When Gabi and I were publishing Mississippi Arts & Letters in the 1980s we had the great good luck to have a poetry editor, Larry Johnson, who knew more about literature than anyone we had ever known, and who introduced us to the works of a slew of great poetry and fiction writers. The … Read more
At last, we’re going to start publishing poetry on the Mud Flat Press website. The format will be like the formatting for short stories (see https://mudflatpress.com/short-stories/). Like the short stories, poems will be by invitation only. We cannot accept unsolicited submissions. We will start with poems by Jes Simmons, Anne Nayer, Jack Butler—all contributors to … Read more
A new novel by Alec Clayton I’m not writing this. I’m screaming it. But only inside my mind. It’s all in my head. You are in my head. Left completely paralyzed and unable to talk after a stroke, newspaperman Willie Ray Rivers recalls his fight for justice in the little town of Hub City, Mississippi; … Read more
For the second time, and for the second author, the book came to a point where inspiration trailed off. Where to turn? Morris and I had become good friends. We shared a number of interests. Both of us had been teachers. (Morris was a retired UCLA professor of psychology. I had taught grades 9-12, and … Read more
We asked Jackie Cassella, founder of Creative Colloquy to recommend writers for Mud Flat Shorts (mostly fiction). She recommended three writers, all of whom graciously accepted our invitation and all of whom submitted stories that were just right for the anthology. There are two stories by Jenni Prange Boran. Here she talks about her story … Read more
“Emmolene’s Bones” by Jack Butler may well be the strangest love story ever written. “Hawk Gumbo,” also by Jack Butler, is the quintessential Southern Gothic or Grit Lit story. “Godsend” by Samuel Snoek-Brown is the story of a woman obsessed with the thought of murdering her neighbor because the neighbor has irritating habits and sings horrendously. Both … Read more
Yesterday I finished what I think was the third (can’t keep count) complete rewrite, start to finish, of my new novel Teacher. With deep thanks to Brynn Garman, Rin Westcott, Steve Tarry, Cameron Combs, Bryan Willis, Mian Carvan, Margaret Culbertson, Brady Olson, SJ Boyle, Nancy Sigafoos, Diane Sawyer, Don Orr Martin, Megan Kruse, Bev Sykes, … Read more
Ink is Ricker Winsor’s latest book of poetry and drawings with approximately 150 drawings with poems, captions and comments and two essays: “Drawings and Wabi-sabi” and “What I Know About Art.” Winsor says, “Using reed pens and brushes, I made the effort over all those years to get out into the world and make my … Read more
by Ricker Winsor – In Bali, we adopted a village-dog puppy we named Nana. She and her sister found their way, at about seven weeks of age, to the workplace of our neighbor. The office security people there were about to throw them against a wall, the customary way to kill puppies. The dog situation … Read more