Here is is challenge for new work from California:

We are confronted daily with dramatic and very real evidence that California is in decline. Everything seems wrong. We can’t seem to educate our youth, provide families with homes or jobs, keep our parks and libraries open, or take care of our sick. We are not fulfilling the very basic responsibilities of a society–to provide transportation, security, water, clean air, safe and healthy food, or equitable access to opportunity. We don’t trust our institutions, our neighbors, or in moments of honesty, even ourselves. Faced with such complex problems, many revert to hurling simplistic slogans at each other with increasing intolerance, as if loudness could drown out uncertainty. Tragically, at a time when we need it most, California has lost the cultural optimism that has long fueled our dreams.
What wisdom or advice can a publisher offer in these discouraging times? We have a principle we use when we look over a manuscript: don’t start correcting the problems until you understand the strengths. And growing out of the current situation is something amazingly hopeful. What seems to be falling apart along with everything else are old clichés and stale certainties. One senses, at least among thoughtful people, a willingness to question, to probe, to invent new ways of seeing things, to create new dreams.
Stimulated by what has been coming our way, Heyday has begun to search out fresh and thought-provoking new material for what we envision as an annual anthology. We invite our friends and colleagues to help us out.
We’d love more suggestions, and we look forward to hearing from you. Help us bring to California what it needs most at this time—the best thinking and the deepest feeling. Let’s exert our best efforts toward that end.
Malcolm Margolin
Publisher