Kudos Q1, 2020: News and Accolades from the Lighthouse Community

It's kudos time! This is our quarterly opportunity to celebrate the latest publication and award news from our members, instructors, and workshop participants. If you're a Lighthouse member who'd like to share your own good news, let us know here.

 

Book Deals and News

Member Kiri Wetsby’s memoir was published March 3 from Post Hill Press. The memoir is called Fortune Favors the Brave.

Member Jenni MacDonald’s edited collection, Schabraco and other Gothic tales from The Lady’s Monthly Museum, 1798-1828, is out now from Valancourt Books.

Member Brian Kagan’s collection of personal essays, My Shorts: Brief Scenes from my Early Life, was published in February.

Member Carolina Molk had an essay published in The Best, Most Awful Job, edited by Katherine May, and published by Elliott & Thompson (May 1, 2020).

 

Awards and Recognition

Instructor Whitney Gaines’s essay “On Fleek” is the winner of the 2020 Harpur Palate Award for Creative Nonfiction.

Administrative Specialist Helen Armstrong was accepted into Brown University’s fully-funded M.F.A. program.

Member Katherine Rooks’s story “On Top of the World” has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize. The story appears in The New Guard Vol VIII.

Member Raksha Vasudevan received two Pushcart Prize nominations for her nonfiction. Hippocampus nominated her story “Steps to Becoming Fine: As Lived By My Mother,” and Jellyfish Review nominated her flash piece “Pro-Choice Stories: New World Economics.”

Member Michele Finn Johnson’s flash fiction, “Santo Spirito, 1577,” was selected for inclusion in The Best Small Fictions 2019 anthology (Sonder Press). Her flash fiction, “Grafton Hill,” was nominated for a Pushcart Prize by Lost Balloon. She was also named Fiction Editor for Split Lip Magazine.

Instructor Gail Waldstein won the first place poetry prize in The William Faulkner Literary Competition Awards 2019 for her poem, “Aurora Borealis.”

Member Christina Rivera Cogswell’s essay, “Feral,” won first place in Pacifica Literary Review’s CNF contest judged by Melissa Febos. Christina first workshopped this essay at Lit Fest ‘18 with Leslie Jamison, and revised it under the expert guidance of BK Loren.

Member Amanda McCracken was interviewed by the BBC World News and Ireland’s National Public Radio about her personal essay published in the Huffington Post in February, which discussed relationships, sex, dating, and self-love.

Member Susanna Speier started a new position as part-time Staff Reporter at AppGrooves.

Member Petra Perkins scored finalist in the Remember, November contest at Hippocampus with her memoir excerpt, “Cannot Be Seen, Nor Even Touched.”

 

Publications

Instructor Paula Younger’s essay, “So Hard to Love,” was published by Gay Magazine.

Instructor Erika Krouse’s short story, “North of Dodge,” appeared in Glimmer Train’s last issue. Her short story, “The Piano,” was a finalist for Best American Nonrequired Reading 2019.

Young Authors Collective member Elaina Weakliem’s piece “Strawberry Haze” was published in The Round, the biannual literary arts magazine at Brown University.

Member Michele Finn Johnson’s short story, “Stealing Baby Jesus,” was published in Barrelhouse.

Member Lindsay (Fin) Thomas had two poems published (under Finnian Sawyer) in Screen Door Review after being submitted during Willfully Submit.

Member Kaia Gallagher conducted two interviews for The Coachella Review, one with Catherine Chung and the other with Helen Macdonald. She published a memoir entitled Vanaema’s Gift in the Still Point Arts Quarterly anthology on “Grandparents and Other Wise Ancestors.” Her essay, “The Columbine Faultline,” was published in Wordpeace.

Instructor Gail Waldstein had 3 poems published in Literature Today vol. 10: “Highschool Elastic,” “Sandhill Cranes, Gray Lakes, Idaho,” and “Neruda on Tape.”

Member Jennie MacDonald’s guest blog post, “Discovering Character Through Place,” has been published at Typehouse Literary Magazine.

Book Project graduate Corie Rosen had two poems published in Big Muddy: A Journal of the Mississippi River Valley.

Book Project participant Sydney Fowler has a chapter in the newly published Handbook of Sexuality Leadership, “Feminist Activist Leadership and the Five Stages for Matching Values with Practice: A Case Study,” co-written with Dr. Katherine Martinez of Metropolitan State University of Denver.

Member Joey Porcelli’s travel article on the Galapagos Islands appeared in the March/April issue of Colorado Expression Magazine.

Instructor Rebecca Berg has a short story, “My Father’s Daughter,” in the current issue of Map Literary.

Administrative Specialist Helen Armstrong’s short story, “infamous and detestable,” was selected for publication in Jellyfish Review’s special issue, “Instructions for Committing Crimes.”

Instructor John Cotter’s essay “Shocked Quartz” appeared as a feature piece in Catapult.

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Image of Robert McBrearty

Robert McBrearty has new stories published in The Greensboro Review, Matter Press, Loud Coffee Press, and his one-act play "The Interview" has been published by Off-the-Wall-Plays.