You're getting the weekly listings early because I am going out of town and wont be in the office the 25th-29th. I hope something in here suits you. See you next week!

Contests

Arch and Bruce Brown Foundation Short Story Competition. They want a positive story about gay/lesbian lifestyle that is based on a historic person or event. The prize is $1,000, the deadline is Nov 30th and there’s no entry fee. 

Sonora Review Short-Short Contest. Judged by David Means (author of The Secret Goldfish and winner of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize and the O. Henry Award), the prize is $250 and publication, plus 10 finalists will also be considered for publication. Mss must be 1,000 words or less. A $10 entry fee is required. Simultaneous submissions are acceptable, but fees are non-refundable. Postmark deadline of Dec 1. Current students or instructors in the University of Arizona's MFA program are not eligable. 

W.Y. Boyd Literary Award. Sponsored by the ALA, this contest is to recognize a published YA or adult novel set in a time when the US was at war. There’s no entry fee, the deadline is Dec 1, and books can be submitted by publishers or authors. Oh, and did I mention the prize is $5,000?

Maureen Egen Writers Exchange Award. Poets & Writers, Inc. sponsors two prizes of $500 each awarded annually to a poet and a fiction writer from a select area (this year-Washington, D.C.). Each winner also receives an all-expenses-paid trip to New York City to give a reading and meet with writers, editors, publishers, and agents. Writers who have published no more than one full-length book in the genre in which they are applying are eligible. Submit five copies of up to 10 pages of poetry or 25 pages of fiction by December 1. There is no entry fee. 

Black Caucus of the ALA Literary Awards. Given to African American writers. First prize is $500. There’s no entry fee, but your publisher has to send 7 copies to the committee by Dec 31st.

Cintas Foundation Fiction Fellowship. A fellowship worth $15,000 will be given to a Cuban writer, or one of Cuban decent. Students are not eligible. There’s no entry fee, and the submission deadline is Jan 14th, 2008.

Hurston/Wright Award for College Writers. This is for the best previously unpublished short story or novel excerpt by a student of African descent enrolled full time as undergraduate or graduate student in any college or university in the United States. First prize is $1000, two finalists get $500, and the entry fee is $10. Submissions accepted Nov 1-Jan 15th.

Hurston/Wright LEGACY Award. A national award presented to published writers of African descent by the national community of Black writers. "This award, underwritten by Borders Books & Music, consists of prizes for the highest quality writing in the categories of Fiction, Debut Fiction, Nonfiction, and Contemporary Fiction." Paperback originals and self-published books are eligible. There’s a $25 submission fee, prize is around $3000, and the deadline is Nov 15th 

Southern California Review 1st Annual Fiction Prize. Send one story of up to 8,000 words with a $10 reading fee payable to Southern California Review. Multiple entries are permitted, but a separate check should be included with each entry. All entrants will receive a free copy of Southern California Review. 1st Prize: $1,000; 2nd Prize: $200; 3rd Prize: $100. The winning entry will appear in the spring 2008 issue of Southern California Review. Only the 1st prize entry will be published. Postmark deadline of Dec 31st. 

Conferences

The New York Anime Festival will be held on December 7-9, 2007 at the Jacob K. Javits Center in New York City. Pop culture publishing and consulting company ICv2 has announced its first ICv2 Conference on Anime and Manga:  "Inside the Otaku Generation" at New York Anime Festival (NYAF), the new event being launched by the organizers of New York Comic Con. The ICv2 Conference on Anime and Manga:  "Inside the Otaku Generation" will be held on Thursday afternoon, December 6, 2007 at the Javits Center, on the eve of NYAF. These are the panelists currently booked for the event.

Whenever I have a magazine or journal fill out the NSSWM questionnaire, I also ask them to send me a sample issue. I’ve been getting a lot of them recently, and I’ve really been enjoying seeing the wide variety of publications out there. For example, last week I received a magazine called Watermen that has a poem about a Halibut.

Since I’m reading these publications, I thought I’d sporadically give you my impressions of them.

First up, Withersin wins points for best presentation. They sent me the second issue of the magazine, submission guidelines and some bookmarks in a folder. Snazzy, without being a bribe. Plus I like their business card.

From a layout perspective they did a good job. The cover is interesting, the text isn’t too small or crowded together, and the white space ratio is appealing. However, I’m not sure how I feel about the lack of page numbers on the title page, and they use an italic font that is a little hard to read. In one of the stories they seemed to use ? instead of – which got confusing, but for a second issue that’s a pretty minor technical glitch.

On to the content!  They have a mix of did-you-know type articles, book reviews, film reviews (old ones), interviews and stories. The magazine starts with an article about cannibalism. I can’t decide if author Ebien Piestar is joking or not. The eclectic bits of true-life weirdness are fun to read, and I have a hard deciding if some of the items are fiction or nonfiction.

Okay, I’m impressed. They wrangled an interview with Neil Gaiman. It’s a flippant interview where the interviewer talks more than Gaiman does, but it’s interesting, as long as you don’t want much in the way of concrete details.

The mix of the journal is mostly the small weird bits with 2-4 short stories thrown in, with illustrations to go along with every story. The stories are of good quality, and don’t tend to excessive blood and guts, but they still gave me the shivers.

Overall, I’d say Withersin lives up to its subtitle: Dark, different; the pleasantly sinister.

I have so many listings to share this week that you're getting some of them today.

Anthologies

Strong lesbian protagonist. Nuance books is looking for character-driven stories about inspirational women (lesbian or asexual) for their anthology, Toe to Toe: Standing Tall and Proud. They’re open on style, but don’t want horror, erotica or gratuitous sex or violence. Storues can be up to 8,000 words and they pay 1¢ a word, plus a copy of the anthology. They’ll take reprints, and stand alone excerpts from novels are acceptable. The deadline is November 23, 2007 

Queer Horror. Dark Scribe Press has a call out for Unspeakable Horror: From the Shadows of the Closest. They are looking for "edgy, provocative dark genre fiction – horror and dark psychological suspense only. We are not interested in science fiction/fantasy, mystery, or splatter punk for this anthology. We’re looking for stories about those terrors that populate the closets of gays, lesbians, and bisexuals. Terrors can be of any shape, size, and theme – supernatural, psychopaths and slashers, vampires, werewolves, zombies, urban legends, ghosts, witchcraft, demons, and original horrors of any kind." Stories should be 1000-7500 word and the pay is 5¢ a word. There’s a long lead time on this since the deadline is May 15, 2008. 

Speculative Fiction. A very open call from SpecFicWorld, they’ll take any spec fic for their Otherworlds Anthology. Stories can be 1000-12000 and they’ll pay $5 and a copy of the anthology. The deadline is January 15, 2008

Speculative Fiction. DarkHart Press is looking for stories for their themed anthology, Terrible Beauty. "Terrible Beauty: Beauty that causes people to do unspeakable things, beauty that masks something else. Use this theme in a unique way, and get back to us. We want variety, surprises and fresh ideas. There is no set or expected way to approach this topic, so go for it! SF, Urban, and Historical settings are fine." Stories should be around 7000 and they’ll pay 1¢ a word plus a contributor’s copy. The deadline is December 31, 2007.

Speculative Fiction. Another from DarkHart Press, the stories for Traps! Should be based off some Dorothy Parker quotes (see the Web site). Stories should be 7000 and pays is 1¢ a word plus copy. The deadline is also December 31, 2007

Revolving Door

Simon Scribles: Lisa Rao has been hired as an associate editor after working for the imprint as a freelance editor.

Wiley-Blackwell: René Olivieri will step down as chief operating officer at the end of the year.

Houghton Mifflin: Noted children’s books editor Walter Lorraine, a rarity in publishing with his entire fifty-five year career spent with the same company, will retire at the end of the year.

Harcourt: Jenna Johnson has been promoted to senior editor. Jackie Power has been promoted to business manager, sales & marketing operations.

I'd like to correct some misapprehensions about Cory Doctorow's unauthorized posting of my short comic piece "On Serious Literature" on his boingboing.net site.

I originally sent the piece to David Langford for Ansible, because that's where I first saw the quote from Ruth Franklin that the piece riffs on. I also put it on my web site. (It's still there.) Jon Carroll of the San Francisco Chronicle then reprinted it entire in the Chronicle, without asking permission. My agent Vaughne Hansen and I immediately demanded an apology from Carroll, and immediately got one. Harper's asked to publish it, offering me $200.00, which I accepted (I love gravy.)

I then discovered that Doctorow had put it on his web site, without asking permission and without observing copyright, misrepresenting its purpose, and falsely claiming that it was under license by "Creative Commons" so that anyone could copy it.

My agent and I had just decided to ask the e-piracy committe of SFWA, which I had come to count on in similar situations, to intervene on my behalf — when we found that the committee had suddenly been dissolved, following complaints about unauthorized interference, issuing from Cory Doctorow.

The irony of this situation is fairly visible. While Doctorow was making a huge fuss over an honest mistake, which when discovered was immediately redressed, he was publishing another writer's work without asking permission and in clear violation of copyright.

With my consent, Andrew Burt exposed Doctorow's piracy in a letter printed on Jerry Pournelle's web site. Doctorow scoffed, blustered, made no apology to me for misidentifying my work and using it without permission, and behaved as if his action was legitimate, although the Fair Use exception explicitly does not cover reprinting an entire article or poem no matter how short. But he took part of the piece off his site.

At the request of Michael Capobianco, President of SFWA, acting on my behalf, Doctorow has now finally removed the entire piece.

He has not apologised either to me for using my piece without permission, or to the people he misled with his pretense of a "Creative Commons License" into thinking they could reprint a copyrighted piece without violating the law. Nor has he offered to help them remove these many additional copies.

But, thanks to SFWA, he has taken the piece down. My agent is writing to request him to redress some of the other matters. I hope then to be done for good with Mr Doctorow. What I remain upset about is the confusion and destruction he seems to have effected within SFWA.

An overworked committee mistakenly identified a few works, among many, as infringing copyright; the mistakes were promptly admitted and redressed, with apologies; and President Capobianco invited any other parties who thought themselves wronged to contact him. Where is the cause in all this for dissolving a committee which has worked with extraordinary effectiveness to redress real wrongs?

In my view, the best thing that could come out of my brush with the Doctorow Doctrine would be this: the honorable reinstatement of the SFWA e-piracy committee, with an expression of appreciation from SFWA officers and members of the honest and effective work they have done for us for so long.

This letter is not copyrighted and may be excerpted or copied entire.

— Ursula K. Le Guin
October 12 2007

Doctorow has since posted an apology, and LeGuinn has accepted it. LeGuinn is also asking those who have posted the entirety of her piece will take it down.

E-piracy is a growing issue, especially since so many people don’t know the laws. Even when people do know the laws, fair use is difficult to determine, as you can see in the exchange between LeGuinn and Doctorow. Basically, you can quote part of a text, but the acceptable excerpt length is debatable (we generally use 300 words from a book). ALWAYS say who wrote it and where you go it, and make sure to include context.

Also, just because it's online does not mean it falls under the Creative Commons umbrella. Check for copyright info before reposting something. If you’re not sure, include a hyperlink instead of posting it, or ask a lawyer and save yourself a headache and potentially bad press.