New this week: Lincoln in the Bardo by George Saunders; Shadowbahn by Steve Erickson; The Fortunate Ones by Ellen Umansky; All That’s Left to Tell by Daniel Lowe; The Weight of Him by Ethel Rohan; The Dark Flood Rises by Margaret Drabble; and Be My Wolff by Emma Richler. For more on these and other new titles, go read our most recent book preview.
Tuesday New Release Day: Saunders; Erickson; Umansky; Lowe; Rohan; Drabble; Richler
Submissions Open for Dzanc’s Non-Fiction Award
Dzanc Books began the submissions period for its 2013-2014 Non-Fiction Award. The indie press is looking for memoir, political, historical, and biographical manuscripts. Millions contributor Nathan Deuel – whose book Friday Was the Bomb will be published by Dzanc in May — will select a winner from among a list of ten finalists, and the top manuscript will be published in the Fall of 2015. The deadline to enter is June 30, 2014.
●
●
White Lies
“As adults, we should hold each other’s work to high standards, and our own work to the highest of all. As writers, we shouldn’t settle for a single pale line. But before the poem is written, I say, we should lie to ourselves, the way we lied to that winded child. Before composition, we have to be gods.” Alex Chertok writes about literary pep talks for the Ploughshares blog.
Passions, Hobbies. Same Thing, Right?
It’s the weekend, and you know what that means. Time to explore your creative passions. That’s right! Find what you want to do and “dive in a full 10 percent and spend the other 90 torturing yourself because you know damn well that it’s far too late to make a drastic career change, and that you’re stuck on this mind-numbing path for the rest of your life.”
Oratory Passion
The best Fourth of July speech? Frederick Douglass delivered it on July 5, 1852. Pair with a reading list for July.
●
●
Who do you Write Like?
Do you write like Stephen King? Or how about Chuck Palahniuk? That’s what the I Write Like website told me when I entered my work into their little magical computer program–of course, I had to do it more than once!
A New Generation of Historical Epics
Ryan Lenora Brown delves into the ways an exciting new generation of African women writers are taking on the historical epic.
●
●
●
Identity Crisis
Recommended Reading: Our own Ismail Muhammad on a new book of essays by Durga Chew-Bose.
●
●