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You wanted a challenge that's calling you higher

You did? Really?

O.k., try snaring a 2007 Pushcart Prize nomination, like the following fine failbetterers:

Short Story category

Lou Mathews, "The Garlic Eater" (Issue 19)
Cari Luna, "Go" (Issue 19)
Benjamin Krier, "One Guy is Me" (Issue 20)

Poetry category

Sally Ashton, "Same Donkey, Different Blanket" (Issue 20)
Max Winter, "That Night" (Issue 20)
Nicholas Alan Harp, "I Know to You It Might Sound Strange..." (Issue 21)

And then, to them and to you, we'll say, Good luck!

Secluded in a maker stone not only deadlier but smarter too

We refer, of course, to our esteemed alumni, not the least of whom are:

Donald Antrim (Interview, Issue 2), whose memoir The Afterlife was recently a finalist for a National Book Critics Circle Award.

The multi-talented and quite possibly hyperactive David Barringer ("The Vampires," Issue 8), who has a story-cum-satire in the latest number of Opium, essays in recent issues of AIGA Voice and I.D., and a novel, American Home Life, due this summer from So New Publishing.

Charles Baxter (Interview, Issue 10), who recently snagged an Award of Merit for the Short Story from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. No slouch, he—past honorees include Richard Ford, Paula Fox, and some guy Hemingway.

Caren Beilin ("Three or So Uses of the Crab Apple," Issue 21), whose latest fiction appears in McSweeney's 23.

Michael Ceraolo ("Twelfth Possible Definition of Irony," et. al., Issue 7), whose Euclid Creek is now available from Deep Cleveland Press.

Michael Chabon (Interview, Issue 1), whose new novel, The Yiddish Policemen's Union, is just out from HarperCollins.

John Cotter ("Ophelia" and "Midwest," Issue 4), who's been tabbed to be the poetry editor of Open Letters, and who has work in recent issues of word for / word and Absent, and forthcoming issues of Unpleasant Event Schedule and Volt.

Two-time National Book Award nominee Stephen Dixon (Interview, Issue 21), who is retiring after 26 years of teaching writers at Johns Hopkins University.

Josh Dorman ("Bathysphere" et al., Issue 9), who has a solo show running through June 2 at LA's George Billis Gallery, and works in a group exhibit that's up 'til June 24 at the Schick Gallery in Saratoga Springs, NY. Not to mention a smart new website.

Shelley Ettinger ("Glutton for Punishment" et. al., Issue 15), whose story "When Death Did Them Part" graces the latest CRATE.

Jonathan Lethem (Interview, Issue 11), whose recent Harper's piece, "The Ecstasy of Influence," suggested that the very idea of "intellectual property" is preposterous. And lest you think he's not serious, he's offering the rights to a handful of his own short stories for a mere one US dollar, as part of what he calls the "Promiscuous Materials Project." And lest you think he'll stop there—do you? we did... but no!—on May 15, he'll give away—for free!—the film rights to his new novel You Don't Love Me Yet.

Chris Lombardi ("San Francisco in the 1990s," Issue 16), whom the University of California Press recently signed to pen a tome entitled I Ain't Marching Anymore: Soldiers Who Dissent, from George Washington to John Murtha.

Robert Lopez ("Essentials," Issue 15), whose novel Part of the World is now available from Calamari Press.

Alice McDermott (Interview, Issue 22), whose latest novel, After This, was recently a Pulitzer Prize finalist.

Lou Mathews ("The Garlic Eater," Issue 19), who has fiction in recent numbers of Black Clock and Gentle Strength Quarterly, and whose play The Duke's Development is slated for an early '08 run at LA's Powerhouse Theater.

Peter Markus ("Our Father Who Walks On Water Comes Home With Two Buckets Of Fish," Issue 2), who has stories out or due in Denver Quarterly, Chicago Review, Sleeping Fish, New York Tyrant, and the anthology New Sudden Fiction. And his novel Bob, or Man on Boat? Thanks for asking: it's set for a fall '08 release from Dzanc Books. Enough, you ask? No, we proclaim! On top of all that, Peter was recently named Wayne State University's 2008 Writer-in-Residence. Now that's what we call keeping up with the Barringers!

Mary Morris (Interview, Issue 16), whose new non-fiction offering, The River Queen, was recently the subject of an extended Jacki Lyden-hosted feature on NPR's Weekend Edition.

Colleen Mondor ("Our Missing Aviator," Issue 20), who has an essay in the spring issue of Elysian Fields Quarterly, and no end of amusing musings on her website, Chasing Ray.

Thylias Moss ("Prologue of the Book of Hallowed Verses of the Holy Circus of Decent Girls," Issue 18), who has two video poems in the 2007 Venturous Vanguard Video Film Festival, and a whole slew of same available now from YouTube.

Hal Niedzviecki ("Camp Gesher," Issue 18), whose The Big Book of Pop Culture: A How-to Guide for Young Artists is just out from Annick Press.

Bryson Newhart ("Buried Alive," Issue 12), who recently finished his Brown MFA, and has fiction in the March issue of elimae, as well as pieces forthcoming in both the print edition of Tarpaulin Sky and Bust Down the Door and Eat All the Chickens.

Richard Norman ("Line Up" et. al., Issue 20), who has poems forthcoming in dANDelion, Descant, and Nashwaak.

Amie Oliver ("Angels & Infidels XIX" et. al., Issue 22), who had work in a Whitney Museum at Altria show this past March, and has a solo show opening this October at Richmond VA's Project Space, and has generally been so busy that we—not being as energetic as, say, David Barringer—can only keep up with her by reading her blog.

Mia Pearlman("The Galaxies in My Veins Still Waltzing" et. al., Issue 16), whose new work can be seen at Larchmont, NY's Kenise Barnes Fine Art gallery through May 17.

George Saunders (Interview, Issue 5), who is all over The Man for getting rid of book reviewers.

Jenn Scheck-Kahn ("A Day Has a Morning and a Night," Issue 22), who recently nabbed an "honorable mention" in the Atlantic Monthly's student fiction contest, and has a story forthcoming in Tea Party.

Maggie Smith ("I Dream a Highway" et. al., Issue 16), who has poems in current or forthcoming issues of Quarterly West, Third Coast, Indiana Review, Blackbird, Massachusetts Review, Gulf Coast, Mid-American Review, Court Green, Brooklyn Review, and the tiny. And who recently snagged a in Individual Excellence Award from the Ohio Arts Council. Et tu, David Barringer!

David Starkey ("Everything in Store 60% Off," Issue 9), whose collection Ways of Being Dead is just out from Artamo, and is rocketing its way up Poetry Magazine's Poetry Bestseller list.

Randall Stoltzfus ("Chrysler," et. al., Issue 21), whose recent solo show at Charlottesville's Migration gallery has sent the critics into a tizzy.

Terese Svoboda ("The Story," Issue 22), whose memoir Black Glasses Like Clark Kent recently won Graywolf Press's Nonfiction Prize, and who has stories forthcoming in Opium, Prairie Schooner, Green Mountain Review and Narrative. Positively Barringeresque!

Anne Tyler (Interview, Issue 20), whose Digging to America is one of six finalists for the Orange Broadband Prize for Fiction.

Courtney Weber ("This Is What Gets Me," Issue 15), who is simultaneously newslettering with ToxicPop, comedying with SMUT!, and starinterpreting with both BakeSpace and Horrorscopes.

And David Barringer? Shaken, not stirred, no doubt.

We encourage all our alumni to keep us updated on the latest in their lives, by dropping us a line at alumni@failbetter.com.

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