Mail Call: The “Woman’s Work” edition
After posting a teaser for months, the brilliant Michelle Sewell of GirlChildPress finally gave up the goods. Do I even have to mention that I am sooo submitting a story for consideration for this collection (CFS below)?
In other GirlChild news, a few weekends ago, I joined Michelle and 9 other Just Like a Girl contributors for a wonderful reading at Busboys and Poets in D.C. It was only my 3rd reading, the largest crowd ever, and the first time I ever read fiction (“Bomani Jones”, a short story) to an audience (not counting workshops/conferences). And guess what. They liked me; they really liked me! What a rush and an ego boost all at once. People laughed at the funny parts and gave knowing nods at what I guess are some universal truths about middle-school-girlness that I must have stumbled upon. Inexplicably, my eyes watered and leaked a bit as I read. I hesitate to call it crying because I wasn’t sad or anything. But maybe they were involuntary tears of joy. Who knew?
Anyway, onward…a new call from GirlChildPress:
Woman’s Work: The Short Stories
“Part of the problem is that I treat writing like a privilege not an obligation. It comes after everything, after all my other responsibilities.”
Maegan “la Mala” Ortiz
“My Writing Life”
Woman’s Work: The Short Stories is a celebration of what happens when women finally get to the page. About the extraordinary stories that spill out of these extraordinary, and often ignored, storytellers during those stolen moments when she surrenders to her burning desire to write, to create.
GirlChild Press seeks the fresh and exciting voices of writers that can entice the reader with intricate tales of shapeshifters and evil doppelgangers, rock and roll princesses in twisted fairy tales, broken gunslingers in deserted western towns, and political murder mysteries that lead to sex in illicit places.
We will follow her through rabbit holes and pop up as mermaids dressed in camouflage, all while reveling in a romance that bloomed on a long-forgotten battlefield in outer space. Surprises will await us at every corner. We will discover what is passionate, and pure, and complicated and be glad for it.
Ultimately, Woman’s Work is about women as master storytellers.
Submission Requirements
• Deadline: March 1, 2009
• No more than 2 previously unpublished short stories per submission
• Simultaneous submissions okay, but notify if your work is accepted elsewhere
• 4,000 words or less
• Double spaced
• NO POETRY
All contributors will receive a copy of the anthology and will be invited to read at the book launch in 2009.
Electronic Submissions
Girlchildpress@aol.com
Title of submission should be placed in the subject line.
Please include your name, email address, mailing address, phone number, and short bio with your submission.
Snail Mail
GirlChild Press
PO Box 93
Hyattsville, MD 20781
Please include your name, email address, mailing address, phone number, and short bio with your submission
GirlChild Press publishes work that celebrates the triumph, defiance, and excellence of girls and women everywhere!
For more information about GirlChild Press visit www.girlchildpress.com
November 17th, 2008 at 11:19 pm
I love it when you post stuff like this. Maybe I’ll give a whirl. I have a few short stories from years past and many yet to be written, taking up space inside my head. And, I am NOT surprised they laughed at all the right parts, etc.
November 17th, 2008 at 11:20 pm
oh, and how cool would it be if we both got to be at that gig reading from the anthology.
November 17th, 2008 at 11:57 pm
I think we should have a national Woman’s Work contributors sleepover. And dial up boys and put each other’s hair up in curlers, and…
Just kidding!!
Seriously, that would be very cool. My friend poet Yona Harvey and I both got into PMS (poemmemoirstory)#8 earlier this year, and it was an extra thrill.
However, the lovely Michelle actually travels all around the country for the readings, and contributors are invited to whichever one(s) is/are close to them. So unless you came East, or unless I came West… See why I thought of the sleepover!!
November 19th, 2008 at 12:23 am
Deesha, your wordsmithing always makes me smile…and curlers/sleepover? woohoo! Let there be ice cream and midnight snacks!
Finally got the post up, so it was fortuitous that you landed this one today as I was able to include it in the Shaping Youth positive picks of GirlChild Press and teen reads…
btw, Have you read the Twilight saga yet? I’m fascinated by the media mindshift toward gentler, more subtle romance (ok, not that vampire bites are subtle, but you know what I mean)
It means there’s hope for those of us who’d like to have our daughters raised with that ‘butterfly in the tummy’ electricity of eyes locking and an outreached hand over the bump-n-thrust MTV video misogyny ya know? The latter really ‘sucks’ (pardon the pun)
Enjoy the post: here it is for your readers: http://www.shapingyouth.org/blog/?p=3652
Thanks again for contributing, always a pleasure!
November 19th, 2008 at 12:27 am
[...] on inside these girls’ worlds, minds, hearts, and souls. Deesha just posted on her blog, Mamalicious about the NEXT GirlChild Press book forthcoming in the Spring 2009 which will be a special edition [...]
November 19th, 2008 at 9:12 am
Amy,
Thanks to ShapingYouth, I see I must check out “Twilight”. I heard about it from some parents of older girls at my older daughter’s school, and I had no idea what they were talking about. I’m going to be teaching a writing camp at the school this summer and one suggestion was to incorporate the “Twilight” series. If I’m going to do that, I better get caught up, huh??