ANNOUNCEMENTS

As we prepare for the winter 2025 residency (January 10–January 19, 2025), here are just a few of the highlights we are looking forward to. This winter, Stonecoast will once again gather at the Harraseeket Inn in Freeport, Maine, where students and faculty can enjoy the cozy atmosphere and the welcoming tradition of afternoon tea by the fireplace. We’re thrilled to welcome some remarkable guests this season, including Michael Burke, Adrian Blevins, Colin Cheney, Ian-Khara Ellasante, and Zahir Janmohamed, who will bring their unique perspectives and expertise to our community. If you can only attend one event this January, we highly encourage you to join us on Friday, January 17th for The Task Before Us: Reshaping Power with Words. This powerful event will feature alumni Joseph Jackson (Poetry, ’15), Kevin St. Jarre (Popular Fiction, S’10), and poet Anne Wrobel, who will read from their work and engage in a thoughtful exploration of how writing can deconstruct oppressive systems and foster personal and collective healing. This special event is part of Stonecoast’s WISE (Writing for Inclusivity and Social Equity) initiatives. Robin, Justin, and Nikki would like to extend their heartfelt gratitude for your ongoing support and are looking forward to welcoming all who can join us during the residency.

Stonecoast MFA: Winter 2025 Alumni Schedule

The Mesa Verde Literary Festival is still looking for writers willing to travel to Mancos, Colorado, on July 12 for a daylong celebration of writers and writing. All applicants must have at least one published book. Both the author and their books will be promoted and can be sold at the festival. All chosen writers (this is competitive since we already have more than 30 applicants and aspire to around 30-35) will be expected to do at least one activity in town—a reading, serve on a writing panel, or a mini-workshop. The festival will take place in a gorgeous mountain town amid art galleries, boutiques, and restaurants (including two very good coffee shops). Mancos is seven miles from Mesa Verde National Park and is in a valley surrounded by mountains. It is 30 minutes from the lively city of Durango and 90 minutes from Telluride. Apply through the conference web site www.mesaverdewritersconference.org. The conference (held in town in 2025) will be July 10 and 11 with a kickoff public reading on July 9. Registration for the conference opens mid-February and it fills quickly since there is only capacity for 30 students. Breakfast and lunch (but not accommodations) are included. Our poet this year is January Gill O’Neil and our fiction writer is Angie Hodapp. Both Mark Stevens and Lisa C. Taylor are also faculty members.

ALUMS 

Peter Adrian Behravesh (Popular Fiction, W’18) has been promoted to Senior Editor at Insight Editions, where he will continue to oversee the growth of the Mandala and EarthAware imprints, acquiring mind/body/spirit and environmental advocacy titles. The Oxford Handbook of Monsters in Classical Myth, featuring Peter’s essay, “Pearls from a Dark Cloud: Monsters in Persian Myth,” is now available in the US. You can order it here. Finally, nominations for the 2025 Nebula Awards are now open, and Peter’s interactive novel, Heavens’ Revolution: A Lion Among the Cypress, is eligible for Best Game Writing. If you’re a member of the Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers Association, and you enjoyed Heavens’ Revolution, please consider nominating it.

Kathy Briccetti (Creative Nonfiction, W’07) is pleased with the most recent sensitivity read of her novel: “Gripping from the start, Whether They Be is a novel of lush imagery and cultural touchstones that awaken national bruises, unflinchingly. Inventive and well developed, it is an honest look at the subtle and not so subtle race-inspired harm in the lives of Nebraskans who feel real on the page. Besides local issues, [the] novel paints a compelling picture of the Vietnam War’s effects on politics and communities, and on the powder keg of race in the U.S…and what it means to be a woman. A mother. Wife.” –Natasia Deón, sensitivity reader, NAACP Image Award Nominee for Outstanding Literature, attorney and author

Jennifer Dupree (Fiction, W’15) is excited to share that her second novel, What Do You Want from Me? (Apprentice House Press, April 2025), is now available for preorder from Amazon.com (and hopefully other places, too).

Nina B. Lichtenstein (Creative Nonfiction, S’20) welcomes all to Maine Writers Studio’s January 22nd Literary Salon & Open Mic, with literary & artist guest Cliff Hakim who will talk about his project behind his beautifully illustrated and inspirational book Walk In My Shoes. Bring a friend and something to read (5 minutes) at Open Mic! Find out more here. 

Jeanette Lynes‘ (Fiction/Poetry, S’05) fourth novel, The Paper Birds, will be published by HarperCollins Canada in June 2005. The Paper Birds is a historical romance about women codebreakers during World War II.

Jenny O’Connell (Creative Nonfiction, S’17) recently accepted a full time job writing for the Appalachian Mountain Club, where she serves as staff writer, content developer, and managing editor of the AMC Outdoors blog. She’s putting her 15-year outdoor guiding career to work in the form of immersive climate and environmental storytelling aimed at inspiring her audience to care for the natural world, such as last May when she kayaked 100 miles down the Crooked and Presumpscot rivers on a source to sea expedition from Bethel, Maine, to Casco Bay, raising awareness around watershed deforestation alongside professional outdoor photographer Andy Gagne. Their adventure is the focus of an upcoming documentary by Maine Mountain Media, which is set to air in March 2025. Also, Jenny is putting the finishing touches on the second proposal for Finding Petronella, her debut book project that traces her 2014 solo trek across Finland following the footsteps of a legendary woman beyond the Arctic Circle, which her agents plan to take out on submission in 2025. (She’s hard at work on the second draft of the book, too—it was the subject of her thesis at Stonecoast, and after nearly a decade, it’s finally coming out right!) Jenny’s other favorite creative outlet is Wild Story, her Substack, where she shares essays for the wild-hearted, prompts, and notes on writing from the place where a life outdoors meets the creative journey. 

Marisca Pichette (Popular Fiction, S’21) is thrilled to share the cover of her forthcoming novella, Every Dark Cloud, which will be published in March 2025 by Ghost Orchid Press! This eco-horror story takes place in a post-climate disaster work shrouded in artificial cloud—but some things even darkness fails to conceal. Pre-orders are officially open, and you can also find the book on Amazon and Goodreads!

Bruce Pratt (Fiction, S’04) has poetry in Maine Arts Journal (“Alone” and “Gunmetal Grey”), Sport Literate (“Compulsory Figures”), and 12 Willows North Woods at Night (“Lunar Eclipse”). Forthcoming poetry will appear in Gray’s Sporting Journal (“Martha 1914”) and Aethlon: The Journal of Sport Literature (“The Big Ballyard in the Bronx,” “Baseball Was Always Enough,” and “Goliath”). Short story “Winter Ball” is forthcoming in The Twin Bill.

As promised, podcast interviews around sid sibo‘s (sidney woods, Fiction, W’19) The Scent of Distant Family debut novelare currently available from Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers and the Animal Rescue Podcast, plus a print interview with The Maine Review. Curious writer Jill Quist also has a new podcast, Voice Lessons: Uncovering and Claiming your Unique Creative Voice, which will feature a conversation with sibo in February. Quist is actively seeking interested creatives, especially but not limited to writers, who might join her in exploring her topic.

Tamie (Harkins) Parker Song (Creative Nonfiction, S’12) has been writing essays on her Substack recently about her work this past year with Gazans and her ongoing work with children in Gaza. You can read her Substack here: https://tamieparkersong.substack.com/

Lisa C. Taylor (Poetry, S’04) has two new poems in the current issue of The Heartland Review. Her forthcoming novel, The Shape of What Remains, will be widely released on February 18. The Kindle edition is available for pre-order. If anyone is willing to write a review, Lisa can send you a review galley. Email her at lisactaylor22@gmail.com. Pre-reviews can be posted on Goodreads and Amazon after February 18. Thank you! 

FACULTY  

JJ Amaworo Wilson‘s (Fiction, Popular Fiction) short story “Euphoria,” published in November 2024 by Consequence, has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize.

Aaron Hamburger (Fiction, Creative Nonfiction) will be Faculty in Residency at the Rutgers-Camden MFA Program starting in January. He’ll be reading there from recent work on January 29th at 6:00 p.m. Aaron will also be in New York on a panel for the Italian Literary Fiction Festival, to celebrate receiving the Bridge Book Award for Hotel Cuba. Come say hello to him at noon on Thursday, January 16th at Rizzoli Bookstore, 1133 Broadway, New York, NY.

Elizabeth Searle (Fiction, Popular Fiction, Scriptwriting) will be reading new fiction at Newtonville Books on January 19th at 2:00 p.m. at the launch of Solstice magazine’s Winter 2024 issue. And Elizabeth has film news: along with major streamers like Peacock and Amazon Prime, I’ll Show You Mine (the feature film Elizabeth co-wrote) is now also available to watch for free—with ads—via Sling, the Roku Channel and Fandango at Home.