A Good Week to Stay Indoors with Literature
NewPages Newsletter #133 Featuring 37 Submission Opportunities
The garden survived the hot weather and really enjoyed the rain last week. Our new endeavor, seedless concord grapes, actually have three little baby bunches growing and we are excited to see if they will make it through to harvest time. For some reason this weather really made me want to go back and reread the entire Dark Is Rising series from Susan Cooper. Yes, it is written for young adults, but I can still love the series as an adult, can’t I? Do you have go-to re-reads that call out to you even when your To Read list needs some major attention? A well-read book is a welcome friend when the heat or cold or storms are unbearable.
Need more reading material to keep you busy? Discover fledgling publications and the latest issues of your favorites on the NewPages Magazine Stand. The June 2024 issue of About Place explores the concept of “Strange Wests” which conceives of the West beyond its conventional, colonialized framework. Boulevard Winter 2024 – a double issue – spotlights 2022 Fiction Contest winner Trent Lewin, and 2022 Nonfiction Contest winner Gabriel Rogers. It also features a Boulevard Craft Interview with Gus Moreno, a novel excerpt from Joyce Carol Oates, and so much more!
Later this week, discover the Summer 2024 issue of The Kenyon Review includes a folio centered on the theme of Extinction, with poetry by Jessica Abughattas, Saddiq Dzukogi, Martín Espada, and Farah Kader, fiction by Lee Conell, Vida James, and Jimin Kang, and nonfiction by Taneum Bambrick and noam keim. In the Spring 2024 (226) issue of The Malahat Review, readers can enjoy Open Season Awards winning works by Jocy Chan (poetry), Aldyn Chwelow (creative nonfiction), and Dominique Bernier-Cormier (fiction). Nimrod International Journal Spring/Summer 2024 issue is themed “Refuge.” What is refuge? How do we pursue or find it? The concept is rather abstract and wildly different for many people, and the authors within represent that very conundrum.
Need even more of a lit mag fix? Stay tuned for our monthly roundup of all the new issues released and received for this month.
In book news, stop by the NewPages Book Stand to discover new titles to add to your must-read lists. Stephen C. Pollock’s poetry collection Exits explores the beauty and frailty of life, the cycles of nature, and the potential for renewal. It also responds to contemporary anxieties surrounding death and the universal search for meaning. Posting later this week, you can find a comprehensive list of new and forthcoming releases sent to NewPages this month.
Get book recommendations from our reviewers. Eleanor J. Bader tackles Feminism, Violence and Nonviolence which features forty-seven essays published between the 1970s and 1990s. “It’s a valuable collection, but because it is disconnected from the contemporary realities of 21st-century politics and social movements, its usefulness is likely limited to scholars, researchers, and academics.” Jami Macarty reviews Rennie Ament’s poetry collection Mechanical Bull whose poems “toggle between extremes.”
Come back to the NewPages Blog later this week for reviews of Onyi Nwabineli’s Allow Me to Introduce Myself and Haley Lasché’s One.
Sometimes inspiration can come on us in different ways, can’t it? How about using the animals in your life to help you take up your pen (or laptop)? Like a soon-to-be 4-year-old (in human years at least) dachshund that is a rebellious and stubborn teenager and who loves to argue back with you when he doesn’t get his way? Or his twin brother who starts crying murder if another animal comes near their human mother?
Or how about an orange cat that loves to snuggle, but only on his own schedule. Otherwise, he is a king and you are merely a peasant who should never entertain the idea of touching him unless it was his idea to begin with? As king, it is completely fine that he will only eat grilled Fancy Feast with cheese, isn’t it?
Have you ever seen your animals start arguing with another animal that was much smaller or much larger and you are trying to figure out what could have upset them so much? Why is your dog offended by a toad? What did the toad do to him that he’s so upset? Will the dog and toad have a happy ending or is their relationship ruined forever on that bad first impression?
Calls, Contests, & More
Below are this week’s writing contests, calls for submissions, and literary and writing events. Enjoy 37 opportunities to get your work published or to enhance your writing craft. Please note: only paid subscribers get access to this information! You can become a paid subscriber for only $5 a month and get early access to submission opportunities and events before they go live on our site.
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