The Commonwealth Short Story Prize: Winners 2014 + 2015 Prize guidelines

The Commonwealth Short Story Prize unearths and promotes the best new writing from across the Commonwealth, developing literary connections worldwide. The Prize enables and features writers from countries where there is little or no publishing industry, it identifies talented writers who will go on to inspire their local communities.

The Short Story Prize is awarded for the best piece of unpublished short fiction. Regional winners will receive £2,500 and the Overall Winner will receive £5,000. Translators will receive additional prize money. Established in 2012, the Prize now was awarded for the third time.

Winners 2014

• Jennifer Nansubuga Makumbi from Uganda is the Overall Winner of the Commonwealth Short Story Prize, 2014. You can read more about the author here: Overall Winner 2014. 
• The regional winners and their stories are presented here: Commonwealth Short Story Prize - Regional Winners
• And here are the direct links to the stories: 
  -  "Let's Tell This Story Properly" by  Jennifer Nansubuga Makumbi, Uganda
  - "A Day in the Death" by Sara Adam Ang, Singapore
  - "Killing Time" by Lucy Caldwell, UK
  - "Sending for Chantal" by Maggie Harris, Guyana
  - "The Dog and the Sea" by Lucy Treloar, Australia

Short Story Prize 2015 Info + More
The 2015 Short Story Prize will open for entry 15 September and will close on 15 November 2014. Eligible are unpublished stories, story length: 2000-5000 words, from Commonwealth authors.

More about the prize and the previous winners is online at the Prize homepage: Commonwealth Short Story Prize
.

Caine Prize for African Writing: Shortlist Stories online

The shortlist for the 2014 Caine Prize for African Writing has been announced in April by Nobel Prize winner and Patron of the Caine Prize Professor Wole Soyinka. The winning story will be announced on Monday 14 July.

The Chair of judges, award-winning author Jackie Kay MBE described the shortlist as, “Compelling, lyrical, thought-provoking and engaging. From a daughter's unusual way of grieving for her father, to a memorable swim with a grandmother, a young boy's fascination with a gorilla's conversation, a dramatic faux family meeting, to a woman who is forced to sell her eggs, the subjects are as diverse as they are entertaining.”

She added, “The standard of entries was exceptionally high so much so that it was actually very difficult for the judges to whittle it down to a shortlist of only five stories. We were heartened by how many entrants were drawn to explorations of a gay narrative. What a golden age for the African short story, and how exciting to see real originality - with so many writers bringing something different to the form."

To commemorate fifteen years of the Caine Prize this year, £500 will be awarded to each shortlisted writer. The winner of the £10,000 prize is to be announced at a celebratory dinner at the Bodleian Library, Oxford, on Monday 14 July.

The 5 shortlisted stories can be read on the Caine Website, and are also offered as audio versions at Caine Prize podcast.

The Caine Prize 2014 Shortlist:

• Diane Awerbuck (South Africa) "Phosphorescence" in Cabin Fever (Umuzi, Cape Town. 2011)
  Read Phosphorescence
• Efemia Chela (Ghana/Zambia) "Chicken" in Feast, Famine and Potluck (Short Story Day Africa, South Africa. 2013)
  Read Chicken
• Tendai Huchu (Zimbabwe) "The Intervention" in Open Road Review, issue 7, New Delhi. 2013
  Read The Intervention
• Billy Kahora (Kenya) "The Gorilla's Apprentice" in Granta (London. 2010)Read The Gorilla's Apprentice
• Okwiri Oduor (Kenya) "My Father's Head" in Feast, Famine and Potluck (Short Story Day Africa, South Africa. 2013)Read My Father's Head

Impossible Spaces

"Impossible Spaces" is a new collection of twenty-one dark, unsettling and weird short stories that explore the spaces at the edge of possibility.

Sometimes the rules can change. Sometimes things aren’t how they appear. Sometimes you can just slip through the cracks and end up… somewhere else. What else is there? Is there somewhere else, right beside you, if you could only reach out and touch it? Or is it waiting to reach out and touch you?

Don’t trust what you see. Don’t trust what you hear. Don’t trust what you remember. It isn’t what you think.

The collection is available as paperback + e-book: Impossible Spaces

Authors + Editor: The collection is edited by Hannah Kate, with stories by Ramsey Campbell, Simon Bestwick, Hannah Kate, Jeanette Greaves, Richard Freeman, Almira Holmes, Arpa Mukhopadhyay, Chris Galvin Nguyen, Christos Callow Jr., Daisy Black, Douglas Thompson, Jessica George, Keris McDonald, Laura Brown, Maree Kimberley, Margrét Helgadóttir, Nancy Schumann, Rachel Yelding, Steven K. Beattie, Tej Turner, Tracy Fahey

About Hannah Kate
Hannah Kate is a poet and short story writer based in North Manchester, UK. Her work has appeared in local and national magazines, as well as in anthologies. In her other life, as Dr. Hannah Priest, she is an academic researcher and writer. She blogs at HannahKate.net

book page: Impossible Spaces

A Guide to Girl Geek Culture: The 2013 Eisner Award Nominees + links to online reads

The Eisner Awards are prizes given for creative achievement in American comic books, sometimes referred to as the Comics Industry's equivalent of the Oscar Awards. The nominations in each category are generated by a five-member panel and have now been announced. They ate voted on by comic-book professionals, and presented at the annual Comic-Con International convention held in San Diego, California, in July.

"And you know what we do with nominees here!" says the geek web magazine The Mary Sue: "We try to find links to previews, excerpts, first issues, and entire runs that are available to read online for free." 

Check out their page for the full list of nominees and links: The 2013 Eisner Award Nominees You Can Read For Free On The Internet

Nominees Range:
Interesting to see that the nomination inlcudes famous names and publishers, but also self-published works, and webcomics and comic-related online magazines. Below the links to the works that can be accessed online completely or as excerpt:

Direct links to the nominated short stories, single issues, continuing series:

• “Rainbow Moment,” (excerpts) by Lilli Carré, in Heads or Tails (Fantagraphics)
• The Mire, (preview) by Becky Cloonan (self-published)
• Pope Hats #3, (PDF preview) by Ethan Rilly (AdHouse Books)
• Fatale, (first issue available free) by Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips (Image)
• Prophet, (first issue of current run available free) by Brandon Graham and Simon Roy (Image)
• Saga, (first issue available free) by Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples (Image)
• Bandette, (first issue available free) by Paul Tobin and Colleen Coover (Monkeybrain)

Direct links to the nomintated webcomics

• Ant Comic, by Michael DeForge
• Bandette, by Paul Tobin and Colleen Coover - now in print:
  Bandette, (first issue available free) by Paul Tobin and Colleen Coover (Monkeybrain)
• It Will All Hurt, by Farel Dalrymple
• Our Bloodstained Roof, by Ryan Andrews
• Oyster War, by Ben Towle

Best Graphic Album and Best Adaptation

• Homer’s Odyssey, (excerpt) adapted by Seymour Chwast (Bloomsbury)
• Goliath, (excerpt) by Tom Gauld (Drawn & Quarterly)
• Sailor Twain, or The Mermaid in the Hudson by Mark Siegel (First Second)

Best Comics-Related Periodical/Journalism

• ComicsAlliance, edited by Joe Hughes, Caleb Goellner, and Andy Khouri
• The Comics Reporter, edited by Tom Spurgeon
• Robot Six, produced by Comic Book Resources
• tcj.com, edited by Timothy Hodler and Dan Nadel (Fantagraphics)

About The Mary Sue
The Mary Sue hopes to be a place for two things: highlighting women in the geek world, and providing a prominent place for the voices of geek women. Because all we really want is to just be able to geek out with all geeks, of any gender, without feeling like our femininity is front and center for scrutinization. To not feel like we have to work harder than guys to prove that we’re genuinely into geek culture. We want simple things, like to be able to visit a comic book store without feeling out of place. To be able to buy a video game without getting the sense that the cashier thinks we’re buying it for someone else.

Story Tapes

Story Tapes is a space for writers to voice their work. Edited by Eliza Smith and Faith Gardner, the page publishes monthly podcasts and videos featuring established and emerging writers.

Contributors so far include: Lauren Becker, Josh Denslow, Berit Ellingsen, Sarah Rose Etter, Casey Hannan, Tania Hershman, Molly Laich, Scott McClanahan, Mary Miller, Alicia Mountain, Delaney Nolan, Alissa Nutting, Owen Poindexter, Matt Rowan, Sean Schlemmer, Amber Sparks, xTx, Buzzmutt, Doom Dong, High Anxiety, Jonathan Mann, Moonwatcher, Sean Pierce, Ben, Shakey Graves, The Shants, Patrick McGilligan.

Submissions
Storytapes is currently open to submissions: "We like stories that beg to be read out loud. We take stories under 2,000 words. Reprints and simultaneous submissions are fine. Send one story at a time via Submittable."

Recent Story Tapes:

• Story Swap #6: Berit Ellingsen and Tania Hershman trading flash pieces
• Podcast Episode 7: Alissa Nutting talks about fairy tales, flash fiction, and ineffable sadness.

It's Short Story Week! Links, lists, videos, reviews

It's Short Story Week upcoming! To join the big short celebration online, here some links, lists, videos, initiatives: 

#storysunday
A twitter initiative: on sundays, link to someone else's short story published somewhere online which will delight and astound readers this week. Make sure to add the hashtag #storysunday.

The storySouth Million Writers Award
The largest short story award in the web: the storySouth Million Writers Award highlights short stories published in online journals and magazines. Here's the link to the current Top10 list

A brief survey of the short story - a Guardian series 
In an online literary series that started in 2007, Chris Power portrays authors of short stories, and the development of the short story as format over time in the Guardian.

The danger of a single story
Our lives, our cultures, are composed of many overlapping stories. - a TedTalk video.

The Short Review
Online reviews of new, not-quite-so-new and classic collections and anthologies

About Short Story Week
National Short Story Week is an annual awareness event. Its aim is to focus the attentions of the public and the media on the short story and short story writers, publishers and events. The central website is nationalshortstoryweek

A brief survey of the short story - a Guardian series by Chris Power

In a literary series that started in 2007, Chris Power portrays authors of short stories, and the development of the short story as format over time.

In his own words, the portrays form "... a regular series of blogs that propose to offer a (very) partial survey of the short story, each post dealing with a single author who did or is doing something special with the form. In the interests of full disclosure I should point out that when I say "partial" I mean both "incomplete" and "biased", and I hope I'll get to hear dissenting opinions from you folks."

The series starts with Anton Chekhov, whose "subtle portrayals of complex, morally ambiguous characters set an example writers are following to this day" and with H.P.Lovecraft, "a master of fantastic horror tales, but the hate which drove his work was all too real."

Most recent features include Flannery O'Connor ("who brings an enigmatic intensity to her gothic vision of the American South" and Yugoslavian author Danilo Kiš ("Muddling the real and the fictional, the power of Kiš's stories lie in their ability to capture truth by doctoring history").

A series overview is online here: A brief survey of the short story.
So far 43 featuers are online.

Extract(s) - Your daily dose of lit

Extract(s) - Your daily dose of lit is a daily lit blog that also includes a video channel and is open to multiple forms.

In their own words: "Extract(s) features bite-sized literature in surprising forms. We don’t want to be your everything, but we do want to be one thing that makes your day more interesting. Drop by for a few minutes every day. We’ll give you something to think about."

Categories inlcude:
- Excerpts
- Haiku
- In Place
- Poems
- Stories

In Place Literary Video Series 
Extract(s) is currently running a Kickstrater campaign for the second season of their litarary project "In Place". A campaign video is online here, and the Kickstarter page is here: In Place Literary Video Series: Season 2 (deadline is September 19).

About Extract(s)
Extract(s) is edited and organized by: Christopher J. Anderson (Founder & Executive Creative Director;) Jenn Monroe (Founder & Executive Producer); Meg Cameron (Media & Communications Manager & Producer, “In Place”); Kyle Petty (Director, “In Place”)

Website: Extract(s) - Your daily dose of lit
Video Channel: Extract(s)

Fictionaut Reading, New York: trip blogs & links

It happend in New York City, in the KGB Bar: an international fictionaut reading with  main headliners Christopher Allen from Germany and Matt Potter from Australia, and an open mike format that let about 15 other writers the chance to dazzle the KGB Bar, including Tania Hershman from the UK.

For all who didn't have the chance to be there, Bill Yarrow filmed the reads and put them online at YouTube: Fictionaut Reading.

But that's only half of the digital fun: there are several travelogues and blog posts that spin from the reading, lead up to it, or link to further reads:

Christopher Allen's blog post: Fond Memories of the KGB: "The KGB Bar is small and dark. In former times, I'm sure this space was a dank, cloudy fishbowl of the smoking intelligentsia..."

Tania Hershman's travelogue: The Languages We Speak and the Languages We Don't: "I have just had quite an amazing month in the USA and am going to attempt to sum it up, as if that was ever possible, or at least sort out some of the thoughts in my head into some coherence! ..."

Robert Vaughan's post with extra-links Hump-a-day late: "The readers were far flung from all over the globe, and the audience was really appreciative..."

Michelle Elvy's reflection (via facebook): "Sitting on a cool winter evening listening to my own story, in another voice, read on a warm summer night in NYC, thanks to Bill Yarrow's video of readings at the recent Fictionaut event in NYC. You can hear Christopher Allen, Tania Hershman, Matt Potter and also Susan Tepper reading my work here at YouTube: Fictionaut Reading. Feeling very happy about this!! Thanks to you all -- and for Bill for editing this all together."

My Mother Was an Upright Piano - Tania Hershman (Tangent)

My Mother Was an Upright Piano is Tania Hershman's second collection of short stories, and follows The White Road which was commended by the judges of the 2009 Orange Award for New Writers. It includes 56 short short fictions, some of which were broadcast on BBC Radio 4.

"Tania Hershman writes with such passion and playfulness, the pain and the fear and the hope woven through her stories hits all the harder. The result is beautiful, funny and quietly devastating." - Nicola Walker, actress (Spooks, Inside Men)

For more about the book, visit the book trailer.
There also is a new expat-interview with Tania online at Christopher Allen's I Must Be Off blog: interview link.

Tania Hershman was born in London in 1970, moved to Jerusalem in 1994, and returned to the UK in August 2009. After making a living for 13 years as a science journalist, writing for publications such as Wired and NewScientist, she now focuses on short fiction.

Tania Hershman: My Mother Was an Upright Piano
ISBN: 9781906477608

Inter/National Short Story Day 2011

Thursday 22nd December is the shortest day of the year. It also is Short Story Day in the UK. To celebrate prose’s short-yet-perfectly-crafted form, there's a special event website: http://www.nationalshortstoryday.co.uk/

The page features videoclips of short story readings and interviews and story recommendations, quotes and links to short story organisations, as well as links to story sources, publishers, and other pages of interest, like this TedTalk: The danger of a single story.

The Short Story Day invites to "pick up a short story and let your reading take you to territories previously unexplored."

Int'l Short Story Day
There also is a related international twitter account: Int'l ShortStory Day with more links and notes, here just 2 of the links:  a blog of daily short story reviews and a book giveaway.

If you are into story videoclips, check out the Short Story Day Facebook-page for additional short story clips and links.

website link:
Inter/National Short Story Day 2011

related links: short stories, writing events