Recap: New Perspectives in Historical Fiction Panel
Our New Perspectives in Historical Fiction panel on November 30th took a deep dive into the new works with women protagonists living in the same era as our founder, Madge Jenison. Authors, Kitty Zeldis and Eileen Donovan, gave us terrific insight as to what inspired them to write historical fiction as well as reading an excerpt from their novels. Sheila Lewis, longtime-standing board member of the WNBA was the moderator.
The Dressmakers of Prospect Heights by Kitty Zeldis, tells the story of Alice who immigrated from a post-Revolutionary Russia to New Orleans, where she would become a prostitute, which was legal in New Orleans, (circa 1898-1917), just to survive. After meeting Beatrice, Alice is unofficially adopted and they moved to Prospect Heights in Brooklyn, New York, to be exact.
A Lady Newspaperman’s Dilemma, by Eileen Donovan, takes place in Post-WWI Montana where an aspiring journalist, Alex, is hired as a reporter for her local paper. While at the time when newspapers were becoming commercialized, the lead story would go to a senior male associate and blaze over the women. Though, Alex was determined to get the lead story, it in turn, paved the wave for women to strive in their careers to the fullest of opportunities.
The panelists were fielded questions that ranged from inspiration for writing these works, to what their experience was like going through research of the time period, to how their writing may or may not have been affected by the pandemic. Both drew inspiration from various places but channeled their love for the genre writing it for the first time.
In terms of research, Donovan admitted it was difficult to not fall down a rabbit hole though it’s “almost a part of the process”. During the COVID-19 pandemic, most of us had extra time on our hands to write, so Eileen wrote long hand then typed and edited later while Zeldis found herself more efficient when she had left time to write.
Writing a novel is a daunting task on its own, let alone, a new genre. There is always a learning curve to take the book from draft to completion. The commonality among these authors were new technology and having good connections. It is arguably true that word of mouth is still the best form of communication. Though, with new technology it becomes challenging to keep up with readers. Coupled with that, networking your book (and yourself), is a puzzle all on its own.
Recap: Transformative Women Panel
Back in October 2022, the WNBA’s NYC Chapter held the virtual panel, Transformative Women, with authors of two compelling nonfiction books that tell true stories of impressive women who were ahead of their times in many ways. Members and non-members spanning eight states across the country were joined by moderator…
New Perspectives in Historical Fiction: Women Lead the Way
Description
Description: Meet the authors featured in the historical fiction panel on November 30th and learn some of the award-winning novels that focus on the dazzling jazz era of the 1920s. The main characters of these novels bring a strong and advancing approach to the time in order to show that a woman’s search for independence has transcended all eras.
Cost: FREE
Format: You are invited to a Zoom meeting.
When: Nov 30, 2022 06:30 PM Eastern Time (US and Canada)
Register in advance for this FREE meeting:
//us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZwvceurrTgtHt03699PR4rQgq1viCe9zQeV
After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.
Eileen Joyce Donovan
Author of A Lady Newspaperman’s Dilemma
Synopsis: First, we will turn the pages back to1926, in A Lady Newspaperman’s Dilemma. A world of flappers, speakeasies, and bathtub gin. Alex, a cocky college graduate starts her journalism career at a small Montana newspaper. On her first day, a courthouse shootout thrusts her into the lead reporter’s role, and into the path of the town’s most eligible, and handsome, cattle rancher. That spring, an ice jam on the Yellowstone River, floods the town. Only US Army bombs can save it. Alex’s reporting draws national attention and a career dilemma So, she’s faced with a choice. Her dream job or her dream man. Definitely A Lady Newspaperman’s Dilemma.
About the author: Eileen Joyce Donovan’s debut historical novel won the 2019 Marie M Irvine Award for Literary Excellence. Her latest historical fiction, A Lady Newspaperman’s Dilemma, released in September 2022, won the 2021 When Words Count nationwide competition. She’s also had short stories published in various anthologies as well as non-fiction in Chicken Soup for the Soul. She’s a member of the Historical Novel Society, Women’s National Book Association, Women Fiction Writers Association, and Authors Guild. She lives in Manhattan and enjoys going to concerts and plays, as well as reading books that catch her fancy.
_____________________________________________________
Kitty Zeldis
Author of The Dressmakers of Prospect Heights
Synopsis: Next, same era, 1924, but from a big city many of us will recognize, Brooklyn. As New York City enters the jazz age, the lives of three very different women are about to converge in unexpected ways. Recently arrived from New Orleans, Beatrice is working to establish a chic new dress shop with help from Alice, the orphaned teenage ward she brought north with her. Down the block, newlywed Catherine is restless in her elegant brownstone, longing for a baby she cannot conceive. When Bea befriends Catherine and the two start to become close, Alice feels abandoned and envious, and runs away to Manhattan.
Her departure sets into motion a series of events that will force each woman to confront the painful secrets of her past in order to move into the happier future she seeks. Moving from the bustling streets of early twentieth century New York City to late nineteenth-century Russia and the lively quarters of New Orleans in the 1910s, The Dressmakers of Prospect Heights is a story of the families we are born into and the families we choose, and of the unbreakable bonds between women.
About the author: Kitty Zeldis is the nom de plume of a Brooklyn-based author of nine novels and over 35 books for children. Her short fiction, essays and articles have been published in many literary and national publications.
Moderator:
Sheila Lewis: Sheila Lewis is a curriculum and children’s writer, writing coach, educator, and tutor. She teaches meditation and related classes and leads a children’s book club at the JCC in Manhattan. Recently, Sheila co-authored a summer learning program for the national Boys & Girls Clubs of America and is now developing more book club material for after schools. Sheila joined WNBA-NYC over six years ago and worked on many early panels.
Transformative Women
Description
Description: Meet the authors of two compelling nonfiction books and learn the true stories of impressive women who were ahead of their times in many ways. In the late 1800s and early 1900s, these women changed the idea of what women’s work is and advocated for women’s freedoms and rights, just like the women who founded the WNBA did at about the same time.
Cost: Free to all members of all chapters of the WNBA with code.
Please email president@wnba-nyc.org with the WNBA chapter and your name to receive it.
$10.00 for all non-members.
Format: Zoom link will be sent out the morning of the event.
Joanna Scutts
Author of HOTBED: Bohemian Greenwich Village and the Secret Club that Sparked Modern Feminism
Synopsis: On a Saturday in New York City in 1912, around the wooden tables of a popular Greenwich Village restaurant, a group of women gathered, all of them convinced that they were going to change the world. It was the first meeting of “Heterodoxy,” a secret social club. Its members were passionate advocates of free love, equal marriage, and easier divorce. They were socialites and socialists; reformers and revolutionaries; artists, writers, and scientists. Their club, at the heart of America’s bohemia, was a springboard for parties, performances, and radical politics. But it was the women’s extraordinary friendships that made their unconventional lives possible, as they supported each other in pushing for a better world.About the author:Joanna Scutts is also the author of The Extra Woman. She has written for the New York Times, Washington Post, New Yorker, and the Paris Review series “Feminize Your Canon.” She holds a PhD in English and Comparative Literature from Columbia University and lives in Astoria, New York.
_____________________________________________________
Betsy Prioleau
Author of DIAMONDS AND DEADLINES: a Tale of Greed, Deceit, and a Female Tycoon in the Gilded Age
Synopsis: Among the fabled tycoons of the Gilded Age—Carnegie, Rockefeller, Vanderbilt—is a forgotten figure: Mrs. Frank Leslie. For twenty years she ran the country’s largest publishing company, Frank Leslie Publishing, which chronicled postbellum America in dozens of weeklies and monthlies. A pioneer in an all-male industry, she made a fortune and became a national celebrity and tastemaker in the process. But Miriam Leslie was also a byword for scandal: She flouted feminine convention, took lovers, married four times, and harbored unsavory secrets that she concealed through a skein of lies and multiple personas.About the author:Betsy Prioleau is an author and cultural historian. She received her PhD in American Literature at Duke University, and has taught English and world literature at Manhattan College and New York University. In addition to Diamonds and Deadlines, she is the author of Seductress: Women Who Ravished the World and Their Lost Art of Love, Swoon: Great Seducers and Why Women Love Them, and Circle of Eros: Sexuality in the Work of William Dean Howells.
Moderator:
Rosalind Reisner: Rosalind Reisner has moderated many panels for the WNBA-NYC chapter. She is an author and former librarian and the editor and contributing author for Women in the Literary Landscape, the WNBA’s centennial book.
Alternative Roads to Publishing a Debut Novel
In recent years, the publishing industry has thrived more than ever for aspiring authors to be published on many different platforms and break away from traditional publishing. Hybrid, small press, and independent publishing are among the [new] ways to be published. Going through this route does not always mean it will be any easier or less time consuming as three authors found out: DeMisty D. Bellinger, Cheryl J. Fish, and Celia Jeffries. They joined us for a discussion about their publishing journey through a non-traditional publisher that was led by the moderator, Mara Anastas.
Each panelist was able to give their individual story about how they got published through either an independent press, hybrid, or university press. Questions from the audience included: Who does the editing and marketing? How does the publicity get shared? Is it all on your own? What are costs associated from start to finish? These were address throughout the discussion and the panelists took the time to break down each kind of publishing based on her own experience.
Types of Publishing
Hybrid Publishing allows independent authors to cover some of the cost of publishing books that otherwise might have been passed over by traditional publishers.
This type of publishing does have some red flags: misinterpretation of the expectations between client and company, the company asking for a manuscript evaluation, printing is ready once you send the manuscript, and no prices given up front.
Vanity Publishing is a printing house that specializes in publishing books for which the authors pay all or most of the costs.
This type of publishing is a service and wants distribution, but no return on the books. This would also cover the concept of not all small publishers have a return rate.
Smaller Press Publishing: Runs on a smaller scale than a large publisher.
Here, your advance is in direct correlation to the amount of marketing and at the same time, your marketing is as good as the writer. Small presses are open to your suggestions.
Takeaways from the evening
—Perseverance and believing in what you have written.
—Never give up on goal of publishing your book.
—Visibility: Be on a social media platform that you are most comfortable. Connect with people through the themes of the book.
—Hire an editor, publicist, marketer, anyone that you feel would enrich your book within your means.
—Selling yourself is not easy, but every author has to market themselves and their book. They don’t sell on their own.
Here are the author’s books:
—DeMisty D. Bellinger wrote New to Liberty and was published by Unnamed Press
—Cheryl J. Fish wrote Off the Yoga Mat and was published by Livingston Press University of Western Alabama
—Celia Jeffries wrote Blue Desert and was published by Rootstock Publishing
Alternative Roads to Publishing a Debut Novel
Dual City Bookstore Crawl
Across the country, April 30th is known as Independent Bookstore Day. This is the day that book lovers pay homage to all the independent bookstores to show their support for local businesses.
The WNBA-NYC chapter and the WNBA-Metro Atlanta chapter, teamed up to tour their respective cities at different independent bookstores. Here is a recap of the stores that the New York City chapter visited. Missed the action? You can find the stories posted on Instagram using the handle #wnbadualcitybookcrawl.
Strands Bookstore at 828 Broadway, New York
One of the more well-known independent bookstores out there. The Strands is a very popular spot for both tourists and locals which includes a basement and two upper levels. Many say that you can lose track of time in here if you don’t set an alarm of some kind. What is your first memory of this iconic store?
Books of Wonder at 42 West 17th Street, New York
Calling all children’s booklovers, here is your kind of store. A wide variety of all types of children’s books: board books, to chapter books, and a few toys in the mix, there is something new to discover here. What is not seen often enough are classic books that we read as kids in their original publication. These books were displayed behind a glass panel in the back of the store. What are some of your favorite children’s books you read or read to others?
192 Books at 192 10th Avenue, New York
This small, quaint bookstore offers books on a variety of subjects including translation, history, music, biography, science, current affairs, and more. Children’s and young adult books were available as well. What is your favorite spot in this area beside the bookstore?
Three Lives and Company at 154 West 10th Street, New York
Located in Greenwich Village, this store has a unique history from catering to the locals, to online ordering, and now becoming an iconic store after nearly closing in 2016. It sells a well-curated selection of books. Does anything stand out to you about this bookstore?
Bravo’s Book Nook at 115 MacDougal Street, New York
The name says it all. This unique store is a little nook right on the corner of MacDougal and Minetta Lane. The titles of hardcover and paperbacks of a variety of fiction and non-fiction. Small gifts for sale included puzzles, maps of New York, and children’s trinkets. Have you ever been to this kind of bookstore?
National Poetry Month Presents Haiku
In honor of National Poetry Month, Haiku writing was the task for our WNBA-NYC subscribers. A haiku is a short poem in the format of typically five syllables in the first line, seven in the second line, and five syllables in the third line. Subscribers were asked to write a haiku about any topic and to let us know what their inspiration was behind it.
Submissions
No title was provided
Spring, we waited. You arrived.
Then you disappeared.
Will you stay this time?
Inspiration: “This came to me last week as I was walking to the grocery store on a surprisingly warm and lovely day”
Author: Sheryl Dluginski, New York
———————————————
Title: “Not Quite Spring”:
Star-shaped spring beauties
Cower in the sleety wind.
Winter’s not done yet.
Inspiration: “A walk on a park trail on an unexpectedly cold and blustery April day.”
Author: Katherine White Drew, Rockville, MD
——————————————————–
Title: Breaking and Entering
Daybreak sheds light on breakdowns.
Bleak streets spill trash, huts squat.
Bike lanes break through.
Inspiration: “I was interested in the word “breaking,” watching city streets shape shift in pandemic times. What “breaks” isn’t so much broken, as entering a new reality.”
Author: Sheila Lewis, New York
Articles of Interest
The WNBA-NYC has done a variety of poetry events throughout the years. Looking through the archives of our blog, these included panel discussions, interviews, a look back at our Centennial celebration for poetry month, why [women] write poetry and more.
Haiku’s are a unique form of poetry and can be pretty tough to write. It has a much different tone than your standard rhyme, sonnet, limerick, or even free verse.
Do you write any of these forms of poetry in your spare time or as your career? Let us know in the comments section below
In Conversation: Doris Weatherford Gets Our Vote!
During Women’s History month and hosted by WNBA-National, an interview with author/historian Doris Weatherford and moderated by Valerie Tomaselli, the author shed light on volumes of history, notably regarding the long road to securing women’s right to vote. One graduate level course sparked Doris’s lifelong interest in women’s suffrage and activism related to women’s issues. Her path, to fill in the gaps of untold history, began with research on the lives of immigrant women and her first of many books.
Doris and Valerie (former president, WNBA National and New York) worked together on WNBA’s centennial publication, Women in the Literary Landscape, but their collaboration dates back to before 1998, when they joined forces on two formidable volumes about women in American politics.
The 19th Amendment, long-time coming:
Doris regaled attendees with backstage dramas, from working with Congress to secure and keep the required 2/3 majority vote in both houses, to states changing their minds, seemingly on the whims of political winds. She described with irony (“things haven’t changed much”). Legislators voted from hospital beds, admonitions from their mothers, and due diligence led to the 19th Amendment added to the Constitution.
Players, Pacifists, and Politics
Although Doris referred to key Suffragists and early feminists, her approach was to place them in broader social contexts, like WWI or labor law movements. Favorites were Carrie Chapman Catt, who led or took part in an astonishing number of campaigns and events, Revolutionary War era women, and radical activists like Alice Paul.
No fact was left unturned in Doris’s presentation. She went on to include other notable times: how Utah had the first female state senator but lost the vote and how indecisive Washington state finally scrapped the vote. In granting suffrage, Western states were generally more liberal than Eastern states. Suffrage and temperance brought to life why Susan B. Anthony (and other women) who chose not to marry (to hang onto their property), and how women did not seek child custody, for fear of being sent to mental hospitals by their husbands.
Doris’s engaging speaking style is deft historian meets delightful storyteller; as she says, “in the end, we needed the radicals, the crazies, and the women wearing pearls, to come together.” It was painful to hear about the treatment of marginalized women of color. So-called luminaries came out on the wrong side of race and religion, including anti-Catholic, and anti-Black differences. Women got arrested picketing, chaining themselves to the fence, and were attacked by Washington DC cops.
Peaks and Valleys, Perspectives and Progress
Lively audience Q/A opened up the conversation. “Everything takes a long time, but look at what we have today. When President Biden made his State of the Union address, there were two women behind him for the first time (Vice President Kamala Harris and Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi).” Doris said. She referred to the last 50 years or so as a time of “peaks and valleys, mostly valleys – things were achieved in the first half of the 20th century, and still rights are not equal… Although the age of consent in Delaware was just seven in 1900, women were banned from serving on juries until the 1960s, and teachers did not receive equal pay until the 1950s.” Even progressive women opposed the Equal Rights Amendment for complicated reasons, including being of the mindset that the ERA might not protect women’s rights on the job, or might leave women worse off.
Doris shared her current concerns diplomatically, “Just vote for the party that concentrates on women’s reproductive rights. Get active on campaigns. It’s easy to get discouraged. Vote for the party that is most sympathetic to women’s rights,” concluding that to go on, “it takes dedication, perseverance, strategic thinking and tactical maneuvering.” Valerie added parallels between fights for women’s rights and women in publishing, and how WNBA’s founding in 1917 addressed that singular need. Doris’s unwavering vigilance to set the record straight and inform the public about women’s history has enticed me, and I’m sure many, to learn and read more.
“Writing is my favorite form of activism.”
What’s next? Doris is planning a summer visit to Washington, DC, to watch the statue of Mary McLeod Bethune replace Florida’s confederate general (posted in 1922). Bethune founded a college and was considered one of the most influential women during the Roosevelt and Truman eras. Valerie referred to Doris as “the great mentioner,” so we will end for now with this final mention, best wishes for continued success!
More information
Doris Weatherford’s books can be found on her website: //dweatherford.ag-sites.net/bio.htm.