Blood Orange Review 5.3 is here!

We’re pleased to announce the new issue of Blood Orange Review.

Featuring poetry by Candace Black, John McKernan, James Tyner with audio poetry by Amy Ash and Mandy Malloy. Also in this issue, read fiction by Lindsay Merbaum, Paige Riehl, and Gregory J. Wolos and nonfiction by Emily Adler and Tom Molanphy. The photography of Marius G. Sipa creates the visual centerpiece for this new issue.

From the Editor’s Notes
H.K. Hummel

The sky looks like it portends snow, and the maples are bare of all the brilliant fall colors they had just weeks ago. This morning, a woodpecker was busily drilling the tree in our yard, and like the woodpecker, I feel the urgent need to tidy up the winter supplies.

As I’ve been reviewing the proofs for this issue and doing the last bits of tidying work before we publish, I’ve been moved by the stories found in these pages, and the authentic glimpses of humanity that they reveal. When such pieces as each of these come across our editorial desks, we set down our coffee, rub our bleary eyes, and happily nod in turns. [read more]

See below for our nominations for the Pushcart Prize!

2010 Pushcart Nominations

We are happy to announce our 2010 Pushcart nominations:

Emily Adler, “Summer of Our Unemployment”

Scot Erin Briggs, “Target Practice”

Rosalyn Cowart, “At Breakfast I Asked About the Burning of Bones”

Marcia Trahan, “Bloodletting”

We wish the best of luck to all of the nominees!

Meet BOR at the Hemingway Fair

Stop by our table at the bookfair and meet Blood Orange Review editor Bryan Fry at the Hemingway & Idaho Festival in Moscow, Idaho on Tuesday, October 5. Details below:

Local Authors Read, Live Jazz, & Book Fair
Eastside Marketplace
1420 S. Blaine St. 8:30 p.m. - to Late
After the film, join us at Eastside Marketplace for a festival reading celebrating the 20th Anniversary of FUGUE, the creative writing program’s prize-winning literary journal. Readers include Kim Barnes, Robert Wrigley, Joy Passanante, Kevin Goodan, and Brandon Schrand.

*Stay after for a drink at Mix, appetizers, live jazz, and the festival book fair.

Good news about past contributors

We've received so many notes with good news about past contributors, we wanted to share some of it with you. Congratulations everyone!

Leah Browning's chapbook, Picking Cherries in the Española Valley, was published by Dancing Girl Press in early 2010. The poems "Spring, and the Clocks Go Back," and "Under Construction," were first published in issue 1.4.

Douglas Bruton recently won the HISSAC and Biscuit Short Story Prize for his short story, "Darius and the Bloody Big Fish." To read more of Bruton’s work, go to issue 3.3.


Charles Jensen published his full-length collection of poems through Lethe Press. The collection, The First Risk, confronts murder, myth, the nature of love, and the confusion of loss. You can read a selection of Jensen’s poems from his award-winning chapbook Living Things in issue 1.3.



Montgomery Maxton published This Beautiful Bizarre from Moon Ice Press. His editor said, “Montgomery Maxton writes classical poetry with a photographer’s eye.” Montgomery Maxton was published in issue 1.2.






Diane Simmons won the Ohio State University Press prize for her collection of short stories, Little America. You can read her work in issue 4.2.

Jayne Lyn Stahl was recently published by NYQ Books. Aram Saroyan says Riding with Destiny “embraces a literary heritage from Rimbaud to Ginsberg, from Yeats to Bob Dylan, and makes a street-wise, sexy music all her own.” Her work focuses on the art of poetry and how to “dance the dance of life.” You can read her work in issue 1.1.

Colette Tennant's first book of poetry, Commotion of Wings, is now available from Main Street Rag. Tennant says of her own writing that, “I hear music, and the music I hear is not a solo. It’s meant to be shared—usually as poems, sometimes as songs.” Tennant’s poems “Praise” and “Signs” first appeared in issue 4.3.

Our reading period is now open!

We're taking submissions again through our online submission manager. Please take a look at our guidelines and keep us busy!

Blood Orange Review 5.2 is here!

The 21st online issue of Blood Orange Review has arrived!
The Summer 2010 issue of Blood Orange Review (5.2) includes fresh writing by Mark Beaver, Shimmy Boyle, Scot Erin Briggs, Whitney Dibo, John D. Fry, Aseem Kaul, Jacqueline Lyons, and Jonathan Starke with audio poetry by Arlene Ang and Brently Johnson. Illustrator Scott Gray creates the visual centerpiece for this new issue. Take a look!

Blood Orange Review 5.1 is here!

We’re pleased to announce the new issue of Blood Orange Review.

Featuring the multimedia art installations of Karri A. Dieken, audio poetry by Kimberly Burwick, and fresh writing from Amy Ash, Ilse Bendorf, Rosalyn Cowart, Jeannie Galeazzi, Allan Peterson, Tania Pryputniewicz, and Marcia Trahan.

AWP Conference 2010

The AWP Conference 2010 kicks off tomorrow morning and the Blood Orange Review editors have gathered in Denver to enjoy the event. If you are in Denver for the conference too, you can find us at table O15 in the AWP book fair. Come visit with Blood Orange Review staff, browse our limited edition letterpress broadsides for sale, and re-energize with some orange slice candy if your energy is flagging.

Blood Orange Review would like to congratulate Todd Heldt for the publication of his full-length collection of poetry, Card Tricks for the Starving, through Ghost Road Press. Heldt’s poem, “Gather Us” appeared in Blood Orange Review in Volume 2.5.

Congratulations to Sean Patrick Hill

We would like to congratulate Sean Patrick Hill, whose poem "Love Terns" was first published in Volume 4.1. His first book of poetry, The Imagined Field, is being published by Paper Kite Press, and will be available in February. You can read more about the book and Hill's other works on his blog.

Blood Orange Review Partners with Washington State University

We are pleased to announce that a selection of exceptional students from the Washington State University English Department have joined the Blood Orange Review team as editorial interns. In order to qualify for this internship, candidates were required to go through a rigorous editing and interview process. We selected the top five of these candidates.


(From left to right: Grace Carlson, Deven Tokuno, Maddie Starkovich, Caitlin Woelfel, and Simmone Quesnell)

The interns will spend the semester reading submissions and writing blogs, and meeting once a week with WSU instructor and co-editor, Bryan Fry to discuss possible pieces for upcoming issues. The Washington State University English department has been a strong supporter of Blood Orange Review and we are grateful for this opportunity to work with WSU students.

We’d like to thank our interns for their hard work and commitment to publishing high quality writing!

Photo by Debbie Lee, WSU English Professor

Blood Orange Review 4.4 is here!

We're pleased to announce the new issue of Blood Orange Review.

Featuring artwork by Craig Billow, the Western Australian showcase with audio poetry, and an announcement of our 2010 nominees for the Pushcart Prize.

This issue includes work by:

Seth Borgen
Bridget Hardy
Mandy Malloy
Diane Seuss
David Susman
Eric Vithalani

Editor’s Note
Blood Orange Review 4.4

This issue came together in a quietly spectacular way. As we put together the proofs, frost was icing the lawns of Salem, Oregon. Men were climbing ladders and hanging Christmas lights from the rooftops. As we edited the issue, we listened to the recordings of the Western Australian poems and communicated with the poets through email. Their voices and work radiated warmth in the chilly Pacific Northwest day. [continued]

Good News from Blood Orange Poet

Congratulations to Sally Albiso for publishing her chapbook through Camber Press and for receiving the Fourth Annual Camber Press Poetry Chapbook Award.

Albio’s book, entitled Newsworthy, was selected by poet Steve Orlen who writes: “From a man obsessed with female mannequins to twins fighting for survival in an incubator, Albiso brings us a range of humanity — absurd, touching, and everything in between — and delivers them in tightly crafted poems.” To read more of Orlen’s praise or to purchase Albiso’s book, please visit Camber Press here.

You can also read some of Albiso’s chapbook poems by visiting the first issue of Blood Orange Review: 1.1.