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NewPages Blog

At the NewPages Blog readers and writers can catch up with their favorite literary and alternative magazines, independent and university presses, creative writing programs, and writing and literary events. Find new books, new issue announcements, contest winners, and so much more!

Magazine Stand :: Ganga Review – 2022

Ganga Review print literary magazine annual issue 2022 cover image

A print annual of “international writings for liberation,” Ganga Review, named for the River Ganga that is an expression of Divine Mother, was inspired by a pilgrimage through India in 2004 wherein the editors “traveled from village to village, seeking to alleviate the sorrows that come with poverty, illness, and plain loss of hope.” In simply flipping through the pages, I was struck by a number of works, and this one in particular resonated with my own locus of need. Perhaps it will serve others as well:

SAY IT
by N. Mimmick

The Hopi word is sipala,
which requires little articulation
and no teeth. It is almost a whisper
as is the Hindu shantih, the Persian sula,
the English peace.

With over 200 pages of fiction, essays, poetry, interviews, translation, and fine art that represents diverse faiths and cultures from around the world, contributors include Emily Adair, Faiz Ahmad, Essam M. Al-Jassim, Paul Bamberger, Sacha Bissonnette, Richard Alan Bunch, Steve Carr, Jeffrey S. Chapman, Holly Day, Joe De Quattro, Tejan Green, Marlon Hacla, Ghaliya Hasan, Claudia Hinz, Lidia Kosk, Danuta E. Kosk-Kosicka, Andrew Lafleche, Linda Lamenza, Edward Lee, Xiaoly Li, Catherine Lieuwen, Diego Luis, Charles J. March III, Megan McGibney, Jack Brendan Miller, N. Minnick, Kristine Ong Muslim, Ayaz Daryl Nielsen, Sarah Odishoo, Scott Pedersen, Christina Petrides, Patrick Pfister, Fabrice Poussin, Richard Risemberg, Andrew Ross, Michael Salcman, Rema Sayers, Mary Shanley, Paul Smith, Don Stoll, Bradley R. Strahan, and Mercury Marvin Sunderland.

Book Review :: Memphis by Tara Stringfellow

Memphis a novel by Tara M. Stringfellow published by The Dial Press book cover image

Guest Post by Kevin Brown

In Memphis, Tara Stringfellow’s debut novel, she traces three generations of African American women from the 1930s to the early 2000s. The four main characters—Joan, her mother Miriam, her aunt August, and her grandmother Hazel—all encounter the obstacles one would expect African American women living through those decades to struggle against; however, Stringfellow goes beyond stereotypical concerns to craft fully-realized characters who have hopes and dreams of their own. Hazel wants to live a long, stable life with the man she loves; Miriam wants to create a safe space for her and her children while also carving out a meaningful career. August not only nurtures her nieces, but she tries to save her son from the childhood he had, while Joan wants to create art and beauty. As the title implies, they all pursue their desires in Memphis, which changes over the decades but still provides stability in the midst of chaos for each generation. Though some of the references to historical events seem predictable and almost obligatory, Stringfellow’s fleshing out of her characters enables the reader to enter into their lives and their city, to provide the empathy that all literature strives to evoke.


Memphis by Tara Stringfellow. The Dial Press, April 2022.

Reviewer bio: Kevin Brown has published three books of poetry: Liturgical Calendar: Poems (Wipf and Stock); A Lexicon of Lost Words (winner of the Violet Reed Haas Prize for Poetry, Snake Nation Press); and Exit Lines (Plain View Press). He also has a memoir, Another Way: Finding Faith, Then Finding It Again, and a book of scholarship, They Love to Tell the Stories: Five Contemporary Novelists Take on the Gospels. Twitter @kevinbrownwrite or kevinbrownwrites.weebly.com/.

If you are interested in contributing a Guest Post to “What I’m Reading,” please click this link: NewPages.com Reviewer Guidelines.

New Book :: Elizabeth/The Story of Drone

Elizabeth/The Story of Drone hybrid poetry by Louise Akers published by Propeller Books book cover image

Elizabeth/The Story of Drone
Poetry by Louise Akers
Propeller Books, September 2022

In this hybrid poem about militarized drones and militant angels, Elizabeth abandons her career as a physicist to become a museum administrator, finds god in the basement below the galleries, and dies there. But that is not the end. A blend of form and genre, Elizabeth/The Story of Drone takes readers on a journey through terrain in which the personal and the political collide. Louise Akers is a poet living in Brooklyn, New York. They earned their MFA from Brown University in May of 2018, and received the Keith and Rosmarie Waldrop Prize for Innovative Writing in 2017 and the Confrontation Poetry Prize in 2019. Their chapbook, Alien Year, was selected by Brandon Shimoda for the 2020 Oversound Chapbook Prize.

Magazine Stand :: Southwest Review – Autumn 2022

Southwest Review print literary magazine Autumn 2022 Halloween issue cover image

Trick or Treat? The Halloween issue of Southwest Review is all literary treats with fiction by Edmudo Paz Soldán (tr. Jenna Tang), Angela Sylvaine, Marina Perezagua (tr. Miriam Tobin), Noelle De La Paz, Cristhiano Aguiar (tr. Zoë Perry), Adrian Van Young, Carolina Rodriguez Mayo, Gabriel Carle (tr. Heather Houde), José Natividad Ic Xec (tr. Nicole Genaille), Makenzy Orcel (tr. Nathan H. Dize), Susan L. Lin, Natalia García Freire (tr. Victor Meadowcroft), Antonio Díaz Oliva (tr. Lisa Dillman), Óscar Molina V. (tr. Julia Sanches), Jesse Bullington, Gabriela Damián Miravete (tr. Robin Myers), Gabino Iglesias, Victoria Buitron (tr. Sarah Blanton), Alexis Dubon, Jac Jemc, and Alex Luceli Jiménez, and poetry by Leira Araüjo (tr. Katherine M. Hedeen and Olivia Lott), Lillian Hochwender, Susan Cronin, and Carlos Cortés (tr. Pili Cuairán).

Inaugural Call :: ISSUED: Stories of Service

ISSUED Stories of Service online literary magazine logo image

The newly launched ISSUED: Stories of Services is accepting submissions of stories by active-duty military, veterans, and family members in the form of poetry and flash prose. Appropriately, the deadline is Veteran’s Day, November 11, 2022. Editors hope for works that express the “spectrum of experiences within military life, including gender and sexuality, BIPOC voices, physical and mental health combat, enlisting and separating, family and relationships, and reintegration into society.” The publication also welcomes visual art in any genre. ISSUED is supported by the Office for Veteran and Military Academic Engagement at Arizona State University. For more information and submission guidelines, visit the publication’s website.

Event :: 2023 Looking Glass Rock Writers’ Conference

Looking Glass Rock Writers' Conference 2023 flier

The 2023 Looking Glass Rock Writers’ Conference will take place May 18 through 21 in Brevard, North Carolina. They are currently accepting applications through December 15. Faculty include Camille Dungy, Jamie Ford, and Margaret Renkl. Workshops are limited to 12 participants and there are scholarships available.

Stop by the NewPages Classifieds to learn more.

New Book :: If This Should Reach You In Time

If This Should Reach You In Time poetry by Justin Marks published by Barrelhouse Books book cover image

If This Should Reach You In Time
Poetry by Justin Marks
Barrelhouse Books, December 2022

If This Should Reach You in Time sounds the alarm of climate change and democratic collapse with tender lament and guarded hope from award-winning poet Justin Marks. In “Along for the Ride,” Marks writes, “There’s no way around / not being part // of the problem” and “The best case scenario / is long term disaster.” In this fourth collection of poetry, Marks renders global threats as intimate and personal. As we turn inward, terror and sadness take hold. This is a book of crisis and dread, both human and spiritual. Through these poems, Marks shows readers what could be and what might have been. In the titular poem, he writes, “know / that we didn’t see / the disaster coming / That it wasn’t / imaginable, hadn’t / existed until, gradually / it was, and did / Or that we saw it / and refused to believe / Or saw it and thought / something or someone / else would save us.”

New Book :: In a Few Minutes Before Later

In a Few Minutes Before Later poetry by Brenda Hillman published by Wesleyan University Press book cover image

In a Few Minutes Before Later
Poetry by Brenda Hillman
Wesleyan University Press, October 2022

An iconoclastic ecopoet who has led the way for many young and emerging artists, Brenda Hillman continues to re-cast innovative poetic forms as instruments for tracking human and non-human experiences. At times the poet deploys short dialogues, meditations or trance techniques as means of rendering inner states; other times she uses narrative, documentary or scientific materials to record daily events during a time of pandemic, planetary crisis, political and racial turmoil. Hillman proposes that poetry offers courage even in times of existential peril; her work represents what is most necessary and fresh in American poetry.

Magazine Stand :: Brilliant Flash Fiction – September 2022

Brilliant Flash Fiction online literary magazine September 2022 cover image

Publishing quarterly online on the last day of January, March, June, and September, there’s still plenty of time to enjoy the newest Brilliant Flash Fiction, featuring works by CJ Erick, Emma Louise Gill,  Karthik G. Nambiar, Abha Iyengar, John Salter,  Mary Sloat, Barbara Kurzak, Danny Riordan, Joe Baumann, and Michael Harper. Brilliant Flash Fiction welcomes submissions of stories of1000 words or less and pays $20 per piece accepted.

Book Review :: Interior Femme by Stephanie Berger

Interior Femme poetry by Stephanie Berger published by University of Nevada Press book cover image

Guest Post by Jami Macarty

Among the first four poems of Stephanie Berger’s Interior Femme, the 2020 Betsy Joiner Flanagan Poetry Prize winner, there’s a “Foreword,” a “Prelude,” and a “Preface,” as if there is an anxiety about beginning or that beginning takes time: “she opened up gradually to the possibility of beauty and a city.” The bicoastal cities of San Diego and New York are among the urban settings for these poems as they trace archetypes of the feminine and the matriarchy of family, society, and art—“a lineage // of pain”—focusing primarily on “two subjects: death / & domesticity” while vying for “survival / of the beautiful.” Survival from whom or what might dominate is a central pursuit of these poems. What has power and influence: memories—“a sadness took / my mother to the movies one day / & never brought her back.” The poems puzzle over the implications of the first woman in our lives and the primal feminine being lost to violence. Memories, based in gender dominance and sexual degradation, are “the mercurial knee-jerk / of the patriarchy.” The poet beseeches: “strip me / from what abyss of memory I dragged.” Ultimately, Berger’s is a poetry of ascent; Persephone emerges and “imagination dominates.” In these poems, imagination has the power to counter and save; even “a pit at the bottom // of the kitchen sink, available / for discovery.” Dear reader, in Interior Femme, Stephanie Berger is “a real woman [and poet] / with the scars to prove it,” who understands it is “important to remember / there are windows in the water.” Dear reader, Interior Femme is a window.


Interior Femme, Stephanie Berger. University of Nevada Press, January 2022.

Reviewer bio: Jami Macarty is the author of The Minuses (Center for Literary Publishing, 2020), winner of the 2020 New Mexico/Arizona Book Award – Poetry Arizona, and three chapbooks, including Mind of Spring (Vallum, 2017), winner of the 2017 Vallum Chapbook Award. Jami’s writing has been honored by financial support from Arizona Commission on the Arts, British Columbia Arts Council, and by editors at magazines such as The Capilano Review, Concision Poetry Journal, Interim, Redivider, Vallum, and Volt, where Jami’s poems appear. More at https://jamimacarty.com/

Contest Winners :: Cleaver’s 2022 Flash Contest

Cleaver Magazine Flash Contest 2022 logo

Cleaver online literary magazine has announced the winners of their 2022 Flash Contest. Winners, honorable mentions, and finalists will be published in Cleaver Issue No. 40, their 10th-anniversary issue.

Judge: Meg Pokrass

First Place: Sabrina Hicks
“When We Knew How to Get Lost”

Second Place: Janet Burroway
“The Tale of Molly Grimm”

Third Place: Dawn Miller
“The Egg”

HONORABLE MENTION
Laura Tanenbaum
Fannie H. Gray
Andrea Marcusa
Lisa Lanser-Rose
Andrew Stancek
Luke Tennis
Emily Hoover
James LaRowe
Paul Enea
Kris Willcox
Christina Simon

FINALISTS
Theo Greenblatt
Meredith McCarroll
Amanda Hadlock
Madeleine Barowsky
K Moore
Ron Tobey
Sarah Freligh
Nicholas Claro
Joe Artz
Lyn Chamberlin

New Book :: The Beckoning World

The Beckoning World, a novel by Douglas Bauer published by University of Iowa Press book cover image

The Beckoning World
Fiction by Douglas Bauer
University of Iowa Press, November 2022

Douglas Bauer’s newest work, The Beckoning World, is set in the first quarter of the twentieth century and follows Earl Dunham, whose weeks are comprised of six days mining coal followed by Sundays playing baseball. Then, one day, a major-league scout happens on a game, signs Earl, and he begins a life he had no idea he could even dream. But dreams sometimes suffer from a lovely abundance, and in Earl’s case, her name is Emily Marchand. They fall quickly and deeply in love, but with that love comes heartbreaking complications. The Beckoning World gathers a cast of characters that include Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig, a huge-hearted Pullman steward offering aphoristic wisdom, and countless others, not least of which is the 1918 Spanish flu taking vivid spectral form. At the center is a relentless love that Earl and Emily are defenseless against, allied as they are “in this business of their hearts.” Douglas Bauer has written several books, including Prairie City, Iowa: Three Seasons at Home (Iowa, 2008). He teaches writing at Bennington College and lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Magazine Stand :: Blue Collar Review – Summer 2022

Blue Collar Review A Journal of Progressive Working Class Literature Summer 2022 issue cover image

A “Journal of Progressive Working Class Literature,” Blue Collar Review Editors never shy away from work that addresses some of our society’s most pressing concerns. This newest issue is no exception: “The contributors in this summer issue understand the growing threat of competitive corporate dominance, of fascism and war, especially in this time of climate emergency. Close to 80% of working people support universal healthcare, climate action, voting rights, and women’s reproductive freedom. These priorities are subverted by corporate media and politicians funded by big business interests whose priorities are legislated at the expense of our freedoms, our health, and the future of life on earth. Democracy, unlike fascism, is defined by authentic public participation. Getting there from here is a continuing struggle upon which our rights and existence depend. [. . . ] This issue [of Blue Collar Review] completes twenty-five years of publication. We are grateful to be able to continue doing our part to demonstrate and encourage a mindset of social and class solidarity necessary to our struggle for a livable world and for authentic democracy.” Sample works from the most recent issues can be read online at Blue Collar Review.

Magazine Stand :: Poetry – October 2022

Poetry Magazine print publication October 2022 issue cover image

As the newly established editor of this long-standing publication, Poetry Magazine, Adrian Matejka welcomes readers with an ethusiastic Editor’s Introduction, expounding on all the ways she had intended to drive the content to “showcase the beautiful confluence of voices in contemporary poetry” and “to offer an idea of what Poetry might look like in the future.” Instead, Matejka admits, she “began this job in a convergence of ignorant and well-meaning ambition,” and she has no reservations in sharing this, as “one of the things you’ll get from me while I’m an editor here is transparency of process and editorial proclivity.” Tempering the ambitions, Matejka assures, “Instead of trying to curate a single issue celebrating the 110th year of Poetry, we are using this historic issue to begin a multi-year, long-form interrogation of the magazine’s complicated archive in hopes of illuminating some of the brilliant poets who weren’t given access in the previous decades. You get to see the beginning of that excavation in this issue as we highlight the gorgeous work of Carolyn Marie Rodgers, author of numerous books, cofounder of Third World Press, long-time Chicago resident, and a vital Black poet whose work never appeared in the pages of Poetry until now.”

Other poets whose works are featured in this issue include Adrian Matejka, Alex Dimitrov, Dāshaun Washington, Martín Espada, Ruth Ellen Kocher, Yusef Komunyakaa, Karyna Mcglynn, Trevor Ketner, Edgar Kunz, Eugene Gloria, Victoria Chang, Myronn Hardy, Winniebell Xinyu Zong, Ladan Osman, and Diane Seuss.

New Book :: The Six-Minute Memoir

The Six Minute Memoir Fifty-Five Short Essays on Life by Mary Helen Stefaniak published by University of Iowa Press book cover image

The Six-Minute Memoir: Fifty-Five Short Essays on Life
Memoir by Mary Helen Stefaniak
A Bur Oak Book
University of Iowa Press, October 2022

Culled from two decades’ worth of Mary Helen Stefaniak’s “Alive and Well” column in the Iowa Source, each essay invites readers into the ordinary life of a woman “with a family and friends and a job . . . and a series of cats and a history living in one old house after another at the turn of the twenty-first century in the middle of the Middle West.” One great aunt presides over nineteen acres of pecan grove profitably strewn with junk. A borrowed hammer rings with the sound of immortality. Famous poets pipe up where you least expect them. Living and dying are found to be two sides of the same remarkable coin. Writing prompts at the end of the book invite readers to search their own lives for such moments—the kind that could be forgotten but instead are turned, by the gift of perspective and perfectly chosen detail, into treasure. The Six-Minute Memoir encourages people to tell their own stories even if they think they don’t have the kind of story that belongs in a memoir.

October 2022 eLitPak :: Submit Your Work: Pangyrus Fiction Contest

Screenshot of Pangyrus' Inaugural Fiction Contest flyer for the NewPages October 2022 eLitPak
click image to open PDF

Deadline: December 10, 2022
Pangyrus announces its first Fiction Contest. Calling all writers of short stories! The contest is an open theme and the judge is novelist Jennifer Haigh. Cash prizes and publication for the top three winners! Please see Pangyrus‘s Fiction Contest 2022 Submittable page or view flyer for more details.

Want to get our eLitPak opportunities delivered straight to your inbox? Subscribe today!

October 2022 eLitPak :: Apply to UNCG’s MFA Program & Join their Community of Writers

Screenshot of UNCG MFA's flier for the NewPages September 2022 eLitPak
click image to open PDF

Application Deadline: January 15
UNC Greensboro’s MFA is a two-year residency program with fully funded assistantships and stipends. UNCG offers courses in poetry, fiction, publishing, and creative nonfiction, plus teaching opportunities and editorial work for The Greensboro Review. Students work closely with faculty in one-on-one tutorials and develop their craft in a lifelong community of writers. Note our new December 15th priority consideration deadline! Visit our website and view our flyer to learn more.

Want to get our eLitPak opportunities delivered straight to your inbox? Subscribe today!

October 2022 eLitPak :: Fifteenth Annual Tartt First Fiction Award

Screenshot of Fifteenth annual Tartt First Fiction Award from Livingston Press flier
click image to open PDF

Deadline: December 31, 2022
The Tartt First Fiction Award from Livingston Press at the University of West Alabama is given annually to a collection of short stories written in English by an American citizen. Writers cannot have already published or be under contract to publish a fiction collection. Winner will receive $1000, plus standard royalty contract, which includes 60 copies of the book. Visit the Livingston Press website or view flyer to learn more.

Want to get our eLitPak opportunities delivered straight to your inbox? Subscribe today!

October 2022 eLitPak :: Madville Publishing at the 2022 Southern Festival of Books

Screenshot of Madville Publishing 2022 Southern Festival of Books flyer for the NewPages October 2022 eLtiPak
click image to view PDF

Madville Publishing congratulates Pauletta Hansel, Susan O’Dell Underwood, and Jeff Hardin, all featured authors at The Southern Festival of Books this year, Friday, October 14, 12 PM – Sunday, October 16, 5 PM, in Nashville, Tennessee. We hope to see you there! (We’ll be in booth #15!) View flyer or visit our website.

Want to get our eLitPak opportunities delivered straight to your inbox? Subscribe today!

New Book :: The Red Ear Blows Its Nose

The Red Ear Blows Its Nose Poems for Children and Others by Robert Schechter Illustrated by S. Federico published by Word Galaxy Press book cover image

The Red Ear Blows Its Nose: Poems for Children and Others
Poetry by Robert Schechter
Illustrations by S. Federico
Word Galaxy Press, April 2023

If you’ve got any “littles” in your life, The Red Ear Blows Its Nose is the perfect gift book to preorder for next year’s National Poetry Month. Published by Word Galaxy Press, an imprint of the well-respected Able Muse Press, The Red Ear Blows Its Nose dishes out hilarity, wit, wordplay, and wisdom in a playfully illustrated collection of poems “for children and others.” It considers thought, identity and what it means to be a person, nature and the seasons, and includes assorted creatures, such as a horse who says “Moo,” a “Dear Earthling” letter from an invading alien, bees, ants, birds, and elephants. Several poems focus on the senses and the brain, including this thoughtful short work:

Just Wondering

For there to be a butterfly
must the caterpillar die?
Or does the caterpillar brain
in the butterfly remain?

This debut collection from Robert Schechter is complemented by S. Federico’s illustrations, which add to the possible interpretations of the works. Robert Schechter’s award-winning poetry for children has appeared in Highlights for Children, Cricket, Spider, Ladybug, the Caterpillar, Blast Off, Countdown, Orbit, and more than a dozen anthologies published by Bloomsbury, National Geographic, Macmillan, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, the Emma Press, and Little, Brown Books for Young Readers.

Magazine Stand :: THEMA – Autumn 2022

Thema print literary magazine Autumn 2022 issue cover image

The newest print issue of THEMA features works in response to the premise, “Get it over with!” Contributors include Lynda Fox, Linda Berry, Bill Glose, June Thompson, Ruth Holzer, Lisa Timpf, Margaret Pearce, Melanie Reitzel, R.G. Halstead, Jesse Doiron, Marica Bernstein, Melinda Thomsen, Matthew J. Spireng, Beverly Boyd, Linda McMullen, Dana Stamps, and Ojo Moses. For each THEMA issue, the premise must “be an integral part of the plot, not necessarily the central theme but not merely incidental.” Submissions can include prose, poetry, artwork, and B&W illustrations. Upcoming themes include “So THAT’S why” (deadline 11/1/22) and “Help from a stranger” (deadline 3/1/23). Visit THEMA for more information.

Where to Submit Round-up: October 14, 2022

Happy Friday! The leaves in Michigan are venturing towards their peak colors while the temperatures keep dropping and the long-awaited rain finally shows up in time for the harvest. Time to air out your sweaters, grab a warm drink, and get to writing and editing, isn’t it? Our Where to Submit Round-up covers new and ongoing submission opportunities to help you out.

hand holding a pen and writing in a notebook

Want to get alerts for new opportunities sent directly to your inbox every Monday afternoon instead of waiting for our Friday Where to Submit Round-ups? For just $5 a month, you can get early access to new calls for submissions and writing contests before they go live on our site, so subscribe today! You’ll also get our monthly eLitPak. View October’s, which was emailed to our subscribers on Wednesday of this week, here.

Continue reading “Where to Submit Round-up: October 14, 2022”

Book Review :: The Fastening by Julie Doxsee

The Fastening, poetry by Julie Doxsee published by Black Ocean book cover image

Guest Post by Jami Macarty

In The Fastening, Julie Doxsee’s fifth collection, the poet makes a poetry of unburdening “that feeling / she always felt”: imperiled. At the center of these poems is a “flesh-twin” of childhood that arises when a new mother’s fears for the safety of her children trigger a visitation of memories of her own lack of safety as a child:

When I am old enough, I’ll know
a mother’s sunset can’t blacken out
the underside of the door, I’ll know
I can’t stay by the river in the park
because there’s no protection
from being a girl.

(“Masterpiece of the Hijacked Girl”)

As well as being a book that plumbs the experiences of a childhood, the implications of being a daughter, and the meaning of motherhood, this is a book about survival—the precarious survival of a woman and an artist: the “rough forms of me.” In these poems, there always seems to be something inserting hooks, applying thumbs; something to get out from under so the “body / can shake this debt” of gender-blame in pursuit of the pleasure orbiting connections between life partners and between mother and sons. The pleasure that fastens a woman to her life and a poet to her “imagination— / the strobing mono-light blurring as it wails near.” With narrative concision, lyric urgency, and emotional coherence, Julie Doxsee speaks from “roadways that artists can’t / fake.”


The Fastening, Julie Doxsee. Black Ocean Press, May 2022.

Reviewer bio: Jami Macarty is the author of The Minuses (Center for Literary Publishing, 2020), winner of the 2020 New Mexico/Arizona Book Award – Poetry Arizona, and three chapbooks, including Mind of Spring (Vallum, 2017), winner of the 2017 Vallum Chapbook Award. Jami’s writing has been honored by financial support from Arizona Commission on the Arts, British Columbia Arts Council, and by editors at magazines such as The Capilano Review, Concision Poetry Journal, Interim, Redivider, Vallum, and Volt, where Jami’s poems appear. More at https://jamimacarty.com/

If you are interested in contributing a Guest Post to “What I’m Reading,” please click this link: NewPages.com Reviewer Guidelines.

Magazine Stand :: New England Review – 43.3

New England Review print literary magazine issue 43.3 cover image

Cozy into fall with the newest issue of New England Review. Whether exploring the mystery of fever and illness, violence in a synagogue, or a father or mother moving into the past tense, the pieces within frequently take on ultimate things through the earthy particular. A special feature, “Mirroring Practice: Poets Respond to Jasper Johns,” includes new poems by Rick Barot, Khadijah Queen, Cole Swensen, and Brian Teare, written in response to a recent Jasper Johns retrospective. Sushil Lee Park translates Korean women poets from previous centuries, and essays explore cities and wilderness past and present, from a police station in Lagos to the streets of Berlin to Graceland in Memphis, Tennessee. Plus new work by a dozen poets and fiction writers. Browse the full table of contents here. Single copies are available as well as subscriptions.

New England Review dedicates this issue to the memory of Marcia Parlow Pomerance, their steadfast, beloved managing editor from 2013 to 2021, who devoted herself to NER with patience, precision, good humor, and abiding compassion.

New Book :: How to Maintain Eye Contact

How to Maintain Eye Contact poetry by Robert Wood Lynn published by Button Poetry book cover image

How to Maintain Eye Contact
Poetry by Robert Wood Lynn
Button Poetry, January 2023

The 2020 Button Poetry Chapbook Contest Runner-Up, Robert Wood Lynn’s How to Maintain Eye Contact is set in three sections that explore interior uncertainty, interpersonal uncertainty, and uncertainty at a larger scale. These narrative poems, influenced by storytelling traditions, find themselves at the nexus of the intimate and the humorous, as well as the absurd and the tragic. These poems examine isolation and grief in their many forms—through heartbreak or the death of loved ones, or show us the world looking back at itself after it ends. Lynn’s poems have recently appeared in The Cincinnati Review, Narrative Magazine, Shenandoah, The Southern Review, and other journals. He splits his time between Brooklyn, New York, and Rockbridge County, Virginia. Signed copies of How to Maintain Eye Contact are available to order from the publisher’s website.

New Book :: What’s Left to Us by Evening

What's Left to Us by Evening poetry by David Ebenbach published by Orison Books book cover image

What’s Left to Us by Evening
Poetry by David Ebenbach
Orison Books, October 2022

How does one live in a world that is both beautiful and broken—a world of cherry blossoms and gun violence, fellowship and political enmity, plague and rebirth? What’s Left to Us by Evening, David Ebenbach’s unsparing and timely new poetry collection, examines the obligation—and privilege—of carrying it all. Ebenbach is the author of numerous books of fiction, poetry, and essays. He lives in Washington, DC, where he teaches creative writing at Georgetown University.

New Book :: Sit Down and Have a Beer Again

Sit Down and Have a Beer Again poetry and fiction by Greg Wyss published by Cholla Needles Arts & Literary Library book cover image

Sit Down and Have a Beer Again
Fiction and Poetry by Greg Wyss
Cholla Needles Arts & Literary Library, June 2022

The poems and stories that make up Sit Down and Have A Beer, the first chapter here, were in a chapbook published in 1977 by Realities Library. The stories and poems had been published in small press magazines impacting a small cadre of creatives in the country in those days.

The Small Press world of those days was the precursor to the internet – insane editors and publishers who believed that the established publications had simply lost touch with the creative reality of our nation. And, just like the internet, the small presses were eventually bought out by the rich folks who figured out the best way to beat them was to buy them out.

The second chapter of the book contains the other poems that were published in these mags but never collected till now.

The third chapter represents a small sample from When Life Was Like A Cucumber, the great novel about the early 1970’s that tells the story of a young man’s journey of self-discovery and sexual awakening as he tries to find his place in
post-Sixties America.

Where to Submit Round-up: October 6, 2022

Happy October! Leaves are turning color and the weather is making up its mind that it does want to be more like fall. The dog days of summer are now long gone. With cooler weather, it’s a perfect time to work hard on writing, editing, and submitting. Our weekly Where to Submit Round-up is here to help you out.

hand holding a pen and writing in a notebook

Want to get alerts for new opportunities sent directly to your inbox every week instead of waiting for our Friday Where to Submit Round-ups? For just $5 a month, you can get early access to new calls for submissions and writing contests before they go live on our site, so subscribe today! You’ll also get our monthly eLitPak (October’s is coming out next week so stay tuned!).

Continue reading “Where to Submit Round-up: October 6, 2022”

Event :: Winter 2022-23 Caesura Poetry Workshop Offerings

Caesura Poetry Workshop logo open book with red bookmark

John Sibley Williams’ Caesura Poetry Workshop has announced Winter 2022-23 virtual events! First off there is a FREE generative workshop taking place Saturday, December 10 via Zoom: Burning Down the Old Year: Writing Poems About the New Year. Then in January, enjoy a critique and generative workshops series happening each Friday while in February these will be held on Sundays.

View their ad in the NewPages Classifieds to learn more.

New Book :: Sweet, Young, & Worried

Sweet Young and Worried poetry by Blythe Baird published by Button Poetry book cover image

Sweet, Young, & Worried
Poetry by Blythe Baird
Button Poetry, November 2022

Following her successful debut, Sweet, Young, & Worried is the sophomore collection by author Blythe Baird. Invoking breathtaking imagery and punching narratives, Baird guides readers on an expedition embracing queerness, love, loss, mental health, feminism, and healing along the way. At only 25 years old, Baird is already recognized and acclaimed for her work in spoken word poetry. Originally from the northwest suburbs of Chicago, the viral writer has garnered international recognition for her performance pieces that speak urgently and honestly about sexual assault, mental illness, eating disorder recovery, sexuality, and healing from trauma. Baird graduated from Hamline University in 2018 with a dual degree in creative writing and women’s studies. In 2020, she became the recipient of the prestigious McKnight Artist Fellowship for Spoken Word administered by The Loft Literary Center in Minnesota. Signed copies of Sweet, Young, & Worried are available to order from the publisher’s website.

Magazine Stand :: Rain Taxi – Fall 2022

Rain Taxi Review of Books print publication cover image Fall 2022

The newest issue of Rain Taxi Review of Books includes an interview with Ryan Blacketter by Arthur Shattuck O’Keefe and an interview with Hillary Leftwich by Zack Koppl. There are also articles readers can enjoy: “Elements of the Icelandic Saga” by Emil Siekkinen, “The New Life” a comic by Gary Sullivan, and “On Writing in Public and Helping the Public Write” by Eric Elshtain, in addition to dozens of reviews of fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and comics.

New Lit on the Block :: Radon Journal

Radon Journal issue one online sci fi literary magazine cover image

Radon [rey-don] noun Chemistry + Journal [jur-nl] noun Literature

[entry] what happens when a group of highly educated people with more than fifty years writing experience and twenty-five years in publishing get tired of not seeing their interests represented so create a journal combining libertarian socialism with science fiction.

Initially launched without a masthead, “afraid of potential blowback against a sci-fi anarchist journal of expression,” Radon Editors now reflect, “nothing except love has come our way, and we are proud to provide a professional venue for authors of all forward-thinking stripes.”

Publishing mid-January, May, and September, Radon Journal focuses on science fiction, anarchism, transhumanism, and dystopian literary arts, though they do also look for professional digital artwork for each issue. Stories are available for free reading and download, and they will also provide any requested digital format to their patrons.

The name Radon comes from the publication’s motto: “Radical Perception.” By taking the first three letters and the last two, the editors “forged a snappier name to rally behind. That the word Radon is also a known radioactive gas is simply a delightful coincidence.”

Continue reading “New Lit on the Block :: Radon Journal”

New Book :: Anchor

Anchor poetry by Rebecca Aronson published by Orison Book cover image

Anchor
Poetry by Rebecca Aronson
Orison Books, October 2022

Threaded with epistolary poems to Gravity—envisioned as a capricious god as the author’s father began to fall frequently at the outset of a progressive illness—Aronson’s latest poems contemplate and address what anchors us, literally and figuratively. These poems excavate grief during the process of losing parents, one to physical illness and the other to dementia. But even in the midst of grief, Aronson never loses sight of the larger world, ever present in all its danger and beauty.

Magazine Stand :: The Malahat Review – Summer 2022

The Malahat Review print literary magazine Summer 2022 issue cover image

Eking out the final days of summer, there’s still time to enjoy The Malahat Review‘s newest issue, featuring Novella Prize winner Jenny Ferguson’s “Missing,” along with Poetry by Amy M. Alvarez, Jes Battis, Heather Birrell, Rose Henbest, Meghan Kemp-Gee, Michael Kenyon, Louie Leyson, Lauren Marshall, Jordan Mounteer, Heo Nanseolheon and Lee Okbong (both translated by Suphil Lee Park), K. R. Segriff, and Kenneth Tanemura; Fiction by Martha Nell Cooley; Creative nonfiction by Daniel Allen Cox and Jen Hirt; and Reviews of books by Lee Gowan, Steven Heighton, Tomson Highway, Helen Humphreys, Sarah Mintz, Leah Ranada, and Diane Tucker, as well as three anthologies AfriCANthology: Perspectives of Black Canadian Poets, Me Tomorrow: Indigenous Voices on the Future, and Best Canadian Poetry 2021. Cover art by Jinny Yu.

New Book :: The Anchored World

The Anchored World: Flash Fairy Tales and Folklore Fiction by Jasmine Sawers published by Rose Metal Press book cover image

The Anchored World: Flash Fairy Tales and Folklore
Fiction by Jasmine Sawers
Rose Metal Press, October 2022

A goat begins to grow inside a human heart. The rightful king is born a hard, smooth seashell. Supernovas burst across skin like ink in water. Heartbreak transforms maidens into witches, girls into goblins, mothers into monsters. Hunger drives lovers and daughters, soldiers and ghosts, to unhinge their jaws and swallow the world. Drawing inspiration from a mixed heritage and from history—from the fairy tales of Hans Christian Andersen to the ancient legends of Thailand, from the suburbs of Buffalo, New York to the endless horizon of the American Midwest—Jasmine Sawers invents a hybrid folklore for liminal characters who live between the lines and within the creases of race and language, culture and gender, sexuality and ability. The Anchored World: Flash Fairy Tales and Folklore is equal parts love letter to the old tales and indictment of their shortcomings, offering a new mythology to reflect the many faces and voices of the twenty-first century.

Books Received October 2022

NewPages receives many wonderful titles each month to share with our readers. You can read more about some of these titles by clicking on the “Books” tag under “Popular Blog Topics.” If you are a publisher or author looking to be listed here or featured on our blog and social media, please contact us!

Poetry

All the Blood Involved in Love, Maya Marshall, Haymarket Books
Anchor, Rebecca Aronson, Orison Books
Belly to the Brutal, Jennifer Givhan, Wesleyan University Press
Duets, Alexis Rhone Fancher & Cynthia Atkins, Small Harbor Publishing
The Elliott Erwitt Poems, Simon Perchik, Cholla Needles Art & Literary Library
F & G, D. Marie Fitzgerald, Cholla Needles Art & Literary Library
Green Burial, Derek Graf, Elixir Press
How to Maintain Eye Contact, Robert Wood Lynn, Button Poetry
How Much?, Jerome Sala, NYQ Books
How to Cut a Woman in Half, Janis Harrington, Able Muse Press
Never Catch Me, Darius Simpson, Button Poetry
O, Tammy Nguyen, Ugly Duckling Press
Poetry Mountain, David Chorlton, Cholla Needles Art & Literary Library
Selected Poems, Takuboku Ishikawa, Cholla Needles Art & Literary Library
Seven Stars Anthology 1973-1998, realities library
Sit Down And Have A Beer Again, Greg Wyss, Cholla Needles Art & Literary Library
Sweet, Young, & Worried, Blythe Baird, Button Poetry
Talk Smack to a Hurricane, Lynne Jensen Lampe, IceFloe Books
Tits on the Moon, Dessa, Rain Taxi Review of Books
What’s Left to Us by Evening, David Ebenbach, Orison Books

Continue reading “Books Received October 2022”

New Book :: Dancing for Our Tribe

Dancing for My Tribe: Potawatomi Traditions in the New Millennium by Sharon Hoogstraten published by The University of Oklahoma Press book cover image

Dancing for Our Tribe: Potawatomi Tradition in the New Millennium
Native American/U.S. History by Sharon Hoogstraten
The University of Oklahoma Press, July 2022
Hardcover, 304 pages, 9.5 X 13 format
272 Color and 32 B&W Illustrations, 2 maps

In the heyday of the Anishinaabe Confederacy, the Potawatomis spread across Canada, Michigan, Indiana, Illinois, and Wisconsin. Pressured by the westward expansion of the fledgling United States of America, they became the most treatied of any Indian tribe. Forced removals and multiple treaty-era relocations resulted in cultural chaos and an enduring threat to their connections to the ancestors. Despite these hardships, they have managed to maintain (or restore) their rich heritage.

Beginning with Citizen Potawatomi Nation, photographer and Citizen Potawatomi Sharon Hoogstraten visited all nine nations of the scattered Potawatomi tribe to construct a permanent record of present-day Potawatomis wearing the traditional regalia passed down through the generations, modified to reflect the influence and storytelling of contemporary life. While the silver monochrome portraits that captured Native life at the turn of the twentieth century are a priceless record of those times, they contribute to the impression that most Indian tribes exist only as obscure remnants of a dimly remembered past. With more than 150 formal portraits and illuminating handwritten statements, Dancing for Our Tribe portrays the fresh reality of today’s Native descendants and their regalia: people who live in a world of assimilation, sewing machines, polyester fabrics, duct tape, tattoos, favorite sports teams, proud military service, and high-resolution digital cameras.

The Potawatomi nations have merged loss and optimism to reinforce their legacy for generations to come. We learn from the elders the old arts of language, ribbonwork, beading, and quillwork with renewed urgency. Preserving Potawatomi culture, tribal members are translating traditional designs into their own artistic celebration of continuing existence, lighting the path forward for the next seven generations. Dancing for Our Tribe illustrates vividly that in this new millennium, “We Are Still Here.”

Magazine Stand :: Kenyon Review – Sept/Oct 2022

Kenyon Review print literary magazine September October 2022 issue cover image

The Sept/Oct 2022 issue of Kenyon Review includes fiction by Sena Moon, Matthew Neill Null, and Adam Wilson; poetry by Lillian-Yvonne Bertram, Jenny George, Rochelle Hurt, and Shelley Wong; and nonfiction by Tan Tuck Ming. Plus, readers will enjoy works from the winner and runners-up of the 2022 Patricia Grodd Poetry Prize for Young Writers:

First Prize: Sophie Bernik’s “Come Closer”
Runner Up: Madison Xu’s “For My Father Who Lives Alone”
Runner Up: Myra Kamal’s “Diptych on Getting from Point A to Point B”

New Book :: Selected Poems

Selected Poems by Takuboku Ishikawa edited by r soos published by Cholla Needles Arts & Literary Library book cover image

Selected Poems
Poetry by Takuboku Ishikawa
Edited by r soos
Cholla Needles Arts & Literary Library, August 2022

This book is a selection of Ishikawa’s youthful poems, and a complete imagining into English of his final collection known in English as Grieving Playthings, Sad Toys, and more specifically Suffering Playthings. For over 100 years Ishikawa’s work has been exciting for the modern reader because he was among the very first to bring the depths of his inner turmoil as a human being to life on the page.

New Book :: All the Blood Involved in Love

All the Blood Involved in Love poetry by Maya Marshall published by Haymarket Books book cover image

All the Blood Involved in Love
Poetry by Maya Marshall
Haymarket Books, June 2022

In a moment of critical struggle for reproductive justice, Maya Marshall’s haunting debut, All the Blood Involved in Love, meditates on womanhood—with and without motherhood. Traversing familial mythography with an unflinching seriousness, Marshall moves deftly between contemporary politics, the stakes of race and interracial partnership, and the monetary, mental, and physical costs of adopting or birthing a Black child. Maya Marshall, a writer, and editor, is cofounder of underbellymag.com, the journal on the practical magic of poetic revision. As an educator, Marshall has taught at Northwestern University and Loyola University Chicago. She holds fellowships from MacDowell, Vermont Studio Center, Callaloo, The Watering Hole, Community of Writers, and Cave Canem.

Magazine Stand :: Willawaw Journal – Fall 2022

Willawaw Journal online literary magazine Fall 2022 issue cover image

The newest issue of Willawaw Journal is now online for poetry and art lovers to enjoy! This issue features contributors from 22 different states and four different countries, 22 men and 19 women. Twenty-six of the forty-one poets are first-time Willawaw contributors, and an array of talent, emerging to very well-established: Kenneth Anderson, Frank Babcock, Jodi Balas, Louise Cary Barden, Carol Berg, Robert Beveridge, Ace Boggess, Jeff Burt, Natalie Callum, Dale Champlin, Margaret Chula, Richard Dinges, Rachel Fogarty, Matthew Friday, D. Dina Friedman, David A. Goodrum, John Grey, Allen Helmstetter, James Kangas, David Kirby, Tricia Knoll, Linda Laderman, Kurt Luchs, Stacy Boe Miller, Kathryn Moll, John C. Morrison, John Muro, Toti O’Brien, John Palen, Darrell Petska, Vivienne Popperl, Laura Ann Reed, Erica Reid, Lindsay Rockwell, Beate Sigriddaughter, Jeffrey Thompson, Elinor Ann Walker, William F. Welch, Charles Weld, Kevin Winchester. David Memmott is the featured artist, sharing a high-energy and high-chroma palette of work based on photo and ink drawing, which he calls his “Crooked Comix.” He is also a contributing poet.

Poem Review :: Ode on My Nightingale by Barbara Hamby

Barbara Hamby headshot

Guest Post by Aimee L.

The nightingale is often considered a songbird well known for its melodies that spur feelings of love and romance in people. It is a bird that symbolizes romanticism, which is something that Barbara Hamby’s “Ode on My Nightingale” captures. Hamby [pictured], like a nightingale, strings together a melody depicting the beauty and terror that nighttime brings—the broken dreams, regrets, the loneliness. But despite these quieter moments, she depicts a sense of wonder. “My nightingale is the conquistador of moonlight.” Reading this opening line, I felt reassured. I realized how life shines in the darkness—in the “derivative of sin,” as Hamby puts it. One passage, in particular, speaks to me: “…and I am your little god, / your drinking water straight from the stream, / for my song is spooling into the night forever / and ever, amen.” It’s a little magical.


Ode on My Nightingale” by Barbara Hamby. 32 Poems, Spring/Summer 2020.

Reviewer Bio: Aimee L. is a regular college student and aspiring “writer.”

If you are interested in contributing a Guest Post to “What I’m Reading,” please click this link: NewPages.com Reviewer Guidelines.

New Book :: Never Catch Me

Never Catch Me poetry by Darius Simpson published by Button Poetry book cover image

Never Catch Me
Poetry by Darius Simpson
Button Poetry, October 2022

Darius Simpson’s debut collection Never Catch Me centers on Black boyhood in the midwest and familial disintegration over time. Simpson pulls back the curtain, exposing the violence enacted against and upon, Black bodies, and yet, still, each poem is saturated in revolution and hope. Never Catch Me is the anthem necessary to organize a community that is committed to a better right now–one that can only be achieved with an intensity and action that goes far beyond the page. Darius Simpson is a writer, educator, performer, and skilled living room dancer from Akron, Ohio. Much like the means of production, he believes poetry belongs to and with the masses. He aims to inspire those chills that make you frown and slightly twist up ya face in approval. Darius believes in the dissolution of the empire and the total liberation of Afrikans and all oppressed people by any means available. Free The People. Free The Land. Free All Political Prisoners. Signed copies of Never Catch Me are available to order from the publisher’s website.

Where to Submit Round-up: September 30, 2022

hand holding a pen and writing in a notebook

It’s the final day of September already. The year keeps marching forward leaving us no time to take a break it seems. Don’t miss out on all the September 30 and October 1 deadlines below in our Where to Submit Round-up! And with October literally around the corner, do check out our Big List of Writing Contests for those with October deadlines and beyond.

Want to get alerts for new opportunities sent directly to your inbox every week instead of waiting for our Friday Where to Submit Round-ups? For just $5 a month, you can get early access to new calls for submissions and writing contests before they go live on our site, so subscribe today! You’ll also get our monthly eLitPak (view September’s here) along with the occasional promotional emails from advertisers.

Continue reading “Where to Submit Round-up: September 30, 2022”

Magazine Stand :: Hippocampus – Sept/Oct 2022

Hippocampus literary magazine logo

The September-October 2022 issue of Hippocampus Magazine offers fresh essays, flash CNF, reviews, interviews, and craft and writing life columns. Contributors include Rick Brown, Sarah M. Clifford, Stephanie Eardley, Aiysha Jahan, Karen Kao, Mark Lucius, Susan Morehouse, Suzanne Orrell, Brooke Randel, Sara Streeter, and Yvanna Vien Tica. Hippocampus speaks with Sabine Hossenfelder, author of Existential Physics: A Scientist’s Guide to Life’s Big Questions, and Linda Murphy Marshall, author of Ivy Lodge: A Memoir of Translation and Discovery. And readers will appreciate Kristen Paulson-Nguyen’s Writing Life column, “How a Lit Mag Can Grow You,” in which she shares how getting involved with the literary community opened doors, as well as Nicole Breit’s Craft column, “Big Writing Dreams? Here’s Why You Need to Enter CNF Contests,” which dishes some solid submissions advice.