Unfortunately, we just learned that Moon City Press’ distribution outlet, the Chicago Distribution Center, has closed until April 9 in response to the social-distancing order in Illinois. This will, of course, temporarily disrupt our ability to ship our titles, but rest assured that normal business procedures will resume as soon as the order is lifted, and we encourage you to go ahead and order books in the meantime as a way of supporting both our press and our authors:
The editors of Moon City Press would like to congratulate the following 11 writers, whose manuscripts have been named finalists in the 2019 Moon City Poetry Award competition:
Emily August of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Paul Bone of Evansville, Indiana C.w. Emerson of Palm Springs, California Charlie Green of Cortland, New York Karen Kovacik of Indianapolis, Indiana Ann Lovett of Ashland, Oregon Katharyn Machan of Ithaca, New York Sandy Marchetti of Lisle, Illinois Matt Morgan of Kalamazoo, Michigan Phoebe Reeves of Cincinnati, Ohio Bret Shepard of Tacoma, Washington
Series Editor Karen Craigo will select a winner from this group. That winner will have their book published on Moon City Press and receive the $1,000 top prize.
We congratulate these authors for making it to this stage, but also regard every writer who entered this contest, so many great manuscripts, making our decision extremely tough.
Time to pre-order your copy of Pablo Piñero Stillmann’s awesome debut collection of stories, Our Brains and the Brains of Miniature Sharks, winner of the 2019 Moon City Short Fiction Award! The book is set to release on April 1, but reserve your copy today!
“Pablo Piñero Stillmann’s astonishing stories stun with their punchy sharpness and style, with their deeply layered humor and humanity. Each piece is disarmingly matter-of-fact in its patient excavation of emotional density: mental anguish, generational grief, existential resignation. I burned through Our Brains and the Brains of Miniature Sharks in a day, and you will, too:a genuinely immersive collection from a dazzling writer.”—Joseph Scapellato, author of The Made-Up Man
This edition’s contributors include Melissa Barker, Sara Browning, John Gallaher, Jennifer Howard, Angie Macri, Kim Magowan, John McNally, A.R. Robins, Michelle Ross, and Jennifer Wortman.
After much deliberation, we have made the very difficult decision to opt out of this year’s AWP Conference in San Antonio. Sadly, this means that Moon City Press and Moon City Review will not be at our booth at the book fair, nor will we be holding our offsite reading on Wednesday night—all of our authors have opted out of the conference as well.
We are especially sad for our authors whose books were supposed to have their first AWP this year: Phong Nguyen for Roundabout (Missouri Author Series), Kathy Goodkin for Crybaby Bridge (Moon City Poetry Award), and Pablo Piñero Stillmann for Our Brains and the Brains of Miniature Sharks (Moon City Short Fiction Award). All had scheduled signings at our booth, and all were looking forward to presenting their books to fifteen thousand writers this week, live and in person.
Though this won’t be happening, we ask that you please seek out these books and pick up a copy—and while we’re at it, we can all do our part to support the authors, journals, and presses who have to miss out on this year’s conference.
If you’re attending the AWP Conference in San Antonio this coming week, don’t miss the Moon City Press offsite reading on Wednesday, March 4, from 8 to 10 p.m. at Southtown 101. The reading will feature Kim Magowan, Amanda Marbais, Phong Nguyen, Michelle Ross, and Pablo Piñero Stillmann.
We’re thrilled to announce that Sarah Layden’s “The Jumper,” which first appeared in Moon City Review 2019, has been selected by final judge Michael Martone to appear in Best Microfiction 2020. Congratulations, Sarah!
The editors of Moon City Press would like to congratulate Pablo Piñero Stillmann of Mexico City, Mexico, for being chosen as winner of the 2019 Moon City Short Fiction Award for his collection, Our Brains and the Brains of Miniature Sharks. The author holds an MFA in creative writing from Indiana University. He’s also been the recipient of Mexico’s two top grants for young writers: The Foundation for Mexican Literature (f,l,m) and The National Fund for Culture and Arts (FONCA). His fiction, nonfiction and poetry have appeared in, among other journals, Ninth Letter, Bennington Review, The Normal School, The Summerset Review, The Rumpus, and Moon City Review. His debut novel, Temblador, was published in 2014 by Conaculta.
The finalists and runners-up of the 2019 competition are as follows:
Andrew Bertaina Angela Buck Timothy DeLizza Emily Doak JoeAnn Hart Bradford Kammin: RUNNER-UP Nathan Oates: RUNNER-UP Jenn Stroud Rossmann Marvin Shackelford Rob McClure Smith
Our Brains and the Brains of Miniature Sharks will be published in 2020 by MCP, and its author will receive the $1,000 prize upon publication.
Entries for the 2020 Moon City Short Fiction Award are still being accepted through December 15.
Moon City’s editors would like to thank everyone who entered this contest for helping to make it so competitive, so great. We received so many fantastic entries, we only wish we could publish more of them alongside this winning book.
We so love the cover of our next issue, Moon City Review 2020! The art is by Missouri State University’s own Jordan Seyer and is designed by the brilliant Charli Barnes. This issue (so far) features work by writers such as Sarah Browning, John Gallaher, Jennifer Howard, Gary Leising, Kim Magowan, John McNally, Jessica Mehta, Michelle Ross, Rebecca Schumejda, Jennifer Wortman, and lots of other talented folks. Debuting at the Association of Writers & Writing Programs conference in San Antonio, then everywhere else right after!
The editors of Moon City Press and Moon City Review are happy to announce that, after a three-year hiatus, we are rededicating ourselves to publishing regular reviews of contemporary books, focusing on recent releases of poetry, fiction, creative nonfiction, and graphic narrative from small/independent/university presses.
To head this operation, we’ve taken on recent staff member and Missouri State University grad Katelyn Grisham as official Reviews Editor. Katelyn will be acquiring books for review, searching out reviewers, setting a schedule, and editing the content.
If you would like to see our guidelines or submit a review, please use our Submittable portal:
