Read Donna Hemans’ essay on Ploughshares!
Date: January 4, 2021
The operator-assisted collect call comes on a July morning in 1987. It’s still early, before 9 a.m., and except for the telephone ringing, the house is quiet, my younger sister […]
Date: January 4, 2021
The operator-assisted collect call comes on a July morning in 1987. It’s still early, before 9 a.m., and except for the telephone ringing, the house is quiet, my younger sister […]
Date: January 4, 2021
Each month, Beyond The Page: A WGBH Book Club features a notable author, who takes part in a live Q&A with a WGBH personality to discuss the intricacies of that month’s novel. […]
Date: January 4, 2021
In these disunited states, containing within them many sovereign nations, we are in what Biodun Jeyifo called “arrested decolonization.” And yet, as Mukoma Wa Ngugi wrote, “The work of decolonization […]
Date: January 4, 2021
RIFT ZONE BY TESS TAYLOR Taylor released two books this year: a Dorothea Lange documentary project, and this collection of original poems that mine personal, California, American history, and changes […]
Date: January 1, 2021
Pasadena, CA: Red Hen Press, 2020. First Edition. Softcover. “There are perfectly good explanations/ for the simultaneous risks we juggle./ There are shipyards of baubles/ and harbors that have dried up/ and martinis made up […]
Date: December 18, 2020
Enjoy a virtual conversation with widely traveled poet and performer, Keith Flynn, on December 18th at 7PM! We will be discussing his newest collection of poetry, The Skin of Meaning. Catch the […]
Date: December 16, 2020
An old post from 2019, featuring Elizabeth Bradfield’s TOWARD ANTARTICA. Though she writes in a completely different style than Oliver, Elizabeth Bradfield’s Toward Antarctica (Boreal Books, 2019) also belongs in the hands […]
Date: December 16, 2020
Generally, I don’t care about the new year. The clock ticking from December 31st to January 1st doesn’t mean much, other than time moving as it always does, bringing all […]
Date: December 14, 2020
S2 E14 – Tracy Daugherty “In our Season 2 finale (probably), we welcome our friend Tracy Daugherty, the author of many books of nonfiction and fiction, to discuss his recent […]
Date: December 14, 2020
My list of the best Latinx poetry published this year includes After Ruben (Red Hen Press), a stunning collection of poems by Francisco Aragon, inspired by another of Latin America’s greatest poets […]
Date: October 17, 2022
Full of warmth, terror, and underhanded humor, If I Were the Ocean, I’d Carry You Home, Pete Hsu’s debut story collection, captures the essences of surviving in a life set […]
Date: October 17, 2022
Coffee, Shopping, Murder, Love is Carlos Allende’s Quill Prize-winning novel from Red Hen Press. Readers will embark on a riotous, ribald, and somehow still laughter-inducing ride, from a terrible first date […]
Date: October 3, 2022
“Hell,” wrote Percy Shelley in 1819, “is a city much like London.” A hundred and twenty years later Bertolt Brecht, who fled the Nazis for Santa Monica, volunteered a different […]
Date: September 28, 2022
The Healing Circle by Coco Picard is a lyrical novel—written in sketches and short chapters that feel like jabs—about dying, and much more, happening across past and present timelines, dipping in […]
Date: September 26, 2022
“The novel’s surreal atmosphere is grounded by mundane details, as of the hot tea that John offers Eli upon his arrival, and the rabbit’s foot charm dangling from the rearview […]
Date: September 17, 2022
HOPE, WHEN HELD past the point of reason, is liable to transform into a certain kind of absurdity. Over the course of The Healing Circle — the latest novel from writer, artist, […]
Date: September 12, 2022
Northampton author Ellen Meeropol used her first four novels to explore how a range of social and political issues, from the rise of the U.S. security state in the aftermath […]
Date: September 12, 2022
“Since all around us refugees seem to be fleeing from something, one must ask from what they themselves flee—and that it’s hard to imagine there is anywhere left one can go […]
Date: September 12, 2022
A unique and inherently engaging novel about life, death, and dying, “The Healing Circle” showcases author Coco Picard’s natural flair for crafting a novel of serious substance with a flair […]
Date: September 8, 2022
Although Marybeth Holleman’s five books are all deeply rooted in Alaska’s landscape and wildlife, Tender Gravity is her first expression of that connection through poetry. The title phrase comes from the first […]