September Publishing Notes

The buzz: The schedule for the 2009 Atlanta Queer Literary Festival, November 3-8, 2009, has been posted at http://www.atlqueerlitfest.com/. Events include readings by Andrew Beierle, Catherine Lundoff, Collin Kelley, Franklin Abbott, Stacyann Chin, and Manil Suri, workshops with Regie Cabico, Kit Yan, Marty McConnell, and Ami Mattison, and an exhibition of photographs and ephemera featured in the book Gay and Lesbian Atlanta with comments by co-author Wesley Chenault. The AQLF's partnership with the Decatur Book Festival takes place over Labor Day Weekend, September 4-6, in Decatur, GA. Featured authors includes Sharon Sanders, Franklin Abbott, Z Egloff, Shawn Stuart Ruff, Collin Kelley, Megan Volpert, Amy King, C. Dale Young, James Allen Hall, Radclyffe, Kim Baldwin and J.M. Redmann.

The Lambda Literary Foundation will hold a Read-a-Thon Set November 21, 2009 at 7:30 p.m. at Giovanni's Room bookstore in Philadelphia to benefit both the Foundation and the bookstore. LGBT authors will read from a recent or classic book and answer questions for approximately 15 minutes total for each author.

Charles Flowers, the Executive Director of The Lambda Literary Foundation will leave his position in the fall.

Broward County in Florida is proposing to balance its budget by slashing 30% of its cultural grants, a move that could impair Fort Lauderdale's Stonewall Library & Archives. The Stonewall Library & Archives houses over 18,000 LGBT-related books and audio-visual materials, as well as 5,000 historical LGBT items, many focusing on the history of gays in the South.

A West Bend, Illinois couple has asked that certain books be moved to a restricted section of the West Bend Community Memorial Library community library and that the Library Board balance its collection of books about homosexuality with books that affirm traditional “heterosexual perspectives.” A group called Parents and Friends of Ex-Gays and Gays recently issued a statement condemning the library for continuing to neglect books by ex-gay authors. On June 2, members of the West Bend Library Board voted unanimously not to move or restrict any of the books. Meanwhile, the terms of four Library Board members were not renewed. Four men subsequently filed a lawsuit, stating certain books caused them pain, and called for one of the library’s books to be publicly burned.

Greenwood Press has issued a two-volume Encyclopedia of Contemporary LGBTQ Literature of the United States, edited by Emmanuel S. Nelson.

The Outer Alliance, a new organization, has been set up in support of LGBT advocacy in the Sci Fi/Fantasy community. More details can be found at http://outeralliance.wordpress.com/.

Kensington will publish Michael Salvatore's Between Boyfriends in June 2010.

Country Valley Press has just published a limited edition hand-sewn chapbook by Jeffery Beam of a long poem entitled, An Invocation.

Entertainment Weekly reported that Michael Cunningham is working on his latest novel, his first in four years, titled Olympia. Olympia follows an art dealer who is drawn increasingly toward his wife’s younger brother, who reminds him of the couple’s younger years.

In October, Belhue Press will publish The Manly Art of Seduction by Perry Brass.

This fall, Rebel Satori Press will publish D. Travers Scott new story collection, Love Hard.

In 2010 It Books will publish RuPaul's Workin’ It! RuPaul's Guide to Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Style!, a style guide and confidence manifesto.

Queerty noted that there are reportedly two finished scripts of Invisible Life, E. Lynn Harris’s first novel -- one which focuses on the college years and the other on the New York City years of characters Raymond, Nicole and Basil. The late author was in Los Angeles meeting with producers shortly before he died. Several of Harris’s friends — including Eric Jerome Dickey and Kimberla Lawson Roby — will meet with local book clubs in his place this fall.

Mike Nichols will direct Deep Water, an adaptation of the 1957 Patricia Highsmith novel starring Viggo Mortensen and Charlize Theron.

Robert Downey Jr. is reportedly in talks with Universal Pictures to play the vampire Lestat in a new film based on Anne Rice’s popular trilogy of novels The Vampire Chronicles.

The Menier Chocolate Factory’s production of La Cages Aux Folles is headed to Broadway and will open in a yet-to-be-announced Shubert theater on April 18, 2010.

Kudos: Among with recipients of literary awards from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, which honor writers of exceptional talent, was Chris Adrian who received the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award for his short story collection A Better Angel. Among the writers receiving 2009 Guggenheim Fellowships were Chris Adrian and Stacey D’Erasmo.

Open Calls: Candace Walsh and Laura Andre are seeking submissions for And Then It Shifted: Women Open Up About Leaving Men For Women to be published by Seal Press in 2010. Deadline is December 1, 2009. More details can be found at andthenitshifted@gmail.com and http://sites.google.com/site/andthenitshifted

Applications are now being accepted for the James Duggins Mid-Career Novelist Award awarded annually at the Saints and Sinners Literary Festival in New Orleans. The awards, in their fourth year, recognize and promote LGBT mid-career novelists of extraordinary talent and service to the LGBT community. They are made possible by James Duggins, PhD, a retired educator who taught history at San Francisco State University. Two annual cash awards of $5,000 each will be made to one man and one woman. Eligibility is open to any author who has written and published at least three novels, or at least two novels and substantial additional literary work, including poems, short stories, or essays. Authors may nominate themselves or another candidate by midnight October 31, 2009. For more details visit: http://www.sasfest.org/.

Also of Note: Copies of The Haunted Heart and Other Tales, a collection of my gay-themed ghost stories, published by Lethe Press, is now available through your favorite bookseller.

The gorgeous cover painting was done by Richard Taddei, a painter I have long admired. If you want to see more of Richard’s work, you can find him online at http://www.richardtaddei.com/.

Vince Liaguno, co-editor of the Stoker-winning anthology Unspeakable Horror: From the Shadows of the Closet, has posted his generous review on line at Dark Scribe Magazine, which he edits and publishes. Read it at: http://www.darkscribemagazine.com/reviews/

And I am also doing a reading on October 29th in Manhattan at Housing Works Bookstore with two other talented writers (and friends) who have new books coming out -- Tom Cardamone, author of Pumpkin Teeth: Stories, and Sean Meriwether, author of The Silent Hustler. Here’s the details on the event.

Tricks and Treats: Gays, Ghosts, and Goblins
Thursday, October 29, 2009
7:00 pm
Housing Works Bookstore Café
126 Crosby Street
New York, NY
Admission is free and all book sales proceeds benefit people living with HIV.