Limited-time offer

Right now (and for a limited time) Common Boundary: Stories of Immigration is on sale at Barnes & Noble (online) for $11.48 (that's a 28% discount). Tell your friends!

Virtual Notes Marks Common Boundary

Have you seen Dorothee Lang's virtual notes on Common Boundary? Take a look here - she gets right to the heart of the book. And no wonder, as Dorothee is a writer, essayist, editor, and translator. When you go to her virtual notes, you can find out more about her. Check it out.

Got $50 Grand?

St. Francis College is pleased to announce the opening of submissions for the second, biannual St. Francis College Literary Prize which offers encouragement and significant financial support in the form of $50,000 to a mid-career writer, one of the richest prizes in the United States.

“We received several dozen submissions last time and feel we really spoke to a part of the writing community that greatly needed the attention and support the St. Francis Prize offers,” said Vice President for Academic Affairs and Academic Dean Tim Houlihan. “Writers on their third to fifth book sit at a delicate crossroads where they can choose to continue to pursue their craft or head in different directions. We want to be the reason why a talented writer will continue to share their work with the world.”

The 2011 Prize will be awarded for an outstanding third to fifth book of published fiction. The jury will consider books published from July 2009 to May 2011. Self-published books will be considered for award consideration as will English translations. A short list will be announced in mid-August 2011. The winner will be announced at the Brooklyn Book Festival in September 2011.

The first St. Francis College Literary Prize went to Aleksandar Hemon for his book, Love and Obstacles (Riverhead Books). Hemon, raised in Sarajevo and now residing in Chicago wrote his first work in English in 1995. “I was going to quit after this book now it turns out I'm mid-career,” said Hemon in his short, modest and humorous acceptance speech. “Thank you all for… exposing me to this embarrassing pleasure. I will keep writing, I guess I have no other choice.”

The first jury which selected Hemon’s work included Pulitzer Prize winner Michael Chabon (The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay), National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction winner Jonathan Lethem (Motherless Brooklyn), author and co-editor of The Believer magazine Heidi Julavits (The Uses of Enchantment: A Novel), author and professor at the MFA writing program at Columbia University Ben Marcus (Notable American Women) and New York Times bestselling author Ayelet Waldman (Bad Mother: A Chronicle of Maternal Crimes, Minor Calamities and Occasional Moments of Grace). The new jury is currently being recruited.

The deadline for entries is May 1, 2011.

Inquiries can be made via email to Ian Maloney to:
imaloney@stfranciscollege.edu

Submissions (6 copies) should be mailed to:

Professor Ian Maloney
Department of English
St. Francis College
180 Remsen Street
Brooklyn, NY 11201

Two Bits Today

1. Daily s-Press has given Common Boundary: Stories of Immigration a 5 star rating on Goodreads. 2. We'd like to get more fiction (short stories) for Battle Runes: Writings on War. 3. We expect to have more profiles on writers in the near future. You'll have to check in to see. Did we say two bits? Okay, well here's a fourth: John Guzlowski has given Common Boundary a 5 star rating on Amazon.com.