March Publishing Notes

The buzz: Little, Brown and Company will release David Sedaris's next book this October, Squirrel Seeks Chipmunk: A Modest Bestiary, a book of animal fables, with cover and interior artwork by Ian Falconer.

This month, the University of Arkansas Press will publish Harm’s Way, Eric Leigh’s first book of poetry. The collection was a finalist for the inaugural Miller Williams Prize. More details can be found here: http://www.uapress.com/titles/sp10/leigh.html.

A Midsummer Night's Press is publishing two new books in April as part of its Body Language imprint of queer poetry: Handmade Love by Julie R. Enszer, a first collection from the founder of the lesbianpoetryarchive.org and Mute by Raymond Luczak, a collection exploring deaf gay experience. The Press is offering free shipping on US orders via its website: www.amidsummernightspress.com.

OR Books will publish Eileen Myles's The Inferno, a poet’s novel.

QNY will publish Laurie Rubin’s Do You Dream in Color, a blunt take on being blind by a thirty-year-old Jewish lesbian who sings opera around the world and designs her own jewelry line.

This spring Rebel Satori press will publish a new collection of poetry from Emanuel Xavier and reissue Trebor Healey's poetry collection Sweet Son of Pan, as well as bringing out new titles by jj hastain, Chad Helder, and Dennis Mahagin. On the fiction front are works by Stephen Beachy, Kevin Killian, Rob Stephenson¦ and others. Also up for the press are Chick Band by Rakelle Valencia, winner of the Project QueerLit, Contraband by Charlie Vazquez and Slut Machine by Shane Allison.

This month the University of Wisconsin Press will publish Jerry Rosco’s Glenway Wescott Personally, a biography of the author of The Pilgrim Hawk and other novels.

This Spring Chelsea Station Editions will publish The Wolf at the Door by Jameson Currier, a novel set in a haunted gay-owned guesthouse in New Orleans.

Out this month from Fiction Collective 2 is Rob Stephenson’s new novel, Passes Through.

This Spring Alyson will publish Ken O'Neill's The Marrying Kind, about a couple whose decision to boycott weddings until all couples can get married.

In June Cleis will publish James Lear's Sticky End: A Mitch Mitchell Mystery, the third erotic novel in series about a murder mystery.

Out this month from Bear Bones Books, an imprint of Lethe Press, is Bears in the Wild, an anthology of erotic stories edited by R. Jackson. Lethe will also publish Marshall Moore’s forthcoming novel, An Ideal for Living.

This October Agate Bolden will publish Terrance Dean's Straight, From Your Gay Best Friend, a humorous and soulful advice guide for straight women from the vantage point of a gay man.

Teachers College Press will publish Mollie Blackburn's LGBTQ Students Reading the Word and the World in the Fall of 2011.

Among the new gay literary Fan pages launched recently on Facebook are ones for literary journal Bloom, Amos Lassen’s Literary Pride, and GLBT Bookshelf.

The sixth issue of Bloom, the literary journal for queer writers, readers and artists will debut next month at the AWP conference in Denver.

Creating a lot of blog traffic recently was a publisher’s decision to cancel a proposed book of gay zombie stories. Editor Vince Liaguno weighed in on the controversy on his blog at http://vinceliaguno.blogspot.com/2010/02/of-zombies-and-stupidity.html.

Reports have surfaced that London’s gay bookshop, Gay's the Word, is again facing a rent increase. The bookstore is located in busy shopping street in the Bloomsbury neighborhood.

New York’s Second Annual Rainbow Book Fair will take place March 27, 2010, from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. in the Concourse of the City University of New York headquarters at 34th Street. The Second Annual Rainbow Book Fair is hosted by CLAGS, the Center for Lesbian and Gay Studies at CUNY. For more details visit: http://rainbowbookfair.org.

Among upcoming events are OutlantaCon 2010 April 30-May 2 in Atlanta; Saints and Sinners Literary Festival, May 13-16 in New Orleans; and Gaylaxicon 2010, an international science fiction, fantasy and horror convention, in Montreal October 20-31.

The Lambda Literary Awards will take place Thursday, May 27 in Manhattan. Over 430 books have been submitted for consideration for the awards.

The Publishing Triangle awards will be presented Thursday, April 29 in Manhattan.

TnT Classic Books has published Short Plays to Long Remember, compiled and edited by Francine L. Trevens, featuring 27 plays by 14 American authors including Perry Brass, Jane Chambers, Michael Devereaux, Paul Dexter, Victor Gluck, David Brendan Hopes, David Johnston, David J. Mauriello, Sidney Morris, William F. Poleri, Daniel P. Quinn, Francine L. Trevens, Doric Wilson and George Zarr.

Broadway diva Patti Lupone is running a contest on her Web site pattilupone.com to come up with a name for her memoir. The New York Times reported the winner will get an autographed copy of the book, two tickets to Lupone’s next Broadway show (or major show in a city near you), and the actress will congratulate the winner personally at the theater. Contest ends March 30, 2010.

Patrick Dennis’s novel, Auntie Mame, has become an unlikely bestseller in Italy. The novel was published in 1955 and penned by Edward Everett Tanner III, an idiosyncratic social observer and satirist who wrote under several pseudonyms. The Italian director Luca Guadagnino is reportedly interested in a film remake that would star the British actress Tilda Swinton in the title role.

Jon Robin Baitz is currently at work on a new play about Hollywood figure Robert Evans. The play is expected to premier on Broadway within the next year. Baitz will also make his Broadway playwriting debut with Love and Mercy.

Monday night performances of Jon Marans’ off-Broadway play The Temperamentals, based on Harry Hay and the founding of the Mattachine Society, will be followed by post-show discussions with special guests including Larry Kramer, Paul Rudnick, Derek and Romaine, Bill C. Davis, Tom Viola, Charles Kaiser, John Loughery, Elizabeth Ashley and Michael Wilson. For schedules, see the Web site: www.thetemperamentals.com.

Lily Tomlin and Jane Wagner have joined the producing team of the upcoming Off Broadway show My Trip Down the Pink Carpet, written by and starring Leslie Jordan, with performances beginning April 14.

Kate Clinton will join Lily Tomlin for Back 2 Back on April 17 and 18 at the St. George Theatre in Staten Island, NY.

Portia de Rossi’s forthcoming book will detail her relationship with Ellen DeGeneres and her battle with bulimia. Her partner Ellen DeGeneres will become a comic book next month. Bluewater Productions’ Female Force is releasing a biographical comic book on the star.

Kudos: D.A. Powell was awarded the Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award. Powell’s poetry collection, Chronic, is also a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award.

Among the nominees for the 2009 Strand Magazine Critics Awards, recognizing excellence in mystery fiction, is The Little Stranger by Sarah Waters for Best Novel.

Among the finalists for the Bram Stoker awards given by the Horror Writers Association are Martyrs and Monsters by Robert Dunbar and In the Closet, Under the Bed by Lee Thomas, both in the category of Superior Achievement in a Fiction Collection.

Among the finalists for the 2009 Nebula Awards from the SFWA are “I Needs Must Part, The Policeman Said,” by Richard Bowes for Best Novelette; The Love We Share Without Knowing by Christopher Barzak for Best Novel, and Ash by Malindo Lo for the Andre Norton Award for Young Adult Science Fiction and Fantasy.

The 2010 Alice B. Medals were presented to Catherine Friend, JM Redmann, and Kate Sweeney and the 2010 Lavender Certificates to D.L. Line for On Dangerous Ground, Colette Moody for The Sublime & Spirited Voyage of Original Sin, Carsen Taite for truelesbianlove.com.

Among the winners of the Black Quill Awards, given by Dark Scribe Magazine, are Kelland by Paul G. Bens Jr. for Best Small Press Chill-Editors' Choice, and The Haunted and Other Tales by Jameson Currier for Best Dark Genre Fiction Collection-Editors' Choice.

Finalists for the annual fiction and playwrighting contests sponsored by the Saints and Sinners Literary Festival include: For fiction: Danny Bracco, Nathan Burgoine, Emily M. Danforth, James Driggers; Jack Fritscher, Wayne Lee Gay, William Holden, James Nolan, Steve Scott, and Shawn Syms. For playwriting: Suzanne Bachner, Fengar Gael, Jewelle Gomez, John Greenwell, , Kim Hanna, Joseph M. Paprzycki, Felice Picano, Jim Provenzono and Jerry Rabushka.