CHARLOTTE--Doris Iarovici, A Duke University psychiatrist won the 2005 Novello Literary Award last night for a book called "American Dreaming and Other Stories." She will receive a $1,000 prize and her short story collection will be published next fall by the Public Library of Charlotte and Mecklenburg County, through its nonprofit Novello Festival Press.
Iarovici (pronounced YAHR-o-vich) came to New York City from Romania at age 5. She began to publish poetry and essays in Seventeen Magazine at age 15, and she won a fiction-writing prize while an undergraduate at Yale.She attended Yale's medical school and moved to Durham to do her residency training in psychiatry at Duke Medical Center.
The Creative Loafing Carolina Writers Night, part of the Novello Festival of Reading, showcases Carolinian wordsmiths and wordjoneses, of which, according to Bland Simpson, there are many.
Steve Cushman, author of "Portisville" was the first speaker last night, but I sadly missed that part. But I did get to see and hear Judy Goldman, Sharyn McCrumb and Bland Simpson, who not only read marvelously from his works but also entertained us with sung songs and an electric keyboard. A real bundle of disciplined energy!
Sharyn McCrumb, before him, read a section from her soon to be published novel, "St. Dale," . . . a rousing tale of NASCAR fans on a Chaucerian pilgrimage.
Judy Goldman delighted the crowd with visual aids and anecdotes about how and why she wrote her novel, Early Leaving.
Finalists:
Sandra Cimadori of Lincolnton
Julia Nunnally Duncan of Marion, N.C.
Mark Ethridge of Charlotte
Dot Jackson of Pickens, S.C.
Kay McSpadden of Rock Hill.
