weekend of manuscript consultations

Chris Boginski

• Consults On: Memoir, Book-Length Nonfiction, Individual Essay, Short Fiction, The Novel.

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  Christopher Boginski is a recent graduate from the MFA program at the University of Washington, where he taught creative writing and English as a second language and where he was a research assistant for David Shields. He lives in Boston and is in the process of finishing his first book, a memoir that explores the influence of the past upon the present in everyone from himself to Camus.

Ethan Gilsdorf

• Consults On: Poetry, Memoir, Individual Essay, Book-Length Nonfiction, Journalism, Feature Writing
• Interested Themes: travel, pop culture, family/medical trauma, childhood, adolescence, food, personal narrative

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  Ethan Gilsdorf is a freelance journalist, poet, critic, editor and teacher. A regular contributor to The New York Times, Boston Globe, the San Francisco Chronicle and The Improper Bostonian, Gilsdorf also writes on travel, arts and culture for National Geographic Traveler, Psychology Today, Fodor's travel guides, The Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, Poets & Writers, and the Christian Science Monitor. As a poet, he is the winner of the Hobblestock Peace Poetry Competition and the Esmé Bradberry Contemporary Poets Prize, and has published poems in Poetry, The Southern Review, The North American Review and several anthologies. He is co-founder of Grub Street's Young Adult Writers Program (YAWP), volunteers as a guest speaker in the Boston Public Schools and leads journalism, feature writing, travel writing and creative writing workshops at Grub Street, Media Bistro and, for younger students, in schools and community centers. His book project, "ESCAPE ARTISTS: Inside The World of Role Playing Freaks, Online Gaming Geeks, and Other Dwellers of Imaginary Realms" is currently under consideration at several publishers. Read more at http://www.ethangilsdorf.com/

Eric Grunwald

• Consults On: short fiction, sci-fi/fantasy/mystery genre fiction, the novel, memoir, individual essay, and book-length non-fiction.
• Interested Themes: Literary, Short Story, Contemporary, Historical, Mystery, Science Fiction, Fantasy, Suspense, Humor, Nonfiction: Translation, Lit Crit, Philosophy, Language & Literature, Film/Cinema/Stage, Travel, History, Biograph/autobiography, Humanities, Technical Writing/Manuals, Popular Science, Art/Architecture, Humor

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  Former managing editor of Agni (2000-2004), Eric Grunwald is a fiction writer, book reviewer, translator, photographer and actor. His work has appeared in Partisan Review, The MacGuffin, The Boston Sunday Globe, The San Francisco Chronicle, Spoiled Ink, Two Lines, The Denver Post, The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, The Improper Bostonian, and Agni. He received his MA in creative writing (fiction) from Boston University and his undergraduate degree from Stanford, with distinction, in Russian and East European history. He is fluent in German (has lived in Berlin) and proficient in Italian. He has received grants from the Ludwig Vogelstein Foundation (2003) and the St. Botolph's Club Foundation (2001), as well as fellowships from the Writers' Room of Boston, the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, and the Helene Wurlitzer Foundation. He teaches fiction, composition, and American Literature at Suffolk University, ESL at Roxbury Community College, and German at Boston Language Institute. He has chaired PEN New England's Freedom to Write Committee. More, including samples of his work, can be found at http://www.ericgrunwald.com.

Michelle Hoover

• Consults On: Short Fiction, The Novel, Memoir, Individual Essay, and Book-Length Nonfiction.
• Interested Themes: Literary Fiction, Historical Fiction, Mystery, Horror/Suspense, Travel Writing, Personal Essay/Creative Nonfiction/Memoir

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  Michelle Hoover is a full-time instructor at Boston University and has published short stories and novel excerpts in numerous journals, including Prairie Schooner, The Massachusetts Review, Night Train and Confrontation. She has been the Philip Roth Writer-in-Residence at Bucknell, a MacDowell Fellow, and in 2005 the winner of the PEN/New England Discovery Award for Fiction. Her work has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and published in Best New American Voices. Her novel, The Quickening, will be published by Other Press in 2010.

Tim Horvath

• Consults On: short fiction, the novel, poetry, individual essays, and book-length nonfiction
• Interested Themes: philosophy, psychology, music, science, humor, and the role of landscape in fiction

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  Tim Horvath received his MFA from the University of New Hampshire, where he won the Thomas Williams Memorial Prize and the Lt. Albert Charait Award. In 2006, his story "The Understory" won the Raymond Carver Short Story Award, whose judge was Bill Henderson, founder and president of the Pushcart Press; it was nominated for a Pushcart. "Circulation" won the '06 Prize of the Society for the Study of the Short Story, and will be published in book form in March 2009 by Sunnyoutside Press. Tim has received a Yaddo Residency and been a four-time finalist in Glimmer Train competitions. His fiction has been published or is forthcoming in Alimentum: The Literature of Food, Fiction, Puerto del Sol, Web Conjunctions, Diagram, Sleepingfish, 3 A.M., and elsewhere, and his poetry appears in Night Train. He has completed a short story manuscript called The Complicator: Stories, as well as the draft of a novel, entitled Goodbye in Many Languages. Examples of his writing and audio samples from the novel can be found at www.timhorvath.com. Tim was a high school English teacher for nine years and teaches fiction writing at Chester College of New England and the Johns Hopkins Center for Talented Youth. At Grub Street he has developed the classes "Cortiscrawl: Writing with the Brain in Mind" and "More and Less: Varieties of Minimalism and Maximalism."

Michael Marano

• Consults On: Genre Fiction, Short Fiction, Young Adult Fiction, Individual Essay, Book-Length Nonfiction, Journalism, Screenwriting, and Feature Writing.
• Interested Themes: Genre fiction, including, but not limited to: Mystery, Thrillers, Science Fiction, Fantasy, Horror, Humor, Western. Popular Non-Fiction and Non-Fiction about pop culture topics and personalities. Magazine and newspaper writing about film, TV, media, music, including reviews and criticism. Personal essays.

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  Michael Marano is a literary horror and dark science fiction writer, with stories in The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror 11 and Outsiders: 22 All-New Stories from the Edge; his first novel Dawn Song won the Bram Stoker and International Horror Guild Awards. He is Fiction Editor of the award-winning dark fiction magazine Chiaroscuro (www.chizine.com) and has worked one-on-one with authors in the development of their short fiction. Stories From the Plague Years, a collection of Marano's new and reprinted short fiction, is now in preparation at Cemetery Dance Publications. Since 1990, he has also been reviewing movies and doing pop culture commentary for the Public Radio Satellite System program Movie Magazine International, syndicated in more than 111 markets in the US and Canada. Mike is a former Writing instructor in the SUNY system, and his non-fiction has appeared in venues like The Boston Phoenix, The Weekly Dig, The Independent Weekly, Paste Magazine, and Science Fiction Universe.

Amy Marcott

• Consults On: Short Fiction, The Novel

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  Amy Marcott has taught creative writing and composition at Penn State University, where she received an MFA. She received her undergraduate degree from Wesleyan University. She is the recipient of a Somerville Arts Council fellowship, and her fiction has appeared in Memorious and Juked, was nominated for a 2009 Pushcart Prize, won third place in Glimmer Train's Very Short Fiction Contest, was a finalist in Glimmer Train's Fiction Open Contest, and has been nominated for Scribner's Best New American Voices anthology and the Associated Writing Programs' Intro Awards. Her first novel is currently under consideration. She has been a professional writer and editor for many years and currently plies her trade at MIT.

Elaine McArdle

• Consults On: Memoir, Journalisam.

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  Elaine McArdle ditched being a lawyer years ago in favor of journalism. She writes for a variety of publications, including Boston Magazine, the Boston Globe, and her favorite, Amplifier, a magazine for serious fans of power pop. Her reporting and writing garnered her the Massachusetts Bar Association's first-ever "Excellence in Law-Related Journalism Award," as well as awards from the American Bar Association and the New England Newspaper Association. A graduate of Vanderbilt University Law School, and a former features editor at Lawyers Weekly USA, she has taught Media Law to law students and to practicing lawyers. The Migraine Brain, by Dr. Carolyn Bernstein and Elaine, was published in September 2008 by Free Press (a division of Simon & Schuster). Read more about Elaine at www.elainemcardle.com.

Jane Moore

• Consults On: The Novel, Short Fiction, Memoir, Personal Essay.
• Interested Themes: All literary fiction, with special interest in travel, medicine, music, and suspense; personal narrative nonfiction.

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  Jane Moore (a.k.a. Jenny) has provided thoughtful, constructive critiques to writers for more than a decade. Since earning her MFA in fiction writing at the New School in 2000, Jane has honed her critiquing and writing chops in master-level workshops and in one-on-one exchanges with published writers. She just finished a massive overhaul of her first novel, excerpts of which were exhibited in Boston City Hall as part of the Mayor’s Prose & Poetry program. Now she’s writing a second novel and works as an editor for literary, cultural, and financial publications. Jane has been an editor at LIT magazine and a guest artist at the Arts Mentoring Program at Girls Ranch, and is the recipient of grants from the Squaw Valley Community of Writers and Stanford University. Her defense of The Great Gatsby appeared in Grub’s The Free Press “Point/Counterpoint” column.

Wendy Mnookin

• Consults On: Poetry
• Interested Themes: Family and relationships, "truth" in poetry of family and personal history, persona poetry, arrangement of poems in a manuscript--and whatever moves you.

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  Wendy Mnookin's fourth book of poems, The Moon Makes Its Own Plea, was published by BOA Editions in 2008. Her previous collection, What He Took, won the book prize from the New England Poetry Club. She is also the recipient of a Poetry Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts. She teaches a poetry workshop at Emerson College and has taught courses and workshops for children and adults throughout the Boston area. She received her BA from Radcliffe College and her MFA in Writing from Vermont College. You can find out more at www.wendymnookin.com.

Kathleen Willis Morton

• Consults On: Memoir, Poetry, Individual essay, Book-length nonfiction, Short fiction, the Novel.
• Interested themes: Narrative subject focused nonfiction, spirituality, food, travel, literary fiction, poetry, memoir.

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  Kathleen Willis Morton holds an MFA in Creative Writing. Her first book, The Blue Poppy and the Mustard Seed, was published by Wisdom Books. She has been published in Shambhala Sun Magazine, Hip Mama Magazine, and the anthology, Best Buddhist Writing 2009 published by Shambhala/Random House Publications. She can be reached at http://www.thebluepoppyandthemustardseed.com/.

Celeste Ng

• Consults On: Short Fiction, The Novel, Memoir, and Individual Essay.
• Interested Themes: Literary fiction, family issues, "culture clash," and anything that tells a good story

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  Celeste Ng received her MFA in Prose from the University of Michigan, where she won the Hopwood Award in Graduate Short Fiction. Her fiction has appeared in One Story, TriQuarterly, and Subtropics, and has been nominated for Best New American Voices. Celeste taught undergraduate creative writing at Michigan and has over six years' experience as an editor and proofreader. She lives in Cambridge and is currently at work on a novel and a collection of short stories.

Sophie Powell

• Consults On: The Novel, Short Fiction, Individual Essay, Young Adult Fiction.
• Interested Themes: Literary fiction, family sagas/relationships, fantasy, magical realism; genre fiction: women's, romance, mystery; inspirational writing; travel writing, memoir.

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  Sophie Powell was born in 1980, and split her time growing up between London and a sheep farm in the Brecon Beacons in Wales. She graduated in Classics from Trinity College, Cambridge University, where she was a junior scholar, and has an MFA in Creative Writing (Fiction) from New York University, where she had a fellowship. She is the author of the novel The Mushroom Man (Putnam Penguin) which received glowing reviews, including one from the New York Times Book Review, and which has been translated into several languages. She has also published short stories and creative nonfiction. Sophie lives in Boston with her husband, Christian, where she teaches creative writing at Boston College. Previously she has taught at New York University, Georgetown University, George Washington University and with the Lesley Seminars. She is also assistant director of Abroad Writers' Conferences. For more about Sophie, visit www.meetsophiepowell.com.

James Scott

• Consults On: Short Fiction, The Novel, Screenwriting, Individual Essay, and Young Adult Fiction.
• Interested Themes: All types of fiction, but lean more towards literary novels and short fiction. Non-fiction interests are pop culture (music, film), sports, and history. Screenplays of any genre are welcome.

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  James Scott has published fiction in One Story, American Short Fiction, Saint Ann's Review and others. He received his MFA from Emerson College in December 2007. While there, he was a recipient of the Presidential Award and a runner-up for the graduate short fiction award. His work has received numerous nominations for the Pushcart Prize, as well as scholarships from Middlebury College, the Sewanee Writers' Conference, the Wesleyan University Writers' Conference, and the New York State Writers' Institute. He was also the fiction editor and managing editor of Redivider. Before Emerson, James worked for a literary agency and a production company, as well as Bob Vila and the Boston Red Sox. Currently, he writes for the music magazine Under the Radar.

Clara Silverstein

• Consults On: Poetry, Memoir, Book-Length Nonfiction, Individual essays, Journalism, Feature Writing.
• Interested Themes: Food writing and cookbooks, personality profiles, historical research, writing about race.

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  Clara Silverstein is the author of the memoir White Girl: A Story of School Desegregation (University of Georgia Press), and two cookbooks, The Boston Chef's Table (Globe Pequot Press), and the New England Soup Factory Cookbook (Thomas Nelson) with chef Marjorie Druker, a top-selling soup cookbook on Amazon.com. A former food writer and editor at the Boston Herald, Silverstein's articles have also been published in Health magazine, Prevention, Runner's World, American Heritage, the Boston Globe, and the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. She directs the Chautauqua Writers' Center, a summer creative writing program at the Chautauqua Institution in western New York, and has led writing workshops at Grub Street, Boston University, and Emerson College.

Jorge Vega

• Consults On: The Graphic Novel, Comics.

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  Jorge Vega is a playwright, children's author and comic book writer originally from New York and now living in Brockton, Massachusetts. In 2007, Jorge entered Platinum Studios "Comic Book Challenge", an on-line contest in which more than 7 million users voted on their favorite concept. The finalists were flown out to last year's San Diego Comic Convention where they pitched their ideas to a panel of celebrity judges. Jorge's graphic novel, Gunplay, an 88-page supernatural/western about a cursed buffalo soldier, emerged victorious and hits bookstores this coming April. Learn more at www.whodiestoday.com

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