Juliana Spahr on poetry and pedagogy, Paul Bowles on music, and more...

INTERVIEWS

Community & the Classroom: An Interview with Juliana Spahr
Interview by Michelle Naka Pierce
Spahr discusses pedagogy through the prism of a poet's eye.

REVIEWS: POETRY

Iraqi Poetry Today
edited by Saadi Simawe and Daniel Weissbort
This anthology was compiled in hopes that a new translation of Iraqi poetry into English would contribute to the appreciation and cause of peace in the Middle East. Reviewed by Jeffrey C. Alfier

Here & Elsewhere: A Poetic Cul-de-sac
Raymond Federman
If literature is near death, Federman's Here and Elsewhere fans the flames. Reviewed by Karl Krause

The To Sound
Eric Baus
In his debut collection, Eric Baus engages minerals, math, cartography, and sound itself to pull apart the micro-cosmology of language. Reviewed by Jane Sprague

Involuntary Vision: After Akira Kurosawa's Dreams
edited by Michael Cross
Like Kurosawa's characters, the poets in this anthology reveal that the monstrous in our world is always inextricably, instinctually, and inexorably human. Reviewed by Mark Tursi

Immigrant Blues
Goran Simic
Simic, a Bosnian poet, writes blunt poems about living in war-torn Sarajevo. Reviewed by Gilbert Wesley Purdy

REVIEWS: GRAPHIC NOVELS

Clumsy
& Unlikely
Jeffrey Brown
Two autobiographical graphic novels grapple with sex, drug use, and drinking, and renders the terrific blanches and indelible happiness one can inflict upon another in high school. Reviewed by Jennifer Przybylski

REVIEWS: FICTION

Book of Ten Nights and a Night
John Barth
An erudite and playful postmodernist tackles the events of 9/11 in this new collection of stories. Reviewed by Alicia L. Conroy

Denny Smith
Robert Glück
Glück exudes remarkable narrative adeptness in this new work, complete with the diversionary tactics that multiply layers of awareness and reading pleasure in the best contemporary fiction. Reviewed by Gail Scott

Bluett's Blue Hours
Thomas Kennedy
An American writer based in Denmark has just come forth with the second volume of his Copenhagen Quartet. Reviewed by Linda Lappin

Detroit Tales
Jim Ray Daniels
In this collection of short stories, Daniels does everything he can to confirm all of our greatest fears regarding the Motor City. Reviewed by Dustin Michael

REVIEWS: MIXED GENRE

Juniper Fuse: Upper Paleolithic Imagination & The Construction of the Underworld
Clayton Eshleman
A passionate and visionary work, Eshleman's Juniper Fuse translates and reintegrates the narrative of awakening humanity as depicted within psychic wombs on the cave walls of southwestern Europe. Reviewed by Sarah Fox

REVIEWS: NONFICTION

Paul Bowles on Music
edited by Timothy Mangan and Irene Herrmann
Though known primarily for his novels, stories, and translations, Paul Bowles was also an accomplished composer and widely published music critic. This new collection of his music writings includes the last interview with Bowles before his death in 1999. Reviewed by Mark Terrill

Lost Splendor: The Amazing Memoirs of the Man Who Killed Rasputin
Prince Felix Youssoupoff
In this memoir, the prince provides an exciting and detailed account of how he assassinated the erstwhile holy man who wielded a frightful and prodigious power over Russia's royal family in the years preceding the Bolshevik Revolution. Reviewed by Rod Smith

The Soft Cage: Surveillance in America: From Slave Passes to The War on Terror
Christian Parenti
Parenti explores the place of surveillance techniques in American life (and the fight against them). Reviewed by Jim Feast

Listen Here: Women Writing in Appalachia
edited by Sandra L. Ballard and Patricia L. Hudson
Listen Here collects the voices of women who have carved life and art out of the rough beauty of the Appalachian territory. Reviewed by Lynnell Edwards

Feminine Persuasion: Art and Essays on Sexuality
edited by Betsy Stirratt and Catherine Johnson
This collection celebrates the 50th anniversary of Kinsey's landmark publication Sexual Behavior in the Human Female. Reviewed by Stacy Brix

The Lennon Companion
edited by Elizabeth Thomson and David Gutman
& Lennon Legend
James Henke
Joyce-inspired writer, heroin-drenched, black-cloaked troublemaker, self-appointed imaginary saint—John Lennon was all these things and more. Two new books deepen this iconic figure of the 20th century. Reviewed by Steven Lee Beeber

The Road to Santiago
Kathryn Harrison
Harrison walks the most venerable footpath of Western Europe and describes her experience through her perspective as a woman, a mother, and an American. Reviewed by John Toren

Borderlines
Caroline Kraus
Follow this dark journey into a strange and manipulative relationship between the dispirited Caroline and the abuser Jane. Reviewed by Holly Chase Williams