SPARKS: News & Notes from
Tiny Lights: A Journal of Personal Narrative
Announcements (Click and Go)
Searchlights & Signal Flares: "What does writer's block look like?" Featured Writer: Nancy Wallace-Nelson
Tiny Lights' 16th Essay Contest
NEW!! 22nd Flash in the Pan posting
Poetry & Essay Contest
E-chapbook Submissions
Greetings!,   

The deadline is looming for the Tiny Lights' personal essay contest! Have you sent in your entries? To paraphrase Seth Godin, my favorite marketing madman: "You don't need more time. You just need to decide (to finish)." Postmark February 18, 2011.  


More on the 16th annual Tiny Lights essay contest

A local literary event this Tuesday, February 15:
The Aqus Speakeasy (see ad below)

The latest 
Searchlights     

 A new Flash in the Pan

All this good stuff! Glad you can join us!
                   Susan Bono, Editor
www.tiny-lights.com

If you subscribe to the print edition of Tiny Lights and haven't received the Contest 2010 issue mailed in mid-January, please

email editor@tiny-lights.com.

   
.   
Searchlights & Signal Flares 
Tiny Lights' Online Writers' Exchange
  
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It's a personal matter, but why should it be private? That's why Marilyn Petty, this month's featured writer, along with Claudia Larson, Becky Povich,   Don Edgers,   David Johnson, Bree LeMaire, Theresa Saunders, Joan Zerrien, Catherine Crawford, Sara Baker, and  Susan Bono are shining light on the question,

"Who sees your work in progress?    


This Month's Featured Writer: Marilyn Petty  

You may have already enjoyed Marilyn's wry wit in previous postings of Searchlights. I am happy to announce she is going to be a regular contributor this year.  

 

Marilyn Petty is a dyed-in-the wool Midwesterner, a long-ago émigré to California and a fortunate resident of Sonoma County, CA. When not tangling with yarns she is unknotting words, writing poetry and personal essays. She has taught weaving through SRJC, wrote and edited the weavers' guild newsletter for 10 years. She putters in her garden when words fail her.

WRITERS: It's your turn to shine in Searchlights. Go to the  Searchlights & Signal Flares Guidelines page to find out how.  Here's the next question:   
  What's your idea of an effective cover letter?
 (Deadline 2/21/11)
  
Send Searchlights submissions with bio (and title!) to editor@tiny-lights.com

 

 

Tiny Lights' 16th Annual Essay Contest

        D
eadline: February 18, 2011

Tiny Lights is looking for next year's contest winners! 

          • First Place: $350
          • Second Place: $250
          • Third Place: $150
          • Two Honorable Mention Prizes: $100 each.
          • Three FLASHPOINT prizes of $100 each
                                 Guidelines

Awards will be determined by a panel of judges. Final authority rests with the Editor-in-Chief, Susan Bono.


Winners will be posted at www.tiny-lights.com by April 11th, 2011
All contestants will receive a hard copy of Tiny Lights' contest publication featuring the winning entries.


Flash in the Pan Online Quarterly

  

 The 23rd Flash has arrived!

Featuring: Ted Scott, Risa Nye, Jack McDaniel, Jeanne Jusaitis,  

Mimi Peel Roughton, Cheryl Somers Aubin, Linda Wisniewski,  

Al Levenson, Trudy Woodworth, Kelley Clink, Ray Scanlon, Nina Schneider, Pamela Malone, Joan Zerrien  


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     What is a Flash in the Pan? It's life caught in the blaze of a match, a beam of moonlight, the glare of a home-made explosion. These  pieces of first-person non-fiction prose (500 words or less) are like potato chips--you won't be able to stop with just one. Our gems are posted quarterly in January, April, July and October on the Tiny Lights website. A select few appear in the hard copy editions of the magazine. Send your jewels to editor@tiny-lights.com.
Go to:Flash in the Pan

Sheila Bender's
Writing it Real 2011 Writers Conference
April 28-30 Manresa Castle  Port Townsend, WA


Join Sheila Bender, Jack Heffron and Meg Files for hands-on help with your writing. They are wise, experienced experts in poetry and essay.
Her website: Writing It Real

Earlybird deadline: February 20: $425


 

 

 

CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS    

 

Quarterly online publications of fiction, memoir or poetry
each featuring one author. Read them at:

  

www.echapbook.com 

 


The spring 2011 FICTION e-chapbook
is open to submissions January 1 through February 21.

 

Contact Publisher Jo-Anne Rosen: echaps@wordrunner.com 


 

                   www.mcwc.org

  Sonoma County Events

 Speakeasy Literary Saloon

@ Aqus Cafe, Petaluma CA.

Gather for a drink, a bite & a feast of words with hosts

Susan Bono & Ransom Stephens.

Winter confab: Tuesday, February 15, 2011 7-9 p.m. @ Aqus

Admission: $5 to benefit Sonoma County Free Book Mobile

Programme:

Wise and sassy Susan Swartz

Baby Doc Mark Sloan

Word artist Ethel Mays

Lakota Poet Luke Warm Water

Beer connoisseur, physicist,  Ken Weaver

ATTN: WRITERS! Bring a short piece of writing and enter the drawing for the 2 open mic slots (4 min. each)!


 

A Unique Offer from Writer/Photographer

Tony Johnson 
 

Tell Me A Story

 Everyone has a story. Stories shape our lives and give them meaning. If you tell me a story, I will record it digitally, along with using photography to reveal what is important to you. This recording and these images will be a celebration of your life and provide a wonderful gift to those you love.
 

To see samples of my work and obtain further information, please go to http://tonyjohnson.zenfolio.com/ , then go to the Tell Me a Story link at the top of the page.
 

 

TonyJohnsonPhotography/InnerLandscapes

e-mail: tonyjohnsonmail@yahoo.com



WRITERS FORUM, PETALUMA


Marlene Cullen hosts this series of writing workshops on the third Thursday of the month from 7-9 p.m. at the Petaluma Community Center.

 

February 17: Zoe FitzGerald Carter

 

The Joys and Pitfalls of Writing Memoir

  

 Zoe FitzGerald Carter is a graduate of Columbia Journalism School and has written for numerous publications includingThe New York Observer, Premiere, The San Francisco Chronicle, Salon, and various national magazines.  Imperfect Endings is her first memoir.

 

Call 778-4380 (Petaluma Community Center) or visit www.thewritespot.usfor  info.  

 $15 at the door

Bibliophoria Poetry Contest  

for Sonoma & Marin County Poets

 

First prize - 100 copies of high-quality letterpress-printed chapbook. Reading, signing and sale at Copperfield's Books in Sebastopol, CA.

 

Second and third prizes - 20 copies of letterpress-printed broadside and bookstore reading.

 

Deadline - Postmark March 15, 2011.

 

Submit  total of 12 pages of poetry, with  Two cover sheets, one with chapbook title, author information, including address, e-mail and phone; another with chapbook title only. On the manuscript put chapbook title on every page. Author's name cannot appear on any page of the manuscript.

 

Final judge - Gwynn O'Gara, Sonoma County Poet Laureate

 

Reading fee - $10 check payable to Sebastopol Center for the Arts.  Mail to Sebastopol Center for the Arts, c/oBibliophoria,  6780 Depot St., Sebastopol, CA 95472. 

  

 

No manuscripts returned without SASE.  No electronic submissions.

 

Notification - Winners will be notified by email April 20, 2011.

 

For additional information, contact: Arlene Mandell:

 poetessxyz@sbcglobal.net

 

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Iota Press Studio News
Iota Press is a letterpress shop and literary studio in Sebastopol.

Along with the usual enchantment and shenanigans, Iota's Slow Print Cooperative has morphed into a quarterly offering of little books. "Almost a journal. Nearly a magazine. Kind of a trip." $30 per year for 4 chapbooks. $10 single copies. This current issue features Eric Johnson's  "kaleidoglyphs," such as the one featured above.

Location:  925-c Gravenstein Hwy in South Sebastopol (next to 'Beekind).

Contact: Eric Johnson....823-6152  Our latest works online at:  www.iotapress.com

 

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Tiny Lights Recommends:


  Online Classes with Ken Rodgers
                                   
*********************

                  OCCIDENTAL CENTER FOR THE ARTS


For reservations, or more information call: OCA   707 874 9392. OCA is located in Harmony Village in downtown Occidental at 4008 Bohemian Hwy.


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Write Free Monthly Email Newsletter: Insights, activities and open-hearted inspiration for attracting the creative life by authors Rebecca Lawton and Jordan Rosenfeld. www.writefree.us

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Skate through the season and

to the print edition of Tiny Lights.

 

    Deborah Garber's illustration for
   "Gliding Away" by Andrea Marcusa.
Handwritingonline.net

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Since 1995, Tiny Lights has been celebrating the power of personal voice with a biannual journal devoted to short essay. The annual essay contest, which offers $1500 in prizes, provides the material for the summer issue, while the winter issue is by invitation only.

The online component of Tiny Lights is designed to catch what can't be contained in the pages of the newsstand editions. Lights Online provides a venue for additional voices, information about Tiny Lights and resources for writers of personal essay. Sparks: Email News & Notes is our free monthly electronic newsletter.

Subscriptions to the print edition of Tiny Lights, which includes original art:
$10 per year (2 issues)
Current issue: $5 each
Back issues: $3 each
 Checks payable to Tiny Lights Publications, P.O. Box 928, Petaluma, CA 94953
Or take advatage of our new PayPal feature!

islandSusan Bono, Editor
Tiny Lights Publications
P.O. Box 928, Petaluma, CA 94953

(707) 762-3208
www.tiny-lights.com