By Daily Press staff
Santa Monica College has announced the release of the fall edition of the Santa Monica Review, its acclaimed bi-annual national literary arts journal that showcases the voices of both established authors and emerging writers.
“The newest issue includes short stories by a handful of terrific authors who also happen to be writing teachers, as well as current students of creative writing, some from area schools,” said Andrew Tonkovich, Santa Monica Review editor.
“This was purely by accident,” he said. “It was only after putting together the issue that I realized I’d located students and teachers from college and university workshops... I was impressed with the quality and range of writing — voice, style, topic, humor — shown by the writers.”
Among the 10 pieces in the issue are short stories by Benjamin Weissman (“Dear Dead Person”), who teaches at the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena and Katherine Haake (“No Reason on Earth”), an instructor at California State University at Northridge. John Mandel, who debuts work in this issue, teaches at California Institute of the Arts. Novelists Janet Kauffman (“Rot”) teaches at Eastern Michigan University and Gary Fincke (“Writing Letters for the Blind”) is the Writers’ Institute director at Susquehanna University in Penn.
The issue includes a further installment of former Peace Corps worker Eran Williams’Africa memoirs and another in Elizabeth Losh’s series of fictional stories considering human bodily fluids. Losh directs the Humanities Core Program at the University of California at Irvine, and Williams is an MFA creative writing candidate at San Jose State University.
Two local student writers are showcased: Sarah Winterfield of Santa Monica College, and Lindsay Fitz-Gerald from UC Irvine’s esteemed MFA creative writing program.
Founded by SMC English instructor Jim Krusoe (Blood Lake, Iceland), the Review has presented readers works of fiction, nonfiction, poetry, interviews and essays, including works by well-known authors such as Harold Pinter, Gary Soto, Lynn Freed and Alan Cheuse.
The issue, which is now the college’s 15th, is available for sale at the SMC Bookstore, Dutton’s Brentwood, Beyond Baroque in Venice, and other Los Angeles-area booksellers. Copies also are available by mail and by subscription through Santa Monica Review, Santa Monica College, 1900 Pico Blvd., Santa Monica, Calif., 90405. Copies are $7 per issue or $12 for a one-year subscription. Submissions may be made to the same address. For information, go to http://www.smc.edu/sm_review.
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on October 17, 2003. Read the original PDF.