Greetings writers, editors, and readers!
We hope you are all holding on and holding up...looks like the end maybe in sight. (Tuning out Dr. Osterholm here.) Or at least summer is.
We've been a little lax on keeping track of literary happenings, also being recused from social media. So if we missed anything, which certainly we did, please let us know at lesterliteraryupdate@gmail.com or frankbures@yahoo.com. Thanks to Trisha Shaskan, Laurie Hertzl and Kris Bigalk for helping to pull this info together.
Wishing everyone a calm and productive 2021!
Lester
OFFICE SPACE
Are your kids driving you insane? Do you want to get out of your home? We know of three reasonably priced (cheaper than some co-working spaces), covid-safe offices for rent in the St. Anthony Park neighborhood of St. Paul, available immediately. Shoot me a note if you're interested: frankbures@yahoo.com.
NEWS
Do you have thoughts on what it means to be from the Midwest? The Midwessay is looking for short pieces. Contact jordan.wiklund@gmail.com
Minnesota Book Award finalists
Milkweed Fellowship closes March 22
Mike Wohnoutka and David LaRochelle won the Theodor Seuss Geisel Award for the best book for beginning readers.
Kawai Strong Washburn's novel, "Sharks in the Time of Saviors" is a finalist in two categories for a PEN America award, the PEN/Jean Stein Award for the most original book in any genre, and the PEN/Hemingway Award for best debut book.
25 Year of Rain Taxi Exhibit Virtual Tour (Now online)
PODCASTS
Dessa’s new science podcast, Deeply Human.
Gear Junkie Podcast interviews Stephen Regenold, the Gear Junkie himself: “You’d think building a multimedia empire takes a lot of planning. But in fact, sometimes you just back into it.”
FILMS
Kate DiCamillo’s Flora And Ulysses is now a film:
New documentary on Tim O'Brien’s attempt to write one last book:
ARTICLES
Public Safety, by Paul Rousseau (Roxane Gay’s Emerging Writers Series)
The Year Of Choosing Dangerously, by Maggie Koerth (538)
Comrades, We’ve Been Screwed! (Sunday Long Read) and The Case of the Autographed Corpse (Smithsonian) by Jack El-Hai.
HIV Ruined My Sex Life. Then I Met My Match, by Danez Smith (GQ)
City Pages, the Alt-Weekly Where Music Writing Reigned Supreme, by Keith Harris (New York Times)
NONFICTION
Somewhere in the Unknown World: A Collective Refugee Memoir, by Kao Kalia Yang (November)
Dream Big!: How to Reach for Your Stars, by Abigail Harrison (January)
The Part that Burns, by Jeannie Ouellette (January)
Three Ordinary Girls, by Tim Brady (February)
Radiant: The Dancer, the Scientist, and a Friendship Forged in Light, by Liz Heinecke (February)
Self, Divided, by John Medeiros (February)
The Seed Keeper by Diane Wilson (Milkweed, March)
Laundry Love: Finding Joy in a Common Chore, by Patric Richardson and Karin B. Miller (March)
A Lot Can Happen in the Middle of Nowhere: the Making of Fargo by Todd Melby (March)
Are we there yet?, by Kathleen West (March)
Places of Mind: A Life of Edward Said, by Timothy Brennan (March)
Sensational: The Hidden History of America's "girl Stunt Reporters", by Kim Todd (April)
For the love of Cod by Eric Dregni (April)
Lincolnland, by Klecko. (April)
Lost in Summerland: Essays, by Barrett Swanson (May)
FICTION
Some People Let You Down, Volume 19, by Mike Alberti (October)
Evidence of V: A Novel in Fragments, Facts, and Fictions, by Sheila O'Connor (October)
The Haunting of Brynn Wilder, by Wendy Webb (November)
The Sun Collective, by Charles Baxter (November)
Best American Short Stories 2020, by Curtis Sittenfeld (Editor, November)
Brood, by Jackie Polzin (March)
Waterfall by Mary Casanova (April)
The Blondes of Wisconsin, by Anthony Bukoski (April)
The Youngest Boy, by Jim Heynen (April)
Ivory Shoals, by John Brandon (June)
The Ninth Metal, by Benjamin Percy, (June)
MIDDLE GRADE
Ancestor Approved: Intertribal Stories for Kids, middle grade anthology edited by Cynthia Leitich Smith (February, includes stories by MN authors Dawn Axness Quigley and Art Coulson)
The Great Peach Experiment 1: When Life Gives You Lemons, Make Peach Pie, by Erin Soderberg Downing (April)
Rea and the Blood of Nectar by Payal Doshi Moradian (May)
Long Lost by Jacqueline West (May)
Journey Beyond the Burrow by Rina Bellew Heisel (July)
Trophy Buck by Art Coulson (August)
Lure of the Lake by Art Coulson (August)
The Troubled Girls of Dragomir Academy, by Anne Ursu (October)
Chasing Bigfoot by Art Coulson (Reycraft Books) Fall 2021
Face Off by Art Coulson (Benchmark Education) Fall 2021
The Stubborn Gator by Art Coulson (Benchmark Education) Fall 2021
PICTURE BOOKS
Ten Beautiful Things written by Molly Beth Griffin (January)
Night Shadows written by Barbara DaCosta (January)
Hello, Mandarin Duck! written by Bao Phi (February)
A House for Every Bird written by Megan Maynor (February)
Headstrong Hallie written by Aimée Bisonette (February)
Jayden’s Impossible Garden written by Mélina Mangal (March)
See the Cat: Three Stories About a Dog, by David LaRochelle , Mike Wohnoutka (March)
Yang Warriors by Kao Kalia Yang (Author) and Billy Thao (Illustrator) (April)
The Second Life of Trees written by Aimée Bisonette (September)
Shipwreck Reefs written by Aimée Bisonette (September)
Look, Grandma! Ni, Elisi! written by Art Coulson (August)
If You Want to Knit Some Mittens written by Laura Purdie Salas (October)
The Most Beautiful Thing, by Kao Kalia Yang (October)
Basho’s Haiku Journey by Freeman Ng (October)
POETRY
Can’t Stop, Won’t Stop (Rain Taxi chapbook of poems in the wake of Floyd’s death)
Catrachos: Poems, by Roy G Guzmán (May, Graywolf)
Wound from the Mouth of a Wound, by Torrin A Greathouse (December, Milkweed)
The Orchid Folios, by Mok Zining (2020)
We're the flownover. We come from flyoverland, by Matt Mauch (February)
Hello, Earth!: Poems to Our Planet, by Joyce Sidman (February)
In Passing by Deborah Cooper (March)
Our Delicate Barricades Downed, by William Reichard (April)
Sho, by Douglas Kearney (April)
Rue by Kathryn Nuernberger (April)
Homes by Moheb Soliman (June)
Worldly Things, by Michael Kleber-Diggs (June)
Graphic Novels
Devil's Highway, by Benjamin Percy (March)
Middle-grade
Little Deer and The Little People written by Art Coulson (Fall 2021)
Teen
The Great Gatsby: A Graphic Novel Adaptation, written and illustrated by Katharine Woodman-Maynard (January)
Young Graphic Novel (for ages 5 - 8)
Pizza and Taco: Best Party Ever, written and illustrated by Stephen Shaskan (January)