W. Bruce Cameron‘s latest novel, to be published Oct. 28 by Forge Books, is a 2014 Kirkus Award for Fiction nominee. The Midnight Plan of the Repo Man is described at this link of Macmillan. The story is a comic mystery that includes — of course — a dog. Here, it’s a basset hound named Jake.…
Gene Weingarten, the recipient of 2014 Ernie Pyle Lifetime Achievement Award of the National Society of Newspaper Columnists, has published a new book, his first for children. Me & Dog was released in September by Simon & Schuster. The illustrator is Eric Shansby. Weingarten gave some background for his book in his column in The…
Jennifer Grant, a member of the National Society of Newspaper Columnists, has not one but two books out this fall. Disquiet Time: Rants and Reflections on the Good Book by the Skeptical, the Faithful, and a Few Scoundrels (Hachette/Jericho Books), co-edited by religion columnist Cathleen Falsani, has an Oct. 21 release date. It is endorsed…
The Robert Benchley Society has opened its 2014 Humor Writing Award Competition, named for the early 20th century humorist. The deadline is Sept. 15, his 125th birthday, having been born in 1889. The society also announced that political comedian Mark Russell will be the finalists’ judge this year. Information on the competition can be found…
Online columnist Robert L. Haught has published a novel, “Here’s Clare,” which made its debut at the 38th annual conference in Washington, D.C., in June 2014. “Here’s Clare” is a fast-moving story about a strong, defiant woman who teams with a political opposite in a new romance and a high-stakes race for high office. Or…
Muse Harbor Publishing in June released Everything Ever After: Confessions of a Family Man by Michael Picarella, a member of the National Society of Newspaper Columnists.The book is based on the syndicated family columns of the Southern California writer. Picarella offers witty and often laugh-aloud funny stories about marriage, fatherhood, family and suburban community life…
Jeff Kramer Mystic Tie Award 2014 WASHINGTON, D.C. — Amanda Beam, columnist at the News and Tribune, Jeffersonville, Indiana, is the winner of the 2014 Jeff Kramer Mystic Tie Award for her creation of the top of a story from a farcical premise. The set-up, by 2013 winner Samantha Bennett, Pittsburgh-based columnist, was as follows:…
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Drones — no, not the ones in Congress but the unmanned ones that fly around — have won this year’s Sitting Duck Award from the National Society of Newspaper Columnists. The award is given each year to a person or subject that represents easy pickings for columnists on slow news days. The…
The publisher of Suzette Martinez Standring‘s newest book on writing is offering a two-day giveaway of its electronic edition. “Give” as in free! On Sunday, June 29 and Monday, June 30, 2014, receive a free Kindle dowload of Standring’s The Art of Opinion Writing: Insider Secrets from Top Op-Ed Columnists. RRP International Inc. is providing…
A nominating committee — Mike Leonard and Ben Pollock with Bill Tammeus chairing — has confirmed the following candidates for two-year terms to the board of the National Society of Newspaper Columnists. President — Jerry Zezima. Jerry, currently vice president, is a syndicated humor columnist based at The Stamford Advocate in Connecticut. Vice President —…
A veteran Virginia journalist who has been called “the oppressed people’s correspondent” has been named the 2014 recipient of the Will Rogers Humanitarian Award. Michael Paul Williams, metro columnist and reporter for the Richmond Times-Dispatch, will be honored at a ceremony in the U.S. Capitol on Friday, June 27, during the annual conference of the…
Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Joel Brinkley — a member of the National Society of Newspaper Columnists and serving on its board as scholarship chair — died Tuesday, March 11, 2014, at a Washington hospital. He was suffering from previously undiagnosed leukemia. His death was announced today, Thursday. One report of his passing is from the Courier-Journal…
Nominations are being accepted for the Will Rogers Humanitarian Award, presented annually by the National Society of Newspaper Columnists to recognize a writer whose work has positively affected readers’ lives and produced tangible humanitarian benefits. Click on these links for a history of the award and an annotated list of winners with biographies may be…
Opinion By Suzette Martinez Standring 2004-06 President National Society of Newspaper Columnists Let’s talk about needless savagery that poses as column writing. On a seesaw of best and worst, columnist Kathleen Parker of The Washington Post is a fulcrum. Hamilton Nolan of the Gawker lists her as one of “The Least Important Writers of 2013.”…
John Avlon again is asking his fellow NSNC members for their choices of best columns posted or published in 2013. John will compile the list — besides the National Society of Newspaper Columnists, he is combing social media as well as polling others, in addition to his own picks — and run it at year…
Dorothy Brush, the small-town chronicler named NSNC’s 2004 Columnist of the Year, died this past summer, member Robert Haught has learned. She was 91. The National Society of Newspaper Columnists had honored Dorothy for her courageous battle against cancer, during which the NSNC member missed no deadlines at the Crossville (Tenn.) Chronicle — “doing two…
HARTFORD, Conn. — The National Society of Newspaper Columnists on Sunday gave its annual Sitting Duck Award to “privacy,” but, thanks to the National Security Agency and government data mining, America almost certainly already knows that. The award goes each year to a person or subject that provides columnists with an easy topic to write…
