Jeanette Winterson’s Holiday Recommendations

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“This is a great one to give—it’s the sort of thing you can keep in the loo at Christmas when you’ve eaten too much food.” Jeanette Winterson reveals some of her favorite books for the holiday season, including The Trouble With Women (Andrews McMeel Publishing, 2016) by cartoonist Jacky Fleming, Tara Westover’s Educated: A Memoir (Random House, 2018), and her own collection of winter tales and festive recipes, Christmas Days: 12 Stories and 12 Feasts for 12 Days (Grove Press, 2016).

Diana Khoi Nguyen

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“What may exist between appearance, and disappearance, between sound and silence, as something that is nearly nothing…” Diana Khoi Nguyen, a finalist for the 2018 National Book Award in poetry, reads from her debut poetry collection, Ghost Of (Omnidawn Publishing, 2018). Nguyen is featured in “Wilder Forms: Our Fourteenth Annual Look at Debut Poets” in the January/February issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

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Weekend Contest Deadlines

Planning to submit your work this weekend? The writing contests listed below all share a deadline of December 15, and offer opportunities for poets, fiction writers, and nonfiction writers looking to submit a single work or a full-length book.

Center for Book Arts Letterpress Poetry Chapbook Competition: A prize of $500 and letterpress publication by the Center for Book Arts is given annually for a poetry chapbook. The winner will also receive an additional $500 to give a reading with the contest judge at the Center for Book Arts in New York City in Fall 2019, and a weeklong residency at the Winter Shakers Program at the Millay Colony for the Arts in Austerlitz, New York. Edwin Torres will judge. Entry fee: $30.

LitMag’s Virginia Woolf Award for Short Fiction: A prize of $3,500 and publication in LitMag is given annually for a short story. A second-place prize of $1,000 will also be given. The winners will have their work reviewed by Sobel Weber Associates literary agency. The editors will judge. Entry fee: $20.

Public Poetry’s Poetry Contest: A prize of $1,000, publication in an e-book anthology, and an invitation to give a reading in Houston, Texas, is given annually for a poem on a theme. This year’s theme is “Enough.” Entry fee: $15; $20 for three poems.

Santa Fe Writers Project James Alan McPherson Award: A prize of $1,000 and publication by 2040 Books, an imprint of the Santa Fe Writers Project, is given annually for a book of fiction or creative nonfiction by a writer of color. Gish Jen will judge. Entry fee: $25.

Willow Books Literature Awards: Two prizes of $1,000 each and publication by Willow Books are given annually for a poetry collection and a book of fiction or creative nonfiction by writers of color. Entry fee: $25 for poetry; $30 for fiction or nonfiction.

Visit the contest websites for complete submission details, including eligibility guidelines and poem length requirements. For a look at more writing contests with upcoming deadlines, visit our Grants & Awards database and submission calendar.

You Get Fat When You’re in Love

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“Your buttons can’t hold all the love / rippling up the middle of your ribcage…” José Olivarez reads his poem “You Get Fat When You’re in Love” from his debut poetry collection, Citizen Illegal (Haymarket Books, 2018). Olivarez is featured in “Wilder Forms: Our Fourteenth Annual Look at Debut Poets” in the January/February 2019 issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

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Editor’s Note

The Eternal Optimism of Creative Minds

I wish I could say I always see the glass as half full, that a brilliant glow of optimism illuminates my every thought, but it’s not quite as straightforward as that.

Dani Shapiro on Memoir Writing and Twitter

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“If you’re on Twitter and Facebook and sharing there, there’s no pressure of concealment, and I think good memoir comes out of that place.” Dani Shapiro, whose fifth memoir, Inheritance: A Memoir of Genealogy, Paternity, and Love (Knopf, 2019), is featured in Page One in the January/February issue of Poets & Writers Magazine, talks with Literary Hub’s Emily Temple about how social media could have an adverse effect on writing and storytelling.

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