New York, NY — July 19, 2012 — Poets & Writers, the nation's largest nonprofit organization serving creative writers, invites Alaskan writers to apply for the 2013 Maureen Egen Writers Exchange Award.
Each year, P&W invites fiction writers and poets from a selected state to apply for the award. This year, eligible writers are residents of Alaska who have never published a book, or have published only one full-length book, of fiction or poetry. The judges for 2013 are Ann Napolitano for fiction and Afaa Michael Weaver for poetry.
The winner in each category will each receive an all-expenses-paid trip to New York City to meet with top literary professionals, including editors, agents, publishers, and prominent writers. While in New York, winners will also give a public reading hosted by Poets & Writers. In addition, each winner is invited to spend a month at the Jentel Artist Residency Program in Banner, Wyoming.
The prestigious award, which aims to provide promising writers a network for professional advancement, has helped to launch the careers of Sue Monk Kidd (The Secret Life of Bees), Elaine Beale (Another Life Altogether), Sandra Beasley (Don't Kill the Birthday Girl), David Mura (Turning Japanese: Memoirs of a Sansei), Fae Myenne Ng (Bone), Mona Simpson (My Hollywood), and others.
Download the guidelines and application form at at.pw.org/wexaward. Entries must be postmarked by December 1, 2012.
About the 2013 Judges
Ann Napolitano is the author of the novels A Good Hard Look and Within Arm's Reach. A Good Hard Look was published in July, 2011, and was an Indie Next Pick, an Okra Pick, and spent several weeks on the Southern independent bestseller list. She received an MFA from New York University; she teaches fiction writing for Brooklyn College's MFA program, New York University's School of Continuing and Professional Studies, and for Gotham Writers' Workshop. She lives in New York City with her husband and two children.
Michael Afaa Weaver is a native of Baltimore, Maryland, and a graduate ('87) of Brown University's graduate program in creative writing. His twelfth collection of poetry, The Government of Nature, will be published in early 2013 by the University of Pittsburgh Press. At Simmons College, he holds the first endowed chair established at the college as the Alumnae Professor of English. His websites are afaamweaver.com and transpoet.com.
About Poets & Writers
Founded in 1970, Poets & Writers is the nation's largest nonprofit organization serving creative writers. Its mission is to foster the professional development of poets and writers, to promote communication throughout the literary community, and to help create an environment in which literature can be appreciated by the widest possible public. Learn more at pw.org.
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