The Novel Fosters Community

Pulizter-Prize winning author Junot Diaz filled the room (two, in fact, with the event televised in a second room due to the enormous crowd) at the 2009 CityLit Festival.

After a reading from The Brief Wonderous Life of Oscar Woa, he opened the floor to questions. During the session, he was asked whether he was intentionally trying to confuse people who “didn’t get” science fiction references or know Spanish.

His answer was interesting.

Diaz explained that the intent of a novel is to foster community. He said that he imagined a situation in which a fan boy on a bus would reach out to an old Dominican grandmother and ask what something meant, or vice versa.

Although the creation of a novel is a solitary thing, it is designed to encourage community – the gathering together of people to discuss the novel and what is in it.

Just an interesting thought to come out of the brief, wondrous session of Junot Diaz at this year’s CityLit Festival! (The image of the fan boy and Dominican woman having a conversation they normally would have is a scene worthy of a Diaz novel itself.)

Learn more about Junot Diaz at www.junotdiaz.com.

Julia Alvarez Announced as Next F. Scott Fitzgerald Literary Honoree

Popular novelist Julia Alvarez has been announced as the 2009 honoree for the prestigious F. Scott Fitzgerald Literary Award. She will accept the award at the 14th Annual F. Scott Fitzgerald Literary Conference on October 17.

Julia Alvarez is an author who excels in multiple fields of writing: storybooks for children, young adult books, nonfiction, poetry — and most notably, novels. She is best known for critically acclaimed novels How the García Girls Lost Their Accents and In the Time of the Butterflies. More recent fiction includes Return to Sender and Saving the World.

In being selected as an F. Scott Fitzgerald Honoree, Julia Alvarez Leonard joins an impressive group of talented authors. Previous award winners to accept the Fitzgerald award at the annual conference in Rockville, Maryland include John Updike, Norman Mailer, E.L. Doctorow, Joyce Carol Oates, Ernest J. Gaines, Edward Albee , William Styron, John Barth, Grace Paley, Pat Conroy, William J. Kennedy, and Jane Smiley. Last year’s honoree was Elmore “Dutch” Leonard.

Support comes from the City of Rockville, Montgomery College, Arts and Humanities Council of Montgomery County, Gazette Newspapers, the Rockville Cultural Arts Commission, Peerless Rockville Historic Preservation, Ltd., Vermont Coffee Company, The Legacy Hotel & Meeting Center of Rockville, Roundhouse Theater and the F. Scott Fitzgerald Society.

Learn more about Julia Alvarez and her work at her website.
http://www.juliaalvarez.com/

Make plans to see Julia Alvarez in person at the next F. Scott Fitzgerald Literary Conference on October 17, 2009. Stay tuned to the conference website for details as they become available.
www.peerlessrockville.org/FSF

Smile, Hon, You're Invited!

William P. Tandy, the editor of Smile, Hon, You’re in Baltimore, invites you to get hot and bothered this summer with Issue No. 11, the latest installment in the award-winning series published by Eight-Stone Press. Listen to authors read from the zine and get your copy autographed at the Smile, Hon, You're in Baltimore! No. 11 Release Party at Cyclops Books!

The event will feature William P. Tandy, Caryn Coyle, Fernando Quijano III, Jen Michalski, Alex Hewett, Eric D. Goodman and more!

Here are the details …

WHO: Eight-Stone Press and Cyclops Books

WHAT: "Smile, Hon, You're in Baltimore!" No. 11 Release Party

WHERE: Cyclops Books, Corner of Maryland Ave. and North Ave., Baltimore

WHEN: Wednesday, June 17, 7:00 p.m.

WHY: Because Detroit will never be able to take it away from us.

HOW: They're bankrupt.

Cyclops is right on the corner of Maryland and North, and there is PLENTY of parking on both avenues. And after 6 is free!

Learn more at www.eightstonepress.com/hon/hon11.htm.

Smile, Hon, You're Published!

Well, that’s almost what the editor said.

I’m smiling because my fiction has been published in the latest issue of Smile, Hon, You’re In Baltimore!

For a little literary zine, it packs a big punch. Smile, Hon, You’re In Baltimore! has gotten rave reviews from UTNE Reader, Urbanite and Pop Candy (USA Today’s Blog).

Baltimore Magazine named Smile, Hon, You're in Baltimore! the city's "Best Zine" in its August "Best of Baltimore 2008" issue.

Baltimore City Paper also called Smile Hon Baltimore’s best zine, describing it as “surprisingly fascinating, consistently absurd, and often weird as hell . . . Baltimore at its bizarre best.”

Zine World says Smile Hon “adequately captures Baltimore's grit and glitter, horror and heroes.”

The Johns Hopkins Newsletter says, “Smile Hon revels in Baltimore's every eccentricity”

Even Maryland Mayor Martin O’Malley (how’s that for alliteration?) said that Smile Hon “caused a bit of a stir in my office.”

My story, “Little B&O,” is featured in the latest issue. “Little B&O” is an outtake from TRACKS, my novel in stories. Other authors in issue 11 include Caryn Coyle, Fernando Quijano III, Ben Shaberman, Rosalia Scalia and Alex Hewett.

Learn more — and see the cover — at the link below.


http://eightstonepress.com/hon/hon11.htm

JMWW Extends an Invitation You Shouldn't Refuse

JMWW, the popular literary journal based in Baltimore, invites you to a celebration of the first three years of print anthologies featuring the best work from the online quarterly.

This is the anthology series and literary journal that the Baltimore City Paper says “hooks you from the fist paragraph. A hybrid of poetry and prose, of cold-blooded talent pigtailed with aspiring word artists, JMWW has a cough-syrup twang that keeps you reading. Something addictive about it provokes the dormant writer within.”

My story, “Futures,” is featured in volume II of the trilogy — and everyone knows act two is the best, right?

That’s debatable, because all three volumes of this anthology series offers something for everyone. This Saturday at Cyclops Bookstore, authors from the second and third anthologies will share their work.

Here’s your invitation — directly from the JMWW editor herself:

Cyclops Bookstore (formerly The Baltimore ChopShop) and JMWW (http://jmww.150m.com/) are proud to celebrate JMWW’s authors with a special evening featuring readings from the second and third anthologies. Join editor Jen Michalski along with writers Jessica Anya Blau, William Duell, Pete Pazmino, Justin Sirois, Joseph Young, Savannah Schroll Guz, and Eric D. Goodman.

Copies of the third anthology will be on sale for $7.

Join us for the best pizza in town at Joe Squared afterward.Cyclops is right on the corner of Maryland and North, and there is PLENTY of parking on both avenues. Cyclops will even pay for your meter — just park and come in real quick for some change. After six is free too!

Date: Saturday, June 6, 2009
Time: 5 p.m. to 7:00 p.m.
Location: CyclopsStreet: 30 W. North Ave., Baltimore, Maryland

Learn more about JMWW and browse the latest issue at http://jmww.150m.com.

“Futures” Published in JMWW Literary Anthology

My story, “Futures,” was published in JMWW Literary Journal’s annual print anthology.

JMWW is a popular literary journal based in Baltimore. Although it has a Baltimore flavor, the quarterly online journal publishes fiction, poetry, non-fiction and reviews from around the world. Once a year, it selects the best items of the year to include in a print anthology.

“The writing hooks you from the fist paragraph,” says the Baltimore City Paper of JMWW. “A hybrid of poetry and prose, of cold-blooded talent pigtailed with aspiring word artists, JMWW has a cough-syrup twang that keeps you reading. Something addictive about it provokes the dormant writer within.”

My story, “Futures,” is an excerpt from TRACKS, my novel in stories that takes place on a train traveling from Baltimore to Chicago. The story offers readers attention to place, romance, breakup, transition, heartache (in the most literal sense) and hope.

Other authors included in this print anthology are Rafael Alvarez, Nathan Leslie and Christian Bell. Authors featured in other JMWW issues include Jessica Anya Blau, William Duell, Pete Pazmino, Justin Sirois, Joseph Young and Savannah Schroll Guz.

Learn more about the JMWW anthology at the following link, where you can even order your own copy!


www.lulu.com/content/1728622

See the latest issue of the online journal here.


http://jmww.150m.com/