6-Week Workshop: Summer 2025 Cohort Spotlight!
We have a truly fantastic and varied group of authors in our 6-Week Book Publicity Intensive this summer! Among them: a food anthropologist, several novelists (literary, YA, and horror) from a range of publishers, a self-published children’s book writer, two memoirists, and a few academics publishing with university presses. They’ve all been creating brilliant press materials, sleuthing around for good media contacts, and giving each other invaluable feedback in our community group, which is one of our favorite elements of the Intensive!
Here’s a little spotlight on a couple members of our fabulous summer crew:
Love and Purgatory in the Age of Climate Grief: Sarah Stone’s MARRIAGE TO THE SEA
These linked novellas explore the joys and dangers of family intimacy and impulsive relationships—both straight and queer—while navigating the eco-crisis, political turmoil, and the afterlife. It’s a “sumptuous literary tapestry” according to author Lillian Howan, and it publishes in March 2026 with Four Way Books.
Sarah’s previous book Hungry Ghost Theater was a finalist for the Northern California Book Award. Check out her other amazing work here: www.sarahstoneauthor.com
Outlaws, Redemption, and the Distortions of History: Frances Bonney Jenner’s SING TO ME BILLY THE KID
In American lore, Billy the Kid is remembered as either a ruthless killer, a fearless hero, or a rebellious teen. The truth is far more complex—and Frances Bonney Jenner aims to peel back the myths in her work of historical fiction, which will be published by Speaking Volumes in Spring/Summer 2026. Frances grew up in Texas and shares a name with Billy the Kid, aka William Bonney — she has always been fascinated with his story. Now she’s offering her perspective on a tale that has been told mainly by men.
A Forgotten Chinatown and an Imagined City of the Future: Ching-In Chen’s SHINY CITY
This collection of poems retells the history of Riverside, California’s Chinatown, layering the fragmented voices of Chinese immigrants who labored in its citrus groves and the homes of its wealthy with the speculative lives of inhabitants of a futuristic metropolis. Through a deft interweaving of history, imagination, and found text, the poems reanimate voices the archive excluded. Chen is a creative writing teacher at the University of Washington Bothell and the poet laureate of Redmond, Washington.
SHINY CITY will be published by Arlie Press in November 2025.
Examining a Feminist Avant-Garde Classic: RIDDLES OF THE SPHINX by Kimberly Lamm
Published June 12 with Bloomsbury, this deep-dive into the film Riddles of the Sphinx (1977) shines a light on how directors Laura Mulvey and Peter Wollen used experimental form, voice, and sound to challenge Hollywood’s portrayals of women, elevating maternal care as a legitimate form of work.
Lamm, an associate professor of Gender, Sexuality, and Feminist Studies at Duke University, also has another book coming out in Summer 2026 with Punctum called Writing in the Kitchen with Martha Rosler and Carrie Mae Weems: From Reproductive Labor to the Affective Labor of the Image.
The Human Psyche in the Digital Era: Patricia Martin’s WILL THE FUTURE LIKE YOU?
The relentless pulse of our hyperconnected world is rewiring the psyche and fracturing our sense of identity in ways we're only beginning to understand. Patricia Martin, researcher and host of the popular Jung in the World podcast, draws on neuroscience, psychology, cultural anthropology—and her own life and immersive reportage—to examine how our digital life is reconfiguring the architecture of the self. This is not just another critique of screen time! It's a wide-ranging and rigorous exploration that traces the profound psychological impacts of our technological moment.
Publishing with Karnac Books UK in January 2026.