MWC Announces the Winner of the 2025 Great River Writer’s Retreat — Stella Joyce Krall 

Posted on by Ryan Collins

Congratulations to this year’s winner of the great River Writer’s Retreat, Stella Joyce Krall of Madison, WI!

Krall will be in residence August 25 – 31, 2025, at Benet House Retreat Center in Rock Island, preparing one novel manuscript for publication “that looks at the nature of memory and whether a person’s culpability for previous actions is excused if they lose their memory due to dementia rather than repression,” while developing a newer manuscript about “a pair of college friends whose lives have diverged despite their physical and emotional closeness.” She will share some of her work during a public reading at The Atlas Collective (1801 5th Ave., Moline, IL) on Saturday, August 30 at 4pm. 

SPECTRA Reading Series: Young Emerging Writers 20th Anniversary Showcase 

Posted on by Ryan Collins

The Quad Cities’ longest running reading series celebrates 20 years of The Young Emerging Writers Program (YEW) with a showcase of selected YEW 2025 interns and staff on Thursday, July 24 at Rozz-Tox (2108 3rd Ave. Rock Island, IL).  

The event will start at 6pm with a social hour, followed by the Young Emerging Writers showcase. First, ten of this year’s 23 interns, selected by their peers, will read at 7:00 p.m., previewing some of the work that will appear in The Atlas annual literary magazine published by YEW each year, which will be released on August 14 (pre-orders will be available). Then, YEW staff will be close out the reading at 8:00 p.m. Back issues of The Atlas will be available for $5/copy, as well as other MWC Press books.

MWC Press Online Bookstore Issues – Please Order Here

Posted on by Ryan Collins

We apologize for the issue with ordering directly from our MWC Press Bookstore pages — there’s an issue with the website & we are working to fix it with the vendor. For now, you can order some of our recent title here — if you would like to order any back catalog titles, please email us at mwc@mwcqc.org or call us at 309-732-7330. We apologize for the inconvenience & thank you for your patience & patronage…

DRC Writers’ Conference Book Club – 5/28 & 6/5

Posted on by Ryan Collins

This year we’re premiering a #CollinsWritersConference#BookClub! Instead of waiting to be impressed by faculty until after you’ve met, learn the work of the writers who will be teaching you!

Book clubs will take place on May 28 & June 5 at the Rock Island Public Library & spots are limited. MWC has books for sale at a discount and anyone already registered for the Conference who joins the book club will receive their book club book(s) for free.