Martha Frankel (born July 18, 1953) is an American writer. She was born in the

Bronx The Bronx () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Bronx County, in the state of New York. It is south of Westchester County; north and east of the New York City borough of Manhattan, across the Harlem River; and north of the New Y ...

, New York. She began her writing career at the original '' Details'' magazine, writing a column about plastic surgery titled ''Knifestyles of the Rich and Famous.'' She went on to write book reviews, essays and celebrity profiles for other magazines, such as ''

Movieline ''Movieline'' was a website, formerly a Los Angeles-based film and entertainment magazine, launched in 1985 as a local magazine, which went national in 1989. Known for its cult status and popularity among film critics,Saba, Michael''Movieline'' m ...

'', ''

Cosmopolitan Cosmopolitan may refer to: Food and drink * Cosmopolitan (cocktail), also known as a "Cosmo" History * Rootless cosmopolitan, a Soviet derogatory epithet during Joseph Stalin's anti-Semitic campaign of 1949–1953 Hotels and resorts * Cosmopoli ...

'' and ''

The New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issues ...

''. Currently, she serves as executive director of th
Woodstock Writers Festival
a yearly gathering of writers and readers in Woodstock, New York. Martha is host o
Woodstock Writers Radio
a Sunday morning radio talk show on

WDST WDST (100.1 Hertz, MHz), branded as "Radio Woodstock 100.1", is a commercial radio, commercial FM broadcasting, FM radio station licensed to Woodstock, New York, and serving the Mid-Hudson Valley. Radio Woodstock is known as a progressive rock, pr ...

Woodstock, New York Woodstock is a town in Ulster County, New York, United States, in the northern part of the county, northwest of Kingston, NY. It lies within the borders of the Catskill Park. The population was 5,884 at the 2010 census, down from 6,241 in 20 ...

. Her memoir, ''Hats & Eyeglasses'', chronicling her family's lifelong love affair with

gambling Gambling (also known as betting or gaming) is the wagering of something of value ("the stakes") on a random event with the intent of winning something else of value, where instances of strategy are discounted. Gambling thus requires three el ...

, was published in 2008 (Tarcher/

Penguin Group Penguin Group is a British trade book publisher and part of Penguin Random House, which is owned by the German media conglomerate Bertelsmann. The new company was created by a merger that was finalised on 1 July 2013, with Bertelsmann initi ...

). "Hats and eyeglasses" is an old gambling expression describing an unfortunate run at the table. In Frankel's childhood, gambling equated to friendship, food and laughter. "We bet on everything, from sports to how much our mothers would lose at Weight Watchers," Frankel recalls in the book. Her second book, ''Brazilian Sexy: Secrets to Living a Gorgeous and Confident Life'' (co-written with Janea Padilha) was published in April 2010 (Perigee/Penguin Group). Her essay "Looped Yarn" appears in the anthology ''Knitting Yarns: Writers on Knitting'' (2013), published by W. W. Norton & Company. Frankel is a winner of a

New York Foundation for the Arts The New York Foundation for the Arts (NYFA) is an independent 501(c)(3) charity, funded through government, foundation, corporate, and individual support, established in 1971. It is part of a network of national not-for-profit arts organizations ...

(NYFFA) Award in creative nonfiction. She was the 1997 Philip Morris Fellow at the

MacDowell Colony MacDowell is an artist's residency program in Peterborough, New Hampshire, United States, founded in 1907 by composer Edward MacDowell and his wife, pianist and philanthropist Marian MacDowell. Prior to July 2020, it was known as the MacDowel ...

, and the 2003 Artist-in-Residence at SUNY Ulster, where she taught a class in

memoir A memoir (; , ) is any nonfiction narrative writing based in the author's personal memories. The assertions made in the work are thus understood to be factual. While memoir has historically been defined as a subcategory of biography or autobiog ...

writing. She has lived in the upstate New York town of Boiceville for over 30 years, with her husband, artist Steve Heller.

References

External links

* https://web.archive.org/web/20100114024228/http://woodstockwritersfestival.com/ * https://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/07/garden/07frankel.html?_r=2&ref=garden&oref=slogin * http://www.hvmag.com/Hudson-Valley-Magazine/September-2008/Wild-Card/ * http://www.largeheartedboy.com/blog/archive/2008/02/book_notes_mart.html * http://www.dailyfreeman.com/articles/2009/03/19/life/doc49c1563d45667420926320.txt {{DEFAULTSORT:Frankel, Martha 1953 births Living people Writers from New York (state) People from the Bronx