Book Release: Finding Magic Mountain

Literary Mama columnist Carol Zapata-Whelan's book Finding Magic Mountain: Life with Five Glorious Kids and a Rogue Gene Called FOP was released today.

In the book, Carol describes her son's struggle with the rare genetic disease Fibrodysplasia Ossificans Progressiva (FOP), focusing on the time of diagnosis at age nine to his first year in college (he matriculated as a pre-med student at the University of California, Berkeley, in September 2004). She illustrates how this struggle with FOP has shaped and strengthened her family, and how, as a mother, the experience has taught her to put her trust in the universe, and live life one day at a time. Through her son's remarkable grace and strength in dealing with his disease, she has learned that an unexpected encounter with suffering can be a blessing as well.

A portion of author proceeds will go to FOP research at the University of Pennsylvania, Children's Hospital, Central California, and FOP patient needs.

Literary Mama Update: Salon.com, Washington Post and Parenting

Literary Mama Senior Editor Marjorie Osterhout's article Super Sis, about one sister's transformation into the world's coolest aunt, appears in the August issue of Parenting magazine

Literary Mama Associate Editor Helaine Olen's interview with Tracy Thompson, author of Ghost in the House: Motherhood, Raising Children, and Struggling with Depression is featured on Salon.com.

Literary Mama Creative Nonfiction Editor Shari MacDonald Strong was recently the guest blogger at Leslie Morgan Steiner's On Balance blog at washingtonpost.com. Based on the comments, her piece, Russian Orphan Makes Six, about international adoption seems to have touched a nerve.

Become a Literary Mama! Seeking Editors and Editorial Assistants

We're looking for four wonderful women (mothers!) to join us here on the Literary Mama editorial board.

Creative Nonfiction Co-Editor
The Creative Nonfiction Co-Editor will head up the Creative Nonfiction department with Shari MacDonald, our current CNF Editor. Duties and joys include selecting nonfiction pieces, writing acceptance and rejection letters, working with authors on accepted essays, disseminating submission calls, formatting material for web publication, and more. Editing experience vital, computer savvy helpful, publication history a strong plus.

Columns Co-Editor
The Columns Co-Editor will head up the Columns department with Marjorie Osterhout, our current Columns Editor. Duties and joys include working with columns authors, handling administrative duties (our Columns department is very active), formatting material for web publication, and more. Editing experience vital, computer savvy helpful, publication history a strong plus.

Creative Nonfiction Editorial Assistant and Columns Editorial Assistant
We seek two Editorial Assistants for our Columns and CNF departments. The Editorial Assistants' duties and thrills include copyediting, troubleshooting, and general support services. Candidates should possess strong copyediting skills and some computer savvy. Publication history helpful, but not necessary.

* To apply for any of these positions, you must be a mother and a writer.
* All work is done over the Internet.
* Literary Mama is an all-volunteer organization.

Please send us an email to info@literarymama.com stating which position(s) you are interested in talking with us about. Include a cover letter, CV, mention of your mothering status, and a writing sample.

We look forward to hearing from you!

Literary Mama Blog Tour: Mother Shock

We are kicking off the inaugural Literary Mama Blog Tour post, a feature whereby we will showcase some of our favorite places to visit online. We'll be starting things off by introducing you to some of our Editors' blogs.

Today, we head on over to Managing Editor (on hiatus) Andrea Buchanan's Mother Shock. Andi's blog is a mixture of a writer's blog, where she writes about her current projects, and a personal "mom blog," where she writes about her children and family life and the work of mothering (here she writes about sibling rivalry).

Currently she has been focusing on her anthology It's a Girl: Women Writers on Raising Daughters and is writing a blog post about each essay in the book. In some posts she talks about how she first came to be introduced to an author's work. In other posts, she provides some of the essay's back story. She talks about why she was attracted to a particular piece of writing and wanted to include it in her book. Her blog gives interesting insight into the book writing, editing, publishing and marketing process from an author who has published four books.

Random Post Sample from Mother Shock:

I read her first book when it came out ten years ago, and I still remember the moment I finished it. It was the book that finally pushed me from merely aspiring to be a published writer to actually working towards becoming a published writer. Four years later, I had my first piece in a paid publication. Seven years later, I had a book published.

Former LM Editor Awarded Fulbright Fellowship

Former Literary Mama Creative Nonfiction Editor Jennifer Margulis (Author of Toddler and Why Babies Do That) was recently awarded a Fulbright Fellowship to conduct research, teach in the English Department, and write in Niger, West Africa for the 2006-2007 academic year.

Jennifer and her family will be living in Niger, the poorest country in the world according to the United Nations, for the next ten months. Jennifer is interested to see how her children will respond to the experience, as they will see poverty that they do not know exists.

Jennifer plans to revisit all of the project sites that she worked on when she was there 13 years ago working as the small project coordinator for Africare/Niger. She will be working on her book about her experiences in nonprofit development work.

Single Mom Seeking Causes Stir at Washington Post

Who knew that dating as a single mom would cause such a stir?

On July 3rd - 4th , Literary Mama's Rachel Sarah was the guest blogger at The Washington Post for Leslie Morgan Steiner's "On Balance" column. Read it here: "Single Mom Seeks Play Dates, Blind Dates."

But beware! Her short, light-hearted piece on dating as a single mom proved to be controversial.

Leslie Morgan Steiner warned:

"Rachel -- Get your thick skin on. . . I had no idea there was so much sexist vitriol out there! Does this rabid prejudice against single moms ring true for you? It is INSANE!. . ."

Literary Mama's Senior Editor Ericka Lutz wrote into the Washington Post:

I am quite stunned by the nature of so many of the comments! Scary, sexist, judgmental, hurtful. If you're interested in visiting a forum for intelligent mother-writers without the venom, I suggest you come by Literary Mama.

Rachel Sarah has a regular column here where you can get a fuller sense of her life as a strong, wonderful mother and person.

This June, the American Jewish Press Association awarded Rachel Sarah's single parenting columns for j., the Jewish news weekly of Northern California a Louis Rapoport Award for Excellence in Commentary. Of course, many of these dates have made it into her Literary Mama column, "Single Mom Seeking," too.

One of her recent love stories also won Tango Magazine's "Romance Story Submission."