Month: July 2017

The Wardrobe’s Best Dressed: “String Theory” by Jenny Yang Cropp

Lower Market

This selection comes from String Theory by Jenny Yang Cropp, available from Mongrel Empire Press. Our curator for July is Raquel Thorne.

Jenny Yang Cropp is the author of the poetry collection String Theory (Mongrel Empire Press), a 2016 Oklahoma Book Award finalist, and the chapbook Hanging the Moon. Her new chapbook, Not a Bird or a Flower, is forthcoming this summer from Ryga: A Journal of Provocations. Her poems have appeared in a variety of journals, most recently Poemeleon and REAL: Regarding Arts & Letters.  She received her MFA from Minnesota State University-Mankato and her PhD from the University of South Dakota. This fall, she will join the faculty at Southeast Missouri State University as an Assistant Professor of English. Find her online @JennyYangCropp and www.jennyyangcropp.com.

Rhiannon Thorne, known as Raquel by friends, grew up in the Bay Area of California, a couple hours north of San Francisco in the wine country. A genderqueer poet, she currently resides in Baton Rouge, LA, where she is a MFA candidate at LSU and the Interviews/Reviews editor for New Delta Review. Raquel is also co-creator of cahoodaloodaling, an associate interviewer for Up the Staircase Quarterly, and the president of Tandem Reader Awards.

The Wardrobe’s Best Dressed: “String Theory” by Jenny Yang Cropp

Dream in Which I Learn My Sister Is Dead

This selection comes from String Theory by Jenny Yang Cropp, available from Mongrel Empire Press. Our curator for July is Raquel Thorne.

Jenny Yang Cropp is the author of the poetry collection String Theory (Mongrel Empire Press), a 2016 Oklahoma Book Award finalist, and the chapbook Hanging the Moon. Her new chapbook, Not a Bird or a Flower, is forthcoming this summer from Ryga: A Journal of Provocations. Her poems have appeared in a variety of journals, most recently Poemeleon and REAL: Regarding Arts & Letters.  She received her MFA from Minnesota State University-Mankato and her PhD from the University of South Dakota. This fall, she will join the faculty at Southeast Missouri State University as an Assistant Professor of English. Find her online @JennyYangCropp and www.jennyyangcropp.com.

Rhiannon Thorne, known as Raquel by friends, grew up in the Bay Area of California, a couple hours north of San Francisco in the wine country. A genderqueer poet, she currently resides in Baton Rouge, LA, where she is a MFA candidate at LSU and the Interviews/Reviews editor for New Delta Review. Raquel is also co-creator of cahoodaloodaling, an associate interviewer for Up the Staircase Quarterly, and the president of Tandem Reader Awards.

Shannon Elizabeth Hardwick’s Before Isadore Released by Sundress Publications

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Sundress Publications is pleased to Shannon Elizabeth Hardwick’s full-length book of poetry, Before Isadore. The book is available to preorder at the Sundress store!

BeforeIsadore#1

 

“Shannon Hardwick’s Before Isadore gives insight into the softest spaces and the harshest regrets, creating a book ‘birth-sick’ with its own existence. These poems are a waking dream, a dream of lovers and rivers and piles of bones. Hardwick creates a mythos of life and love inseparable from death, asking her readers to ask where the border lies between hope and suffering, if it really exists at all. Hardwick’s invitation is also a prayer ‘about touching / the untouched again.'” -Amy King, author of The Missing Museum and I Want to Make You Safe

“Shannon Elizabeth Hardwick is a remarkable writer. Breathtakingly intimate, riotously magical, by turns harrowing and majestic, Before Isadore is a work of astonishing power. A true triumph.” -Musa Okwonga, poet, journalist, musician and author of A Cultured Left Foot and Eating Roses for Dinner

“Written inside a runnel of a life, these poems work both as offering and birthing, and spell out the coming-to-be of Isadore, along with the dissolution of a marriage—in the poet-mother’s lively inventive and surreal poems. There is a mix of god talk “sounds/only a god knows/exists” and ‘guilt, glitter and grace.’ In such an intelligent book, the poems beckon us to stop and read again “wonder’s first” words, so that we ‘stretch inside circles,’ and so that a newborn, ‘blue lipped/ in the last prayer’ is brought forth both in form and in fancy. The middle section a series of poems describing how parts of the body, marriage and child were made, as in ‘ear is made/into the absence,’ is evocative and inventive. The arc of the book’s poems work wonderfully, ending then with ‘the one who broke/into a person who prays.’” -Veronica Golos, Author of Rootwork

AuthorPhotoHardwick

Shannon Elizabeth Hardwick has chapbooks out with Thrush Press and Mouthfeel Press and an e-chapbook with Agape Editions. Hardwick serves as the poetry editor for The Boiler Journal. Before Isadore is her debut full-length collection.

The Wardrobe’s Best Dressed: “String Theory” by Jenny Yang Cropp

For My Mother, After Becoming a Mother

This selection comes from String Theory by Jenny Yang Cropp, available from Mongrel Empire Press. Our curator for July is Raquel Thorne.

Jenny Yang Cropp is the author of the poetry collection String Theory (Mongrel Empire Press), a 2016 Oklahoma Book Award finalist, and the chapbook Hanging the Moon. Her new chapbook, Not a Bird or a Flower, is forthcoming this summer from Ryga: A Journal of Provocations. Her poems have appeared in a variety of journals, most recently Poemeleon and REAL: Regarding Arts & Letters.  She received her MFA from Minnesota State University-Mankato and her PhD from the University of South Dakota. This fall, she will join the faculty at Southeast Missouri State University as an Assistant Professor of English. Find her online @JennyYangCropp and www.jennyyangcropp.com.

Rhiannon Thorne, known as Raquel by friends, grew up in the Bay Area of California, a couple hours north of San Francisco in the wine country. A genderqueer poet, she currently resides in Baton Rouge, LA, where she is a MFA candidate at LSU and the Interviews/Reviews editor for New Delta Review. Raquel is also co-creator of cahoodaloodaling, an associate interviewer for Up the Staircase Quarterly, and the president of Tandem Reader Awards.

The Wardrobe’s Best Dressed: “String Theory” by Jenny Yang Cropp

Oriental

This selection comes from String Theory by Jenny Yang Cropp, available from Mongrel Empire Press. Our curator for July is Raquel Thorne.

Jenny Yang Cropp is the author of the poetry collection String Theory (Mongrel Empire Press), a 2016 Oklahoma Book Award finalist, and the chapbook Hanging the Moon. Her new chapbook, Not a Bird or a Flower, is forthcoming this summer from Ryga: A Journal of Provocations. Her poems have appeared in a variety of journals, most recently Poemeleon and REAL: Regarding Arts & Letters.  She received her MFA from Minnesota State University-Mankato and her PhD from the University of South Dakota. This fall, she will join the faculty at Southeast Missouri State University as an Assistant Professor of English. Find her online @JennyYangCropp and www.jennyyangcropp.com.

Rhiannon Thorne, known as Raquel by friends, grew up in the Bay Area of California, a couple hours north of San Francisco in the wine country. A genderqueer poet, she currently resides in Baton Rouge, LA, where she is a MFA candidate at LSU and the Interviews/Reviews editor for New Delta Review. Raquel is also co-creator of cahoodaloodaling, an associate interviewer for Up the Staircase Quarterly, and the president of Tandem Reader Awards.

Best of the Net Now Open for Nominations!

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Nominations Open for 2017 Best of the Net Anthology

Nominations are now open for the annual Best of the Net anthology from Sundress Publications. This anthology promotes the diverse and growing collection of voices who are publishing their work online and serves to bring greater respect to an innovative and continually expanding medium.

Nominations must have originally appeared online, and must have been first published or appeared on the web between July 1, 2016 and June 30, 2017.

Nominations must come from the editor of the publication (journal, chapbook, online press, etc), or, if the work is self-published, it must be sent by the author. For journals and presses, each entry may include up to six poems, two stories, and two works of creative nonfiction for consideration. For individuals sending self-published work, please send no more than two pieces regardless of genre.

Please include both the URL of the poem, story, or essay as well as a full text version in a Word or RTF document. Nominations must also include the author’s name and email address as well as the name, contact info, and URL of the journal.

Submissions must be sent via email to bestofthenet@sundresspublications.com between July 1st and September 30th, 2017.

See the full submission guidelines here.

July Reading Series This Sunday!


The Sundress Academy for the Arts is excited to host the July installment of the Sundress Reading Series next Sunday July 16th from 2-4PM at Bar Marley in Knoxville’s Happy Holler. The event will be free and open to the public and will feature Brynn Martin, Daniel Crocker, and James Brubaker.  

James Brubaker is the author of Liner Notes (Subito), Pilot Season (sunnyoutside), and Black Magic Death Sphere: (Science) Fictions (Forthcoming from Urban Farmhouse). His stories have appeared in venues including Zoetrope: All Story, The Normal School, Hobart, Michigan Quarterly Review, Indiana Review, Beloit Fiction Journal, Booth, Hayden’s Ferry Review, and Monkeybicycle, among others. He is the director of Southeast Missouri State University Press and the editor of Big Muddy.

Daniel Crocker is the author of a novel, a collection of short stories and several collections of poetry—including Like a Fish from Sundress Publications. His new poetry collection, Shit House Rat, will be published by Spartan Press in September 2017. His work has appeared in places like The Los Angeles Review, The Chiron Review, and The Mas Tequila Review.  He teaches at Southeast Missouri State University.

Brynn Martin is a Kansas native living in Knoxville, where she recently received her MFA in poetry from the University of Tennessee. She’s excited to soon take over as the Reading Series Coordinator for Sundress Academy for the Arts. Her poetry has appeared in Public Pool and Contrary Magazine. She loves ee cummings and cats almost equally.

Bar Marley is a Caribbean beach bar and grill featuring fusion cuisine, reggae, and latin dance located at 760 Stone St NW Knoxville, Tennessee.

 

 

 

The Sundress Academy for the Arts (SAFTA) is an artists’ residency that hosts workshops, retreats, and residencies for writers, actors, filmmakers, and visual artists. All are guided by experienced, professional instructors from a variety of creative disciplines who are dedicated to cultivating the arts in East Tennessee.

 

Web: http://www.sundressacademyforthearts/      Facebook: SundressAcademyfortheArts

Email: safta@sundresspublications.com                  Twitter: SundressPub

The Wardrobe’s Best Dressed: “Anne with an E” by April Michelle Bratten

April Michelle Bratten - The Winter of Anne p7

This selection comes from the chapbook Anne with an E, available from Dancing Girl Press. Our curator for July is Raquel Thorne.

April Michelle Bratten‘s work has appeared in Gargoyle, Southeast Review, Zone 3, THRUSH Poetry Journal, The Boiler Journal, and others. She is the Editor-in-Chief of the online journal Up the Staircase Quarterly, a Contributing Editor at Words Dance Publishing, and the Vice President of the Tandem Reader Awards. She was recently accepted into the MFA program at UBC Vancouver. Find out more at aprilmichellebratten.com.

Rhiannon Thorne, known as Raquel by friends, grew up in the Bay Area of California, a couple hours north of San Francisco in the wine country. A genderqueer poet, she currently resides in Baton Rouge, LA, where she is a MFA candidate at LSU and the Interviews/Reviews editor for New Delta Review. Raquel is also co-creator of cahoodaloodaling, an associate interviewer for Up the Staircase Quarterly, and the president of Tandem Reader Awards.

The Wardrobe’s Best Dressed: “Anne with an E” by April Michelle Bratten

April Michelle Bratten - To Write a Letter When There Is Too Much to Say p9

This selection comes from the chapbook Anne with an E, available from Dancing Girl Press. Our curator for July is Raquel Thorne.

April Michelle Bratten‘s work has appeared in Gargoyle, Southeast Review, Zone 3, THRUSH Poetry Journal, The Boiler Journal, and others. She is the Editor-in-Chief of the online journal Up the Staircase Quarterly, a Contributing Editor at Words Dance Publishing, and the Vice President of the Tandem Reader Awards. She was recently accepted into the MFA program at UBC Vancouver. Find out more at aprilmichellebratten.com.

Rhiannon Thorne, known as Raquel by friends, grew up in the Bay Area of California, a couple hours north of San Francisco in the wine country. A genderqueer poet, she currently resides in Baton Rouge, LA, where she is a MFA candidate at LSU and the Interviews/Reviews editor for New Delta Review. Raquel is also co-creator of cahoodaloodaling, an associate interviewer for Up the Staircase Quarterly, and the president of Tandem Reader Awards.

Meet Our New Social Media Intern, Tierney Bailey

The Myers-Briggs test tells me I am an ENFJ, like Abraham Lincoln (mostly interesting because I am distantly related to Mary Todd Lincoln) and Peyton Manning (mostly interesting because I was born and raised in Indianapolis—though I only have any fealty to the Pacers because I loved Reggie Miller’s big ears a kid). ENFJs like to put things into external contexts, according to all the profiles I’ve ever read. That might be true, since I was born October 2, 1993, but I like to contextualize it with “I share a birthday with King Richard III, Sting, and Ghandi.” I, however, am mostly convinced that this is just because I wholly embody the phrase my mother uses most often about me: “They can hear you a county over, Tierney.” As a toddler, I constantly received invitations to birthday parties for little, old ladies I had conversations with inside grocery stores and book stores. I remain unconvinced about by the NFJ bits, but “extravert” fits.

Sundress is not my first dealing in publishing. (Here’s to hoping it won’t be my last!) When I first entered college, I enrolled as an English/education major. Luckily, while I loved my students, I found my way into the publishing program early on. I spent my remaining three years as a professional writing major with terrific professors at the University of Indianapolis honing my skills to various degrees—writing, editing, designing, Tweeting, any gerund I could possibly fit into my schedule would eventually be done. Now, I am enrolled at Emerson College as a Writing, Literature, and Publishing graduate student with more amazing people. Most of the time, I use communication to put my world in order because I see interaction as a piece of the greater conversation.

Maybe this is why I’ve ended up as Sundress’s new intern for social media.

I guess the basic profile of myself is this: my name is Tierney Bailey. I like to talk and listen and learn. I mostly just try my best.

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Tierney Bailey is a Libra, a lover of science fiction and poetry, and studies Korean in her spare time. She currently copyedits for Strange Horizons. Tierney is also a Writing, Literature, and Publishing graduate student at Emerson College. As an East Coast transplant from Indianapolis, Tierney still smiles upon the slightest bit of eye contact. If you can’t find her on a train between Providence and Boston, she can easily be found on Twitter as @ergotierney.