A History of the Movement from Stonewall to Slutwalk Melinda Chateauvert Beacon Press ($26.95) by Kelsey Irving Beson Although Sex Workers Unite’s language is dispassionate and academic, the story that it tells can be heartbreaking. It is well known that sex workers are the frequent targets of violent individuals; far less notorious is the fact […]
A Memoir of Heart Disease Thomas Larson Hudson Whitman/Excelsior College Press ($15) by Renée E. D’Aoust Illness as a sanctuary—a necessary retreat from unconscious living—is something the eminent Canadian physician Gabor Maté focuses on. When the body has had enough, it says “no.” Dr. Maté tracks reasons for illness, long before dramatic episodes present. Indeed, […]
Volume 1: Dragon Keeper ($7.99) Volume 2: Dragon Haven ($7.99) Volume 3: City of Dragons ($7.99) Volume 4: Blood of Dragons ($27.99) Robin Hobb Harper Voyager by Kris Lawson Hobb, who also writes under the name of Megan Lindholm, is a prolific author known for her rich world-building, evident here in the evocative, detailed descriptions […]
Carolyn Zaikowski Aqueous Books ($14) by Gavin Pate Carolyn Zaikowski’s novel, A Child Is Being Killed, tells the story of Shrap, a young girl sold by her father into sexual slavery. It is a story with little exposition, one that hurls the reader immediately into the sickening conditions Shrap must endure. However, while the violence […]
Sergio Chejfec translated by Heather Cleary Open Letter ($14.95) by Kristine Rabberman Early in Sergio Chejfec’s The Dark, the nameless narrator describes his disorientation when looking over a landscape as “the vertigo of simple things.” This phrase describes the experience of reading Chejfec’s novel, an interior monologue by the reclusive narrator. He remembers his affair […]
Psychedelic Norway John Colburn Coffee House Press ($16.95) Dance Lightsey Darst Coffee House Press ($17.95) by Benjamin Paloff In The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge, Rilke has a bit about how, if you gather experiences throughout a long, rich life, you might be able to eke out maybe ten decent lines of poetry at the […]
Cynthia Lowen University of Georgia Press ($16.95) by John Bradley There's something magical about a persona poem. The Latin root of the word “persona” helps explains why: mask. The poet steps out of her own identity and embodies the person called forth by the mask. But when the transformation doesn't fully occur, the audience is […]
John Beer Spork Press ($10) by Stephen Burt Once you have figured out that every idea comes from somewhere, everyone’s inner self is a confluence of influences, every claim about any shared feeling drops the claimant into one or another layer of the great hermeneutic circle, everything’s borrowed, and nothing’s uniquely you, should you—if you […]
by Allan Vorda The biography of Richard Powers almost reads like a book. Born in 1957 in Evanston, Illinois, Powers lived in Bangkok, Thailand from age eleven to sixteen while his father taught there. Upon the family’s return to the United States he majored in physics at the University of Illinois, but later switched to […]
by Greg Bem Cambodian American Chath pierSath is both a visual artist and poet. He was born in Banteay Meanchey province, Cambodia, before he escaped the Khmer Rouge with some of his family. As a refugee Chath was relocated to the United States, where he has lived off and on since. His most recent move […]