SCR Update #6 – Meet the Staff: Pam Donahue, The Editorial Director, Short Stories

SCR Update #6 – Meet the Staff: Pam Donahue, The Editorial Director, Short Stories

The third year of the Sand Canyon Review had a truly prolific group of poetry selectors. One of these has even gone on to be this year’s Editorial Director, Short Stories, Pam Donahue. Having taken the helm of her own group, our short stories section of the magazine has thrived under her leadership. I can only hope that she decides to come back for a third year and makes the fifth edition of the magazine even better than this year’s, though that will be quite the undertaking.

In the coming weeks, we’ll spotlight our other staff, so make sure to come back. Have a great week, everyone. We hope to have you back next time.

If you’d like to learn more about The Sand Canyon Review, you can find us at these sites
http://www.facebook.com/thesandcanyonreview
http://www.myspace.com/thesandcanyonreview
http://thesandcanyonreview.blogspot.com/

You can also submit your art, photography, poetry and short stories to
SCRsubmissions@gmail.com

- David Dysart, PR Director




Bio for Pam Donahue
My name is Pam Donahue, and I am the editor for Short Stories for the 2011 edition of The Sand Canyon Review. I was born in 1959 and have lived in Southern California my whole life. I spent my first 21 years in Highland, when it and I were still small. My family left our doors unlocked without fear. Making play dates with other kids was unheard of; small packs of children would range from house to house on our street. Chatting with neighbors over fences was not uncommon, and we knew the names of our grocery clerks and service station attendants.
There was obviously a mixed bag of changes that came along the way when I was growing up, not only to me and my small town, but to the entire American culture. I was a child in the 60’s and only experienced the hippy movement from a child’s point of view. But the 70’s and 80’s brought lots of changes. Although thick smog replaced my blue sky, we were amazed by blow-dryers, microwaves, and portable phones. “Self-Serve” gas stations were a rude awakening, and I had to learn how to pump my own gas. Open fields and orange groves were leveled, disked, and then transformed into mini-malls, banks, and liquor stores. The local market was changed into a business office, and our beloved feed store where residents bought hay for their horses and cows (yes, cows) was gutted and made into an auto body repair joint. People figured out that the Inland Empire was a pretty tasty little piece of real estate, and it filled up.
After I got married, my husband and I moved to Redlands. From here I continued to experience changes. We had two sons who’ve grown up to be a couple of really decent and nice people. I am a three-time cancer survivor and, in my marriage, I learned the importance of good choices and things that matter. I have been married for 31 years as a result. Southern California turned into a sea of humanity, though, despite my wishes. The rural, agricultural place that had been my home in my youth was replaced by brick and mortar, glass and chrome, commerce, choked freeways, and busy-ness in my adulthood. I had to get used to change in the world around me, for good or ill. There are some things in me, however, that refuse to budge.
The same is true with writing, whether it is short stories or poetry. Even though a lot has changed in literary styles over the years, some things stay the same. The format for a short story -- with an interesting beginning and a well-developed middle culminating in a fascinating climax, settling into a sensible ending -- still make for good story telling, regardless of trends. Non-fictional autobiographical pieces do well when they include the “take-away,” the turnabout when the main character has that “a-ha!” moment that changes their life.
At The Sand Canyon Review, we welcome the changed and the traditional, and are looking to make the 2011 edition our best one to date. In order to do that, we need your submissions. Write your stories, whether they be fiction, creative non-fiction, or flash fiction. Even if you haven’t written much or have never been published, we want to read your work.
The general rules: Story length limit is 10 pages (1” margins, double-spaced, Times New Roman 12 font). Attach your story to an email to: SCRsubmissions@gmail.com. The deadline: March 18, 2011.
Everyone, with their own unique voice, has stories to tell. We want to read yours!