapping out submission strategies. After all, most of us here in the U.S. have a three-day weekend and a bit of extra time.

Here’s a resource that may help you, right here on erikadreifus.com: a page on “Where to Publish Your Work.” I hope that you find it helpful! And if you do, please share it with your friends/fellow writers.

Have a great weekend, everyone. This blog won’t take Monday off–we’ll see you back here then.

Monday Morning Markets/Jobs/Opportunities

It’s good to be back! I had a lovely vacation week (even if the weather didn’t really cooperate until Thursday). Those of you who subscribe to The Practicing Writer will be receiving your September issues today. Plenty of the usual medley of offerings for poets/fictionists/writers of creative nonfiction, in terms of the no-fee competitions and paying calls for submissions. Plus, an interview with author, essayist, editor, and professor Dinty W. Moore. Soon, I’ll post the issue online, but if you’re not yet a subscriber why risk missing out on first glance at our next issue, too? Subscribe now! For today’s blog post, I’ll limit myself to items that didn’t make it into the newsletter.


From Chuck Sambuchino: “As the editor of both Guide to Literary Agents and Children’s Writer’s & Illustrator’s Market, I need upfront informative articles for those books. I am now open to queries if you want to submit any ideas. Send them to [literaryagent(at)fwmedia(dot)com] and put “Query” in the subject line. I will only be open to queries until about mid-September, and I will respond within 4-8 weeks from now, so please query soon. Articles are 1500-2300 words and will appear in the 2012 editions (next summer). I urge writers to go in detail about what they had in mind and who, if anyone, they plan to interview. In other words: Wow me!”


Win a free writing class: Basement Writing Workshop is running a prompt-based contest (no entry fee). “The contest winner will receive a free online class from the Basement Writing Workshop, chosen by him or her from any of our Winter offerings, as well as publication in the Basement Writing Workshop ‘campus’ website, props in our newsletter and social networking outlets, and last but not least, a Certificate of Awesomeness, signed by all our Portland-based instructors, in lipstick.” Deadline is November 1.


Brown University (R.I.) “invites applications for an Associate Professor or Professor specializing in Poetry, position to begin 1 July 2011. Candidates should have a strong national and international reputation as a poet, a substantial publication record, and extensive teaching experience; additional expertise in other areas such as translation or poetics. An ideal candidate will also have leadership potential and be interested in helping to develop and administer the future of the Literary Arts Program.”


California State University, Monterey Bay “seeks an Assistant Professor whose specialty is in both Fiction and Creative Nonfiction Writing to teach undergraduate courses in its Creative Writing and Social Action concentration (CWSA). We seek a candidate who is uniquely qualified and committed to educating working-class, ethnically diverse, and historically under-served students through innovation in interdisciplinary teaching and learning, scholarship, community service, and collaborative and imaginative program development. The concentration in CWSA is offered as part of the New Humanities for Social Justice (NHSJ) curriculum, along with Chicana/o Latina/o studies, Africana studies, cultural history, oral history, and new media studies.”


Harvard University Press (Mass.) seeks a Publicity Assistant, Princeton University (N.J.) is looking for a Public Relations Specialist, and Montgomery College (Md.) wants to hire a Speech Writer.