The WWS members included in this post published their work in amazing places during March and April of 2024. I’ve included an excerpt from published pieces (if available), along with a link (if available) to where the pieces can be purchased and/or read in their entirety.
Please join me in celebrating our members who published in March and April of 2024!
Continue reading “March and April 2024 Publication Roundup”Women Who Submit is proud to serve woman-identifying and nonbinary writers across the nation and the world through our Chapters program. Started in 2017 by cofounder, Ashaki M. Jackson, WWS Chapters has continued to grow under the leadership of Chapters Director, Ryane Granados with support from Chapters Liaison and WWS-Long Beach Chapter Lead, Lucy Rodriguez-Hanley. We thank Ryane and Lucy for their last four years of service. Together they have been essential in making WWS resources available and accessible to countless writers and community members.
Women Who Submit is excited to share that Ryane Granados’ first book, The Aves, won the 2023 Leapfrog Global Fiction Prize and is slated for publication in fall 2024! As she takes on this new chapter in her writing career, she bids farewell to WWS Chapters. WWS thanks Ryane for her commitment and grace and sends many claps and cheers for what’s to come! As we like to say in orientation, once a WWS member, always a WWS member!
Women Who Submit is proud to welcome our new Chapters Team! We happily announce as Chapters Director, our former Chapters Liaison, Lucy Rodriguez-Hanley, and introduce as Chapters Liaison, WWS member and collaborator, Thea Pueschel.
Please read below for a farewell message from Ryane and an introduction from Lucy and Thea.
Literary Play Cousins: A Farewell Message From Ryane Granados:
Recently my inquisitive middle son asked me why he had so many cousins. I only have one sister, so when I married my husband, I was drawn to his familial bonds that came with multiple siblings through biology and marriage. In addition to the cousins who carry the same surname, my son also has the privilege of play cousins. These enduring connections defined my childhood, and in turn they are enriching his. Play cousins are a mainstay in the Black community and they are bonds born from chosen family. These relationships transcend ancestral ties and date back to slavery when families were often torn apart. In my son’s case, his play cousins are the kids of our closest friends. The arrangement is best described as a braid with a group of threads crossing over and under each other into one.
This same braided image comes to mind when I think of my role as Chapters Director for Women Who Submit. I accepted the role at a crossroads both professionally and personally. I had stepped down from a tenured teaching position to manage the medical needs of another one of my children, and I found myself in search of an identity that encompassed retired professor, overwhelmed mom, artist, activist, author, and hopeful community builder. This braid had a lot of threads, but what it was missing was the cultural continuity of close-knit networks. This is what I liken the development of our WWS chapters to be. Expanding our organizational reach was a worthy endeavor, but for me, it wasn’t purely altruistic. In all sincerity, I was in search of literary play cousins and as our chapters grew, I found them. In New Chapter Lead Orientations, I would often joke about the idea of meeting chapter leads all across the globe; a kindred connection of cousins with the shared mission of encouraging women and non-binary writers to submit their work for publication.
I am grateful for my time as Chapters Director and after 4 plus years and 35 plus chapters, I find myself at a new crossroads. My gratitude for this journey is matched only by my appreciation for the partnership formed with my longtime Chapters Liaison, Lucy Rodriguez-Hanley. In the ongoing spirit of leadership development, another unexpected byproduct of WWS, I am excited to hand over the role of Chapters Director to Lucy. Additionally, she will be working in collaboration with Thea Pueschel, our new Chapters Liaison. Together they are exceptionally suited to help usher the chapters direction of Women Who Submit into a new and exciting season.
As for me, I am stepping down to focus once again on family, professional commitments, and the launch of my forthcoming novella. I am also stepping out with an identity fortified by my braided connections and my multitude of literary play cousins. In my season as Chapters Director, I was given as much as I gave, and I hope that my interactions will leave a lasting impression on our ground-breaking artistic community.
In Solidarity,
Ryane Nicole Granados
Outgoing WWS Chapters Director
WWS Member
Welcome
Q & A with the Chapters Team: Introducing Chapters Director, Lucy Rodriguez-Hanley and Chapters Liaison, Thea Pueschel
How and when did you first hear about Women Who Submit and how did you first become involved?
LUCY RODRIGUEZ-HANLEY: In 2013 I took a memoir workshop with writer/editor Seth Fischer. He encouraged the women in the class to join Women Who Submit. At the time, I had no idea the positive impact this community would have in my life. I’ve gotten published by my sheroes; Vanessa Martir, Reyna Grande and Myriam Gurba. I have benefited from mentorship and a myriad of resources that have helped develop my voice as a writer. I have two young children and have found solidarity with other moms in the community. The people I’ve met have become favorite people and/or the most fantastic friends.
THEA PUESCHEL: I first heard about WWS from the Airing out Your Dirty Laundry Workshop I took at the 1888 Center in Orange, CA. The facilitator asked me if I had been submitting my work. I responded maybe once or twice a year just to validate that I am not a literary writer. She told me I needed to join the WWS. This was before the Lockdown times, and so I had to wait 6 months to attend an in-person orientation. The first time I submitted with WWS was May 11, 2019, according to Submittable.
What excites you about working with WWS Chapters?
LRH: I love community building and encouraging women and nonbinary writers to submit their work to publications. I am an optimist, every month I see the change this organization is making when our members get published, even the rejections count. Facilitating opportunities, spreading our mission and sharing resources with our chapters, like our upcoming 2024 Summer Workshops or soliciting submissions to our anthology or grants is very gratifying.
TP: Helping others facilitate the magic of bringing more voices to the literary landscape.
What is something you wish people knew or understood about the WWS Chapters?
LRH: A chapter can be as simple as two writers getting together to submit their work to publications. You don’t need big numbers to be a successful chapter. As a Chapter Lead your sole duty is to host the gathering and cheer submissions on (most of us clap when a submission has gone out). You are not there to read someone’s work, facilitate a workshop or provide feedback. You can have multiple people leading a chapter, you can also have multiple chapters in the same region (Los Angeles and the Bay area both have multiple chapters).
TP: Each WWS chapter is a support network. A net to catch us when we get those hard-hitting rejections. A cheering squad for when we get those hard-won yeses. An audience to clap when we put our big kid chonies on and submit. For those of us humans that have come up as creative lone wolves for years and decades because we may not have the creative connections or known how to maneuver the literary world the WWS Chapters offer support. A village for us to walk on our two legs, to transform from lone wolf creatives to writers with a community. I think additionally, it’s such an important space particularly for those of us who grew up working class without connections whether we were the first generation to go to college or were bitten by the creative bug without formal education. WWS chapters bring experience, and resources.
Not all WWS Chapters are the same, but they are all worthwhile and community based.
If someone was interested in starting a chapter in their area, how might they begin that process and what does it look like?
LRH: If possible, I suggest attending a meeting to make sure it is something you want to take on. Ask yourself why you want to lead a chapter and what you’d like to gain from the experience. Do you want to lead alone or co-lead with one or two people? The process is simple, after filling out an application, we schedule an orientation where we share information, resources and best practices about the organization and the submission process. We also have a social media manager that can help you spread the word when you are ready to launch your chapter.
TP: It’s pretty easy peasy… 1. Check the WWS website for orientation dates, 2. Follow the direction and guidelines on the WWS website and submit your packet of interest to start a WWS Chapter, 3. Patiently wait while we analyze the materials, 4. Once you get your invite attend a WWS orientation, 5. Ask us questions!
We’re all writers and creatives first at WWS, what are you working on these days? Do you have any exciting news to share?
LRH: I am writing 500 words per day. The last six months have been hard for me on the creative front. I started a writing challenge this month led by fellow mom and WWS member, LiYun Alvarado. It’s a lot of shitty first drafts but I’m writing again! The goal is to get back to my memoir in May. I’m really happy about this and celebrating every day that I write a new page.
TP: Right now, I am in the process of having rehearsals for two plays that I am directing for the Short + Sweet Hollywood 10-minute play festival. I haven’t directed in a decade, so I am extremely excited about this.
In 2021, I had a solo exhibition of mixed media work at the Center in Orange. I realized that once the triptych of large format paintings stood next to each other I wasn’t pleased with how they looked. Separate I felt that the intention was clear, but when the series was lined up, I realized they just didn’t work. I like the foundation of the original paintings but feel that more is missing than my desired effect which is about displacement. I’ve been in the process of making smaller concept mockups and playing with color and design in my studio.
Monday, June 17th 6pm-7:30pm I am leading a FREE workshop Discovering Your Subconscious Thematic at the Cerritos Library in the Skylight Room. It’s a journey of personal discovery for writers. It provides a safe space to sift through the stories that attract us and analyze our own work. By discovering our personal theme, we are able to connect on a deeper level with our own work and create more generative flow.
Join Women Who Submit in celebrating the publication of our third anthology, TRANSFORMATION! Thanks to the work of Managing Editors, Ryane Granados and Noriko Nakada, Advising Editor, Tisha Marie Reichle-Aguilera, eight Genre Editors, Lorinda Toledo, Erin Anadkat, Flint, Laura Sturza, Luivette Resto, Hazel Kight Witham, Aruni Wijesinghe, Lucy Rodriguez-Hanley, and publisher Nikia Chaney and Jamii Publishing, our third anthology features poetry, fiction, creative nonfiction, and drama from 42 women and nonbinary writers from around the world.
“Given these perilous times of great global and local humanitarian
failures, cruel objectives cemented by morally repugnant mindsets,
and given the history of violence which has proven all too
predictable, I know my words may appear hugely insufficient in
protecting the most vulnerable, may prove never to be enough to
diminish the sorrow and suffering of others, and yet as a writer,
I continue to write.”
Inspired by these words by Helena Maria Viramontes, shared at her AWP 2020 keynote address, Women Who Submit’s third anthology, TRANSFORMATION, centers work that speaks to the ways writers and other artists can promote change in the world.
To order a copy, visit our partner and bookseller, Libromobile.
TRANSFORMATION BOOK RELEASE PARTY WITH WEHO ARTS
Saturday April 13, 2024, 2pm-5pm
Plummer Park: 7377 Santa Monica Blvd, West Hollywood, CA 90046, at the Great Hall patio
Readings by liz gonzález, Erika Ayón, Lisa Cheby, Sandy Yang, Aruni Wijesinghe, and Monona Wali
Hosted by Angela Franklin
Music by DJ Langosta
And now with a welcome from special guest, WeHo Poet Laureate, Jen Cheng.
The party will include snacks, book cake, and expo of LA literary orgs and booksellers.
This is a free event and open to all!
The WWS members included in this post published their work in amazing places during February 2024. I’ve included an excerpt from published pieces (if available), along with a link (if available) to where the pieces can be purchased and/or read in their entirety.
Please join me in celebrating our members who published in February 2024!
Continue reading “February 2024 Publication Roundup”
The WWS members included in this post published their work in amazing places during January 2024. I’ve included an excerpt from published pieces (if available), along with a link (if available) to where the pieces can be purchased and/or read in their entirety.
Please join me in celebrating our members who published in January 2024!
Continue reading “January 2024 Publication Roundup”
The Association of Writers and Writing Programs (AWP) Conference is next week, and Women Who Submit is here to help you maneuver through the mayhem. If you’re unfamiliar with the AWP conference, it is the largest writers conference in the nation that lasts four days. It’s typically in the winter, and it moves around the country each year. Next year, AWP 2025 will be in Los Angeles! We’re already thinking about what fun event we can do to celebrate.
If you are attending AWP Kansas City, WWS hopes to help you with a list of events from our members as well as from writers, presses, schools, and orgs we love and support. Look through the listing and find the folks you’d like to link up with. My favorite thing to do at AWP is attend a couple of panels featuring my friends. It’s always nice to support your community, and seeing friendly faces at the front of the room is calming. Plus, I know I’ll never be disappointed (there’s a reason they’re my friends).
If the bookfair is where you like to spend your time, be sure to visit Women Who Submit at the Kaya Press table #838. We will be selling copies of our newest anthology TRANSFORMATION, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday from 9am-12pm. Come say hi!
A quick list of dos:
Drink water
Carry snacks
Take breaks outside the convention center
Say yes to invitations to coffee, lunch, or dinner
Support friends
WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 7, 2024
PANEL: Embracing the Body: A Journey of Illness and Celebration
9:00 am to 10:00 am
Virtual
Panelists: Maria Maloney, Carolina Monsiváis, Elisa Garza, Katherine Hoerth, Laura Cesarco Eglin
Description: Throughout our lives, we encounter various health challenges and gender expectations on our bodies that test our physical and emotional well-being. However, there is beauty to be found in celebrating our bodies. This panel of poets shares and discusses poetry of resilience and celebration of our bodies to find meaning and perspective. The panel explores the transformative power of writing that honors the courage it takes to embrace the diversity of our bodies.
This virtual event was prerecorded. It will be available to watch on-demand online starting on Wednesday, February 7, 2024 through Thursday, March 7, 2024.
THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 8, 2024
PANEL: Navigating Stormy Waters: Telling your tales when they’re hard to tell
9:00 AM – 10:15 AM
Room 2209, Kansas City Convention Center, Street Level
Panelists: Juanita Mantz, Toni Ann Johnson, Hannah Sward, Nikia Chaney, and Laurie Markvart will read from their work and discuss writing about difficult topics based on themselves and their families.
Description: How do you write your tale with compassion and love when it is a hard story to tell? These five writers will read from their works of memoir and autobiographical fiction touching on their own stories and their family stories of addiction, mental illness, trauma, neglect, and chaos. After, they will talk about how they were able to navigate the choppy waters of truth telling in their books, and how they use their voices for change and to highlight their own stories of redemption and forgiveness.
PANEL: Sin Fronteras: Navigating, Representing, and Publishing Latine Authors
9:00 AM – 10:15 AM
Room 2215A, Kansas City Convention Center, Street Level
Panelists: Viktoria Valenzuela, Cloud Delfina Cardona, Carlos Espinoza, Maria Maloney, Edward Vidaurre
Description: As the United States continues to diversify, state legislatures advance bills that target people of color and the LGBTQ+ community. Publishing is one of the only industries that gives a truer representation of the richly complex Latine populations in the U.S. and their contribution to culture, history, and literary landscape. This panel of independent publishers from the U.S.-Mexico border discusses the importance of publishing Latine, including LGBTQ+ Latine authors in Texas and the U.S..
PANEL: Speaking Mosaics: Hybrid Narratives & the Prism of Identity
9:00 AM – 10:15 AM
Room 2504AB, Kansas City Convention Center, Level 2
Panelists: Marissa Landrigan, Rajiv Mohabir, Monica Prince, Adriana Es Ramirez, Caitlyn Hunter
Description: Accustomed to wielding multiple perspectives, many BIPOC, queer, and neurodivergent writers are drawn to fragmented or hybrid forms: multimodal cross-genre mosaics of personal experience, and cultural, social, political, or natural history. Our panelists work across poetry, performance, nonfiction, and folklore, and will explore the craft and challenges of fragmented forms, offering inspiration and motivation to embrace hybridity as a way to claim space for historically marginalized communities.
BOOK SIGNING: Incantation: Love Poems for Battle Sites (Mouthfeel Press 2023) by Xochitl-Julisa Bermejo
10:00 AM – 11:00 AM
Mouthfeel Press Booth #3021
PANEL: Decolonizing American Literature: The Goals, Challenges, and Strategies of Writers
10:35 AM – 11:50 AM
Room 2502A, Kansas City Convention Center, Level 2
Panelists: GEMINI WAHHAJ, Sehba Sarwar, Oindrila Mukherjee, Namrata Poddar
Description: Four writers will discuss decolonizing American literature through the examples of literary works in the colonial languages of English and French from Black, brown, and Asian writers across the world, as well as literature in Indian languages, including Urdu and Bengali. Panelists will discuss the goals of decolonial anglophone literature and consider the challenges and strategies of writers confronting imperial patterns in American Literature.
PANEL: Getting Non-Writers to Write: Teaching Outside of the English Department
12:10 PM – 1:25 PM
Room 2103A, Kansas City Convention Center, Street Level
Panelists: Melisa Cahnmann-Taylor, Deb Olin Unferth, Elline Lipkin, Mihaela Moscaliuc, and Iris Jamahl Dunkle
Description: “I’m not good at writing,” “I don’t know what to write,” and “My English isn’t good enough”—working with creative writers outside English departments requires shifts in expectations, approaches, and consciousness. This panel gathers those working in a variety of nontraditional settings: libraries, prisons, hospitals, and teacher certification programs. Each panelist addresses challenges they’ve encountered and strategies for success to teach with courage, creativity, and care.
PANEL: Poets Against Walls: An Anthology/Handbook for Writing Past the Checkpoints
1:45 PM – 3:00 PM
Room 2215C, Kansas City Convention Center, Street Level
Panelists: Cesar De Leon, Sehba Sarwar, Emmy Perez, Carolina Monsivais, Celina Gomez
Description: Poets Against Walls anthology/handbook features poetry and hybrid writings from the geopolitical spaces of the borderlands, along with a history of the collective’s social actions, discussions on craft, and writing prompts. In addition to reading short selections of their work and speaking on the value of writing directly about communities under attack, panelists will provide tips and strategies for writing what some may feel dissuaded from in workshop spaces: crafting work for social change.
PANEL: Reproductive Writes: Writing About Reproductive Choice, Loss, and Justice
3:20 PM – 4:35 PM
Room 2105, Kansas City Convention Center, Street Level
Panelists: Jacqui Morton, Erika Meitner, Carla Sameth, Maria Novotny, Robin Silbergleid
Description: How do writers use poetry and nonfiction to explore reproductive choice, health, and loss? What are the unique challenges and risks raised in the act of writing about reproductive topics, including infertility, miscarriage, and abortion? How does the stigma of discussing the intimate emotional and bodily aspects of reproduction carry over to the page? How do these issues change across genre? Writers with a range of experiences and backgrounds will read from their work and engage these issues.
PANEL: To Keep or Not to Keep: Shifting Models in the Post-Pandemic Workshop
3:20 PM – 4:35 PM
Room 2104B, Kansas City Convention Center, Street Level
Panelists: Sarah A Chavez, Ever Jones, Ching-In Chen, Rochelle Hurt
Description: This panel explores inclusive innovations in creative writing workshop learned from remote instruction during the pandemic. Since “getting back to normal,” an assumption has been made that we can and should return to previous pedagogical models. But should we? Has the traditional workshop model successfully served the growing diversity in classrooms? From varied subject positions and range of courses taught, panelists will elaborate on ways that workshop practices can and have shifted toward equity.
READING: TRANSFORMATION: A Women Who Submit Anthology – AWP Release Reading
3:30 PM – 4:30 PM
Kansas City Central Library: 14 West 10th Street Kansas City, MO 64105
Room: “The Vault”
Featuring Lisa Allen (WWS-KC), Xochitl-Julisa Bermejo, Carly Marie DeMento, Toni Ann Johnson, Noriko Nakada, and Nancy Lynée Woo
READING: Host Publications proudly presents “A Feminist Reading at AWP Kansas City’’
7:00 PM – 9:00 PM
BLK + BRWN.: 104 1/2 W 39th St, Kansas City, MO 64111
Featured readers: Stephanie Niu, m. mick powell, mónica teresa ortiz, cloud deflina cardona, Bianca Alyssa Pérez, lily someson, Ae Hee Lee, Jae Nichelle, and Ashley-Devon Williamston.
Description: Host Publications proudly presents “A Feminist Reading at AWP Kansas City’’ featuring nine women & non-binary authors. A special opportunity to celebrate our 2023/2024 chapbooks, threesome in the last Toyota Celica and Survived By at the independently owned Kansas City Bookstore BLK+BRWN.
READING: AWP Offsite Reading with Co•Im•Press, Green Writers Press, Mouthfeel Press, and Noemi Press
7:30 PM – 9:30 PM
Café Corazón: 110 Southwest Blvd
READING: Macondo Open Mic
8:00 PM – 10:00 PM
Mattie Rhodes Cultural Center: 1701 Jarboe St, Kansas City, MO 64108
FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 9, 2024
BOOK SIGNING: Breaking Pattern (Inlandia Books 2023) by Tisha Marie Reichle-Aguilera & Incantation: Love Poems for Battle Sites (Mouthfeel Press 2023) by Xochitl-Julisa Bermejo
10:00 AM – 10:30 AM
Letras Latinas Table #830
PANEL: Should I Just Give Up?
12:10 PM – 1:25 PM
Room 2215A, Kansas City Convention Center, Street Level
Panelists: Michelle Otero, Anel Flores, Xochitl-Julisa Bermejo, Jackie Cuevas, Tisha Marie Reichle-Aguilera
Description: These Chicana/x feminist poets, memoirists, artists, administrators, and professors have invested a collective ninety years on projects that lingered long past their anticipated finish dates. Because we represent communities whose stories might not otherwise be heard, the writing process can be especially daunting. We’ll talk about how we got it done, the communities that supported us, how we handled rejection, how we navigated this long relationship, or how we finally let go and moved on.
BOOK SIGNING: Catastrophic Molting by Amy Shimshon-Santo
1:00 PM – 2:00 PM
FlowerSong Press, Booth #T1051
Panel: Beyond Borderlands: Celebrating Essential Latinx Poetry from Texas Presses
3:20 PM – 4:35 PM
Room 2104B, Kansas City Convention Center, Street Level
Panelists: Xochitl-Julisa Bermejo, Luivette Resto, Adrian Cepeda, Vincent Cooper, and Edward Vidaurre
Description: FlowerSong Press and Mouthfeel Press are just a small representation of the Latinx-owned independent presses creating vibrant work in the Borderlands. Both founded in Texas, these presses publish new, emerging, and established writers who’ve historically gone underrepresented, but whose words hold the power of resilience and transformation. This poetry reading celebrates contemporary Latinx poets and their books of struggle, truth, and hope as a call to elevate diverse voices and spread cultura.
PANEL: Too Small For the Patriarchy: Getting Girlhood Stories Past the Gatekeepers
3:20 PM – 4:35 PM
Room 3501 EF, Kansas City Convention Center, Level 3
Panelists: Chaiti Sen, Toni Ann Johnson, Rose Smith, Magdalena Bartkowska, and Natalia Sylvester
Description: Who has the right to grow up in American literature? On this panel, authors discuss the joys, challenges, and importance of writing and publishing diverse narratives about American girlhoods. Getting these stories past the gatekeepers, who often misunderstand and reject them for being “too quiet” or “too small,” requires courage and persistence. When our own inner critics tell us such stories don’t truly matter, how do we push beyond our doubt and continue writing on a path to publication?
PANEL: Transformation: Creating Change Through Collaboration
3:20 PM – 4:35 PM
Room 2104A, Kansas City Convention Center, Street Level
Panelists: Noriko Nakada, Tisha Marie Reichle-Aguilera, Nikia Chaney, Sarah Rafael Garcia, Ryane Nicole Granados
Description: Inspired by Helena Maria Viramontes’s AWP 2020 keynote address, Women Who Submit’s third anthology, TRANSFORMATION, centers work that speaks to the ways writers and other artists can promote change in the world. By focusing on generosity and collaboration, shared leadership and mentorship, and inclusive partnerships, panelists discuss how Women Who Submit makes this change a reality not just in the writing they publish but in the ways they edit, publish, and promote their writers.
READING: A Dozen Nothing AWP Offsite Reading
5:00 PM – 7:00 PM
Vulpes Bastille: 1737 Locust St, Kansas City, MO 64108
READING: FlowerSong AWP Offsite Reading
6:05 PM
Habitat Contemporary: 2012 Baltimore Avenue
Featured readers: César de León, Amy Shimshon-Santo, Michelle Otero, and Eddie Vega.
Description: Friday, February 9, FlowerSong Press will be teaming up with CavanKerry Press, Acre Books, and Perugia Press for an AWP 2024 offsite reading at Habitat Contemporary. A big shout out to Dimitri Reyes for putting this together.
SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 10, 2024
PANEL: Una Mujer Peligrosa: Celebrating the Queer Work and Life of tatiana de la tierra
9:00 AM – 10:15 AM
Room 2104B, Kansas City Convention Center, Street Level
Panelists: Olga Garcia, Karleen Pendelton Jimenez, Amelia María de la Luz Montes, Myriam Gurba
Description: tatiana de la tierra (1961–2012) was a Latina lesbian writer and trailblazer. In the nineties, she cofounded Esto No Tiene Nombre and Conomoción magazines featuring Latina lesbians in the United States and abroad. She later authored her iconic For the Hard Ones: A Lesbian Phenomenology. In 2022, Redonda y radical: antología poética de tatiana de la tierra was published in Colombia (Sincronía Press). This panel features some of tatiana’s literary coconspirators to discuss her dangerously delicious life and works.
PANEL: Be Gay, Do Crime: Teaching Queer and Trans Poetics in Dangerous Times
10:35 AM – 11:50 AM
Room 2103A, Kansas City Convention Center, Street Level
Panelists: Meg Day, Oliver Bendorf, Donika Kelly, Ching-In Chen, Melissa Crowe
Description: Given our nation’s latest investment in suppressing both bodies and books, what is at stake—newly, historically—in the teaching of queer and trans poetics? Five seasoned poet-educators, working inside the classroom, libraries, and community centers, gather to discuss navigating threats on the poems they teach, the poems they make, and the bodies they occupy as they do both. Panelists will offer experiential commentary and strategies for protecting, generating, and sustaining queer and trans people and poems.
PANEL: Keeping It Lit: Nurturing a Literary Journal Program at Two-Year Colleges
10:35 AM – 11:50 AM
Room 2211, Kansas City Convention Center, Street Level
Panelists: James Ducat, Melissa Ford Lucken, Mary Lannon, Phoebe Reeves
Description: This panel explores ways to shepherd a community college literary magazine with diverse, high-risk, low-income students. Topics of discussion include: staff recruitment, pedagogy, editing, layout, budget, advertising, submissions, course credit, and technological tools. The panelists reflect on obstacles—some common, some unique—and equity-minded solutions. Faculty advisors share experiences producing print and online student journals and fostering a vibrant literary community.
PANEL: Beyond Zoom: Building Vibrant Literary Communities in a New Hybrid Era
12:10 PM – 1:25 PM
Room 2104B, Kansas City Convention Center, Street Level
Panelists: Karina Muñiz-Pagán, Minal Hajratwala, Randy Winston, Maceo Nafisah Cabrera-Estevez, & Juanita E. Mantz (JEM)
Description: Community is essential to a writer’s growth, but what do you do when spaces are inhospitable to your community? Build your own! These innovative authors share how they’ve built thriving programs for diverse NYC fiction writers, global Muslim writers, women/nonbinary writers, domestic workers, and BIPOC+ authors. We share strategies and tools to empower anyone eager to create a nurturing space that centers writers of color, language justice, disability justice, and voices at the intersections.
TABLES & BOOTHS
Antioch University Los Angeles #825
Cave Canem Foundation, Inc. #719
Copper Canyon Press #1223, #1225
Feminist Press #737
FlowerSong Press #T1051
Kaya / Women Who Submit / Blaft #838
Kundiman #1330
Letras Latinas #830
Mouthfeel Press #3021
Noemi Press #1449
Santa Fe Writers Project #3124
Sundress Publications | Sundress Academy for the Arts | Best of the Net Anthology #1111
UCLA Extension Writers Program #831
The WWS members included in this post published their work in amazing places during December 2023. I’ve included an excerpt from published pieces (if available), along with a link (if available) to where the pieces can be purchased and/or read in their entirety.
Please join me in celebrating our members who published in December 2023!
Continue reading “December 2023 Publication Roundup”
By Thea Pueschel
A few weeks ago, I sat at my desk in the Markham cabin at the beautiful Dorland Mountain Arts Colony overlooking the Temecula Valley. I was confident that the words would trickle from my fingertips. They didn’t. Instead, I productively procrastinated and gave the desk lamp a face and christened him Lampé.
Goodbyes can be hard. Clearly, from the found object lamp collage, you can see I was distressed to the point of cubism.
Last year, when Noriko Nakada was passing the baton for Blog Managing Editor, I saw her at a party. She asked me if I was interested and if I thought I’d apply. I vacillated. Was I qualified enough to edit the work of such a great community of talented writers? What direction could I possibly take it? I sent in my letter of intent, went through the interview process. I waited patiently for the news. There were other qualified and talented writers that were interested in becoming the BME. Surely, they wouldn’t pick me, the candidate that lacked editing experience.
I don’t know what tipped the fates in my favor, but I was given the opportunity to run the Intersect series. I cannot express the gratitude I feel for all the writers that were willing and able to trust me with their words, and Xochitl Julissa-Bermejo, and the leadership team for giving me the honor to guide.
The editor/writer relationship is sacred in my mind. It only seems fitting that the final essay that I edited for Intersect was that of Sara Chisolm, an editor for Made in L.A. As editor I had solicited several writers with work I admire, most didn’t submit, but Sara did. I met her at the Vroman’s reading for Made in L.A. Vol. 5: Vantage Points and as we talked about childhood fears of the Night Stalker and the cultural tapestry that is Los Angeles; she made me hungry for her words. A month later, she submitted “Stories Told and Untold in the City of Angels.” After editing the piece, I can still smell the incense and buttery Salvadoran quesadillas.
In my role as editor, I didn’t want to modify voices. I wanted to provide a megaphone for each writer and shine a spotlight in dark corners where I thought their voices could be a little louder. I must commend the authenticity and vulnerability each writer brought to the process. Audrey Harris Fernández floored me with “On Losing a Religion and Finding a Voice,” I too had left a faith and could resonate with the sentiment “For years after leaving… I felt adrift.” I asked her for more Audrey in the piece, and she brought herself forward with ferocity. Stories like this are often untold.
I had the privilege of nominating two writers for the Best of the Web. Gina Duran’s essay “How the Crestline Blizzard Taught me Forgiveness” and Ashton Cynthia Clarke’s “Drapo Vodou Art of Myrlande Constant – Traditional African Religion Meets the Colonizers.” I was lost in the blizzard and felt the ice crystals of frozen snow in my bare hand and heard the squeal of the tracks of the subway on Ashton’s mother’s secret visit the Obeah woman.
I can’t list everyone that I went through this creative evolution with, but you can read all of them here. Each writer left me with the gift of deeper understanding. I’ve worked with several types of editors over the years in various spaces. I learned each time, specifically how I did not want to behave or operate if ever given the seat of editor. I’ve worked with kind editors and cruel ones. When editing I wanted to foster community and exchange, so I met writers where we intersected on the corner of compassion and mutual respect.
What the writers of the Intersect taught me through the editorial process was how to communicate more effectively as an editor, how to create a style guide for fixes to ease the burden of edits, and to set clear boundaries. The latter part, I thought I had already, but it was my first time in this role, and I had to learn to be more specific as time is a commodity and something I have in short supply. They also taught me how to be a better writer. I think all writers should do a stint editing. It shows the world from a new perspective. It shines a spotlight on the dark spaces in one’s own writing.
The curtain is closing on this act, but it will rise again, and I hope to read your words in the future incarnation of the WWS blog under the guidance of the new editor.
Editing is a dance. I feel honored so many writers were willing to partner with me. It is with sadness and excitement I pass the hat on to another to fill the year long position. I am excited to see what direction they take the blog, and plan to submit.
Thea Pueschel is a writer, multimedia artist, and the blog managing editor for the literary nonprofit Women Who Submit and a repeated Dorland Arts Colony Resident. Thea has been published in Short Edítion, Perhappened, and the Made in L.A. Anthology: Vantage Points Volume 5, among others. Thea is known for drinking copious amounts of iced tea, random acts of binge creation, taking people through subconscious journeys and teaching people to make shapes with their bodies.
Writer’s note: Dorland is a beautiful low cost residency. If you would like to go somewhere local that feels off the beaten path, I highly suggest Dorland. I was introduced to this residency through Women Who Submit. Did you know that the Kit Reed Travel Fund offers three $350 awards to BIPOC women & non-binary writers to attend a writing program or residency and that the Zachai cabin is $350/week?
The WWS members included in this post published their work in amazing places during November 2023. I’ve included an excerpt from published pieces (if available), along with a link (if available) to where the pieces can be purchased and/or read in their entirety.
Please join me in celebrating our members who published in November 2023!
Continue reading “November 2023 Publication Roundup”
By Sara Chisolm
Los Angeles residents have always been stereotyped as Hollywood physically fit with a green juice in hand while driving down Rodeo Drive. I do occasionally enjoy a green juice but I don’t make a habit out of frequenting tourists’ traps. I pass the Disney concert hall while on my way to Chinatown, East L.A., Little Tokyo, or mid-city. Away from the glitz of Tinseltown, the heart beat of the city exists. Some Angelenos leave to seek more affordable pastures while others linger in the only place that they will ever call home. Some come from areas torn by war or in search of the American dream. This is a place where dreams are made and broken. Perhaps that is why I write and listen to stories about Angelenos. We thrive in a paradigm of contradictions.
I always remember to pack a pair of shades, water, sunscreen, notepad and pen while canvassing Los Angeles on the public transportation. They’ve extended the train lines, which suits me just fine. I can lumber around Sawtelle taking in the savory aroma of bone broth, dip out and be in Mariachi Plaza to hear a serenade while the glare of the afternoon sun beams down on all of those poor souls stuck on one of the freeways, which resemble parking lots during rush hours. I watch people as they walk down the street, bus tables in restaurants, attend to their children, or sit at the local coffee shop typing away on their computers while sipping on their coffee. I usually choose to write at home but the city and its inhabitants inspire me to step away from my desk and home library.
I yearn for the smell of incense, buttery Salvadoran quesadillas, jasmine, and marinated meats. I can smell all of these things from the crowded streets when I walk down just the right one. I sometimes wonder about the people that I encounter in those brief moments. What is their life like? What do we have in common? What are our differences?
In a place as diverse as Los Angeles, differences are easy to pick out, but it’s the similarities that can make people bond and feel empathy for others. Stories can be a powerful bridge to understanding one another. On occasion, I find myself imagining that the woman in front of the temple with the incense sticks is praying for forgiveness. The man in front of me at the panadoria is buying breakfast for his family. The basketball players whose movements blow the scent of fresh jasmine onto the street might be worried about their upcoming finals. The cook in the taco truck is wondering how he’s going to make ends meet this month. I don’t know their stories, but I know that we are alike in some ways, and that thought alone makes me take out my notepad.
I sometimes jot down a few notes and ask a few questions here and there. Occasionally, the answers yield more questions that will go without a response. I try to understand people who may have vast differences from me by researching certain topics related to their experiences.
Spending hours in a library conducting research on history, culture, and language is helpful to my writing. I‘d be a liar if I didn’t admit that the mildew smell of used books is a comfort for me. Going to a library is like coming home. My research doesn’t address all of the questions that I have from talking to people. There are times when emotions and the past guide reactions. Feelings can be difficult to explain or even comprehend. Who knows why one motorist will roll down their window and cuss at another person for cutting them off on the freeway while another one won’t even bother. Emotions about situations are a reflection of the past.
I’ve drawn the conclusion that to live here, one has to admit how much and how very little they know about the city’s residents. Although the differences between us can be numerous, we can always offer empathy. I listen with compassion and gain an insight that I would never have acquired had I not spoken to my fellow Angelenos. These life lessons help me in my day-to-day tasks as well as in my writing.
I ran into someone carrying a power tool on the bus. His eyes lit up when he saw the name of the school that I work for emblazoned across my chest in huge white letters on a fire hydrant red t-shirt. He asked if I was a teacher and what subject I taught. When I told him I work with small children, he told me stories about his daughters that ended with him instructing me on how to use a power drill. I sometimes think of him when I write stories about families. That twinkle in his eyes reflects the same starry gaze that I have when I reminisce about my own little “knuckleheads.” Our astronomically different lifestyles bear resemblance as we connect over children and unfinished projects in my apartment. I learn a fair amount about myself while talking to others. Their experiences guide me.
The most prolific life lessons that I have had through stories comes from the families that I work with as a preschool teacher. I used to work for non-profit organizations in areas that experienced frequent gang activity, poverty, and violent crime. The parents told me stories about being refugees, being harassed by cops, not having enough resources for their children. I had to take notes as I devised a way to best help with their children’s needs.
We are people of color, dark skinned and historically marginalized. I saw a bit of myself reflected in their appearance. We shared the same spaces. I visited the same grocery stores, restaurants, and walked down the same streets. In those instances, I become a part of a community story. We would vibe about the store clerk who always picked their nose when they thought that no one is looking. Complain about the higher prices at our favorite heladeria.
I grew up in an all-American suburban town in the San Gabriel valley. Just another pissed off teen in A.P. English writing poetry and journaling. My parents were able to provide a decent living for me and my little brother. While growing up, I didn’t have the same barriers to resources as my students’ families. Learning about life experiences that differ from mine expands my understanding and awareness of the human condition. This fact makes their stories resonate with me. I don’t focus on writing stories that reflect life experiences that are solely my own. A good book makes the reader relate to the characters in some way. A great book will make you emotionally invested in the characters. I am a speculative fiction writer. My aim is to intrigue readers by creating relatable characters in imaginative moments that no one on this good green earth has experienced.
My favorite books growing up were fairy tales or what I would dub as “whimsical flights of fantasy.” My writing reflects my earlier reading choices, but with a sprinkle of darkness and culture. My plot lines used to rack up body counts as if I was playing a video game. I’ve slightly amended my ways and began to focus more on relationships between characters without the climactic death scenes. Some life situations are just as stressful as being torn limb from limb by zombies. Maybe I’ve changed. Motherhood has become a prominent theme in my stories. Exploring folklore from around the world has taken root in my fiction. Fairy tales where Angelenos reside in conflict. Not every story has to have a happy ending, but it always has to end.
The stories that my past students’ families told me were also full of hope. In a city brimming with dreams, hope is contagious. There’s always a chance for a better tomorrow. At the end of the year, the center that I used to work for hosts a pre-kindergarten graduation. Folks filled up the auditorium while clutching balloons, bouquets, and stuffed animals. Some people have to stand because there aren’t enough chairs. The children perform a few songs, dawn graduation caps, and eat over frosted pieces of white sheet cake. The families shifted together. The metal folding chairs were scattered against the wall to make room for the adults’ latest gossip. An older cousin just graduated high school or college. A father just opened his own small business. A mother is expecting a new addition to the family. We share sorrow and rejoice in triumphs.
The last graduation that I attended at the center was a type of farewell ceremony for me as well. By the end of the week, I’d be starting at a new center. The preschool that I was starting at had raised beds for gardening, several fenced in play yards, and a beautiful interconnecting bike path. Outdoor play would be very different from the scenes of police brutality reenacted by my past students. When I told the families that I was close with that I was switching schools and that the new school would serve wealthy families, they rolled their eyes or gave me menacing looks. They were pissed off that I could leave them to serve families that had their pick of great teachers. I politely sympathized and took their outrage and disgust as a complement to my care of their children and teaching abilities.
Everyone faces challenges in life, although the challenges of the new families that I would be serving might be different, they were still plagued with their own obstacles in life. I couldn’t help but question my decision to leave the center for a more privileged population though. The choice to leave the center was not made light-heartedly. I wanted to stay because I had fostered relationships with the families, but ultimately my desire for new challenges and experiences had won out.
I occasionally run into my old students and people in the community that I once served. Our paths intersect when I stop by my favorite restaurants or bakeries in the area. We embrace, talk, and laugh about the old times. Tears come to the corners of our eyes while remnants of our bond bring back once forgotten feelings. Sometimes when I say goodbye, I can feel their resentments in their hugs or handshakes. Other times, I feel their affection and sorrow. As Angelenos, we bring meaning to each other’s lives in our everyday encounters. Stories told and untold about our differences and similarities. Tall tales that seem like legends among the temples, taco trucks, coffee shops, skyscrapers, and congested freeways.
In a city as crowded and spread out as L.A. you can marvel in her diversity. Draw strength from it. The promise of a better future draws people from different walks of life to this city. No matter what, there is always a tomorrow and another story to write.
Sara Chisolm is a speculative fiction writer based in the Los Angeles area. Her urban fantasy short stories “Serenade of the Gangsta,” “The Fortune of the Three and the Kabuki Mask,” and “We Found Love as the Undead,” were featured in the second and third volumes of the Made in L.A. fiction anthology series. Sara has co-edited for the third, fourth, and fifth books for the annual Made In L.A. anthology.
