Places to submit

YWCA invites writers to address the issue of domestic violence

The YWCA invites Sonoma County writers to address the issue of domestic violence through poetry, flash fiction and memoir for October 2014’s Domestic Violence Awareness Month. Authors and poets are free to explore the topic from many perspectives, focusing on a more personal approach, a social level, the viewpoint from victims, children, loved ones, those who witness the violence, or those who work in the field, such as doctors, police, therapists. The YWCA defines domestic violence as threatening behavior that seeks to control and exercise power over another. This behavior can include one or all of the following: emotional abuse, psychological abuse, sexual abuse, verbal abuse, physical abuse, financial abuse, and/or threats of abuse or violence to a partner’s children or pets. Short fiction and personal narrative pieces should not exceed 1000 words. Up to three poems may be submitted, but the total number of pages of poetry shall not…

Places to submit

Saddle Road Press wants your writing.

Are you looking for a press to publish your book length writing? Consider Saddle Road Press, as Michelle Wing did with her book of poetry, Body on the Wall. Saddle Road Press, founded in 2011, is a small literary press located in Hilo, on the Big Island of Hawai’i. In 2013 they founded the Forty-Three North Chapbook Series – named for the latitude of Lake Erie – to honor their long-time home near Buffalo. Now that SRP is permanently settled back home in Hawai’i, they are focusing more on writing from and about the Pacific. They are primarily looking for work that moves and delights them. They are open to older writers, to non-MFA writers, to performance pieces, to writers whose first language is not English. They are interested in poetry, literary fiction, memoir and essays. Shape your writing now, and be ready to submit later this year. “We read submissions once each…

Book Reviews

Body On The Wall by Michelle Wing

Michelle Wing’s captivating book of poetry, Body On The Wall — is divided into four elements: Wind, Fire, Earth and Water.  Michelle delves into the complex array of emotions with an artist’s eye and sure hand, transporting the reader from piece to piece with honesty and intensity. In Wind, readers feel the breeze, the cleansing air, the playfulness, despair and hope. In Fire, the rich texture and complex layers travel a labyrinth of emotional experiences. In Earth, more ups and downs on the emotional ladder of pain, humiliation, awareness, hope, reality. In Water, new life, satisfaction, rejection, sharp pain, settling, calming and humor. Joanna McClure, an original San Francisco Beat Poet: I enjoyed reading Michelle Wing’s poetry — full of her rich and varied multi-cultural life —  its sensual pleasures as well as its dark depths. Kathy Myers reviews Body On The Wall: I wish I could reach through the cover…

Guest Bloggers

Due Dates — Making Friends with Deadlines by Michelle Wing

Guest Blogger Michelle Wing writes: I have always been rather envious of writers who say they sit down at their desks each day at, say, 9 a.m., and write for three or four hours. In other words, writers who have a pattern and a discipline to their output. That is simply not how I am wired. I can’t do anything that way – exercise regimens, meals, study sessions – nope, I fail at every attempt to adhere to a strict schedule. Instead of berating myself over this, I have learned to look at what does work for me. What are my ideal conditions for writing productivity? I thrive under deadlines. Having spent over 15 years of my life working as a journalist, I am very familiar with the feeling of having to get a story out – now – just under the wire. It is its own particular type of…