SCN members make the news by publishing books, articles, essays, poems, dramas, and art. They also make presentations, lead workshops, facilitate groups, and organize programs. Below are some of our members’ achievements this year.
If you’re an SCN member who has news to share, please let us know by filling out the form found here. If you’re not a member, why not join us? Maybe you’ll soon be able to post your news on this page!
Linda Wisniewski Double Published
Linda Wisniewski saw the publication of two of her pieces on the same day, September 4th. Her flash fiction “Bonnie’s Dream Room” was published in Sledgehammer online literary magazine. “Class of Rebels” was published in Panoply literary magazine.
Bonnie’s Dream Room – Linda C Wisniewski
Class of Rebels – Linda C Wisniewski
Linda Wisniewski lives in Bucks County, PA, where she volunteers at the historic home of author Pearl S. Buck. Linda’s debut novel, Where the Stork Flies, came out in May 2021. Linda’s website
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Jo-Ann Vega Interviewed for “PRIMO Magazine”
Jo-Ann Vega, a 3rd-generation American with Italian heritage, was interviewed in PRIMO Magazine about her book Moments in Flight: A Memoir. The memoir is crafted from four decades of journaling and writing experience and is set in the last half century of disruptive cultural change. It offers an independent perspective from a gay woman who retained her core in the face of internal and external obstacles for success. Good stories are nutrients for healing and connection.
Jo-Ann Vega is an author and dynamic speaker with 30 years experience as an educator who lives with her life partner and canine companion, and is technologically challenged.
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Jude Walsh included in new publication
In Transformational Journaling for Coaches, Therapists, and Clients: A Complete Guide to the Benefits of Personal Writing (Routledge), more than 50 coaches, therapists, and journaling experts from around the world share their best practices and explain in detail how they use journaling to improve their work with clients. Jude Walsh’s chapter, “More Journals, Fewer Lesson Plans,” offers advice on using journaling to create shared culture, including a school-wide focus on literacy.
Jude Walsh is the author of Post-Divorce Bliss: Ending Us and Finding Me. She also writes personal essay and fiction. Her current work-in-progress is a Christmas romance.
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Stephanie Barko Wins Award as Best Publicist
Stephanie Barko, Literary Publicist was voted Best Promotional Firm, Site, or Resource in the 2020 Critters™ Readers’ Poll (formerly Preditors & Editors).
Learn more here.
Stephanie Barko has been marketing adult pre-pub nonfiction and historical fiction for 15 years. She especially enjoys working with debut authors. Clients include Sarton winner Jamie Patterson, bestselling memoirist Anna Penenberg, and SCN editor Mary Jo Doig.
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Bette Lafferty Published in “The Pen Woman” Magazine
“Words,” Lafferty’s story about becoming a writer, will be published in the Summer 2021 issue of The Pen Woman magazine, a publication of the National League of American Pen Women. Previously, Lafferty’s poem The Giver of Wisdom won first place in their Free Verse contest.
Bette Lafferty is a retired 85-year-old widow living in Boerne, Texas. A member of the Tampa branch of the NLAPW, she has had two books of poetry and life stories published in the last three years, and is working on book three. Besides writing, Bette loves growing flowers.
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Marilea Rabasa’s “Stepping Stones” Tapped Again
Stepping Stones is a finalist in the 2021 National Indie Excellent Awards.
Marilea and her partner live on an island in Puget Sound where they enjoy music, boats, salt air, and grandchildren. More at www.recoveryofthespirit.com.
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Debra Thomas Interviewed in Loyola Marymount University Podcast
Member and Sarton Winner Debra Thomas was interviewed by Rachael Beaty. Listen to the Advocate through Fiction, a Talk with a Debut Author podcast here.
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Marilea Rabasa’s “Stepping Stones” a Finalist
Stepping Stones is a 2021 Finalist in the Next Generation Indie Book Awards for Memoir/Personal Struggle/Health Issues. I feel so honored to be in the company of all these talented authors.
A retired ESL teacher, Marilea’s travels in the diplomatic service provide the backdrop for her second memoir, full of humor and pathos, on how she’s overcome her lifelong depression and found her key to happiness. More at www.recoveryofthespirit.com.
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Patricia Daly Published in Bestselling Anthology
Patricia Daly’s contribution to the anthology Quitless: The Power of Persistence in Business and Life was one of 32 submissions selected to appear in this USA Today Bestseller publication. Quitless also hit the Wall Street Journal Bestseller list the following week. A free download of her personal story of persistence can be obtained here: https://landing.mailerlite.
Betty Gillies WAFS Pilot: The Days and Flights of a World War II Squadron Leader (October 2020) is a finalist in two categories in the Colorado Authors League awards competition: Non-Fiction: Biography, Memoir and Fiction/Non-
Sarah Byrn Rickman is the author of 11 books about the gutsy women pilots who flew Army aircraft in World War II. Her latest: biographies of the flight leaders—trailblazers, role models—aimed at the Young Adult audience. www.sarahbyrnrickman.comBeeaff’s “On Traigh Lar Beach” Wins Award
Dianne Ebertt Beeaff is pleased to announce that her short story collection, On Traigh Lar Beach, was the winner in the category of Short Stories with the Pinnacle Book Achievement Awards and also won the Gold Award for first place in the category of Popular Fiction with the Kops-Fetherling International Book Awards.
Dianne Ebertt Beeaff has written professionally for many years, beginning in the area of magazine journalism. She is also the author of six published book, most recently her short story collection, On Traigh Lar Beach. More: www.debeeaff.wordpress.com.
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Linda Wisniewski Releases Novel “Where the Stork Flies”
Sand Hill Review Press released Linda Wisniewski’s time-travel novel, Where the Stork Flies, on May 3rd. Inspired by a female ancestor, Linda tells the story of a 19th-century Polish peasant and a wisecracking medieval queen who join forces to help a confused Pennsylvania librarian heal her broken family. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/57931627-where-the-stork-flies
Linda C. Wisniewski is a former librarian and journalist. Her work has been published widely in literary magazines and anthologies, and on her blog, www.lindawis.com. She is the author of a memoir, Off Kilter, published by Pearlsong Press.
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More Recognition for Marilea Rabasa’s “Stepping Stones”
“So happy and honored that Stepping Stones has earned more recognition. It picked up a Silver Medal in the Women’s Issues category of the 2021 eLit Awards. Thank you, Brooke, and all the wizards at SWP. Such a great team effort!
“In addition, I am thrilled, and humbled, to be recognized as a semi-finalist in the 2020 Chanticleer International Book Awards, The Journey Award. It’s an honor to be recognized with all these talented authors.” ~Marilea Rabasa
A retired ESL teacher, Marilea’s travels in the diplomatic service provide the backdrop for her second memoir, full of humor and pathos, on how she’s overcome her lifelong depression and found her key to happiness. More at www.recoveryofthespirit.com.
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Winners of the LifeWriting Contest Announced
Congratulations to the winners of Story Circle Network’s annual LifeWriting Contest. They are:
First place: The Forty Year Journey by Cynthia F Davidson
Second place: Infertility in Three Acts by Carrie Steckl
Third place: Winning the Losing Battle by Sara Etgen-Baker
Third place: Jungle Jaunt by Suzanne Adam
Please watch our website for next year’s competition dates and guidelines.
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Sara Etgen-Baker published in Chicken Soup anthology
Sara’s story “From A Distance” is being published in Chicken Soup’s latest anthology, Chicken Soup for the Soul: Eldercare and Dementia. The story highlights her rather unconventional way of dealing with her parents after her father had a stroke and her mother developed dementia. She hopes her story will encourage others not to feel guilty when they also chose unique ways of dealing with eldercare and dementia.
Sara Etgen-Baker retired from teaching in 2010 after a lifetime as a professional educator. She began her writing journey and since that time has had many of her memoir vignettes and personal narratives published in a host of anthologies, books.
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“Reading the Rings” feature article by Susan J Tweit
Susan J. Tweit’s article on what tree rings tell us about hurricanes, pirates, and snowmageddons—among other things—was featured on the cover of the spring issue of WILDFLOWER Magazine. One of the scientists featured in the article bragged about it on Twitter!
Susan J. Tweit is an award-winning writer and botanist. Her thirteen books include the memoir Bless the Birds: Living with Love in a Time of Dying, which author Craig Childs said left him “awed and shaken.” http://susanjtweit.com
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Linda Wisniewski Interviewed on Grab the Lapels: Reading Women
Linda Wisniewski was interviewed by the blog Grab the Lapels for its “Meet the Writer” feature. Read the interview here.
Linda is the author of the memoir Off Kilter: A Woman’s Journey to Peace with Scoliosis, Her Mother, & Her Polish Heritage. On her website, she describes herself as a writer, memoir teacher, knitter, quilter, and happy trail walker. Wisniewski is a longtime member and former board member of Story Circle Network. Her work has been widely published online and in print, and her debut novel, Where the Stork Flies, is forthcoming in May 2021.
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Connie Spitler Featured on NPR
Connie Spittler, Omaha Nebraska author, was invited to read her essay “Pink Moments” on NPR’s Bob Edwards Show. Her essay was selected for the This I Believe: 100 Essays list. She appears with the likes of John Updike, Pearl Buck, Albert Einstein, Isabel Allende, and Dr. Anthony Fauci. The link: https://thisibelieve.org/essay/11439/
Connie Spittler, long time Tucson, Arizona, essayist and author of two novels, now lives in Omaha, Nebraska. She currently is writing and editing a coffee table nature book entitled Turkey Creek Preserve: A Sacred Journey, to be published summer 2021.
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Sara Etgen-Baker Published in Good Old Days Magazine
Sara’s story “The Thornback and the Red-Headed Man” appears in the February 2021 (Valentine’s) issue of Good Old Days Magazine. The story tells the tale of how her husband and soulmate of 38 years met–a magical, synchronistic moment in the autumn of 1983. Another story by Sara, “Long Live the Landline,” is also published in that same issue. That story is a remembrance of the thrill of having a landline in her home in the late 1950s–a time when many folks didn’t have phones in their homes. Hard to imagine in today’s world! 
Sara Etgen-Baker began her writing journey shortly after she retired from a 25-year career as a teacher and counselor. Her manuscripts have been published in anthologies and magazines including Chicken Soup for the Soul, Guideposts, and Good Old Days Magazine.
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Lynn Goodwin and Her Memoir Featured on the Tamron Hall Show
B. Lynn Goodwin and her husband have been invited to do a Zoom interview for the Tamron Hall Show, featuring Goodwin’s memoir, Never Too Late: From Wannabe to Wife at 62. They were interviewed by Tamron Hall on February 11 and the epidsode aired on March 8. View her clip, which demonstrates that it’s never too late to find love, here: https://twitter.com/TamronHallShow/status/1369080851942768641. If you haven’t read Goodwin’s story, copies of her memoir are available through https://writeradvice.com/
B. Lynn Goodwin owns Writer Advice, www.writeradvice.com. Her YA book Talent, republished in November 2020 by Koehler Books, won some awards, and she’s editing the sequel, Ground Rules. Her memoir is Never Too Late: From Wannabe to Wife at 62.
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