Emerging Writers Network

Short Story Month 2013 - Stop Here, My Friend by Merrill Joan Gerber

Stop Here, My Friend was originally published in 1963  and is a wonderful short story collection that I have had the pleasure of reading to proof read the eBook that Dzanc Books is putting out in our rEprint collection--this title should be available this forthcoming week.

Reading one of the later stories again very early this morning, I hit the line:

"The wound of my Aunt Beth's grave isnot yet healed, and beside it a new one is open."

This thought by the protagonist, Janet, at the funeral of her Uncle Ben. Her Aunt Beth had been dead less than a year; there was still not even a tombstone at the site of her grave.

For whatever reason that image jumped into my head and I realized just how many times Merrill Joan Gerber had done that in this collection--taken a pretty common moment and created a unique image or thought about that moment. With maybe the most amazing thing about that  to me is that this collection is being re-released 50 years afterit first appeared and yet the stories and writing are still extremely relevant. In the early 60's, Merrill Joan Gerber was writing things in a way that I'm still not seeing today on a regular basis.

The above line comes from the story "We Know That Your Hearts Are Heavy," which was published by The New Yorker as was one other. Other stories inthe collection were published by Mademoiselle, Redbook and The Sewanee Review.

The more I read from Gerber's work the more excited I get to have found a writer with a shelf plus full of books to fall into whenever I want, not having to wait 2 or 3 years for her next book to come out (side note--not SSM related, but Gerber related--her newest work, the novel The Hysterectomy Waltz, has just printed and will be available online and in stores extremely soon!). Pick up one of her eBooks now and see if you don't get hooked too. (one other side note--Gerber also does water paintings and the artwork from the cover is from her as well).

 

Short Story Month 2013 - Dzanc - All Over by Roy Kesey

Throughout the month I'm going to go through various Dzanc or Dzanc-related titles and in the case of the Dzanc published works, discuss what it was that caught at least my own eye (not wishing to speak for Steve).

All Over by Roy Kesey

The first book that Dzanc Books accepted for publication. This was back when we thought we'd publish a book (or maybe two) per year and so while there were many manuscripts we liked, we were looking for one that we loved and loved more than the others we really liked.

One thing Steve and I had done was ask the editors of about a dozen literary journals that we really thought highly of if they knew of any authors that they'd published that were having problems finding homes for a book they had completed. Aaron Burch of Hobart suggested Roy (immediately reminding Steve and me that we had just previously been disucssing the story Roy had published in Orchid).

It was pretty clear very quickly that this was what we were looking for. One of our readers burnt lunch the day she was reading the manuscript as she completely forgot she had something on the stove. What caught my own attnetion was the attention that Roy had obviously placed on not just the ideas behind the stories, but the structures he'd use for each, and  the wordplay--the sentences themselves. This was a person in love with words and language and using them in an expert manner. One that was a true chameleon when it came to styles and structures--if a story was best served to be in the form of nothing but responses to assumed job interview questions, so be it. And the stories had heart; there weren't characters I didn't care about.

Truly,  once we started reading the manuscript, we PLOWED through it without stopping and shared dozens of emails deciding very quickly that this was the book that we wanted to show the world what Dzanc was looking to publish. I know that the fact it was the first one has something to do with this, but it's still right there at the top of my list when anybody asks me to pick from amongst the titles we've published as my favorite. I know for a fact it's the one I've read the most times and that's not simply because it's the oldest.

 

Dzanc Books - The Hysterectomy Waltz

Very happy to be sending the following letter out tomorrow with galleys of Merrill Joan Gerber's The Hysterectomy Waltz, which Dzanc Books is publishing May 14, 2013.

Dear Reviewer,

I am happy to send for your consideration our next release, Merrill Joan Gerber’s novel The Hysterectomy Waltz, scheduled for publication May 14, 2013.

I first encountered Gerber’s writing a little over a year and a half ago while reading her earlier novels and short stories that Dzanc is publishing as eBooks in our rEprint series.  I realized, while reading her work, that she has been an important writer since the early sixties, when she published her first novel, An Antique Man.  Her stories have won many prizes, including an O. Henry Award, and her novels likewise, have won a Pushcart Editors’ Book Award as well as the Ribalow Prize from Hadassah Magazine “for the best English language novel on a Jewish theme.”

Merrill has been writing about sexuality from a woman’s point of view long before it became fashionable. She has also been a fantastic addition to the Jewish American library of literature. My thoughts upon entering the world she’s created in The Hysterectomy Waltz is that we are publishing a female version of Steve Stern, with her usage of black humor to delve deeply into a subject that has seemingly scared other writers away over the years— hysterectomy and what it does to a woman’s life. Gerber’s tale is definitely one that will cause you to reconsider everything you might believe you knew about this surgery—all of it presented with a wild, funny, and sometimes dark and biting humor.

Fiction writer, critic, and essayist, Cynthia Ozick, wrote of The Hysterectomy Waltz: “It's truly powerful, and acrid, and barbed, and filled with wonderful, and unexpected, turns of phrase, and above all it's shocking in its directness and understated anger and sadness and fear. In short, it's an amazing piece of writing. It will fly into print!”

Merrill Joan Gerber has published over two dozen titles including the award-winning King of the World and The Kingdom of Brooklyn. She teaches fiction writing at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, California.

If you need any additional information, please do not hesitate to contact me directly, by email or by phone. Thank you for your consideration!

Sincerely,

Dan Wickett
Executive Director
Dzanc Books

Merrill is also seeing the majority of her backlist (16 of her past works) being re-published through Dzanc's rEprint series--eight of which are currently available.

Dzanc Books Receives Matching Donation

Last week Dzanc Books sent out an email and announced at their website that they had received an anonymous matching donation up to $6,000 for any donations received before December 31, 2012.

Any size donations are helpful--a dollar means two dollars, five means ten and so on.

Truly, ANY amount helps--that five that turns into ten helps us get two to three review copies of our books our to reviewers; money goes  to our publishing, our promotion of literature, as well as our programs like the Dzanc Writer in Residence Program with a writer visiting/teaching the same class of children once per week in the schoolroom about the power of words--to write and read creatively.

 

www.dzancbooks.org/support/ is the place to visit and donate. ALL donations, no matter the amount, will see the wonderful person donating to Dzanc put into a drawing to potentially receive a copy of every title we published in the year 2012.

 

Thank you.

Dzanc Books Poetry Collection Competition

Dzanc Books announces the Dzanc Poetry Collection Contest, an annual prize for a book of poetry.  The judge for the inaugural contest will be C. Dale Young. The contest is open to new and published poets, and we invite submissions of poetry in all modes and aesthetics. The Dzanc Poetry Collection Contest-winning manuscript will be published in high quality trade paperback and eBook versions. The winning author will receive a $500 advance and a standard Dzanc publishing agreement including support for readings and distribution via Consortium and our network of eBook distributors. Finalist and runner-up manuscripts may also be considered for publication.

 THE JUDGE

 C. Dale Young is the author of three collections of poetry: The Day Underneath the Day (Northwestern 2001); The Second Person and Torn (Four Way Books 2007, 2011).  His poems and stories have appeared in numerous magazines, journals, and anthologies, including several installments of The Best American Poetry series.  A recipient of fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Rockefeller Foundation, and the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, he practices medicine full-time, edits poetry for the New England Review, and teaches in the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers.

 SPECIFICS

 The contest deadline is January 31, 2013.

• The winner will be announced in the second quarter of 2013. All entrants will be notified of the winner by email before the announcement is made public.
• Previously published excerpts or individual pieces are acceptable as part of your entry, but the manuscript as a whole must be unpublished.
• Simultaneous submissions are acceptable, but entries should be withdrawn immediately if accepted elsewhere.
• Once submitted, manuscripts  may not be revised without a complete withdrawal and the payment of a new entry fee.
• You may enter the contest as many times as you like, but each entry will require its own separate entry fee.

Relatives, close friends, and/or former students of C. Dale Young should not enter this contest, and will not be eligible to win in the case of their entry. If such a winner is selected, the manuscript will be disqualified at our discretion, and no refund of entry fees will be granted.

Andy Plattner Receives Dzanc Books Mid-Career Novel Award

Per the Dzanc Books News blog:

 

ANDY PLATTNER WINS DZANC MID-CAREER NOVEL AWARD

August 14, 2012, Ann Arbor, MI—Dzanc Books is pleased to announce that Andy Plattner is the winner of our 2011 Mid-Career Novel Award.  Plattner’s manuscript, Offerings from a Rust  Belt  Jockey, was selected from more than 100 submissions.  This collection will be published in October 2013.

Steven Gillis, Publisher and Co-Founder at Dzanc Books, notes:  “Andy Plattner's Offerings From A Rust Belt Jockey is a dead on the money infectious novel.   The writing is hilarious and touching, the narrative, and each of Andy's fully realized characters, presents a perfectly pitched tale of love and ambition, honor and betrayal. The ability to be at once funny as hell and at the same time heartbreakingly accurate in the depiction of what it means to be human with all of our flaws and wants and needs is captured with a marksman's eye.  Dzanc is pleased and proud to have Andy Plattner as the winner of our Mid-Career Novel Award.”

“Dzanc is a smart, purposeful press,” Plattner said upon winning. “I know my manuscript will benefit from this collaboration.”

ABOUT ANDY PLATTNER

Andy Plattner’s first story collection, Winter Money, originally published in 1997, is set to be re-released in paperback from the University of Georgia Press at the start of 2013. (The collection won the Flannery O'Connor Award in 1997.) His second story collection, A Marriage of Convenience, was  published last year. He has stories in the current editions of The Southern Review and Fiction, have forthcoming work in The Sewanee Review and apt. Plattner lives in Atlanta with his wife, Diana.

FINALISTS

The short list of finalists consisted of novels from Margo Berdeshevsky, Maria Flook, Karen Osborn, Micah Perks, Russell Rowland, Chris Torockio, Mary Troy, and Edra Ziesk.

ABOUT THE MID-CAREER AWARD

While at times it seems the publishing industry is only interested in the next big thing, we at Dzanc recognize the value of experienced writers who have gone through the process of creating and publishing two or more books. Mid-career writers are the backbone of our industry yet often these writers are overlooked and have a harder time finding a publisher than first time writers. More details can be found at www.dzancbooks.org/submissions/

Dzanc's Dog Days of Summer Sale

Read Them  While They're Hot!

The titles pictured here are the three most recent Dzanc titles: Josip Novakovich's essays: Shopping for a Better Country; Matt Dojny's novel, The Festival of Earthly Delights; Jennifer Spiegel's short story collection, The Freak Chronicles--and the next three titles with set dates for publishing: Josh Russel's novel, A True History of the Captivation, Transport to Strange Lands, & Deliverance of Hannah Guttentag; George Singleton's short story collection, Stray Decorum; and Luis Jaramillo's Dzanc Short Story Collection Contest winning collection, The Doctor's Wife.

Each of these is available if you're taking advantage of the Buy One Get One at an Equal of Lesser Value Free option of the sale.

The other option available is five titles for $25 (including eBooks and free shipping) or ten titles for $50 (also including eBooks and free shipping).

Novella Month - Preparations for Search by Joseph McElroy

I'm always a little lost in the wilderness when it comes to just what exactly is a novella. Two years ago I had a few authors that had published novellas give me their definitions but I'm afraid they were mostly a little too smart for me. I know I don't simply believe it's a word or page count. I think there's something that differentiates a novella from a long short story, and from a short novel as well--I just don't know what exactly that is.

A long-winded introduction to say that I'm not fully sure that Joseph McElroy's Preparations for Search is a novella, but it feels like it to me. Originally this material was a portion of McElroy's novel, Women and Men, that was removed. He published it rather quietly in the journal Formations in 1984. Small Anchor Press then published it as a square-bound book with some slight revisions to the text that sold out rather quickly. It has recently been published in eBook form by Dzanc Books in their rEprint Series with an introduction by Mike Heppner.

From this introduction:

In conversation with Joseph McElroy, I once described his short novel Preparations for Search in genre terms as "noir-core," in which the conventions of noir are flattened and compressed into dense, jet-black space, a gravitational singularity...There's a sense of noir in Preparations for Search as well, "noir" as defined by George Tuttle as a subcategory of hardboiled detective fiction in which "the protagonist is usually not a detective, but instead either a victim, a suspect, or a perpetrator"...One could say that McElroy, in both his novels and short fiction, invites us to become sleuths as we plunder, decode, hypothesize about and interrogate his information-rich narratives. But what makes Preparations for Search "noir-core" is McElroy's approach to tempo and tone. Here the prose is so tightly wound—the pace accelerated to two-hundred beats-per-minute—that what we're left with is the structural essence of noir without the flabby clichés.

An example of McElroy's writing, Preparations for Search begins:

     It was only money, but it was quite a lot of money and I told him I felt I couldn't let him have it. Enos said he could understand. I said what he did with the money was his business, but--eleven hundred dollars to pay a detective to track down someone Enos hadn't seen since he was two? He looked me in the eye and asked if it was true that what he did with the money was his business. "What money?" I said, and he laughed and said didn't I mean whose money?

And so it begins. That last line of what I've quoted of Heppner's introduction perfectly describes McElroy's work here. The pace of the book does accelerate with the lack of excess, or cliche, that one might expect from a more standard work. It allows for a quick read, which to be honest I was very happy for as I actually immediately went back to the start to read it again as the prose is not just accelerated but simply lovely. There's a rhythm to it, a flow that is fascinating. It has me more than ready to tackle the slightly over 1000 page long Women and Men--but that will be after Novella Month is over.

 

Dzanc Books to Publish Robert Coover!

Dzanc Books just issued a Press Release--exciting news!                                                  

 

Dzanc Books to Publish Robert Coover

May 29, 2012 - Ann Arbor, MI—Dzanc Books is proud to announce that it will publish The Brunist Day of Wrath, the sequel to Robert Coover’s award-winning debut novel, The Origin of the Brunists, in September 2013. Dzanc Books will also publish an as yet untitled Coover short story collection in September 2014. The Dzanc rEprint Series will be publishing ten of Coover’s backlist titles to eBook form beginning in August 2012 and running on up through August 2013. Titles include the aforementioned award-winning The Origin of the Brunists; Pricksongs & Descants; The Public Burning; Spanking the Maid; Gerald's Party; A Night at the Movies, or You Must Remember  This; Whatever Happened to Gloomy Gus of the Chicago Bears; Pinocchio in Venice; John's Wife; and Ghost Town.

Robert Coover has published fourteen novels, three short story collections, and a collection of plays since The Origin of the Brunists received the The William Faulkner Foundation First Novel Award in 1966. At Brown University, where he has taught for over thirty years, he established the International Writers Project, a program that provides an annual fellowship and safe haven to endangered international writers who face harassment, imprisonment, and suppression of their work in their home countries.  In 1990-91, he launched the world's first hypertext fiction workshop, was one of the founders in 1999 of the Electronic Literature Organization, and in 2002 created CaveWriting, the first writing workshop in immersive virtual reality. Michiko Kakuntaini of The New York Times has said “Of all the postmodern writers, Robert Coover is probably the funniest and most malicious, mixing up broad social and political satire with vaudeville turns, lewd pratfalls, and clever word plays that make us rethink both the mechanics of the world and our relationship to it.” Coover has also received awards from the Lannan Foundation, American Academy of Arts and Letters, National Endowment of the Arts, and the Rea Lifetime Short Story Award.

Dzanc's Executive Director, Dan Wickett, said of the acquisition:  "We are thrilled to be able to bring out both new and past work from Robert Coover, a favorite author of ours here at Dzanc Books for many years. To be able to bring back many of his older works to a new readership is extremely exciting and to see him return to West Condon and the Brunists after all these years with a simply fantastic novel is something we’re very happy to be a part of."

This signing was made through Robert Coover’s agent, Georges Borchardt.

About Dzanc Books

Dzanc Books was created in 2006 to advance great writing and to impact communities nationally with our efforts to advance literary readership and our advocacy of creative writing workshops and readings. As a non-profit, 501(c)3 organization, Dzanc Books not only publishes literary fiction, but works in partnership with literary journals to advance their readership at every level. Dzanc is also fully committed to developing educational programs in schools.

For more information on Dzanc Books and its mission, imprints, books, authors, awards, and programs, please visit www.dzancbooks.org.

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National Short Story Month - Trio of Dzanc!

Three story collections I cannot wait to see enter the world are a trio of collections that Dzanc Books is bringing out before the end of the year: Jennifer Spiegel's The Freak Chronciles (June), Luis Jaramillo's The Doctor's Wife (October), and George Singleton's Stray Decorum (November).

The short stories in this collection explore, both implicitly and explicitly, the notion of freakiness.  They worry over eccentricity, alienation, normalcy, and intimacy. What is it that makes one a freak, makes one want to embrace quirkiness, have the fortitude to cultivate oddity? Is there a fine line between abnormality and the extraordinary?  Jennifer Spiegel’s stories delve into these questions and others.

Winner of the Dzanc Short Story Contest, Luis Jaramillo's The Doctor's Wife pushes the limits of what a short story collection can be. In stylish, intimate, and devastating short flashes, Jaramillo chronicles the small domestic moments, tragic losses, and cultural upheavals faced by three generations of a family in the Pacific Northwest, creating a moving portrait of an American family and the remarkable woman at its center.

Eleven stories, all previously published in journals like The Atlantic, Oxford American, and The Georgia Review, in which George Singleton brings small-town South Carolina alive. Using everyday situations like a dog needing its annual vaccination and buckets of humorous observations, Singleton pokes and prods his readers into realizing we're all simply restless for a pat on the head.