Haitian author and editor, Beaudelaine Peierre is visiting Drexel today. The reception will start at 3:00pm followed by a reading at 3:30 in Stein Auditorium, Nesbitt, 33rd and Market Street.

Doors part with a hydraulic hiss. Steam billows. Behold! The emerging voices of the nation have arrived… from the future.

Author Dani Shapiro, perhaps best known for the best-selling Slow Motion, her memoir of decadence and death, sits in as editor in the tenth entry in the Best New American Voices series: the 2010 edition.

How I am reading the best voices of 2010 while sitting a 2009 living room is beyond me. Perhaps the suggestion is that these time-traveling voices are the ones we ought to watch for in the new year. I was never much good at science.

At any rate, a leisurely 8-hour bus trek from Massachusetts to Philadelphia (including the obligatory breakdown at the side of the highway, but the extent of literature I could make out in the darkness were terse text messages) provided me with plenty of time to chisel my way through Shapiro’s selections, gleaned from writing programs and summer conferences such as Bread Loaf and Sewanee. So far the memorably named Boomer Pinches has underwhelmed, David James Poissant writes of broken father-son relationships with the same exterior grit and interior sentimentality of a Bruce Willis character, Claire O’Connor tackles cancer and great white sharks, and Christian Moody of the University of Cincinatti outdoes his peers with the truly original “Horusville,” a place where trees have eyes and record the lurid private lives of the town residents.

The Best New American Voices series first came on the scene in that dastardly year 2000 (remember stocking up on water and canned green beans? I know you do) and has since been edited by, in addition to the changing yearly guest editors, executive editor John Kulka and writer and critic Natalie Danford.

I recently bought the 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die anthology, edited by Peter Boxall, on discount at a local Antropologie store. I must say that it is a horrible piece of commercial trash. It highlights the most obvious American novels like The Great Gatsby and To Kill a Mockingbird and leaves out most of Gore Vidal and Anais Nin’s work. Carson McCullers and Marilynne Robinson are never mentioned. Please skip if you find this in a bargain bin.

Poetry readings present a variety of great opportunities to a diverse assortment of people.

• Average Guys: Impress your bleeding-heart girlfriends!
• Wannabe Poets: Get tips on how to darken your blacker-than-black wardrobe!
• Angsty Teens: Jot down lines you like and use them to protest your parents!

Furthermore, people who are — no! — legitimately interested in the simple pleasures of a nice, grandmotherly-cum-trendy cup of tea and/or fabulous poetry will enjoy themselves.

On November 10 — that’s tomorrow, for those among you who grope blindly at thin air like angry babies deprived of their Blackberries and iCal organizational tools — Painted Bride Quarterly is very pleased to present count ‘em 2! poets at Bubble House.

To get all the W’s out of the way in one fell swoop:

• What: Poetry reading.
• When: November 10, 7:30 p.m.
• Where: Bubble House, located at 3404 Sansom St. in good old Philadelphia
• Who: Lynn Levin, Ernest Hilbert
• Why: To spread great literature and all that good lofty stuff.
• How: Magic.

Maya, Drexel’s undergraduate literary magazine, is holding its 2nd Annual Fall Term Writing Contest! Drexel undergaduates can submit writing in any of the three categories: Poetry, Fiction, and Nonfiction. All undergaduates are welcome to submit as many pieces in one or all categories as they would like. First place in each catefory wins cash prize and will be considered for possible publication in Press 1, literary arts journal. First, secound and third places will recieve automatic publication in the 2010 Maya issue. This is a freat way to build your resume, and there is no fee to submit!

The deadline to submit writing is December 1, 2009. Please submit enteries to dsomaya@drexel.edu before December 1! Submissions will be read blind and voted on democratically by Maya staff members (staff members are not allowed to compete). For more information go to Maya’s website.

…Herta Müller!

A Romanian-born German, Müller, who suffered through the notorious reign of dictator Nicolae Caeucescu and the cruelties of an alcoholic father, draws upon her tumultuous life for inspiration in her acclaimed works.

She made her literary debut — to many a censor’s dismay — in 1982 with Niederungen, a collection of short stories. In the nearly thirty years to come, the prolific Müller churned out some two dozen works of poetry, essays, novellas, and novels.

Past winners of the Nobel Prize for Literature include Doris Lessing, Toni Morrison, Saul Bellow, and John Steinbeck. “Müller” may not be such a household name — yet. But take a peek inside any of her works, and that just might change.

Okay, you’ve done the hardest part already: you’ve gotten over your white elephant, conquered writer’s block, and finished a manuscript!

…Now what?

On October 17, 2009, Rosemont College (located in Rosemont, PA, at 1400 Montgomery Avenue) is hosting an all-day writer’s workshop. For a fee of $75 — okay, maybe not a drop in the bucket for the average college student, but hear me out — you gain access to a whole slew of events from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. You can find the whole schedule in detail here, but for starters, you’ll:

• get breakfast and lunch
• hear published authors speak
• take your manuscript through a round of “speed-dating” with real editors (just like during Drexel’s own Week of Writing — and if you missed it, check out my article)
• breakout sessions including topics like “Finding a Home for your Short Story,” “Polishing your Poetry,” “How to Succeed in Submissions,” “Do I Need a Publicist?” and more.

So get your baby out in the world!

Maya (Drexel University’s undergraduate literary magazine) was invited to attend the ‘09 Mid-Atlantic Student Magazine Conference on October 9th. As the Editor, I’ll be representing Maya and giving a lecture on my research in media/publications as pedagogical tools in higher education. This will mark Maya’s first attendance at a major conference since the ’80s.

The Mid-Atlantic Student Magazine Conference is held every fall to bring together college student magazine editors, writers, artists, and faculty advisors from the mid-Atlantic region. This event is centered on a series of editorial workshops, student lectures, and guest speakers to present new research on undergraduate publishing. Other Philadelphia universities like Temple University, the Community College of Philadelphia, and University of Pennsylvania will also be in attendance.

Mark your calendars!

On Wednesday, September 23, acclaimed author of Persepolis and Persepolis II, Marjane Satrapi, will speak at the Free Library of Philadelphia, located at 1901 Vine Street. The event is absolutely free and is scheduled to begin at 7:30 p.m.

Not the biggest Persepolis fan? Well, I don’t see how you couldn’t be… But just the same, the Free Library (a.k.a. FLP, for those cool cats in the know) is hosting a whole plethora — that’s right, a plethora — of awesome literary events, the bulk of them at no admission.