NEWSFLASH!!! NEW FICTION CONTEST! IT'S TIME FOR #3. Posting that contest and guidelines soon. Want something to do for the holidaze? Searching for a way to spill the bile, or, holiday cheer, as it were? Enter the new fiction contest and if you win, get posted for all to see! Past winners and honorable mentions and so forths, have had their work posted, gotten fan notes, even interest from agents. One writer, Yasmine Lever, who was one of the co-winners of Contest #1, just won the prestigious UCLA James Kirkwood Award (see below). So c'mon. Shake off that tinsel, unload those menorahs, unwrap your turbaned minds and set pen to paper, or fingers to the keyboard, or quill to parchment -- whatever it takes. Click on PICK-OF-THE-LITTER to see details!!!
UPCOMING READINGS/EVENTS:
Friday, January 11th at Barnes & Noble, Westside Pavilion, 10850 W. Pico Blvd., from 7pm - 8pm, Yours truly kicks off this WRITERS ON WRITING series of five evenings on Creativity & Craft, a promo for upcoming UCLA Winter Conference where I'll teach THE NECESSARY LIE: TURNING LIFE INTO FICTION...according to the Writers Program Quarterly, I'll share expertise, tips, and answer your writing questions in a stimulating, free-to-the-public evening...yowza.
Happy Holidaze! Many classes are winding down, and that means student readings! Monday, December 1st, my Topanga fiction workshop (we've been reading Gaston Bachelard's THE POETICS OF SPACE) will read their new work at the Mimosa Cafe in Topanga Canyon, from 7:30pm to 9pm. Then we'll go tie one on at Abuelita's. Come join!
My UCLA Extension class A Touch of Evil: Writing Unflinching Fiction, will have their reading on Wednesday, December 12th at the Novel Cafe in Venice, around the corner from One Life Natural Foods. That, too, will be from 7:30pm to 9pm. Then we'll hit some local spot to quaff bubbly (water or alcohol as the case may be), and celebrate.
Then on Wednesday, December 19th, my West Hollywood fiction workshop, in which we read Erich Fromm's wildass THE ANATOMY OF HUMAN DESTRUCTIVENESS, will be doing a reading of their new work at Book Soup, from 7:30pm to 9pm. There too we will decamp post-reading to celebrate.
TRACK 16 HOLIDAZE READING, WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 18TH: I will be reading, along with Arty Nelson, Jerry Stahl, Georganne Deen, Bernard Cooper, Michelle Huneven, Ann Heche, Joe Donnelly, and more! Don't miss. Check www.track16.com for more info. Forget the time. Evening. It's over at Bergamot Station. Should be a high voltage, rockin' evening, sure to get your jingle on.
PUBLICATIONS:
San Francisco smut editor Cara Bruce's BEST BISEXUAL WOMEN'S EROTICA is out!!! And it seems to be selling like hotcakes, or would that be hotpants? It's zooming up there on Amazon. Must say it's kinda trippy being a part of that antho. Bit of an experiment. Wonder how it will affect my lit cred, such as it is. Check www.cleispress.com for more info. Interesting to be in company of all these accomplished erotica writers. I guess erotica is literary porn? But what I have in there, don't know if it fits. Just so happened I had a section from my second book-in-progress, tentatively titled EDUCATION OF A CUNT, that featured a few sections that fit the bill because there was some bi action in there -- though it's pretty strange, twisted, sad, ambivalent, complicated stuff -- well, see for yourselves. Always fun to be published.
In fact, so much fun -- and such a boost to the often lonely job of writing, that I agreed to submit something for wunder-editor Cara Bruce's next project -- OBSESSED: FETISH EROTICA antho. I also couldn't resist joining forces with writers like JT Leroy (SARAH) and Jerry Stahl. This forthcoming story is called "MAN AND WOMAN, A STUDY IN BLACK & WHITE" and is way more graphic than the previous story. But it also explores touchy subjects like race, racism, fetishizing the Other, power dynamics and abuse, self-loathing -- you know, fun stuff! Not sure when that will be out, but soon I think. Cara just turned the proofs in yesterday! Will keep you posted.
Also, don't forget to pick up your handy copy of the new HUNGRY? II guidebook, out from hypercool local publishing house, Really Great Books, edited by former fabulous student Kristin Petersen. Check www.reallygreatbooks.com to learn more about this happening LA-based house and find out where you can find the latest glovebox guide. (P.S. -- they're always looking for contributors for their various glovebox guides!)
And if you didn't catch it last time, I have a short piece in an Italian lit mag, Storie. They did an antho of worldwide writers writing little ditties on what they were doing in the afternoon of April 19th. You can click on http://www.storie.it/pomeriggio.htm to read the samples. There are tons of local writers in there, from me to Michael Tolkin to Jerry Stahl to Meri Nana-Ama Danquah, and then a slew of global ones. Weird since it's all before The New World.
STUDENT NEWS
After teaching at UCLA, and Antioch, Chapman, various private workshops for the last five plus years -- I've got a bunch of former students who are making the news with their publishing, MFA'ing, or general antics! PLEASE SEND IN NEWS TO ME IF YOU ARE A FORMER STUDENT, OR KNOW OF NEWS OF ONE! And click on back issues to see earlier news.
I mentioned this last time, but just as a boost to you writers out there -- YASMINE LEVER, one of the first place winners of the First Fiction Contest on this site, subsequently took a fiction writing class with me at UCLA, I nominated her for the James Kirkwood Award, and just this past October she won!!! She got a special luncheon on her honor, and a thousand bucks in cash which she's using to take my THE NECESSARY LIE: TURNING LIFE INTO FICTION class at the UCLA Winter Writers' Conference, and Tod Goldberg's novel writing course, also at the Conference. Putting that dough to good use! So write your short-shorts!
More to come!
Saturday, December 1, 2001
Today, I am woozy with fighting off flu. So won't write long today. Not sure what to say, either. Still reeling from 9.11 and trying to sort this new world we're living in. Do think it's interesting that many people who hadn't been pursuing fiction are turning back to it, now. Perhaps it's because there's so much less work, and so much laying off! But I think there's also an intense need to reach for the authentic, to express, to do something worthwhile. Similarly there are impulses toward deeper learning -- including about other cultures (about time) -- and charitable works. All good, I say. How about you?
I also want to thank everyone who contributed to the incredible 9.11 PICK-OF-THE-LITTER site which became a forum for writers, browsers, students and site members to voice their opinions and thoughts and stories. Powerful, wild stuff. Do please click on that back issue of P-O-T-L to read, if you haven't had the chance.
More shortly,
Signing off from Topanga,
Rachel
Click to get back issues of updates -- more gossip, ranting!
September-November 2001 -- the 9.11 Spread, This New World Of Ours
September 2nd Update: Loss of Lima, and, other ramblings from the days before The World Changed
June-August 2001: Off the Rails at Track 16 Gallery & Other Tales
April/May 2001: Second Pick-of-the-Litter Winners! plus Snap and trash from Tin House bash
December/January 2001: Happy Kwanzaa Send-Off, Holidazing
November 2000 Update: Seven Deadly Sins Contest! Plus Bonus Political Rant
June 2000 Update: Hell's Angels, Rocking the Tin House, and More!
February 2000 Update: My Bloody Valentine