Catching up with Peauxdunque

Posted on January 27, 2017 by tadbartlett

There have been a ton of great developments for the writers in the land of Peauxdunque over the last couple months, so before we get too far behind, here’s the news:

Emily Choate‘s great short story, “Eufala,” has been accepted for publication by Shenandoah, the sixty-seven-year-old journal that has published the likes of e e cummings, Dylan Thomas, W. H. Auden, James Merrill, Ezra Pound, William Faulkner. and Flannery O’Connor. Emily’s work will fit right in!

Peauxdunque writers have also aimed their pens at the current political times, with topical publications by Kelly Harris (“Resistance Must be Personal,” on after i was dead); Maurice Carlos Ruffin (“Talking in New Orleans in the Age of Trump,” a podcast republication of Maurice’s LitHub essay from last November, on the Racist Sandwich blog; and “The Effects of White Supremacy Are Non-Transferable,” on LitHub); and Alex Johnson (“Election Elegy 2016: A Carpenter’s Prayer on a Walnut Bed in the Woods,” on Flagpole), in addition to Tom Carson‘s regular cultural and political insights, which have moved from his old post at GQ to his new digs at Playboy (see, for example, his most recent essay, “Alternative Facts Will Rule the White House: Let’s Not Take the Bait“).

In other publication news, Maurice’s gentrification essay, “Transition in New Orleans,” has been published by Room 220; and his new critical take on Confederacy of Dunces, his essay “Ignatius in the New New Orleans,” was published by Louisiana Cultural Vistas. Also, Cassie Pruyn had her essay, “Report From the Field: Speaking Into Silences,” published at VIDA Review.

In awards-season news, the slightly old but huge news is that Maurice’s short story, “The Ones Who Don’t Say They Love You,” published in 2014 by The Iowa Review, made the list of 100 “Other Distinguished Short Stories” listed at the back of the 2016 Best American Short Stories, guest edited by Junot Diaz. Maurice also has two of his 2016 publications nominated for a Pushcart Prize, his short story “Children of New Orleans,” published in AGNI, and his essay, “Fine Dining in New Orleans.” His two Pushcart nominations join Tad Bartlett‘s nomination for his essay, “My Time With You,” published in 2016 by Chautauqua Literary Journal. AGNI also noted that Maurice’s essay, “Stanislavski in the Ghetto,” was one of its Top 5 blog posts for 2016. And, finally, L. Kasimu Harris‘s photography and writing work has been recognized with his naming as one of eight “Louisianians of the Year” by Louisiana Life.

Kelly in Cleveland, Maurice on LitHub, Tad with news

Posted on November 16, 2016 by tadbartlett

Long one of our favorite poets (and now a member of Peauxdunque!), Kelly Harris will be featured by Larchmere Arts and the Nia Coffeehouse Poetry Series in Cleveland next Tuesday night, November 22. She will reunite with Vince Robinson & The Jazz Poets for a special show starting at 8 p.m.

Last week, LitHub ran a pre-election essay it commissioned from Maurice Carlos Ruffin, an incredible meditation on race, language, privilege, and political discourse, “Talking in New Orleans in the Age of Trump.”

Tad Bartlett learned over the weekend that his short story, “Anti-Heroically Yours,” will be published in January by Bird’s Thumb. He also found out that his non-fiction piece, “My Time With You,” which was published in June by Chautauqua Literary Journal, has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize. This is Tad’s second Pushcart nomination (his non-fiction piece, “Head Space,” was nominated last year by The Writing Disorder).

Kooy with a publication; Choate to read at W&M

Posted on November 10, 2016 by tadbartlett

The writers and artists of Peauxdunque are dedicated to fighting, protecting, and expressing the strength of humanity, the love of our complex natures and collective worth, and the true freedoms of a people together. And we will never stop. With that …

We are all very excited to learn that Andrew Kooy will have his creative nonfiction piece, “Masochistic Tendencies,” published in Barely South Review in an upcoming issue! We will post a link on our Facebook page when the piece goes live.

And TODAY, at the Words and Music Conference in New Orleans, Emily Choate will be a selected reader (at 4 p.m. at the Hotel Monteleone), reading from her novel-in-progress. Don’t miss it!

Peauxdunque on the 2016 Faulkner-Wisdom lists

Posted on October 3, 2016 by tadbartlett

Continuing a growing tradition of Peauxdunquians winning and placing in the various categories of the William Faulkner-William Wisdom Creative Writing Competition (administered by the Pirate’s Alley Faulkner Society), 2016 sees another slew of folks from Peauxdunque placing in the competition. Seven different Peauxdunquians placed nine pieces in three of the competition categories!

In the novel category, Emily Capdeville was on the short list for her novel, Where Ground Gives Way to Water. Emily won the gold medal in the novel-in-progress category last year for her manuscript, Search a Dark and Empty Space. Also in the novel category, Susan Kagan’s novel, Ruxandra: Granddaughter of Vlad the Impaler, placed as a semi-finalist.
In the short story category, Hayley Lynch‘s story “Horsewomen” was named a finalist, as well as “The New World” by Liz Gruder and “Way Station” by Susan Kagan.
In the novel-in-progress category, Hayley Lynch was on the short list with her manuscript, Hunter’s Moon; and Alex Johnson was also on the short list, with Skylakes Fall. J.Ed. Marston placed as a finalist with his manuscript, Dispossession. Sabrina Canfield made the list of semi-finalists, with To the Place Where They Go.

2016 “Bests”: Maurice Carlos Ruffin and L. Kasimu Harris

Posted on September 21, 2016 by tadbartlett

Two Peauxdunquians have work honored in compilations of “Best” writing from 2015. L. Kasimu Harris‘s essay, “Ya-ka-mein: Old Sober,” which originally appeared on Edible New Orleans, will be reprinted in Best Food Writing 2016, edited by Holly Hughes. And Maurice Carlos Ruffin‘s short story, “The Ones Who Don’t Say They Love You,” which appeared originally in volume 44, no. 3 of the Iowa Review (and won the 2014 Iowa Review Fiction Prize), is noted on the list of “Notable Fiction” in Best American Short Stories 2016!

Good news for Capdeville, Bartlett, and Ruffin

Posted on September 16, 2016 by tadbartlett

Two more publications and an agent-signing in Peauxdunque!

Emily Capdeville has learned that her story, “An Act of Consolation,” will be printed by The Crab Orchard Review in November. Her first fiction publication, but certainly won’t be her last!

Tad Bartlett‘s story, “The Memory Gardener,” will appear in the Fall online edition of The Baltimore Review, and will be included, as well, in TBR‘s print edition in Spring 2017.

Finally, Maurice Carlos Ruffin has signed with PJ Mark of the agency Janklow & Nesbit, to represent Maurice’s upcoming novel. There will be more news on this in the coming months, so keep an eye out!

Maurice signing up with Janklow & Nesbit

Words for Terri Sue: Wrap-up and photos

Posted on September 8, 2016 by tadbartlett

After the show: Nick Fox, Maurice Carlos Ruffin, Terri Shrum, Tad Bartlett, Kelly Harris, Nicholas Mainieri, and April Blevins Pejic. Photo by L. Kasimu Harris.

Peauxdunque shared a beautiful evening of love and generosity and art (so much wonderful art) with its founding member, Terri Sue Shrum, and with a large cross-section of the New Orleans writing and reading community on August 30, at Three Keys at the Ace Hotel. The event was our “Words for Terri Sue” benefit reading, to raise funds for Terri’s out-of-pocket cancer treatment expenses, and featured DJ’ing by DJ Sep (Giuseppe Catania); the New Orleans premier of Gian Smith‘s award-winning short film, “The Adulterer”; brilliant, touching, thought-provoking, and energetic readings by best-selling and award-winning writers M.O. Walsh, Kelly Harris, Bill Loehfelm, Nicholas Mainieri, and Maurice Carlos Ruffin; with the emcee duties handled with great spirit and skill by Nick Fox. The stage was also graced by Terri herself, with a tribute to all those who came out to make the night possible. We raised approximately $2,000 on the night, bringing our total fundraising for Terri over $11,000 in the past three months! And we’re not done, yet. Please visit our gofundme page for Terri, and keep your eye out for another fundraising effort in conjunction with the Words & Music Conference in November.

If you couldn’t make it (and even if you did), here’s a slideshow of photos taken by Peauxdunquian writer/photographer/renaissance-man, L. Kasimu Harris:

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More poems published by Nordette Adams

Posted on September 6, 2016 by tadbartlett

Peauxdunquian Nordette Adams has published four poems in Unlikely Stories‘ #BlackArtMatters issue. Nordette’s four poems appearing in the issue include “My Uncle Roscoe is an Artist,” “Borg Adjacent,” “Ladonna Waits on the Suburban Women’s Book Club,” and “Scrawl.” We look forward to the next place Nordette’s workds land!

Cassie Pruyn wins Walt McDonald First-Book Prize in Poetry

Posted on September 2, 2016 by tadbartlett

Just fantastic news in Peauxdunque: Cassie Pruyn, poet (peaux-et) and so much more, has been named the winner of the 2017 Walt McDonald First-Book Prize in Poetry! Her book-length collection, Lena, will be published in the Spring of 2017 by Texas Tech University Press. The poems in this collection cut to the heart and the bone, and beyond. Many congratulations to Cassie, and keep an eye out here and on our Facebook page for details as she moves closer to the publication date.

Cassie at Peauxdunque’s 2015 Writers’ Camp

Words for Terri Sue: Meet the writers, part 6

Posted on August 28, 2016 by tadbartlett

This Tuesday, August 30, a special coming together of the writing tribes (and those who love them, or at least dig them) will occur at Three Keys (at the Ace Hotel, 600 Carondelet Street, NOLA), as six best-selling and award-winning writers will present work at a benefit reading for Peauxdunque founding member Terri Sue Shrum. In May, Terri was diagnosed with inoperable stage-4 pancreatic cancer. Since then, Terri has begun chemotherapy treatments at the Winship Cancer Institute at Emory University in Atlanta, and writers nationwide have come together to help with an active fund-raising campaign to help Terri with her out-of-pocket treatment-related expenses. From 7 to 9 p.m. on August 30, we’ll continue that, with tunes spun by DJ Sep (Giuseppe Catania) and an evening emcee’d by Nick Fox. Admission is free, and donations will be accepted at the door and throughout the evening; RSVP here.

Our sixth featured writer is M.O. (“Neal”) Walsh. M.O. Walsh was born and raised in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. He is the author of the story collection, The Prospect of Magic, and the novel, My Sunshine Away, which was a New York Times bestseller and won the Pat Conroy Book Award for Fiction. His stories and essays have appeared in The New York Times, The Guardian, Oxford American, The Southern Review, and others. He currently directs the Creative Writing Workshop at the University of New Orleans. Many thanks to Neal for joining our line-up Tuesday, along with Maurice Carlos Ruffin, Bill Loehfelm, Kelly Harris-DeBerry, Nick Mainieri, and Gian Smith.