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Best Books of 2016

December 30, 2016 by

2016 had a great many books that thrilled me, and others that delighted. The rest of the year I could have done without —  so many deaths and a horribly long election and a range of backlash to terrify anyone.

For those interested, these are the best books I read in 2016, though not all were published in 2016.

Best Series:

March by John Lewis, Andrew Aydin, and artist Nate Powell (March: Book One, March: Book Two, March: Book Three)

Best Photography:


Photographs from the Edge: A Master Photographer’s Insights on Capturing an Extraordinary World by Art Wolfe, Rob Sheppard

Best Memoir:

Bukowski in a Sundress by Kim Addonizio

Best Children’s Book:


Science Verse by Jon Scieszka, illustrated by Lane Smith

Best Young Adult Fiction:


The Scorpio Races by Maggie Stiefvater

Best Short Story Collection: (I only read 3 and these 2 tied)


Heirlooms: Stories by Rachel Hall (this one has remained on my mind more than expected)


Fall of Poppies: Stories of Love and the Great War by Jessica Brockmole, Hazel Gaynor, Evangeline Holland, Marci Jefferson, Kate Kerrigan, Jennifer Robson, Heather Webb, Beatriz Williams, and Lauren Willig

Best Jane Austen Fiction: (this is a three-way tie)


A Moment Forever by Cat Gardiner


Darcy’s Hope: Beauty from Ashes by Ginger Monette


The Courtship of Edward Gardiner by Nicole Clarkston

Best Poetry: (another tie)


Field Guide to the End of the World by Jeannine Hall Gailey


Obliterations by Heather Aimee O’Neill and Jessica Piazza

Best Fiction: (a three-way tie)


The Secrets of Flight by Maggie Leffler


My Last Continent by Midge Raymond


This is the Story of You by Beth Kephart

What books were your favorites this year?

Filed Under: announcements, Best of 2016, reviews Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

My Last Continent by Midge Raymond

November 17, 2016 by

Source: the author
Hardcover, 320 pgs.
I am an Amazon Affiliate

My Last Continent by Midge Raymond is an expedition that leaves you feeling the biting cold as it burns the skin and takes the breath away from naturalists like Deb Gardner. Antarctica is a deeply mysterious place, one that travelers may have on their bucket list because they can see icebergs cleaving and wildlife free from human interruption. This environment, however, is not forgiving and many times those who travel there — even for research — can lose parts of themselves or their lives even if they are highly trained.

“The end of the world, the beginning of everything.” (pg. 14 ARC)

Raymond has crafted a novel that takes the harshness of the frozen wasteland and reweaves it into a place of solace for Gardner, a researcher whose family life is not close-knit and who feels closer to the penguins she observes than to people. Her narrative shifts backwards and forwards in time, sometimes a few months and sometimes by a few decades, but readers never leave Deb’s world view. She pushes you to care for the animals and their world, even as it crumbles around them and even as a researcher she is polluting its pristine nature. The dichotomy of her work is never lost on the reader — learn more about their environment and the effects of humanity upon it by being there and observing but through the act of observing, you disrupt the natural way of things (even if only for a few months).

“I feel his proximity like an electric current, a frayed wire, loose and dangerous.” (pg. 93 ARC)

The stakes become even higher when Deb finds that she feels more at home with fellow naturalist Keller Sullivan, a man who knew little until she reluctantly trained him. The nature of their work separates them more than it brings them together, but don’t be fooled into thinking this is a mere romance. There are deeper layers — the surface slush must be swept aside.

“But nature has a way of surprising us, of overpowering us, of reminding us that, no matter what we believe and no matter how hard we try, we’re not in control after all.” (pg. 140 ARC)

Sometimes the last continent may be a return to the one you abandoned long ago. My Last Continent by Midge Raymond is engaging and deeply moving. It’s message is clear; we are not so far evolved from our animal brethren and even if we were, we all still need the same planet to build families and to survive.

RATING: Cinquain

About the Author:

Midge Raymond is the author of the novel My Last Continent and the award-winning short-story collection Forgetting English. Her writing has appeared in TriQuarterly, American Literary Review, Bellevue Literary Review, the Los Angeles Times magazine, Poets & Writers, and many other publications.

Midge worked in publishing in New York before moving to Boston, where she taught communication writing at Boston University for six years. She has taught creative writing at Boston’s Grub Street Writers, Seattle’s Richard Hugo House, and San Diego Writers, Ink. She has also published two books for writers, Everyday Writing and Everyday Book Marketing.

Midge lives in the Pacific Northwest, where she is co-founder of the boutique publisher Ashland Creek Press.

Filed Under: ARC, fiction, Publishers/Publicists, Read in 2016, reviews, Simon & Schuster Tagged With: ,

Mailbox Monday #366

March 13, 2016 by

Mailbox Monday, created by Marcia at To Be Continued, formerly The Printed Page, has a permanent home at its own blog.

To check out what everyone has received over the last week, visit the blog and check out the links.  Leave yours too.

Also, each week, Leslie, Vicki, and I will share the Books that Caught Our Eye from everyone’s weekly links.

Here’s what I received:

My Last Continent by Midge Raymond from the author for review.

It is only at the end of the world—among the glacial mountains, cleaving icebergs, and frigid waters of Antarctica—where Deb Gardner and Keller Sullivan feel at home. For the few blissful weeks they spend each year studying the habits of emperor and Adélie penguins, Deb and Keller can escape the frustrations and sorrows of their separate lives and find solace in their work and in each other. But Antarctica, like their fleeting romance, is tenuous, imperiled by the world to the north.

A new travel and research season has just begun, and Deb and Keller are ready to play tour guide to the passengers on the small expedition ship that ferries them to their research destination. But this year, Keller fails to appear on board. Then, shortly into the journey, Deb’s ship receives an emergency signal from the Australis, a cruise liner that has hit desperate trouble in the ice-choked waters of the Southern Ocean. Soon Deb’s role will change from researcher to rescuer; among the crew of that sinking ship, Deb learns, is Keller.

Cecil’s Pride: The True Story of a Lion King by Craig Hatkoff, Juliana Hatkoff, and Isabella Hatkoff, photographs by Brent Stapelkamp from Anna.

Known as the King of Beasts, the lion has always been a symbol of strength and courage. But there was one real lion that earned the title of Lion King. He was known simply by name: Cecil. News of his tragic death spread across the globe like wildfire, raising questions to an unprecedented level about our relationship to our animals and our planet.

Cecil’s Pride is a tale of resilience and responsibility–a triumph out of tragedy. Discover Cecil’s struggle as a young lion to survive, his rise to power, and his extraordinary alliance with Jericho, his former arch-rival. Cecil is gone, but his legacy lives on. The world knows the story of how Cecil died. This is the story of how he lived.

Complete with stunning photographs by Brent Stapelkamp, a photographer and lion researcher with the Oxford University Wildlife Conservation Research Unit that has tracked Cecil and his pride for nine years.

National Geographic Kids Chapters: Rascally Rabbits!: And More True Stories of Animals Behaving Badly by Aline Alexander Newman for review from Media Masters Publicity.

These bunnies may look adorable, but there’s more than meets the eye! In Rascally Rabbits, meet some rabbits that cause nothing but trouble, a rescue pup who will eat ANYTHING, and a sneaky bear with a taste for treats. Readers won’t stop laughing as they read these hilarious–and completely true!–stories. Filled with engaging photos, fast facts, and fascinating sidebars, readers won’t want to put this book down.

What did you receive?

Filed Under: mailbox monday, meme Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

Mailbox Monday #233

August 26, 2013 by

Mailbox Monday (click the icon to check out the new blog) has gone on tour since Marcia at To Be Continued, formerly The Printed Page passed the torch.  August’s host is Bermudaonion The Reading Fever.

The meme allows bloggers to share what books they receive in the mail or through other means over the past week.

Just be warned that these posts can increase your TBR piles and wish lists.

Here’s what I received:

1. A Constellation of Vital Phenomena by Anthony Marra, which I won from Caribousmom.

Two doctors risk everything to save the life of a hunted child in this majestic debut about love, loss, and the unexpected ties that bind us together. “On the morning after the Feds burned down her house and took her father, Havaa woke from dreams of sea anemones.” Havaa, eight years old, hides in the woods and watches the blaze until her neighbor, Akhmed, discovers her sitting in the snow. Akhmed knows getting involved means risking his life, and there is no safe place to hide a child in a village where informers will do anything for a loaf of bread, but for reasons of his own, he sneaks her through the forest to the one place he thinks she might be safe: an abandoned hospital where the sole remaining doctor, Sonja Rabina, treats the wounded. Though Sonja protests that her hospital is not an orphanage, Akhmed convinces her to keep Havaa for a trial, and over the course of five extraordinary days, Sonja’s world will shift on its axis and reveal the intricate pattern of connections that weaves together the pasts of these three unlikely companions and unexpectedly decides their fate.

2. Everyday Book Marketing by Midge Raymond, which includes a Q&A from me! I was so surprised when the book came.

Book publication is just the beginning… Everyday Book Marketing is for the published author who is not only a writer but who also may have another career, a family, and any number of other obligations that require fitting book promotion into a budget where both hours and dollars may be hard to find. This book will guide you on the journey from Writer to Marketing Pro, offering essential marketing tools along the way-including such book promotion basics as how to schedule a book tour and how to make the most of social media to how to keep the buzz going long after your launch date. Everyday Book Marketing is divided into easily accessible sections that cover not only what you’ll need to handle before publication, such as establishing a blog and website, but what you can do during your book launch and beyond. It also offers tips and advice for how to keep the never-ending tasks of book promotion manageable, whether you have ten minutes a day or two hours a day. Also included are Q&As with a range of authors and industry experts-from fiction authors and poets to librarians and event managers-who provide such invaluable tips as how to present yourself as an author, how to reach out to event coordinators, and how to find new readers both within your community and beyond.

3.  Always Watching by Chevy Stevens, which I snagged from Novel Books‘s ARC free pile.

In the lockdown ward of a psychiatric hospital, Dr. Nadine Lavoie is in her element. She has the tools to help people, and she has the desire—healing broken families is what she lives for. But Nadine doesn’t want to look too closely at her own past because there are whole chunks of her life that are black holes. It takes all her willpower to tamp down her recurrent claustrophobia, and her daughter, Lisa, is a runaway who has been on the streets for seven years.

When a distraught woman, Heather Simeon, is brought into the Psychiatric Intensive Care Unit after a suicide attempt, Nadine gently coaxes her story out of her—and learns of some troubling parallels with her own life. Digging deeper, Nadine is forced to confront her traumatic childhood, and the damage that began when she and her brother were brought by their mother to a remote commune on Vancouver Island.  What happened to Nadine?  Why was their family destroyed? And why does the name Aaron Quinn, the group’s leader, bring complex feelings of terror to Nadine even today?

4.  TransAtlantic by Colum McCann, which I snagged from Novel Books‘s ARC free pile.

Newfoundland, 1919. Two aviators—Jack Alcock and Arthur Brown—set course for Ireland as they attempt the first nonstop flight across the Atlantic Ocean, placing their trust in a modified bomber to heal the wounds of the Great War.

Dublin, 1845 and ’46. On an international lecture tour in support of his subversive autobiography, Frederick Douglass finds the Irish people sympathetic to the abolitionist cause—despite the fact that, as famine ravages the countryside, the poor suffer from hardships that are astonishing even to an American slave.

New York, 1998. Leaving behind a young wife and newborn child, Senator George Mitchell departs for Belfast, where it has fallen to him, the son of an Irish-American father and a Lebanese mother, to shepherd Northern Ireland’s notoriously bitter and volatile peace talks to an uncertain conclusion.

5.  The Kashmir Shawl by Rosie Thomas, which I snagged from Novel Books‘s ARC free pile.

On the eve of 1941, newlywed Nerys Watkins leaves rural Britain to accompany her husband on a missionary posting to the exotic city of Srinagar, India. But when he leaves to take on a complicated mission elsewhere, Nerys discovers a new world. Here, in the heart of Kashmir, the British dance, flirt, and gossip against the backdrop of war, and Neryssoon becomes caught up in a dangerous liaison. By the time she is reunited with her husband, she is a very different woman.

Years later, Nerys’s granddaughter Mair Ellis clears out her dead father’s house and finds an exquisite shawl. Wrapped in its folds is a lock of a child’s curly hair. With nothing else to go on, Mair decides to trace her grandparents’ roots back to Kashmir, embarking on a quest thatwill change her own life forever.

6.  Leviathan by Scott Westerfeld, which I purchased at Novel Books as it is the October book club selection.

It is the cusp of World War I. The Austro-Hungarians and Germans have their Clankers, steam-driven iron machines loaded with guns and ammunition. The British Darwinists employ genetically fabricated animals as their weaponry. Their Leviathan is a whale airship, and the most masterful beast in the British fleet.

Aleksandar Ferdinand, a Clanker, and Deryn Sharp, a Darwinist, are on opposite sides of the war. But their paths cross in the most unexpected way, taking them both aboard the Leviathan on a fantastical, around-the-world adventure….One that will change both their lives forever.

7. Foreign Devils on the Silk Road by Peter Hopkirk, which I purchased at Novel Books as it is the September book club pick.

The Silk Road, which linked imperial Rome and distant China, was once the greatest thoroughfare on earth. Along it traveled precious cargoes of silk, gold, and ivory, as well as revolutionary new ideas. Its oasis towns blossomed into thriving centers of Buddhist art and learning. In time it began to decline. The traffic slowed, the merchants left, and finally its towns vanished beneath the desert sands to be forgotten for a thousand years. But legends grew of lost cities filled with treasures and guarded by demons. In the early years of the last century foreign explorers began to investigate these legends, and very soon an international race began for the art treasures of the Silk Road. Huge wall paintings, sculptures, and priceless manuscripts were carried away by the ton and are today scattered through the museums of a dozen countries.

What did you receive?

Filed Under: mailbox monday, meme Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

Everyday Writing by Midge Raymond

October 26, 2012 by

Everyday Writing: Tips and Prompts to Fit Your Regularly Scheduled Life by Midge Raymond is a slim volume with purpose — to get those writers back to the words on the page.  Raymond is a busy woman, like most writers, and she holds a full-time job in addition to writing.  Her advice is on point and should be taken to heart — by me especially.  The book is broken down into two main sections — tips on how to become a writer and stay in that mode and a series of writing prompts broken down my expected writing duration.

I’ve got a semi-unconventional review today.  This book offers me more motivation than ever.  With the toddler running around and the full-time job, plus the additional stress I’ve been under lately, I need a good kick in the butt to get me back to writing.

What I loved about Raymond’s book was her no-nonsense advice and her anecdotes about her own struggles with writing.  She even shares some of the best moments she’s experienced when she was procrastinating.  One major point that book bloggers already know, especially in this time of Twitter and other social media, that we need to disconnect from the Internet.  My book is overflowing with post-it tabs, but here are a couple of my favorite passages:

“Being an Everyday Writer is not about putting daily words on a page but about seeing the world as a writer and recognizing the myriad ways in which your everyday life informs your work.  And this, in turn, will put words on the page.”  (page 2)

“Writing exercises can help our writing in ways we don’t know until we do them.  They can, for instance, allow our minds to retreat from the puzzle of a current project and wander a bit, perhaps leading us back to the puzzle from a different angle and getting us closer to a solution.”  (page 6)

Some of her practical advice includes creating a schedule that works for you with your work and childcare schedule and that it doesn’t have to be every day.  Additionally, you have to remain open to revising the schedule and making sure that others in your life take your writing time as seriously as you do.  Writers also need to set bigger goals and break that down into more manageable goals, and these goals should be reassessed at least quarterly to determine how much progress has been made.  Another cool tool in the book is Raymond’s checklist for those writers who think they’ve finished a piece to make sure they’ve covered all the bases, including whether every scene is necessary and whether the point of view is consistent.

Everyday Writing: Tips and Prompts to Fit Your Regularly Scheduled Life by Midge Raymond is a slim book, just what writers need — practical advice, but not lengthy practical advice that causes them to procrastinate about their projects.  Raymond’s writing style as engaging as her advice, and the writing prompts can be used for any project.  What she offers most is the ability for writers to be flexible and not beat themselves up about it so long as they are meeting their own goals.

About the Author:

Midge Raymond’s short-story collection, Forgetting English, received the Spokane Prize for Short Fiction. Her stories have appeared in TriQuarterly, American Literary Review, Indiana Review, North American Review, Bellevue Literary Review, the Los Angeles Times magazine, and many other publications. Her work has received several Pushcart Prize nominations and received an Artist Trust/Washington State Arts Commission Fellowship.

Midge taught communication writing at Boston University for six years, and she has taught creative writing at Boston’s Grub Street Writers and Seattle’s Richard Hugo House. While living in Southern California, she held writing workshops and seminars at San Diego Writers, Ink, where she also served as vice president of the board of directors.

Midge lives in the Pacific Northwest, where she is co-founder of the boutique publisher Ashland Creek Press.

Filed Under: Read in 2012, Reference, review copy, reviews Tagged With: , ,

Mailbox Monday #195

September 24, 2012 by

Mailbox Mondays (click the icon to check out the new blog) has gone on tour since Marcia at A Girl and Her Books, formerly The Printed Page passed the torch. This month’s host is BookNAround.

The meme allows bloggers to share what books they receive in the mail or through other means over the past week.

Just be warned that these posts can increase your TBR piles and wish lists.

Here’s what I received:

1.  The Ghost Runner by Blair Richmond from Ashland Creek Press for review.

2.  Everyday Writing by Midge Raymond from Ashland Creek Press for review.

How to be a writer even when you can’t write every day…

Writers are often told that in order to succeed, they must write every day–yet this isn’t realistic or feasible for writers with families, day jobs, and other responsibilities that preclude a daily writing practice.

Everyday Writing is about how to be a writer every day, even if you’re unable to sit down to write every day.

This book provides dozens of tips for busy writers, including how to create your ideal writing space, how to develop habits that work for you, and how to keep your projects moving forward even when you’re short on time. Everyday Writing also offers more than 150 prompts to fit into any writer’s life, from five-minute prompts you can do in a grocery store line to lengthy prompts that are perfect for a writing retreat. Whether you’d like to generate new material, free yourself from writer’s block, or start a revision, these writing exercises provide a way to engage immediately with your work.

3.  The Art Forger by B.A. Shapiro from Algonquin unexpectedly.

On March 18, 1990, thirteen works of art worth today over $500 million were stolen from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston. It remains the largest unsolved art heist in history, and Claire Roth, a struggling young artist, is about to discover that there’s more to this crime than meets the eye.

Claire makes her living reproducing famous works of art for a popular online retailer. Desperate to improve her situation, she lets herself be lured into a Faustian bargain with Aiden Markel, a powerful gallery owner. She agrees to forge a painting—one of the Degas masterpieces stolen from the Gardner Museum—in exchange for a one-woman show in his renowned gallery. But when the long-missing Degas painting—the one that had been hanging for one hundred years at the Gardner—is delivered to Claire’s studio, she begins to suspect that it may itself be a forgery.

4.  Comet’s Tale by Steven D. Wolf and Lynette Padwa from Algonquin unexpectedly.

Forced into early retirement by a spinal condition, Steven Wolf reluctantly left his family and moved to Arizona for its warm winter climate. A lifelong dog lover, the former hard-driving attorney is drawn to a local group that rescues retired racing greyhounds. When Comet, a once-abused cinnamon-striped racer, chooses to “adopt” Wolf, he has no idea that a life-altering relationship has begun—for both of them.

Racers, cruelly treated and exposed only to the track and cage, have no inkling of the most basic skills—walking on tile floors, climbing stairs, even playing with toys or children—so Wolf must show the mistrustful greyhound how to thrive in the real world. Gradually, a confident but mysterious spirit emerges from the stunning animal. And when Wolf’s health starts to worsen, the tables turn and Comet must now help Wolf with the most basic skills.

5. The Girl on the Cliff by Lucinda Riley, which I received from Simon and Schuster for review in October.

To escape a recent heartbreak in New York, Grania Ryan returns to her family home on the rugged, wind-swept coast of Ireland. Here, on the cliff edge in the middle of a storm, she meets a young girl, Aurora Lisle, who will profoundly change her life.

Despite the warnings Grania receives from her mother to be wary of the Lisle family, Aurora and Grania forge a close friendship. Through a trove of old family letters dating from 1914, Grania begins to learn just how deeply their families’ histories are entwined. The horrors of World War I, the fate of a beautiful foundling child, and the irresistible lure of the ballet give rise to a legacy of heartache that leaves its imprint on each new generation. Ultimately, it will be Aurora whose intuition and spirit may be able to unlock the chains of the past.

Sweeping from Edwardian England to present-day New York, from the majestic Irish coast to the crumbling splendor of a legendary London town house, The Girl on the Cliff introduces two remarkable women whose quest to understand their past sends them toward a future where love can triumph over loss.

6. When It Happens to You by Molly Ringwald, which I purchased at Novel Places.

When it happens to you, you will be surprised. That thing they say about how you knew all the time, but just weren’t facing it? That might be the case, but nevertheless, there you will be.

Molly Ringwald mines the complexities of modern relationships in this gripping and nuanced collection of interlinked stories. Writing with a deep compassion for human imperfection, Ringwald follows a Los Angeles family and their friends and neighbors while they negotiate the hazardous terrain of everyday life—revealing the deceptions, heartbreak, and vulnerability familiar to us all.

7. House Inspections by Carsten René Nielsen, translated by David Keplinger, which I purchased at Novel Places after hearing the poet and translator at a recent reading.

With a dozen poems previously published in The Paris Review, Carsten René Nielsen is already a familiar name to US poetry readers. These dark prose poems—reminiscent of Charles Simic—map out a uniquely European territory with chilling, cinematic clarity.

Award-winning Danish poet Carsten René Nielsen is the author of nine books of poetry, including his US debut The World Cut Out with Crooked Scissors (2007). His poems appear in The Paris Review, Agni, Circumference, Mid-American Review, Mississippi Review, and elsewhere. He lives in Aarhus, Denmark.

David Keplinger’s poetry awards include the Colorado Book Award, T.S. Eliot Prize, an NEA fellowship, and grants from the Danish Arts Council. He directs the MFA program at American University in Washington, DC.

What did you receive?

Filed Under: mailbox monday, meme Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Winner of Forgetting English

April 26, 2011 by

Random.org selected #5 out of 13 entrants in the Forgetting English by Midge Raymond giveaway.

The winner is Julie of Read Handed, who said:  “I love the title of this collection. I enjoy reading short stories so I will have to check this out. One of my favorite collections of short stories is Coronado by Dennis Lehane. He is so well known for his novels (many of which have been adapted into movies) that his short stories are often overlooked, which is a shame.”

Congrats to Julie.  I hope you enjoy the book.

Filed Under: giveaway, winners Tagged With: ,

Guest Post: Inside the Writer’s Studio

April 18, 2011 by

Today’s guest is author Midge Raymond, whose collection of short stories Forgetting English was recently released in an expanded edition.  Her stories received the Spokane Prize for Short Fiction, were nominated for three Pushcart Prizes, and received an Artist Trust/Washington State Arts Commission Fellowship.  She graciously agreed to write up a guest post about her writing space.  Please give her a warm welcome.

 

This is the first photo I took of my current writing space, taken on the day I moved into my house.

I took this photo because I wanted to remember what my writing studio looked like before I really got settled in. I loved the way this clean, empty space looked—yet somehow I knew it wouldn’t last.

Of course, the room didn’t have much personality before the unpacking began, but at the same time, this photo above represents my dream desk: no clutter, no bills, no cat sleeping on the keyboard. Nothing but the blank screen and an empty chair. I don’t even have books in the shelves to distract me. While this setup was a little too spare for the long term, I still hoped to keep my writing studio somewhat de-cluttered—as if it might become a mirror image of my brain: open and ready for the muse to do her work.

Here is my desk today:

The writing studio is more homey, certainly—and at least the cat is staying off my keyboard (for the moment). I have my creativity crystal, my water and my coffee, all the books and journals I could possibly need should I get writer’s block. And, as I’d envisioned, the writing studio is indeed a reflection of what’s going on in my brain, i.e., a cluttered mess, in which million things are spinning all at once. (What you may not be able to see in the photo is my to-do list, stuck underneath the coffee mug, with frantically scrawled items in various stages of completion.)

At the same time, I love my desk, and most days, I even prefer it to the lovely spare one I used to dream of. It’s the desk of a person blessed with a full life, and I can’t complain about that. The trick is to put on my writing blinders, to mentally nudge all the other stuff out of the way in order to focus on writing new work, or revising old work, or jotting down ideas that may be brought to fruition in yet another writing space somewhere else.

Or, I’ll just move everything onto the floor, out of sight, and that works even better.

Thanks, Midge, for sharing your writing space.  Please check out her Website, blog, and the Press 53 site.

About the Author:

Midge Raymond’s short-story collection, Forgetting English, received the Spokane Prize for Short Fiction. Her award-winning stories have appeared in TriQuarterly, American Literary Review, Indiana Review, North American Review, Bellevue Literary Review, the Los Angeles Times, and many other publications. Her work has been nominated for three Pushcart Prizes and received an Artist Trust/Washington State Arts Commission Fellowship. She lives in the Pacific Northwest, along with her husband and an opinionated orange cat.

Giveaway Details:  US/Canada residents only.

1.  Leave a comment here about why you enjoy short stories.

2.  Tweet, Facebook, blog the giveaway for a second entry.

Deadline April 25, 2011, 11:59 PM EST

Filed Under: giveaway, guest post Tagged With: , ,