Kuma2.net Blog

We hope that this Thanksgiving (and every holiday, really) finds you surrounded by people who love you–and good food. 🙂

-Tawanna & Martina

Our Annual HOLIDAY PARTY!
The Publishing Triangle invites you to its annual holiday party on Friday, December 8, from 6:30-9:30 p.m. at the offices of In the Life, 184 Fifth Avenue, 5th Floor (between 22^nd & 23^rd Streets). It’s a great opportunity to meet other publishing professionals and writers in a festive environment featuring food, drink, and a 50/50 raffle. We always get a great crowd, so if you’ve never been to a Triangle event, this would make a great first one.
Admission is $15 for Publishing Triangle and Out Professionals members, $20 for guests—and includes one free drink ticket. Admission is waived for individuals who join the Triangle at the door. (Membership is $35; new members only.) All proceeds benefit the Publishing Triangle Literary Awards Fund.
And we invite you to be a literary Santa: Bring a new book to the holiday party that we can donate to the LGBT Community Center’s Pat Parker/Vito Russo Library.

It’s that time of the month again.  The Kuma literature section has been updated with sex new poems and three new stories.

There is also a new book added to our library

   
Longing, Lust, and Love: Black Lesbian Stories
by Shonia Brown (Editor)

Purple Panties
Lesbian anthology edited by Zane
Publisher: Strebor Books/Simon and Schuster
Deadline: April 1, 2007
Payment: $200 and 5 copies of the book

Zane is seeking submissions for Purple Panties. Stories must prominently feature lesbian activities with African-Americans in one or more of the key roles.
Stories should be between 2,500-3,500 in length (no longer). Stories must not just be strictly sex-filled but must actually have a storyline and character development.
The deadline for submissions is April 1, 2007. Please allow 4-5 months for a response to your submissions as the submissions process will be very competitive. Contributors will be paid a one-time fee of $200 and receive 5
complimentary copies of the finished book.
Emailed submissions will not be accepted. All submissions must be double-spaced with 1″ margins and in 12-pt. Times New Roman font or will not be considered. Please send your submissions to: Strebor Books/Simon and Schuster, ATTN:
PP, PO Box 6505, Largo, MD 20792.

Fantasy: Untrue Stories of Lesbian Passion

Edited by Barbara Johnson & Therese Szymanski
Publisher: Bella (the Bella After Dark imprint)
Payment: $50 and 2 copies of the book
Submission deadline: December 1, 2006 (to be published in 2007)

Amidst all the anthologies of “true” and “real” lesbian sex, Barbara Johnson and Therese Szymanski have realized that well-told fantasy is often far hotter than anything reality has to offer. Also, always on the playful side of things, they’ve decided they want untrue stories of lesbian love, passion and sex.

The kicker is this: All stories must be written in first-person. They should read like true stories, but we want you to bring your hottest, wettest fantasies to us personally in a very personal way. So pull the readers into the story: make them hot, make them wet, and make them want more. Put your all into it, and keep in mind that we love good stories! Humor and twist endings are fun, but the stories must also be hot and sexy. Give us your very best!

Please note, we do love twist endings and surprises. Give us real characters, real stories and real sex. Make us wish it had happened to us. Knock our socks off. Also, we highly recommend you write your tale, then rewrite it, then
put it aside for a while and proofread it before sending it in to us. Typos, punctuation, grammar, odd/incorrect POVs, and other things DO count. And don’t underline. Anything. Really.

Guidelines:
1) Stories should be between 2,000 and 10,000 words in length.
2) Please submit a typed, double-spaced hard copy in at least 12-point type. Preferably in a nice, readable serif font like Times New Roman.
3) Characterization, plot, and story are key. (Really. Tell us a good, hot story!)
4) Stories must be erotic, be written in the first person, and be an untrue story of lesbian passion between two woman, or three, or a roomful. Lesbian is the key word.
5) Name, address, phone number, word count, and email address (if applicable) should all appear on the first page. (If accepted, final manuscript must be submitted electronically.)
6) Include a 50-word bio with your submission.
7) Only previously unpublished stories, or stories that have appeared on the Internet, will be considered.
8) Only three submissions per person please.
9) Include an SASE with sufficient postage to return the manuscript, or, if manuscript is disposable, please state so in your cover letter.
10) Out of Country? If you email Szymanski very nicely beforehand, politely requesting that you be allowed to submit your story via email, she may let you, at her discretion. Her email address is tsszymanski(at)worldnet.att.net (replace (at) with @). Be simple and short with your request, and please format your ms with US standards of 8.5 x 11, etc.
11) Handy hint: If you don’t necessarily need/want the manuscript back, but would like to know if you’ve been rejected, please include a #10 SASE (that is, Self-Addressed Stamped Envelope) so we can let you know if we’re unable to
use your story with a simple form letter.

Contributors will be paid upon publication and will receive two copies of the anthology. No final decisions about stories to be included in this anthology will be made before 3/1/07.

Send all manuscripts to:
Therese Szymanski
8500 16th Street, #128
Silver Spring, MD 20910

Please do not send manuscripts in any way that requires a signature upon delivery. If you enclose a self-addressed stamped postcard with your story, Szymanski will be happy to drop it in the mail upon receipt.

About the Editors:  Barbara Johnson is the bestselling author of Strangers in the Night, Bad Moon Rising, The Beach Affair, and Stonehurst. Therese Szymanski is the Lammy finalist author of the Brett Higgins Mysteries/Motor City Thrillers and the editor of Back to Basics: A Butch/Femme Anthology and Call of the Dark: Erotic Lesbian Tales of the Supernatural. And both edited A Perfect Valentine: Erotic Valentine’s Day Lesbian Love Stories and are part of the Lammy finalist team for Once Upon a Dyke: New Exploits of Fairy Tale Lesbians and
Bell, Book & Dyke: New Exploits of Magical Lesbians.

RedBone Press is celebrating the work of its newest
author, Ana-Maurine Lara, with a reading/signing of
her debut novel, Erzulie’s Skirt. The event will be at
7 p.m. Wednesday, Nov. 15, 2006 at Noche Bohemia at
the Monkey Room, 597 Fort Washington Ave. & 187th
Street, New York, NY. 917-494-1941. The reading is
held in conjunction with the 5th anniversary of GALDE,
Gay and Lesbian Dominican Empowerment organization
(www.galde.org). Suggested donation of $5 helps
support GALDE’s programming. 

For more information, visit:
www.redbonepress.com 

Color of Violence:  The Incite! Anthology Panel Discussion

Monday  November 13   6-8 p.m.
Harold Washington Library Center
Cindy Pritzker Auditorium
400 S. State St.
This event is free and open to the public.
Reservations are recommended and can be made on-line, via email, or 312.422.5580.

This event is co-sponsored by the Chicago Public Library and Chicago’s Metropolitan Battered Women’s Network.

HOW WILL WE END VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN OF COLOR?
Where has the mainstream anti-violence movement gone wrong? What does it mean to reconceptualize violence against women beyond the interpersonal? How can we make connections between gender violence and state violence in the forms of militarism and colonialism? How do we strive to understand and challenge the perpetration of white supremacy?
Join us for this compelling and inspiring exploration of justice and freedom. 

Presenting Authors, Activists & Scholars…
Elizabeth (Betita) Martinez, co-founder and director of the Institute for MultiRacial Justice.  She has been a social justice activist and organizer for over 45 years and published numerous books and articles on popular struggles in the Americas including 500 Years of Chicano History and De Colores Means All of Us: Latina Views for a Multi-Colored Century.

Andrea Ritchie is a progressive lesbian feminist of African Caribbean descent who has worked in the women’s movement in the U.S. and Canada over the past 15 years as an advocate and researcher.

Andrea Smith of the Cherokee is a co-founder of Incite! Women of Color Against Violence and the Boarding School Healing Project.  She is also Professor of American Studies at the University of Michigan.

Moderated by: Beth E. Richie, the director of African-American Studies at the University of Illinois-Chicago.  Her work focuses on the relationship between domestic violence and poverty, incarceration, substance abuse, child abuse and neglect, and other social problems that are concentratied in communities of color in this country.

More about the anthology…
Color of Violence places women of color at the center of analysis and argues that neither white-dominated discourses on gender violence nor male-dominated discourses on racial violence provide the comprehensive analyses to end racism and sexism.

This anthology presents the fierce and vital writing of 32 visionaries who shift the focus from the interpersonal and map innovative strategies of movement building and resistance used by women of color around the world.
Copies of Color of Violence will be available to purchase at the event.

Publishing 102 

Learn how to market and promote your book as a panel of publishing professionals explains the ABCs of book buzz and take your questions next Thursday, November 16, at 8:00 p.m. The panel, Publishing 102: How to Market Your Book, features Bryan Christian, senior marketing manager at Simon & Schuster, Radclyffe, Lambda Award–winning author and publisher of Bold Strokes Books, and Martin Wilson, publicist at Vintage/Anchor. It will be moderated by Brent Gallenberger, former senior publishing manager at Free Press, and held at the LGBT Community Center, 208 West 13th Street. Admission is $7.00 for Publishing Triangle members and $10.00 for all others.

5th annual Saints and Sinners Literary Festival

May 11-13, 2007

The “Saints and Sinners” LGBT literary festival presents panel discussions and master classes around literary topics to provide a forum for authors and editors to talk about their work for the benefit of emerging writers and the enjoyment of fans of LGBT literature. 

Featuring Spirited contributors Anthony Hardaway and Conrad Pegues
Saturday, Nov. 11, 2006
1-4 p.m.
Memphis Gay & Lesbian Community Center
892 S. Cooper
Memphis, TN 38104
(901) 278-4297

Event Flyer