Free Dear Committee Members: A Novel by Julie Schumacher Page B

title of your place of business. Apostrophes are not appropriate for simple plurals; they indicate possession (as in “Darren’s book”) or the omission of a letter (for example, the absent letter i in “Darren’s the person we want to hire at Xanadu”).

February 8, 2010
    Camilla Mayhew
    Chair, Department of English
    DiCameron College
    55 North Plane Street
    Siderea, FL 32703
    Dear Camilla,
    It seems only a few short years ago that you were here in my office (yes, I am still snugly installed in the same bucolic location, next to the restrooms), asking for a letter of recommendation to assist in what you felt was an unlikely bid for graduate school; and now, post-PhD, with two solid books under your belt, you are already chairing a department. I had faith in you then, and I’m gratified to see that I wasn’t mistaken.
    You have asked for my candid assessment of Tamar Auden, applicant for the position of assistant professor, tenure track, with concentrations in British literature, rhetoric, and creative writing. And, yes, you are correct in assuming that Dr. Auden was, as an undergraduate, my advisee, though she went on to receive an MA in women’s history, an MA in rhetoric/comp, and a PhD in English (her thesis focusing on the Lake poets). But she began as a fiction/fantasy writer, and it was in my classroom where she first sketched out what would become the series of youngadult fantasy/sci-fi novels (volume one arriving in bookstores a few months ago) involving a fellowship of teenage aliens who infiltrate a Midwestern boarding school and perform social and intellectual experiments on its hapless young pupils. I suspect the series has inspired you to request this letter—presumably to head off querulousness within your department regarding the potential hire of a “popular” writer. In answer to your unasked questions: yes, I have read the first volume; and no, I am not intending to read volumes two, three, or four—but my lack of enthusiasm for extraterrestrial rapscallions is irrelevant to your search.
    Here’s the pertinent question: Who in god’s name, given the ad your department placed, would argue to turn Dr. Auden down? DiCameron is a small college with limited means: you’ve clearly been charged with hiring a jack-of-all-trades. And Dr. Auden is that mythical creature you seek: fully qualified to teach British and American literature, women’s studies, composition, creative writing, intermediate parasailing, advanced sword swallowing, and subcategories and permutations of the above. As for the aliens: picture the 3-D version of Dr. Auden’s first installment, Experiment Nineteen , at the multiplex. Has anyone outside the state of Florida heard of DiCameron College? They soon will if you hire Dr. Auden. And consider the financial benefits: she won’t need to argue for niggling raises every year, because she’ll be earning royalties that will put her faculty salary—and yours—to shame.
    I don’t mean to be overly facetious, and frankly I salute Dr. Auden and anyone else who can procure a publishing contract during the era of My Personal Screen. The market is forbidding: my own new work has been met with a marked lack of interest by my agent—erstwhile colleague and friend—and most of my backlist is now out of print. (I am reduced to hunting for used copies at the local secondhand store, the proprietor, Alvin, taking sadistic pleasure in stashing my books on a grimy shelf behind the desk, bookmarking the title pages to reveal the inscriptions: To Devon, in friendship. To Kim: hope to see your own book on these shelves soon! To Carole—Yours always, Jay .) *
    You and your colleagues have nothing to fear from Dr. Auden and her otherworldly teens, who will not spell the demise of Wordsworth and Coleridge: they are dead anyway. Moreover, Dr. Auden is exactly the candidate you are seeking to hire. Working eighty hours per week at a minimum, eschewing hobbies and fitness, she will show up in class