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The Last Bookstore opened in 2005 in a loft in downtown Los Angeles. It is now the largest independent bookstore in California, with over 250,000 new and used books. A record shop and coffee bar fill out the ground floor and their calendar has many music and literary events.
Edward Kelsey Moore shares what inspired him to write the novel The Supremes at Earl's All-You-Can-Eat. Moore says he wanted to capture, "that feeling of hearing a story told across the dining room table or at the kitchen counter." Read how Moore met his agent Barney Karpfinger in the July/August issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.
This past Friday a South African couple finished a sixty-five-hundred-mile journey by rowboat from Morocco to New York City. It took them six months to paddle their twenty-three foot vessel, named Spirit of Madiba in honor of Nelson Mandela, across the Atlantic Ocean. This week, write a story about what you imagine such a journey would be like. Consider the dangers of crossing such a massive body of water, and what it would feel like to spend that much time sharing such a small space with another person.
"With first drafts, the best feeling, and sort of the rarest, is when I also don't know what's going to happen.... It's a wonderful pleasure, you're writing the way a reader reads." In this video from the Chicago Humanities Festival, Karen Russell speaks with Time Out Chicago's Laura Pearson about her process. Russell shares how she found her agent Denise Shannon in the July/August issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.
PEN American Center has announced the shortlist for its annual literary awards, which this year will give nearly $150,000 in prize money to established and emerging writers and translators. The awards are given for works of poetry, fiction, nonfiction, translation, and children’s books.
“The PEN Literary Awards bring together writers, editors, and members of the literary community to celebrate the ultimate fruit of free expression: great literature,” said PEN Executive Director, Suzanne Nossel. “These shortlists represent a remarkable array of diverse talents.” In May, PEN issued the first longlist for the awards, in an effort to bring greater attention to the books submitted for the prizes.
The final winners will be announced on September 29 in New York City at the PEN Awards Ceremony, cosponsored by the New School.
On Wednesday night, PEN also announced Ron Childress as the winner of the PEN/Bellwether Prize for Socially Engaged Fiction. The biennial prize, founded and funded by novelist Barbara Kingsolver, is given for an unpublished novel by an author whose work “addresses issues of social justice and the impact of culture and politics on human relationships.” Childress will receive $25,000, and his novel And West Is West will be published by Algonquin Books in Fall 2015. Terry McMillan, Nancy Peral, and Kathy Pories judged.
Established in 1922, the New York City–based PEN American Center works to “ensure that people everywhere have the freedom to create literature, to convey information and ideas, to express their views, and to make it possible for everyone to access the views, ideas, and literature of others.” PEN American Center has administered its Literary Awards for almost 50 years.
Below is a full list of finalists in each category:
PEN/Robert W. Bingham Prize ($25,000): To an author whose debut work—a first novel or collection of short stories published in 2013—represents distinguished literary achievement and suggests great promise.
A Constellation of Vital Phenomena (Hogarth), Anthony Marra
Brief Encounters With the Enemy (The Dial Press), Saïd Sayrafiezadeh
Everybody’s Irish (FiveChapters Books), Ian Stansel
Godforsaken Idaho (Little A/New Harvest), Shawn Vestal
The People in the Trees (Doubleday), Hanya Yanagihara
Judges: Charles Bock, Jonathan Dee, Fiona Maazel, and Karen Shepard
PEN/Diamonstein-Spielvogel Award for the Art of the Essay ($10,000): For a book of essays published in 2013 that exemplifies the dignity and esteem the essay form imparts to literature.
Forty-One False Starts (Farrar, Straus & Giroux), Janet Malcolm
Let’s Explore Diabetes With Owls (Little, Brown and Company), David Sedaris
The Faraway Nearby (Viking Adult), Rebecca Solnit
Critical Mass (Doubleday), James Wolcott
Judges: Geoff Dyer, Stanley Fish, Ariel Levy, and Cheryl Strayed
PEN/E. O. Wilson Literary Science Writing Award ($10,000): For a book of literary nonfiction on the subject of the physical or biological sciences published in 2013.
The End of Night (Little, Brown and Company), Paul Bogard
Five Days at Memorial (Crown), Sheri Fink
High Price (Harper), Carl Hart
Surfaces and Essences (Basic Books), Douglas Hofstadter & Emmanuel Sander
Wild Ones (Penguin Press), Jon Mooallem
Judges: Akiko Busch, Rivka Galchen, and Eileen Pollack
PEN Open Book Award ($5,000): For an exceptional book-length work of literature by an author of color published in 2013.
Duppy Conqueror (Copper Canyon Press), Kwame Dawes
Leaving Tulsa (University of Arizona Press), Jennifer Elise Foerster
domina Un/blued (Tupelo Press), Ruth Ellen Kocher
Cowboys and East Indians (FiveChapters Books), Nina McConigley
Ghana Must Go (Penguin Press), Taiye Selasi
Judges: Catherine Chung, Randa Jarrar, and Monica Youn
PEN/Jacqueline Bograd Weld Award for Biography ($5,000): For a distinguished biography published in 2013.
Lawrence in Arabia (Doubleday), Scott Anderson
Holding On Upside Down: The Life and Work of Marianne Moore (Farrar, Straus & Giroux), Linda Leavell
Margaret Fuller (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt), Megan Marshall
American Mirror: The Life and Art of Norman Rockwell (Farrar, Straus & Giroux), Deborah Solomon
A Life of Barbara Stanwyck (Simon & Schuster), Victoria Wilson
Judges: James Atlas, Lisa Cohen, and Wendy Gimbel
PEN/ESPN Award for Literary Sports Writing ($5,000): To honor a nonfiction book on the subject of sports published in 2013.
Collision Low Crossers (Little, Brown and Company), Nicholas Dawidoff
The Sports Gene (Current), David Epstein
League of Denial (Crown Archetype), Mark Fainaru-Wada & Steve Fainaru
The Emerald Mile (Scribner), Kevin Fedarko
Their Life’s Work (Simon & Schuster), Gary M. Pomerantz
Judges: Joel Drucker, Chad Harbach, and Jackie MacMullan
PEN/Steven Kroll Award for Picture Book Writing ($5,000): To a writer for an exceptional story illustrated in a picture book published in 2013.
Train (Orchard Books), Elisha Cooper
Tea Party Rules (Viking), Ame Dyckman
The King of Little Things (Peachtree Publishers), Bil Lepp
Crabtree (McSweeney’s McMullens), Jon & Tucker Nichols
Judges: Mac Barnett, Ted Lewin, and Elizabeth Winthrop
PEN Award for Poetry in Translation ($3,000): For a book-length translation of poetry into English published in 2013.
Even Now: Poems by Hugo Claus (Archipelago), David Colmer
Diaries of Exile by Yannis Ritsos (Archipelago), Karen Emmerich & Edmund Keeley
Collected Haiku of Yosa Buson by Yosa Buson (Copper Canyon Press), Takako Lento & W.S. Merwin
Paul Klee’s Boat by Anzhelina Polonskaya (Zephyr Press), Andrew Wachtel
Cut These Words Into My Stone: Ancient Greek Epitaphs (Johns Hopkins University Press), Michael Wolfe
Judge: Kimiko Hahn
PEN Translation Prize ($3,000): For a book-length translation of prose into English published in 2013.
An Armenian Sketchbook by Vasily Grossman (New York Review Books), Elizabeth & Robert Chandler
Transit by Anna Seghers (New York Review Books), Margot Bettauer Dembo
The African Shore by Rodrigo Rey Rosa (Yale University Press), Jeffrey Gray
The Emperor’s Tomb by Joseph Roth (New Directions), Michael Hofmann
Autobiography of a Corpse by Sigizmund Krzhizhanovsky (New York Review Books), Joanne Turnbull & Nikolai Formozov
Judges: Ann Goldstein, Becka McKay, and Katherine Silver
Photo: Ron Childress, credit PEN American Center
"I think of a book as an extended hand, it's a gesture, from someone who has attempted to make meaning out of their own experience." Author Alex Gilvarry speaks with Scott Cheshire about his debut novel High as the Horses' Bridles—the story of a child preacher, his faith, and his vision of the end of the world. An interview with Cheshire by Victor LaValle is in the July/August issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.
"Life, in general, is both comic and tragic. In every moment of real sadness, you can almost find something hysterical to laugh at." Debut novelist Mira Jacob discusses The Sleepwalker's Guide to Dancing with tuxedo-clad five-year-old Zakir. Jacob was interviewed by Amanda Eyre Ward for the just-released July/August issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.
For the tenth and final installment of this summer's Winners on Winning series, we spoke with Jessica Hollander, who won the 2013 Katherine Anne Porter Prize for Short Fiction for her debut story collection, In These Times the Home is a Tired Place. The annual prize includes $1,000 and publication by the University of North Texas Press. Originally from Ann Arbor, Michigan, Hollander received her MFA from the University of Alabama, where she currently teaches English, composition, and creative writing.
How has winning this award impacted your career?
The most exciting part about winning has been engaging with the larger writing community. Getting reviews and interviews and being invited to participate in readings and events is invigorating and has certainly gotten my writing more exposure. I’ve also received a handful of contacts from agents and editors, and I recently signed with an agent.
Has winning this award, or previous awards, changed the way you approach your work?
I think winning the award has reinvigorated my enthusiasm to experiment with short stories. I took risks in structure and language in this collection, and winning the award has encouraged me to continue to do so. There’s such a range of publishing opportunities for collections, so many small and university presses with varying aesthetics, so it’s not necessary to think about a mainstream market. I like taking risks from story to story and focusing on what’s exciting me about the writing.
Have you ever entered a contest that you didn't win?
I’ve entered tons of contests that I didn’t win. In These Times the Home is a Tired Place had been turned down by several contests and presses before winning the Katherine Anne Porter Prize. There are so many different aesthetics out there, so many different readers and judges, and there’s no way to predict who might love your work. It’s a lesson I learned when submitting to literary journals, when it would sometimes take a dozen tries before placing a piece. Not to mention I’ve disliked many books that received praise by others, and I’ve loved books that others have hated. Of course rejections still hurt enough that it can be hard to write for a day or two. I try to accept that disappointment is inevitable.
What advice would you offer to writers thinking of submitting to writing contests?
Don’t count on anything in this writing life, but throw your name in the hat as much as you can afford. I suggest first having your writing workshopped by experienced writers you trust, and it doesn’t hurt to get stories or novel excerpts published before sending full books to contests. These things can help you weather rejections better. Because the writing world is insanely competitive. My whole experience being a writer, from applying to graduate schools, getting published in magazines, winning contests, and now seeking tenure-track employment, has taught me to not be too emotionally invested in the outcome of anything. Getting published or winning a contest is the second most satisfying thing that can happen to a writer, but the most satisfying has to be writing itself.
To read more from winners, check out the previous weekly installments of our Winners on Winning series.
Photo: Jessica Hollander, credit Richard Mocarski.
Descriptions offer clarity, and the more detailed your descriptions of events, places, and people, the more fully the reader can experience the emotion and ambiance you are trying to establish. This week, make loads of detailed lists. Make them everywhere you go: the supermarket, your car, the park, your bedroom. Use all five senses to classify where you are, how you're feeling, and what those feelings make you think of. When you're writing a scene about a sticky summer morning on the bus, you'll be able to look back at your list and use the notes you made about the condensation on the windows, or the crying child in the seat behind you.
Read exclusive excerpts from the novels and story collections of debut fiction writers Courtney Maum, Scott Cheshire, Celeste Ng, Yelena Akhtiorskaya, and Mira Jacob.
