News

Sunday News

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You only have a few hours left to buy Matt Bell’s Wolf Parts.

WOLF-PARTS-FINAL2-front

Go HERE to buy.

You only have a few hours left to enter this contest with a pretty sweet prize.

Corium Magazine launches tomorrow and it is going to be exceptional.

March Madness makes me crazy. I’m sick of having to watch the games or rather, I’m sick of spending time with an individual who insists on watching the games. I don’t understand all this talk of brackets. I smiled when Kansas lost.

Outside Writers Collective is auctioning some cool slipcases.

Today is Perfect Movie Sunday on Lifetime Movie Network. I’d really rather be watching that. Kirstie Alley’s new show debuts tonight. I’m sure the word “fat” will be involved.

An enterprising individual has developed a glyph to represent  sarcasm. That’s the product of a whole lot of free time, I think.

This website’s sole purpose is to dissect Julia Alison’s public persona. Fascinating.

GaGa Stigmata: Critical Writings and Art About Lady GaGa. Need I say more? Well, I will say THIS.

PANK 4 Arrives

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Photo 21Hark! Cue the silver snarling  trumpets…

Beginning tomorrow, out go your copies of PANK 4, packaged smartly by our little animatronic snow elves, mailed directly to your door where PANK 4 will emerge from its supple wrappings like a faun, begin whispering its secrets into your ear as it rubs your shoulders, then fuck your brains out. And really, how could it not, this host of hosts, these 234-pages of wicked sweet awesomeness, how could they do anything less than f-u-c-k-y-o-u-r-b-r-a-i-n-s-o-u-t? The metaphor is too convoluted and harsh? I’m sorry, I’m excited. Sweet, sweet love, maybe? PANK 4 does that, too. Hell, PANK 4 will just hold your hand and talk about its feelings if that’s your thing because PANK 4 does it all.

I ask you this: What other literary magazine promises these things?

All by the likes of  Jensen Beach,  Lauren Becker,  Angi Becker Stevens,  Matt Bell,  Summer Block,  Melinda Blount,  Aaron Burch,  Ryan W. Bradley,  Randall Brown,  Rita D. Costello,  Kristina Marie Darling,  Craig Davis,  Ryan Dilbert,  Max Dunbar,  Stevie Lee Edwards,  David Erlewine,  Moe Folk,  Travis Fortney,  AD Jameson,  Elisa Gabbert,  Karen Gentry,  Alicia Gifford,  Barry Graham,  Kevin Grauke,  Katherine Grosjean,  Sarah Harste,  Travis Hessman,  Sarah Hilary,  Justin Heifetz,  Kyle Hemmings,  Bob Hicok,  Donora Hillard,  Shane Jones,  Tim Jones-Yelvington,  Matthew Kirkpatrick,  Laurence Klavan,  Sarah Layden,  Laura LeHew,  Lisa Lewis,  Kirsty Logan,  Sandee Lyles,  Taylor Mali,  Jen Michalski,  Steven McDermott,  Kyle Minor,  Adam Moorad,  Joel Patton,  Jennifer Pieroni,  Meg Pokrass,  Coralie Reed,  Ryan Ridge,  Andrew Roe,  Ethel Rohan,  Kathleen Rooney,  Emily Rosko,  Francine Rubin,  Nick Sansone,  Peter Schwartz,  Matthew Simmons,  Audri Sousa,  Sarah Sweeney,  JA Tyler,  Jared Walls,  Jared Ward,  Brandi Wells,  Lauren Wheeler,  Kevin Wilson,  Bill Yarrow, and  Erin York. It’s like an all-star Marti Gras parade on acid times 4. Seriously.

If you ordered PANK 4 with HOW TO TAKE YOURSELF APART, HOW TO MAKE YOURSELF ANEW, you’ll be receiving both in the coming days. Sorry for the delay.

If you have yet to order your copy, by God, (wo)manchild, do so  here. Our print copies do not last long.

Spread the gospel, PANK.

PANKcast!

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1. Kudos to the publishing industry, where memoirs are written by people with genuinely awesome stories to tell and not Miss USA contestants whining about their cup size!

2. I would go to Boston just to hit up these bookstores.

3. Oh the little things in life – prostitutes in a fruit and veggie truck on your birthday, computer hackers falling in love with librarians, and monks who entertain people by hanging spoons off   their noses.

4. This book should never be erased from your Christmas list.

5. Here’s a wonderful poem by Randall Mann in the Washington Post.

6. We, at PANK, and John Lescroart ask that you buy our magazine and every other book and magazine in print instead of reading it online or on an electronic device.

7. Don’t worry, be happy. Or not.

8. Yummy.

9. Dreading the holidays? You’re not alone.

10. And since Santa doesn’t come around after you’re 10 (well, I was 10),   here are the best-sellers (aka gift ideas) from a cute little Seattle bookstore.

PANK Does the Pushcart

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Congratulations to our Pushcart nominees from PANK 3:

Prose:

Rachel Yoder, Letters to My First Love
Chris Gavaler, Name:_____________
Courtney Elizabeth Mauk, Shadowland

Poetry:

Molly Gaudry, Beneath Mosquito Netting I Imagine
Stephanie King, Baby Says (p. 23)
Caleb Barber, In the Hall of Sculptures and Photographs

News Bits

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Our new editorial assistant Jeni has a new column that will start appearing on Tuesdays next week. You can check out this week’s column here.

John Scalzi on asking favors from established writers. He makes valid points and well-known writers do have to field a lot of requests but the rant still kind of bums me out.

A manifesto of sorts on independent publishing from Electric Literature Andy Hunter.

Congratulations to Adam Robinson and Publishing Genius Press for being named Best Press in Baltimore.

PANK 3 is reviewed at New Pages.

Oprah has anointed a new book for her book club, Say You’re One of Them by Uwem Akpan. Tin House editor Rob Spillman says it’s a bad choice.

What editors really think.

On the importance of a room of one’s own.

Check out Shudder Pageant from two PANK contributors, xTx and Mel Bosworth: Details at http://notimetosayit.com/ and http://eddiesocko.blogspot.com/.

Best blogging practices for writers.

New Pages weighs in on editorial anonymity.

More on the Google Book project.

The 2009 MacArthur grant recipients have been announced.

News Roundup

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New issue of The Collagist and they are having a flash fiction contest, judged by Kim Chinquee.

The September issue of PANK is up.

The Man Booker shortlist. And commentary.

James Patterson signed a 17-book deal with Hachette. He signed a deal for 17 books. Really??? The deal takes him through 2012, so that’s like a book a minute. Looking forward to those masterpieces. Also, why Patterson is worth 150 million dollars.

Dalkey Archive has an intriguing new fellowship program.

The Decameron Annual is looking for submissions.

Haha Clever is live.

On a book of poems versus a poetry book.

Which writers deserve their own academic conference?

A library without books? Good look with that.

A clear sign of the apocalypse.

Interesting new lit blog.

Yet another blog for a book.

Self-marketing for writers.

Poetic advice.

Writing about not writing.

An amazing, rich sound archive. Some pointers on where to look first here.

Tin House is celebrating their tenth anniversary. Enjoy some video of the festivities.

Gigantic has an awesome new website.

If you’re a writer in the UK, you could win a $25,000 prize only the $=$$$terling.

Hobart is looking for an intern.

Great interview with contributors BJ Hollars and Brendan Todt.

Stephen Elliott assesses his use of social networking to promote The Adderall Diaries.

Poet Jim Carroll has passed away.

It cannot be said enough. Nobody puts baby in the corner. Patrick Swayze has passed away and it is a sad, sad day. Barrelhouse has posted the archive of answers to the Swayze Question, to help us through our grief.

The News Never Sleeps

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Subscribe to PANK 4, and/or 5 and/or 6 before 9/15 and receive one entry per subscription in a drawing for an 8GB iPod Touch.

Excellent writing advice gleaned from Breadloaf.

Alice Munro withdraws from prize competition because she’s already won twice. I love her confidence.

Dzanc has some new podcasts up.

A One Day Poem Pavilion.

30 Days of GUD, culminating in a drawing for a Kindle 2.

On the Gmail outage.

Two different ways to design a bookstore.

Flatmancrooked wants to hear your pitches in Brooklyn, NY on 9/27.

Google and Amazon can’t play nice over e-books.

Changing college composition.

A fantastic interview with Rebecca Solnit at The Believer.

The Southern Review is looking for writing about baseball.

Sean Lovelace, briefly concerning flash fiction.

Felicia Sullivan on the culture of entitlement.

The Agriculture Reader No. 3 is on sale through September. I’ve read the issue and it’s fantastic. I’ll talk about it later this week, hopefully.

A Charles Dickens themed amusement park. We had the best of times.

News You Need

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Teresa Houle has joined the Folded Word staff and as our Snuggie poem contest winner, models her Snuggie!

What to say when you don’t like a good friend’s bad novel.

A book club for Russian Literature.

A PW survey on the Google book settlement.

An underground library? Very neat idea.

The e-Reader wars… sounds dramatic.

What college composition should teach.

New: Swink, Eat a Peach, decomP, Storyglossia, DIAGRAM, Emprise Review, Knee Jerk,   DOGZPLOT Flash Fiction.

Magazines worth reading on the regular: Wigleaf, Staccato Fiction, Monkeybicycle, and Everyday Genius.

A lengthy interview with Matt Bell, editor of The Collagist.

Folded Word has announced their Pushcart nominees.

The New Yorker has a new managing editor.

The new Lorrie Moore, reviewed.

Writing without writing… Funny post at Powell’s blog.

Hemingway motivational posters.

Sometimes, it is good to unplug.

Sad. No more Reading Rainbow.

The Lincoln Center is looking for teaching artists.

An intern talks about the slush pile.

Behind the scenes of dispatch eleven. The song is great.

The winners of Prick of the Spindle’s Fiction Open have been announced. There’s still time to enter their Poetry Open.

Are you up on the Google Book settlement?

It’s a great time to be a writer.

The new literacy?

Ethel Rohan on writing flash fiction.

This week’s Luna Review.

News at 11

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Good news! All entrants in Friday’s competition will win a copy of the Lovelace book.

HaHaClever is looking for submissions. Send your stuff, 1,000 words or less, to submissions@hahaclever.com.

Zzzombiezzz.

Getting the South right, or is it write?

For women poets, the Lexi Rudnitsky First Book Prize.

Vestal Review has a new feature. Submit something sexy.

A $1,000,000 book. With an added bonus.

Up at Apostrophe Cast, readings by contributors to the debut issue of The Collagist.

One of the best, most honest interviews I’ve ever read, with PGPs Adam Robinson.

Q & A: Agent George Borchardt.

A Franz Wright poem up at Redivider.

The longest poem in the world?

Black Lawrence Press is looking for interns.

Five Chapters is posting entire stories this week.

Read Eric Beeny’s The Dying Bloom, published by Pangur Ban Party.

Poetry festival–Back on!

An interview with Kim Chinquee.

An essay, Lost Cat, by Mary Gaitskill.

There’s a new issue of Fawlt Magazine and a new issue of The Legendary and a new issue of Pindeldyboz and Under Water by Ethel Rohan up at Monkeybicycle this week.

An interview with BJ Hollars.

Erin Fitzgerald, this story is for you.

Alimentum is having a poetry contest.

PANK 3 contributor Daniel Nester shows us his writing space.

The current US President actually reads, therefore it is news when he takes books on vacation with the intent to actually read them.

A tiny rant:   Free is not synonymous with holier, better, faster, stronger. Free   means one does not have to exchange money for a product. You don’t get extra brownie points in heaven for that. There are lots of free things out there–network television is free (but not that good);some great print journals are free (and damn good); lots of online journals are free (and damn good); and the air we breathe is free so basically let’s all stop vying for beatification by talking about how our stuff is free and instead focus on, I don’t know, writing itself?

News Next Now

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Ten Tips for Landing a Writing Residency

Light Boxes, by Shane Jones, to be published by Penguin in 2010.

Secrets of the Amazon.com bestseller list.

A great interview with Richard Russo.

New issues of PANK, The Collagist, Bust Down The Door And Eat All The Chickens, >kill author, Dispatch Litareview, NOO Journal and Word Riot.

Creative Nonfiction is looking for narrative blog posts.

Some words of wisdom with regard to submissions.

Another self-published writer succeeds.

Via ASF, A compendium of books that only exist within other books.

A fantastic article about the fantastic Publishing Genius Press.

Anne Valente interviews Storyglossia editor and PANK contributor Steven McDermott.

USA Today looks into Twitter as a medium for the literary.

The Writer’s Market 2011 is looking for submissions.

Monkeybicycle editor, Steven Seighman, interviewed by Meg Pokrass.

The Writer’s Colony at Dairy Hollow is offering culinary writing fellowships. Eating and writing. Sounds too good to be true.

A hate mail dramatic reading project? Need more be said?

Some old Jews are telling jokes. They are awesome.

NPR is hosting a second short short fiction contest. Details are here.

Tim O’Brien on writing fiction.

How writers can save publishing.

Some optimism (which we share) about short stories.

Margaret Atwood has taken to the Internet! OMG. GTFO.

Very lovely bookcases.

Exciting things are coming. They start later today!