I have work forthcoming in 140 AND COUNTING, an anthology of twitter literature originally published in Seven by Twenty. Check it out: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1431077765/140-and-counting-an-anthology-of-twitter-literatur

Note that Kickstarter provides rewards for donors. The rewards for donating to this:

$5: A copy of the anthology. (Since the book will cost $5, this is essentially a pre-order of the book.)

$10: The anthology, and two other books (poetry chapbook Blueshifting by Heather Kamins and poetry collection The Glaze from Breaking by Joanne Merriam).

$25: The above, and a thank you in a sponsor listing in the book and on the website of Upper Rubber Boot Books for the next year.

$50: The above, PLUS a one- to two-page manuscript evaluation by the editor (she may comment on aesthetics, word choice, setting, characterization, description, pacing, plot holes, marketability, and other things to consider when revising your work) on up to ten of your poems or a short story (under 5,000 words).

$100: Free copies of every book Upper Rubber Boot publishes for the next five years.

few things have gone the way I hoped

Gave up pursing the workshop in Paris 'cause I was sure I'd be part of this other thing-- the big thing #2 I'd mentioned before, but I was one of 200+ people vying for one of 17 spots and alas, I was also one of the 183+ who got a 'no.' The photo submissions have been no's a loooooooooooooooooooong time coming and the stories I stll have out are going to need to be queried about and I ammmmmmmmm tired of doing that. Three months is long enough to decide if you want a work. Really, it is.

But whatever. My creative life is headed somewhere and all of this is just part of the recipe, the end result.

just jack

the poster of Mr. Kerouac is the only thing out in the writing room. Have packed it all up.

Enjoyed my time -- my very own space-- sad to have to let it go but the next room will be bigger-- my creative self will stretch out a little more.

luggage is packed

Hard process but I have chosen 30 books to take to the residency in Vermont. They are just books about the craft so a short story collection or two will have to be bought there or be carry-ons.

Excited. Very. I feel like I'm going on a retreat.

Another anthology

not an acceptance. . . yet. My proposal for a work has been accepted-- the editors would like to give my story a look.

Yay!

This particular anthology is important and I very much want to be a part of it.

I need to get some kicka** writing done.

another anthology acceptance

yay yay

gotta return the contract . . . and the other one that's still sitting on that stack of stuff!

worked on that novel I didn't work on during NANOWRIMO

a wonderful way to spend the day!

MOM EGG Reading-- May 15, 2011

The Mom Egg Spring Launch Party and Reading
Sunday, May 15th 6-8 p.m.
Cornelia Street Cafe
29 Cornelia Street
NYC 212-989-9319
$7 admission includes
food or drink credit


A party and reading to celebrate the release of Vol. 9 of The Mom Egg, an annual journal that publishes sharp, articulate, inventive poetry, prose, fiction and art by mothers about everything and by everyone about mothers and motherhood. Come hear cutting edge poets and prose writers, and check out the new issue.

Mama says...Don’t miss it!

Featured Readers:
Margo Berdeshevsky
Cheryl Boyce-Taylor
Rosalie Calabrese
Patricia Carragon
Sarah Cavallaro
Fay Chiang
Wendy Levine DiVito
Iris Jamahl Dunkle
Jessica Feder-Birnbaum
Eleanor Gaffney
Janlori Goldman
Heather Haldeman
Lois Marie Harrod
Donna Katzin
Cheryl Keeler
Tara Masih
Rachael Nevins
Puma Perl
Rosaly Roffman
Lee Schwartz
Golda Solomon
Lydia Suarez
Tina Traster
Nancy Vona
and
Alana Ruben Free

a surprise anthology inclusion

a work published online has been selected for inclusion in an ebook to be released later this year.

way cool.

Quote for 4-21-2011

You can make anything by writing.
— C.S. Lewis

hit and miss

Got another story off to an anthology on the list. I missed a deadline this week -- well, I had to think if I wanted to pay the reading fee and I decided I didn't so actually I let a deadline pass --for an anthology and the story I had hoped would get finished for the anthology for which I received an extended deadline didn't get done. I actually got sick and did not get well enough to do anything until the day following the deadline. LOL and shaking my head.

Oh well, that's the way it goes.

another anthology acceptance

yay!


I have 23 more listed that I want to submit to-- due date is tomorrow for one and Saturday for another and I want to make that one since the publisher is cutting me some slack -- we'll see what happens. This week, lots of personal stuff and the semester's winding down, lots of grade calculating and misc.

Another decision is supposed to be made by the end of the month and another story accepted for another anthology appears to in limbo-land, hopefully that is just for the moment.

So off to write some more I am.

Well after I read student papers.

Quote for 4-14-2011

A deadline is negative inspiration. Still, it's better than no inspiration at all.


--Rita Mae Brown

I need a story

Today is a deadline for a themed journal and I have a very rough draft of a short piece which I may or may not be able to mold into something submissable.

There was an anthology that I wanted to submit to, deadline passed. I wrote the publisher and was told if I could get it in by this weekend, they'd give it a look. So I need a story on Saturday too!

Quote for 4-05-2011

You may be able to take a break from writing, but you won't be able to take a break from being a writer.


--Stephen Leigh

not the way to start a morning

a "no"-- a nice one, but a "no" just the same:(

Quote for 3-25-2011

Life is a handful of short stories, pretending to be a novel.

-- unknown

bye bye Borders

The Borders I used to frequent in Nashville is closing down. Sad to hear that but man I wish I were there, stockpiling literature!

still writing

I have today and Saturday and Sunday left to churn out fiction. And part of Monday 'cause I teach at night.

Not nearly as much writing as I wish but I get distracted-- darn the internet and youtube!

Still I will have two finished drafts of new stories today. Hope to get one more completed this weekend.

continuing on my writing mission. . .

Two Ways of Seeing: Two Sisters by Cherry Patrick Jamison

On Saturday, March 26th, Cherry Patrick Jamison will read from Two Ways of Seeing: Two Sisters at 2 pm in the Branigan Library's Roadrunner Room. The book is an equal collaboration between sisters Jamison and Virginia Patrick Hanley.

S. Derrickson Moore wrote that the book, "turned out to be a kind of Valentine, a message of love inspired by their growing-up years and later artist lives in the Southwest," in the February 13 issue of the Las Cruces Sun-News.


Writing in the March issue of The Ink, Roy van der Aa concludes, "Two Ways of Seeing is an interplay, a conversation between imagery in two art forms done sometimes years apart. The intensity of the dialogue comes from a common upbringing and values. The book transcends generations as it speaks to the curiosity, awareness and humanity found in us all."


Two Ways of Seeing will be for sale after the reading for $25 (tax included), and I will be happy to sign each book.


The book is published by Library Integrated Services (www.llibs.com) and is available locally at COAS and Hastings for $24.95 plus tax, as well as from me at 2ndsis.patrick@gmail.com.

Quote for 3-24-2011

The writer must write what he has to say, not speak it.


--Ernest Hemingway

a losing battle?

Ten more stories have dropped off the web!

Not sure if I want to continue trying to get most back on the internet.

Quote for 3-21-2011

As fantastic as it is to see your name in print, getting published shouldn't be the standard by which you determine your level of personal success or failure. … Plenty of things matter much, much more.


– Ann Edwards

up and at 'em

The plan is to use this spring break to get work done. Finish something!

We'll see how that works out, come Friday, but it's Monday morning and I'm sitting at the computer.

A start;-)

Quote for 3-19-2011

Start early and work hard. A writer’s apprenticeship usually involves writing a million words (which are then discarded) before he’s almost ready to begin. That takes a while.


– David Eddings

yay! another acceptance- another anthology

but a poem this time.

yay just the same!

another acceptance

an anthology.yay!

Quote for 3-12-11

There is not a particle of life which does not bear poetry within it.


--Gustave Flaubert

misc

Got my NEA grant application in. Last minute, but I was not planning on that. It's just that I've got fifty million things going on. Never got back to the #2 big thing but maybe next year.

an acceptance

a micro I wrote a week ago.

today I am on a mission to get some real writing done.

so I've got to get to that.

a sign?

I haven't got my application together for big thing #2 and I was just going to let it go but yesterday I got an email that said you asked for an application, but you haven't applied and the deadline's around the corner. . .

Maybe it's a sign for me to get the app together.

Maybe?

almost, almost

This weekend I get to order the last of the furniture for my writing room. A desk, a hutch and a second file cabinet.

My writing room!!!!

In the house I had previously, it originally had one bedroom. Additional bedrooms were added later. The room I had was the original one bedroom and it was located between the kitchen and the only bathroom in the house. Also because I had more stuff, it was my writing room and partial storage room. A space but not necessarily conducive to creating.

Now I have a room that has a door. Very necessary for creating.

I have spent a lot of time on this room, this creative space and I LOVE IT.

It is variations of brown, light and dark, wood and wicker. Bursts of green: the floor pillows, the plants, the lamp. Jack stares at me with those dark wild eyes, reminding me to seek madness. A young, brooding Marlon is there just to remind me that life is oh so sexy. The stereo plays Bach or Brahms or Vilvaldi; accompanying is the trickling water from the fountain on the table by the chair. A candle to light my way or incense to heighten my senses.

A shelf of books and journals says your work is here and here and here.

Shelves of books encourage me to learn this and this and this.

A wall of awards says you've accomplished that and that and that.

The desk and hutch will take up one wall adjacent to the one with the window. I can turn, look over my shoulder and see the world. I can turn back and return to my creative one.

This time next week, I will have what I have always wanted as a writer. A nurturing peaceful place to create art as well as myself.

Lisa McMann Book Tour

Tuesday, Feb 8, 2011, 7pm
MYSTERIOUS GALAXY BOOKS
7051 Clairemont Mesa Blvd. #302
San Diego,CA

Wednesday, Feb 9, 2011, 7pm (with NYT bestselling author Kiersten White -- Paranormalcy)
BARNES & NOBLE - OCEANSIDE
2615 Vista Way
Oceanside,CA

Thursday, Feb 10, 2011, 4pm
MRS. NELSON'S TOY AND BOOK SHOP
1030 Bonita Ave.
La Verne,CA

Friday, Feb 11, 2011, 7pm (with Katie Alender of the Bad Girls Don't Die series)
BARNES & NOBLE
1201 3rd St. Promenade
Santa Monica, CA


Saturday, Feb 12, 2011, 3pm
UNIVERSITY BOOK STORE
15311 Main Street
Mill Creek,WA

Sunday, Feb 13, 2011, 3pm (with Caridad Ferrer -- When the Stars Go Blue)
BARNES & NOBLE
19401 Alderwood Mall Parkway
Lynnwood,WA

Tuesday, Feb 15, 7pm
BARNES & NOBLE
2825 West Main St.
Bozeman, MT

Wednesday, Feb 16, 6:30pm
MURDER BY THE BOOK
2342 Bissonnet St.
Houston,TX

Thursday, Feb 17, 7pm
BLUE WILLOW BOOKSHOP
14532 Memorial Dr.
Houston,TX

Friday, February 18, 2011, 7pm
A Real Bookstore
113 Prairie Road, Fairview, TX 75069

Saturday, February 19, 2011, 3pm
BOOK PEOPLE BOOKSTORE
603 North Lamar Blvd
Austin,TX

Saturday, Feb 26, 2011, 3pm
The Poisoned Pen
4014 N Goldwater Blvd. Suite 101
Scottsdale, AZ 85251

Saturday, March 12, 2011
Tucson Festival of Books
Tucson, AZ

Saturday/Sunday March 19 & 20, 2011
Teen Author Festival NYC
more info to come


Monday, March 21, 2011, 7pm

Little Shop of Stories
133A East Court Square
Decatur,GA


Tuesday, March 22, 2011, 7pm

BARNES & NOBLE #1955
7660 Northpoint Parkway
Suite 200
Alpharetta,GA

Accepted

I am now listed in the Poets & Writers directory.

I'm beginning to feel professional now.

Quote for 1-18-11

Central to natural writing is an attitude of wonder.

--Gabriele Lusser Rico

Big thing #3

I need to get a NEA fellowship application together.

got my application in

for an opportunity which would be a boost for my writing career. We'll see what happens.

Some photo rejections and a story acceptance, a reprint back up on the web.

I need to be writing more though. Find myself a groove and get in it.

Lisa, T.J. and Ellen

Three successful writers with big stuff happening in February. I'll be posting reviews, book signings, etc.

Yes, soon.

Stretching

Applying for something huge.

Actually two huge things, but one seems more likely than the other because the early deadline has passed for one and I'm not sure if I'll get to the final deadline but I'm gonna try.

Creativity quote for 1-09-11

It is better to create than to be learned, creating is the true essence of life.


--Barthold Georg Niebuhr

another chance to read

but I've been to Michigan! A two-day festival and I might, maybe, participate but I need to go to Oregon and Idaho and lots of other states where I haven't been.

Gotta get started on Paris

Finding a place to stay and a flight.

So excited to go out of the country-- first time 'cause I don't think Juarez Mexico really counts.

A'no' from Highlights

but it was a poem and the guidelines state that poetry is used sparingly. Don't feel so bad. Don't feel so great, but . . .

GJM -- visual artist

Had a pic in The Shine Journal. Another work has been accepted for a journal's online cover! Yay!

Put 31 more photographs out there. Have another 11 ready; just need to find more journals that accept art.
Opened another email acct (not that I need another) but the only way I'm going to keep submissions straight.

The Best of Eclectic Flash available

Yep-- a work of mine in there.

Go here.

Invited to read

and I said yes. Something about the date was nagging me so I looked up the NJ event. Same day!

Well, the NJ event happens every month so I'm calling to see if I can reschedule.