News & Interviews
Recent Interviews
David Samuel Levinson. Spring 2011 interns Mary Coyne and Anna Ryan interviewed David Samuel Levinson, whose work appeared in West Branch 65, Fall/Winter 2009.
Lucy Corin. Fall 2010 interns Collin Berry and Kimberly Papa interviewed Lucy Corin, whose work appeared in West Branch 64, Spring/Summer 2009.
Orlando Menes. Spring 2010 interns Annie Leister and David Moffat interviewed Orlando Menes, whose work appeared in West Branch 66, Spring/Summer 2010.
Anne Panning. Fall 2009 interns Katie Davis and Hilary Umbreit interviewed Anne Panning, whose work appeared in West Branch 64, Spring/Summer 2009.
Dorothy Barresi. Spring 2009 undergraduate interns Mary Hood and Janine Hauber interviewed Dorothy Barresi, whose work appeared most recently in West Branch 62, Spring/Summer 2008.
Susan B.A. Somers-Willett. Fall 2008 undergraduate interns Chris Opiela and Scott Van Pelt interviewed Susan B. A. Somers-Willett, whose work appeared in West Branch 61, Fall/Winter 2007.
Recent News
Dick Allen (WB 53, 63) received the 2009 Connecticut Book Award for Poetry for his seventh collection, Present Vanishing: Poems (Sarabande, 2008). He “got to stand on a platform in Hartford and make a small acceptance speech.”
Jacob M. Appel (WB 58) has two new plays currently running: "Helen of Sparta" at the Venus Theatre in Laurel, Maryland, and "Causa Mortis" at the Detroit Repertory Theater. His short fiction is forthcoming in Gettysburg Review, Tampa Review and War, Literature & the Arts. Jacob continues to practice medicine in New York City and to write commentary for Opposing Views and The Huffington Post.
Hadara Bar-Nadav (WB 53) is the author of two new chapbooks, Show Me Yours (winner of the 2009 Midwest Chapbook Series Award, Laurel Review/HighTower Press) and The Soft Arcade (Cinematheque Press), both forthcoming in 2010. She was awarded a 2009 fellowship from the Vermont Studio Center for a four-week residency.
Ralph Black (WB 61) has recent poems in Gettysburg Review, Poetry Ireland Review, and elsewhere. His poem, "21st Century Lecture," won the Anne Halley Poetry Prize from Massachusetts Review.
Nancy Naomi Carlson (WB 61) has a book of René Char translations, Stone Lyre, forthcoming from Tupelo Press in 2010.
Vincent Czyz (WB 55) reports that Shenandoah will publish "The Moon has Fallen into a Well" in their Winter 2009 issue. The story will be translated into Turkish and published in 2010 in an anthology titled, Istanbul'a Coken Hikaye, which roughly translates to "Stories Descending on Istanbul."
Julie Danho (WB 57) received a 2009 Fellowship Merit Award in Poetry from the Rhode Island State Council on the Arts.
Mike Dockins (WB 55, 57) is currently looking for a home for his second manuscript of poems, Letter to So-and-So from Wherever. His first book, Slouching in the Path of a Comet, was published in 2007 by Sage Hill Press, and is enjoying a second print run. His poem "Dead Critics Society" was reprinted in the 2007 edition of The Best American Poetry, guest edited by Heather McHugh. Mike has recently published poems in Lamination Colony, Third Coast, Poetry Midwest, and elsewhere.
Denise Duhamel (WB 27) is the author of a new book, Ka-Ching! (Pitt Poetry Series). More info is available here: http://www.upress.pitt.edu/BookDetails.aspx?bookId=35953 Garrison Keilor recently read one of her poems on Writers’ Almanac: http://writersalmanac.publicradio.org/index.php?date=2009/09/28
Rebecca Dunham (WB 61) has a new book of poems, The Flight Cage, forthcoming from Tupelo Press in 2010. Much of the book focuses on the life of Mary Wollstonecraft, and some of the poems appeared in West Branch.
Annie Finch (WB 58) reports that her book Eve has been reissued by Carnegie Mellon University Press in the Classic Contemporaries Poetry Series. Her new books are Among the Goddesses: An Epic Libretto in Seven Dreams (Red Hen Press) and A Poet’s Craft: The Making and Shaping of Poems (University of Michigan Press).
James Harms (Contributing Editor) has a book, The Joy Addict, reappearing in the Classic Contempories Series by Carnegie Mellon University Press.
William Jolliff (WB 48, 53, 54, 60, 64) is the author of a new chapbook, Searching for a White Crow, from Pudding House Press.
N. M. Kelby (WB 63) published two books in September, A Travel Guide for Reckless Hearts (Borealis Books) and The Constant Art of Being a Writer: The Life, Art, and Business of Fiction (Writer’s Digest Books). Her novel Theater of the Stars was optioned for film by indie screenwriter Elizabeth Dollarhide, and the Whale Season movie project moved one step further with the signing of producer and screen-writer Michael Ellis.
Barry Kitterman’s (WB 51) recent novel, The Baker’s Boy, which won the 2009 Maria Thomas Peace Corps Writers Award for Fiction.
Joseph Love (WB 63) has fiction forthcoming in Raritan and has recently completed a zombie novel.
Juan Martinez (WB 61) is the recipient of UNLV’s President's Graduate Fellowship, which allows him to devote a full academic year to his dissertation, which explores references to Vladimir Nabokov in contemporary fiction. His critical article, "A Fold of the Marquisette: Nabokov's Lepidoptery in Visual Media," appeared in the Nabokov Online Journal earlier this year. Stories are forthcoming in Glimmer Train and the Norton anthology Sudden Fiction Latino.
C.M. Mayo's (WB 47) first novel, The Last Prince of the Mexican Empire, was published by Unbridled Books in May. Based on nearly a decade of original archival research into the true story of Mexico's half-American prince, it has received glowing reviews in Publisher's Weekly, Library Journal, Austin American-Statesman, MexicoConnect, and many other venues. Her essay "Twitter Is" appears in the Digital Utopia summer issue of Literal: Latin American Voices / Voces Latinoamericanas. And she is nearing the fourth anniversary for her blog, "Madam Mayo." www.cmmayo.com
Scott Minar (WB 15, 48, 56) is the editor of The Working Poet: 75 Writing Exercises and a Poetry Anthology, forthcoming from Autumn House Press. It's a college textbook including exercises from poets all across the country and an anthology of poems from Autumn House poets, including Ed Ochester, Jo McDougall, Elizabeth Kirschner, Philip Terman, and more.
Roger Mitchell (WB 51, 53, 56, 59, 62) has a new collection out from Ausable Press, Lemon Peeled the Moment Before: New and Selected Poems, 1967-2008. It won the Readers’ Choice Award as the Best Book of 2008 at the Adirondack Literary Festival.
Edith Pearlman (Contributing Editor) has a new collection of short stories, Binocular Vision, forthcoming from Lookout Books, an imprint of the University of North Carolina Press.
Boyer Rickel (WB 51, 58) recently published a chapbook, reliquary, with Seven Kitchens Press. The title poem was originally published in West Branch. Another chapbook is forthcoming online from Scantilly Clad Press.
Richard Robbins (WB 51) gave readings last spring in New York and Oregon and published creative nonfiction in Brevity, Eclipse, and New Madrid, and poems in Water~Stone. His book-length manuscript, Radioactive City, won the Bellday Poetry Prize and will be published this month by Bellday Books.
Joan I. Siegel (WB 24) is the author of Hyacinth for the Soul (Deerbrook Editions), her first full-length collection of poetry. Reviews and blurbs appear on the publisher’s blog: http://www.deerbrookeditions.blogspot.com
Jeffrey Skinner (WB 51) reports that his play "Down Range" had its world premier this fall in New York City. Recent poems have appeared in The New Yorker, Slate, Sentence, Valpariaso Poetry Revew, and other magazines. He spent April 2009 as a fellow at MacDowell.
Curtis Smith (WB 53) is the author of a forthcoming story collection, Mad Monkey (Press 53). In March 2010, Casperian Books, who published his last novel, Sound and Noise, will put out his next, Truth Or Something Like It.
Noel Smith (WB 44, 53) is the recent author of The Well String, a poetry collection, from Motesbooks.
Ron Tanner (Contributing Editor) has recently published essays in Guernica magazine and Missouri Review, and stories in Iowa Review, Waccamaw, and Connecticut Review; he also won the 2009 Gertrude Press chapbook fiction contest. His story “Cats As Tuna” is being made into an animated short. He continues to direct the Marshall islands Story Project (mistories.org) and serve as president of the AWP.
Lindsay Marianna Walker (WB 64) has poems forthcoming in the African American Review, Valley Voices, and The Southern Poetry Anthology. Her manuscript, The Josephine Letters, was a finalist for the Academy of American Poets' 2009 Walt Whitman Award. This spring she won the Joan Johnson award for Fiction from the Center for Writers. She recently collaborated with playwright Dawson Moore, coordinator of the Last Frontier Theatre Conference, on a tragi-comedy entitled “6 Dead Bodies Duct-Taped to a Merry-Go-Round.”
Josh Weil (WB 59) has a novella collection, The New Valley, out from Grove/Atlantic. It was a New York Times Editors Choice selection and this November it will be honored with a “5 Under 35” Award from the National Book Foundation. He also has stories in American Short Fiction and Five Chapters, and one forthcoming in Glimmer Train. As the 2009-2010 Tickner Fellow, he has begun his tenure as the writer-in-residence at Gilman School in Baltimore.
Joshua Marie Wilkinson (WB 59) has two new projects due out in 2010: Selenography (with Polaroids by Califone's Tim Rutili) to be published by Sidebrow Press in the spring, and Poets on Teaching (featuring short essays by 101 poets) to be published by University of Iowa Press in the fall.
We update our Contributor News section twice each year. If you have been published in West Branch and would like us to include your news in our next installment (spring 2011), please email us at westbranch.assist@gmail.com.
