My Year in Writing

Award Nominations

I have two new award nominations to add! Both are for the same story–my shortest this year, and one of my favorites: “Why I Got Written Up by the Manager at Uncle Earl’s World-Famous Bar-B-Q,” published in the wonderful 100 Word Story.

I’m so excited to learn that the editors of 100 Word Story nominated this piece for both Best Microfiction 2020 (U.K.) and Best Small Fictions 2020 (U.S.)! Sometimes stories just come to life fully formed, like happy little gifts, and this was one of them. “Why I Got Written Up …” was born during a Flashathon (marathon writing session), inspired by words from a restaurant menu. I had the chance to perform it at a Writefest open mic in May 2019 in Houston. It was such a fun piece to write and to read!

Workshops Taken

I had a busy writing year in 2019, with two Flashathon writing challenges, a Fast Flash workshop with Kathy Fish, and two flash workshops with Meg Pokrass. I challenged myself with a Novella-in-Flash workshop, trying a new form and writing several connected flash pieces. I’m still working on the stories that grew out of this workshop, a post-apocalyptic tale of twin sisters, and hope to continue this project in 2020.

Workshops Taught

In 2019, I taught two workshops, one far afield and one close to home. I spent a week in Houston, Texas, teaching a daily flash fiction class for Writespace as a lead-up to the Writefest conference. It was an intense and really productive experience, and I am still working with Writespace as a consulting editor. Back in Rhode Island, I was honored to facilitate a Veterans Writing Workshop alongside reference librarian Jane Granatino of the Barrington Public Library, who started the program after attending a library conference about veterans’ writing groups. We’ve been working with a small but talented group of veterans who are writing stories about their own military experiences as well as those of family members. That group will continue in 2020, and it’s open to all veterans.

What’s Next?

I’m awaiting the publication of two slightly longer stories, “What the Selkies Know” (forthcoming in Atlas and Alice) and “In the Time of Climate Change” (forthcoming in X-R-A-Y) and a new micro, “Halo,” forthcoming in MacQueen’s Quinterly. I’m getting ready to teach an online flash workshop for the International Women’s Writing Guild starting January 21, 2020. And I’m already looking forward to my next “working vacation”–teaching a summer flash fiction workshop on Cape Cod at Truro Center for the Arts at Castle Hill!