July 17, 2014 by augurybooks

Shelly Oria in The Paris Review; New Book Forthcoming

Shelly Oria, photo by T Kira Madden

Friend of Augury and fiction author Shelly Oria, whose short story collection, New York 1, Tel Aviv O, is forthcoming from FSG and Random House Canada (November 2014), appears in this summer’s issue of The Paris Review with her short story, “My Wife, in Converse,” quoted here from TPR’s site:

The last time we had sex, it was cold out and they said a storm was coming. My wife was shivering in fear, making a list to steady herself. For a while I was trying to cross things off—candles, eight gallons of water, move things away from windows. Check, I would say cheerfully at her, check check check. But the more I crossed off, the longer the list got, and the more anxious my wife seemed. She was sitting on our bed, her upper body low like it was trying to reach her knees. I stood close behind her, put my hands on her shoulders. Honey, I said, and she tilted her head back and looked up to meet my eyes. There was such fear in her face, and I hadn’t thought this through; ‘honey’ was all I had.”

Read more here, or you can find the full short story in The Paris Review’s Summer 2014 issue, also featuring new work by Joy Williams, Henri Cole, Zadie Smith, Jane Hirshfield, and more.

For more on Oria and her work, visit her website.

Pre-order the upcoming New York 1, Tel Aviv 0.

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Shelly Oria was born in Los Angeles and grew up in Israel. Her short story collection, New York 1, Tel Aviv 0, is forthcoming from FSG and Random House Canada in November. Shelly’s fiction has appeared in The Paris Review, McSweeney’s, TriQuarterly, and fivechapters, among other places, and has won a number of awards, including the Indiana Review Fiction Prize. Shelly curates the series Sweet! Actors Reading Writers in the East Village and teaches fiction at Pratt Institute, where she also codirects the Writers’ Forum.

June 25, 2014 by augurybooks

Halina Duraj’s THE FAMILY CANNON Featured in Rain Taxi Review of Books

Rain Taxi #74, cover art by Caroline Kent

Rain Taxi Review of Books is a Minneapolis-based quarterly review of literary fiction, nonfiction, and poetry. We are excited to announce a rave review of Halina Duraj’s The Family Cannon, written by Benjamin Woodard, in their current issue for Spring. Woodard acknowledges the central emotional ties of the collection:

Spun through the eyes of Magda, the daughter of Polish immigrants, these linked narratives bob between the familiar—growing old, betrayal, angst—and those unique to Magda’s lineage—accounts of Holocaust survival, fear of Nazis, summers overseas—creating a slim volume that nevertheless provides strong emotional resonance.”

To purchase a copy, head here. Rain Taxi also publishes a quarterly online edition—entirely different from the print edition—available free of charge on their website. Happy reading!

Poets & Writers Examines Augury Books’ Present and Future

This week, Poets & Writers wrote about Augury Books’ expansion into the world of prose with Halina Duraj’s THE FAMILY CANNON and the future goals of the press.

In what is surely a sign of more titles to come, Augury Books, an independent press previously devoted exclusively to poetry, expanded into fiction earlier this year….”

You can read the whole article here.

Augury Books’ reading period is open — Submit your manuscript!

June 18, 2014 by augurybooks

Halfway Through: Augury Books’ Reading Period Still Open for Poetry and Prose Full-Length Manuscripts

Photo by Dave Bledsoe of FreeVerse Photography

We are a little over halfway through our reading period, which is still OPEN through July 31, 2014. We accept full-length manuscripts in the categories of Poetry and Prose. The new Prose category includes Short Fiction Collections and Creative Nonfiction Manuscripts.

See our Submissions Page for length requirements and other guidelines, or find out everything you need to know (including our discounted book specials for those submitting!) on our third-party submissions manager, Submittable, where you can also submit your manuscript.

We can’t wait to read your work and find out who the authors of our 2015 books will be. Thanks to all of you in advance for sharing your work with us, and thanks to those who have already submitted their work this summer!

If you would like to know more about our aesthetic to see if your work might be a good fit for Augury, visit the Books and Orders page to see what works are already in our catalogue.

Don’t forget to Like us on Facebook and Follow this Blog (link in bottom corner) for continued updates about the rest of the reading period and information about our next publication and finalists!

June 13, 2014 by augurybooks

PICS & VIDEO: "Bonus Round" at Fowler Project Space

Last week, Luke Degnan and BOMB Magazine put on the reading, Bonus Round, a final event in the Game Show exhibition at Fowler Project Space in Greenpoint, Brooklyn. The reading included poetry and fiction by presenters Frances Justine Post (BEAST, Augury, 2014), Jack Christian, Michael Coffey, Vincent Katz, and Micaela Morrissette. The exhibition itself displayed work spanning several mediums by Ted Carey, Susan Fang, Kurt Freyer, Elizabeth Hoy, Shanjana Mahmud, Emilie Selden, and Cecelia Post. Enjoy the video and photos documenting the night’s events.

Frances Justine Post reads “Heart Hunted” (Video: Cecelia Post):

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Sarah Gerard of BOMB Magazine and Luke Degnan introduce. Photo: Frances Justine Post

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Michael Coffey reads from his forthcoming story collection, The Business of Naming Things (Bellevue Literary Press, 2015). Photo: Frances Justine Post

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Vincent Katz prepares to read in front of a video piece at Fowler. Photo: Frances Justine Post

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Jack Christian reads new work. Photo: Frances Justine Post

Support the PEN/Faulkner Foundation, Bringing Literature to Public Classrooms

The PEN/Faulkner Foundation is running a DonateNow campaign for contributions of any size to help support their annual award for fiction, their public reading series, and the Writers in Schools Program, which brings writers and over 1,800 copies of their books to the classrooms of D.C. public schools.

PEN/Faulkner’s mission is to promote literature in the classroom by way of adequate writing materials, new books, and author visits for high school students. Recently, Karen Joy Fowler was awarded the 34th PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction, and Joan Silber was invited to talk with northeast D.C. students about writing.

The foundation’s initiatives are funded in large part by donations, and PEN/Faulkner Foundation is a registered 501(c)(3) non-profit organization, so contributions are tax-deductible.

Visit this link for more information on the PEN/Faulkner Foundation, or click here to go directly to the donation page. As friends of the foundation, we greatly applaud any support you are able to give.

Augury Books’ reading period is open — Submit your manuscript!

May 23, 2014 by augurybooks

Audio Interview with Halina Duraj, Author of THE FAMILY CANNON

Photo by Dave Bledsoe of FreeVerse Photography

Halina Duraj, recent 2014 O.Henry Prize recipient and author of the new THE FAMILY CANNON (Augury Books, 2014), sat down with Maureen Cavanaugh from San Diego’s local NPR affiliate KPBS to discuss many topics explored in Duraj’s book—among them the immigrant experience, the interplay between the tragic and the humorous, “the idea of questions,” and the origin of the cannon.

“I think that immigrant stories have so many similarities…. This sense of parents wanting something better for their kids, parents sacrificing for their kids. And also, that love sometimes looks like fear or discipline, but it always comes from this parents’ sense of wanting their kids to fit in in this world that [even] they don’t quite fit in. So I think there are similarities across cultures, and that in many ways the immigrant experience kind of transcends those particular places that the immigrants came from.” —Halina Duraj interview with Maureen Cavanaugh on KPBS

Listen to the whole interview here.

LAST CHANCE: Sign up for a writing and yoga retreat led by Halina Duraj

Yoga and Writing Retreat Led by Halina Duraj: Openings Still Available

This retreat will help you discover, nurture and support your own creative potential by providing you with yoga and writing tools that unravel the writer within. The retreat will take place in the world famous yoga retreat center Prana del Mar — located in the southern tip of Baja, Mexico — from Saturday, May 31st to Thursday June 5th, 2014.

Find out more here!

Fiction Writers Review on Halina Duraj’s ‘The Family Cannon’

Photo by Dave Bledsoe of FreeVerse Photography

The Fiction Writers Review has posted a lovely piece by Matthew Batt on Halina Duraj’s THE FAMILY CANNON (available here). Read an excerpt:

The miracle of this book, calling to mind Anthony Doerr’s recent Memory Wall, is that Duraj manages to distill the historical, cultural, familial, and interpersonal experience of love, memory, and pain in ten crystalline short stories that form a family portrait covering nearly a century, resonating both before its beginning and well beyond its end. ….

What binds it is the fierce and loyal will of the one who knows she has to keep weaving these stray bits of stick and story and trash and grass back together to make us who we are—family.”

Read the whole review here.

But there’s more! Head out to La Jolla tomorrow to see Halina Duraj (recent recipient of a 2014 O.Henry Award) read at D.G. Wills Books: Saturday, May 10, 7 p.m.

It’s Time: Augury Books’ Reading Period OPEN for Poetry and Prose Full-Length Manuscripts

Photo by Dave Bledsoe of FreeVerse Photography

Our reading period is now OPEN through July 31, 2014. We are accepting submissions of full-length manuscripts in the categories of Poetry and Prose. The new Prose category includes Short Fiction Collections and Creative Nonfiction Manuscripts.

We can’t wait to read your work and find out who the authors of our 2015 books will be. Thanks to all of you in advance for sharing your work with us.

Want to find out more about our aesthetic before submitting? Visit our Books and Orders page to order books or read synopses, reviews, and press material about the books in our catalogue.

Don’t forget to Like us on Facebook and Follow this Blog (link in bottom corner) for updates about the reading period and announcements about our next publications and finalists.