Spring 2012

WaterMaine: Photography by Pippi Ellison

JUNE UPDATE: As a Best of the Net award-winning online literary magazine, we feel honored to present our third annual 2012 Solstice CONTEST AWARD WINNERS AND FINALISTS: $1,000 FIRST PRIZE IN FICTION: AMY L. CLARK for “Rheumatic Fever;” RUNNER-UP: CAMERON MACKENZIE for “Ruffy Like Christmastime;” Finalists: MORGAN SMITH, JANET HILLIARD-OSBORN, and SILVIA MORENO-GARCIA.

$500 FIRST PRIZE for the STEPHEN DUNN POETRY AWARD: MIKE NELSON for “Via Dolorosa;” RUNNER-UP: EMILY VAN DUYNE for “I Blame the Ronettes;” Finalists: DON COLBURN, KRISTEN HAVENS and READ TRAMMEL.

$500 FIRST PRIZE IN NONFICTION: DAWN HAINES for “Aleotorik;” Finalists: GAYNELL GAVIN and DEBORAH TAFFA.

All winners and finalists will be published in our Summer Awards Issue, due out in August.

We offer our sincere thanks to all who submitted to our contest. There were many intriguing, fine pieces, which we read carefully, and we lingered over our decisions. Contests are always subjective, so we encourage you to read our award-winners in the SUMMER CONTEST ISSUE. We thank our final judges, Jennifer Haigh and Jerald Walker, as well as Richard Hoffman, our nonfiction editor, and our poetry editors, Kathleen Aguero, Danielle Georges and Betsy Sholl. Also, thanks to our readers. And we thank again Michael Steinberg for donating our first nonfiction prize.

Also, please do become acquainted with the sort of work that we publish by looking at this current terrific Spring Issue. The nonfiction includes a new piece by Best of the Net winner, Michele Cacho-Negrete, as well as Everett Cox’s moving letter to Afghan and Iraqi war vets. Also, a historical take on Ploughshares magazine by Dewitt Henry, and some lit crit by Baron Wormser, as well as a piece about ethnic identity by Alejandro Ramirez.

In fiction, we have a terrific eclectic issue, with pieces by established writers such as Roland Merullo, Jaimee Wriston Colbert, Steven Huff, Perle Besserman, and John Solensten, also new work by Jonathan Curelop and Leslie Johnson, as well as debut fiction by Laura Snyder.

Our poems showcase a wide range of voices and strategies. We welcome work by one of our new poetry editors, Danielle Georges. And highlight pieces by Charles Coe, Carol Hobbs, and Wendy Mnookin, Teresa Sutton and Brian Fanelli.

And in photography, we offer Pippi Ellison’s series titled WaterMaine, evocative water imagery in black and white.

Also, welcome to our new consulting fiction editor, Helen Elaine Lee. And to our new assistant business manager, Siobhan Smith!

Do read this amazing Spring issue and leave comments. The authors often respond. As Solstice moves toward an enhanced multimedia Website, we are promoting community more than ever before! Join our diverse literary world, read on.