ANNOUNCEMENTS

The 2023 Stonecoast MFA Alumni Reading Series

Join us for the 2023 Stonecoast MFA Alumni Reading Series, Part I!

• Featuring
• Lauren M. Davis (Poetry, S’15)
• Linda K. Sienkiewicz (Fiction, S’09)
• Ellie O’Leary (Poetry, W’17)

Thursday, May 18th, 7:00pm EST

RSVP here 

Are you an alum who is publishing a book in 2023? Sign up to read at our second event later this year.

The Stonecoast Writers’ Conference

We are now accepting application to the 2023 Stonecoast Writers’ Conference, which will run from the morning of Tuesday, June 20 through noon on Sunday, June 25. Stonecoast faculty members Debra Marquart and Ron Currie, Jr., will be teaching the nonfiction and fiction workshops, respectively. Because the conference runs concurrently with the MFA’s Summer Residency, you’ll have exclusive access to the faculty and programming—that means, in addition to your workshop class, participants will learn from Stonecoast faculty seminars and readings, visiting scholars, and all the attendant programming. We’ll also have special events just for conferencegoers. 

ALUMS 

Peter Adrian Behravesh (Popular Fiction, W’18) will be attending the Nebula conference in May and will be appearing on the following panels:

Creating Vast Worlds and Keeping Track of Them
May 13, 9:00 a.m. PT
(Will also be streamed)

Power and Politics in Worldbuilding
May 13, 1:30 p.m. PT
(Featuring fellow Stonecoast alum Erin Roberts!)

For the Love of Short Fiction 2022
May 13, 4:30 p.m. PT
(Will also be streamed)

Carina Bissett (Popular Fiction, S’18) is pleased to announce the April publication of her poem “Between Scylla and Charybdis” in The Future Fire. Her nonfiction essay “Words Wielded by Women” is featured in the May issue of Apex Magazine.   

KT Bryski (Popular Fiction, W’16) is pleased to announce that their debut novella Lovely Creatures is forthcoming this winter from Psychopomp.com. Read the announcement by publisher Sean Markey.

Anthony D’Aries (Creative Nonfiction, W’09)recently signed with literary agent Kim Witherspoon at InkWell Management for his novel. His essay “No Man’s Land,” a 2021 Best American Notable Essay, will appear in the 25th Anniversary edition of Sport Literate. He also recently had a short story, “Caretaker,” accepted by Red Coyote literary magazine. 

Jessica de Koninck’s (Poetry, W’11) poem “My Grandmother Talked to Dolls” was a winner in the 2023 Stephen A. DiBiase Poetry contest, and she has a poem in the next issue of the Tampa Review.

Emily Levang (Creative Nonfiction, S’19) has her essay “Walking the River Path” included in the Querencia Press Spring 2023 anthology.

Stephanie Loleng (Fiction, W’19) has been accepted to the VONA Summer 2023 Prose Residency, working with author Jamie Figueroa. Voices of Our Nations Arts Foundation is a multi-genre workshop for BIPOC writers to hone their craft and be in community. VONA honors its writers’ unique histories, traditions and aesthetics and provides a protected mentoring space for learning and fellowship. Stephanie is thrilled to continue working on a collection of short stories she started during her time at Stonecoast.

Nadja Maril (Fiction, W’20) is pleased to announce that two of her poems, “At Age Eight We Were Young Enough to Trespass” and “Lost and Found,” will be appearing in an upcoming edition of the online Arts & Culture Magazine, Across the Margin.

Suri Parmar (Popular Fiction, W’17) had her personal essay “Dealing with Your Cancer Diagnosis: An Existential Guide” published by HerStry in April 2023. You can read it here. 

Bruce Pratt (Fiction, S’04) will have two pieces in upcoming issues of Portland Magazine, a short story, “Fog Bank,” and a piece on six unique niche museums in Maine.

R.M. Romero’s (Popular Fiction, S’15) next YA novel, Death’s Country, has sold to Ashley Hearn at Peachtree Teen. A polyamorous retelling of the Orpheus and Eurydice myth set in Miami, it will be published in the summer of 2024.

Catherine Schmitt (Creative Nonfiction, W’12) enumerated the “Six Words I’m Trying Not to Use to Describe Land” for Orion.

Patricia Smith (Poetry, S’08) was appointed a creative writing professor in Princeton University’s Lewis Center for the Arts; she has also been elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and was appointed chancellor in the Academy of American Poets. Her new book, Unshuttered—a volume of dramatic monologues accompanied by 19th-century images of African-Americans—was released on February 15.

Tamie Parker Song (Creative Nonfiction, S’12) has an essay titled “A Pregnant Teenager Stuck Between Conservatives’ Judgment and Liberals’ Arrogance” out in the print edition of New Lines Magazine, which is on the newsstands in all Barnes & Noble stores in the United States! It’s about how one former Christian fundamentalist (Tamie) found her way to supporting abortion rights and what she finds so wrong about the Left’s conversation on abortion. Get your copy now—they’re selling like hot cakes!

Olive L. Sullivan (Fiction/Poetry, S’15) has been doing a mini book tour with her publisher, Meadowlark Press. The most recent stop was the New Orleans Poetry Festival. She is promoting her most recent book, Skiving Down the Bones, with a cover blurb by Stonecoast’s own Jeanne Marie Beaumount.

Lisa C. Taylor (Poetry, S’04) is co-directing the new Mesa Verde Writers Conference in Mancos, Colorado, July 13-16 along with novelist Mark Stevens. They are delighted to report that the conference is nearly full with only two openings remaining. There are manuscript critique discounts for AWP members. The conference will go to a waiting list once they reach capacity. Faculty includes Lisa C. Taylor, Mark Stevens, Alan McMonagle (from Galway), and Nick Arvin. Contact mesaverdewriters@gmail.com for more information or go to the web site listed above. Also, Lisa has been invited to be a fiction presenter in October at “Write on the Sound,” a writers conference on the coast in Washington State, and she has new poetry coming out in Third Street and North Dakota Quarterly.

Sean Ulman (Fiction, S’05) has new essay “Writing and Recreating,” available here. He also started a radio show—Seward Soundwords, local writers reading their work Live on the Air; new episodes are now available on Youtube on the channel @SAKtown.

FACULTY  

In PANORAMA: The Journal of Travel, Place, and Nature’s Issue #8, which imaginatively illuminates the theme of SPACE, Faith Adiele (Creative Nonfiction),one of its Senior Editors, sets out fresh, expansive parameters of space and movement in her Introduction that ushers in the journal’s new section, “Decolonising Travel.”

Aaron Hamburger‘s (Fiction, Creative Nonfiction) novel Hotel Cuba is here! (Release date: May 2). Booklist raves: “Steeped in rich detail…a riveting journey.” And more importantly, our own Barbara J. Kelly raves “Wonderful…a great read that you’ll thoroughly enjoy.” She’s got copies (and while you’re at it, you can pre-order Shannon Bowring’s new book too). Aaron will be hitting the road this May. Come see him in person (Boston, DC, New York) or online. Future dates this summer include Wesleyan, CT; Portland, ME; Detroit; and more! See the e-card below with details or visit the events page on his website. Also: read out Aaron’s conversation with novelist Elizabeth Graver about their family history novels in Tablet, titled “The Cuban Connection,” and check out this fun interview with Aaron in QNotes Carolinas. Finally, would you like an original mojito cookie recipe that Aaron created in honor of Hotel Cuba? Visit the Hotel Cuba page on Aaron’s website!

Elizabeth Searle’s (Fiction, Popular Fiction, Scriptwriting) feature film script, Lock Her Up, won Best Suspense/Thriller Script in the 2023 Los Angeles Film and Script Festival. Her short film FourSided—starring Rain Valdez; produced by David Ball and Amy Carpenter Scott/CreatrixFilms; based on Elizabeth’s script and novel A Four-Sided Bed—is an Official Selection and Finalist in the Lonely Wolf International Film Festival which screens in Fall 2023. Stay tuned for more movie news, Coming Soon— including about the feature film Elizabeth co-wrote, I’ll Show You Mine. See: www.elizabethsearle.net