New Content LIVE at Hunger Mountain

This week The Varying Shades of Shadows welcomes an exploration of self and sisterhood by Janet Gurtler in Embracing Shadows. Janet’s new novel I’m Not Her was just named to the LA Times Summer Reading List. Also new is In the Half-Light, an essay detailing the shadowy subconscious that aided Hunger Mountain Sneak Peek author Joe Lunievicz in creating his debut novel, Open Wounds (WestSide Books, 2011) which has earned a PW starred review. We are honored to showcase new fiction by Jennifer Hubbard, author of The Secret Year. Monsters is a surprising and raw read. Lastly, in our Industry Insider column we have an interview with Elena Mechlin and Joan Slattery in New Faces at Pippin Properties. Elena and Joan were both kind enough to offer critiques in the HM/VCFA e-bay auction and both agents saw their bids go sky high! We thank them and all the other auction participants and bidders.

E. Kirstin Anderson, HM new Assistant Editor

Along with new content, we have some editorial announcements. Caroline Carlson began as an Assistant Editor working most directly with Miciah Bay Gault, Managing Editor, earlier this year. Caroline has been a tremendous resource, both editorially and in the creating of the web pages for the Hunger Mountain Young Adult and Children’s pieces. Thank you, Caroline. We also welcome E. Kristin Anderson to our staff as Assistant Editor. Emily is a poet (her work has been published here at HM and at the Cimarron Review and others), an up-and-coming novelist (we will be featuring a chapter from her WIP Myself Behind Myself this fall), a book blogger (The Hate Mongering Tart) and is one of the brains behind the popular Dear Teen Me website. Emily will begin by helping to shape content for our fall—The Art (& Insanity) of Creativity— issue. Welcome, Emily.

Sneak Peak over at Hunger Mountain!

From my Welcome from the Editor

We are thrilled to offer a sneak peak into Joe Lunievicz’s debut novel, Open Wounds (WestSide Books, 2011). I had the pleasure of reading this novel while still in manuscript form and have been waiting with bated breath to see it reach the shelves, which it will in early June. I was hooked from word one and know you will be too.

 Earlier, this week, Open Wounds earned it’s first review—starred from Publisher’s Weekly: “Lunievicz’s impressive debut is a dark, often brutal story, balancing some of the meanest villains in recent memory with a beautifully portrayed historical New York and a movie-obsessed boy determined to overcome the hand life has dealt him…Lunievicz paints a grim picture of Depression-era New York: anti-Semitism, violence, and poverty (an early eviction scene stands out) dominate the storytelling, yet bright spots like Cid’s love of cinema are painted with equal brilliance and realism.”

Come back later this month to read “In the Half Light”, an essay written by Joe detailing how he followed the subconscious to discover Cid Wymann, his main character, amid the clashing of swords.

And come back to HERE when I host Joe next month at Inside the Writer's Studio!