Author - John Coyne

John Coyne interviews Susan O’Neill about her new collection of essays Calling New Delhi for Free (and other ephemeral truths of the 21st century) that has just been published by Peace Corps Writers. • Susan, let’s begin with some basic stuff: what is your educational background? I earned an RN at a now-defunct three-year nursing school, Holy Cross School of Nursing, in South Bend, IN. I signed up for the Army while I was a student, so I could help my parents pay the bill with my monthly Army stipend, and afterward, the Army trained me in the Operating Room specialty. Then they sent me to Vietnam (the basis for my short story collection, Don’t Mean Nothing). After that I amassed a degree in Journalism, over 10 years, graduating at last in 1984 from at the U of Maine at Orono. o Where did you serve as a PCV? I . . .

New Madrid is the national journal of the low-residency MFA program at Murray State University. It takes its name from the New Madrid seismic zone, which falls within the central Mississippi Valley and extends through western Kentucky. Between 1811 and 1812, four earthquakes with magnitudes greater than 7.0 struck this region, changing the course of the Mississippi River, creating Reelfoot Lake in Tennessee and ringing church bells as far away as Boston. The editor of the New Madrid Journal is Ann Neelon (Senegal 1978-79).  Ann is a graduate of the MFA program at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst and the author of the book Easter Vigil, which earned the Anhinga Prize for Poetry and our RPCV Writers and Readers Award. She has been a Wallace Stegner Fellow as well as a Jones Lecturer in Poetry at Stanford University. She is also the winner of an Al Smith Fellowship from the . . .

Mark Brazaitis (Guatemala 1990-93) has won the 2013 Devil’s Kitchen Reading Awards for Prose presented by the Department of English at Southern Illinois University Carbondale and Grassroots, SIUC’s undergraduate literary magazine. Mark won for his 2012 collection of stories, The Incurables (University of Notre Dame Press). Mark receives an honorarium of $1000, and will present a public reading and participate in panels at the Devil’s Kitchen Fall Literary Festival at Southern Illinois University in Carbondale, Illinois. The dates for the 2013 festival are October 16–18, 2013. Judges come from the faculty of SIUC’s MFA Program in Creative Writing and the award winners were selected by the staff of GRASSROOTS, SIUC’s undergraduate literary magazine. Mark directs the M.F.A. Program in Creative Writing in the Department of English at West Virginia University. He is the author of An American Affair, winner of the 2004 George Garrett Prize for fiction, as well as . . .

Jurors for the $50,000 St. Francis College Literary Prize have narrowed the more than 170 submissions down to a short list of five novels competing for the biannual award, one of the richest in the United States. The books and authors are: Carry the One (Simon & Schuster), by Carol Anshaw The Middlesteins (Grand Central Publishing), by Jami Attenberg Mule (Mariner Books), by Tony D’Souza (Ivory Coast 2000-02, Madagascar 2002-03) The Right-Hand Shore (Picador), by Christopher Tilghman Dirt (Harper Perennial), by David Vann The winner will be announced at the opening gala for the Brooklyn Book Festival on September 21. “It’s a prize that has no parallel really among existing literary prizes and comes at a perfect time in a writer’s career,” said Jonathan Dee, a member of the jury and winner of the second Literary Prize for his novel, The Privileges. “There’s a lot of attention when you make your debut. . . .

It is time to nominate your favorite Peace Corps book published in 2012 for the Peace Corps Writers annual awards. Make your nomination(s) in the comment section following this announcement so people can see what books have been recognized. You may nominate your own book; books written by friends; books written by total strangers. The books can be about the Peace Corps or on any topic. The books must have been published in 2012. The awards will be announced in August. Thank you for nominating your favorite book written by a PCV, RPCV or Peace Corps Staff. A framed certificate and money are given to the winners. Paul Cowan Non-Fiction Award First given in 1990, the Paul Cowan Non-Fiction Award was named to honor Paul Cowan, a Peace Corps Volunteer who served in Ecuador. Cowan wrote The Making of An Un-American about his experiences as a Volunteer in Latin America in the sixties. . . .

The Fallout by S.A. Bodeen (Tanzania 1989–90) Feiwel and Friends $16.99 (hard cover); $8.89 (Kindle) 336 pages September 2013 Reviewed by Deidre Swesnik (Mali 1996–98) SPOILER ALERT! The Fallout is the sequel to The Compound. If you haven’t read The Compound and intend to, you really shouldn’t read this review. It’s hard to talk about anything in The Fallout that wouldn’t spoil at least some of The Compound. Ok — I warned you. Seriously — I “oh-so-totally-frickin’” warned you. Ok – so I really wanted to say oh-so-totally-frickin’ because it’s cool and because I can legitimately put it into this review since it’s a direct quote from the book. Yep. This young adult book was a lot of fun to get into, and definitely a page-turner. This combination of suspense, survival, and teenage angst makes for a great read. I’m spoiling The Compound for you now. This is officially your . . .

Independent writer and publisher Julie R. Dargis (Morocco 1984–87) will be reading in San Francisco  from her latest book Pit Stop in the Paris of Africa. She is being hosted by the Commonwealth Club and NorCal Peace Corps Association. Date: Monday, September 23 2013 Time: 5:30 p.m. — networking reception; 6 p.m. — program; 7 p.m. — book signing Location: Commenwealth Club/SF Office, 595 Market Street  (directions) Cost: Members free, $20 non-members, $7 students (with valid ID) • Julie will take you on a trip around the world through selected excerpts from stories and verse in her book. In addition, she will share reflections on her humanitarian aid work with African and Eastern European populations affected by war and natural disasters, and include how she dealt with adversity in her day-to-day life in some of the most difficult and dangerous countries in the world. She will close with a brief . . .

After finishing writing his last novel, Tony D’Souza (Ivory Coast 2000-02, Madagascar 2002-03) spent a year as a free lance journalist in St. Louis and Sarasota and racked up a series of awards and recognition for his journalism. Among them were…. National Association of Black Journalists Award for Investigative Reporting (co-award with Tom Finkel) for a 8000 word feature “Plenty of Guilt to Go Around” in Riverfront Times about a murky 1982 St. Louis murder and the African American man still in prison for it despite jury stacking in the early 80s’ racially biased, pro-death penalty courts under John Ashcroft. Florida Magazine Association First Place “Charlie” Award for Investigative Reporting for his 6000 word feature “Eyes Wide Shut” in Sarasota Magazine that uncovered new evidence in the $360 million Art Nadel “Mini-Madoff” Ponzi Scheme. Florida Magazine Association Second Place Feature Writing for the same story. Florida Magazine Association Third Place . . .