Mary Sanders Shartle won the only short fiction prize for Blueline, an Adirondack small press, and had a poem in the Spring, 2005, edition. She has been a semifinalist for a New York State Council of the Arts grant in fiction. She is a member of "The Three Poets" with colleagues Marilyn McCabe and Elaine Handley. Their chapbook, Notes from the Firetower--Three Poets on the Adirondacks, won the first ever prize for Best Book of Poetry, 2004-2005, awarded by the Adirondack Center for Writing, and have just been named winners again for Glacial Erratica. She and her co-authors have performed readings singly or in groups at numerous sites. She is former director of the Saratoga Poetry Zone and teaches memoir writing workshops for adults and senior citizens in many area towns, which resulted in the creation of the book Where We've Been: A Century of Memoirs, which she co-edited with Elaine Handley.

Mary is the recipient of a 2008 NYSCA individual artists' grant for her work on THE HERMIT, a novel about a woman who lives alone in the Adirondacks.

Most recently her poetry has appeared in BLUELINE and SOW'S EAR POETRY REVIEW.

 

At the 2007 Adirondack Mountain Writers' Retreat she led a workshop called "Life Lines: Writing Memoir", a two-session course to teach participants how to turn memories into memoirs. Of her workshop, Mary says, "Do your friends and family ever say: 'You should write that story down before it's lost forever'? Life Lines: Writing Memoir, is an exciting way of exploring, recording and preserving the unique tales of your life. Ordinary people DO lead extraordinary lives, and we are each someone's ancestor...so we owe it to ourselves and future generations to record our experiences. Open to all adults, this class helped participants develop stories through dynamic and fun writing exercises, reading aloud and lively discussion of writing techniques.

Mary's works include: Notes from the Firetowers and its companion chapbook, Glacial Erratica, as well as Where We've Been: A Century of Memoirs.