Here are 15 recent and upcoming books from small presses that span everything from fantasy and crime fiction to memoir and literary short stories.

Artist Trust has announced that Walla Walla author Johanna Stoberock is this year’s recipient of the LaSalle Storyteller Award. The LaSalle Award, which gives $10,000 to a Washington state storyteller with no strings attached, is one of the most consequential awards in the region for writers. Past recipients include Anca Szilágyi and E. Lily Yu, both of whom have published mesmerizing works of fiction. Stoberock’s most recent novel, Pigs, was published this fall by Red Hen Press. You’ll be hearing more about that one on this site later today. Congratulations to Stoberock, and congratulations to Artist Trust for continuing to highlight some of the most interesting writers in Washington state.

Artist Trust today named Whitman College Senior Adjunct Assistant Professor of English and General Studies Johanna Stoberock as its 2019 LaSalle Storyteller Award recipient.

The 2019 award recognizes an outstanding literary artist working in fiction. Johanna authored novels “Pigs,” from Red Hen Press, and “City of Ghosts,” from W.W. Norton.

The Morning News has unveiled the longlist for their 2020 Tournament of Books, which is almost certainly the only literary competition in the country where the winner receives livestock as a prize.

Sixty-two works of fiction have the potential to take home the Rooster, given annually to the winner of the March Madness-style tournament sponsored by the daily online magazine. In past years, victorious authors have been given the option to receive a real-life rooster as their prize, although it’s unclear if any have actually opted for that.

In the sixth of this continuing series, Sara McCrea ’21, a College of Letters major from Boulder, Colo., reviews alumni books and offers a selection for those in search of knowledge, insight, and inspiration. The volumes, sent to us by alumni, are forwarded to Olin Library as donations to the University’s collection and made available to the Wesleyan community.

The most excellent, Rooster-worthy books of 2019. Look for our shortlist of competitors next month for the 2020 Tournament of Books, presented by Field Notes.

In her new novel Pigs (Red Hen Press, 2019), Johanna Stoberock has written a lyrical fable about an island that receives all the world’s garbage. That garbage, both physical and psychological in the forms of dreams and memories, is consumed by six enormous, voracious pigs. Four filthy, starving children wearing rags and living in squalor are responsible for sorting the trash, feeding the pigs and taking care of each other, while the island’s adults indulge in fantasies, gorge themselves, and live in the comfort of a huge mansion. 

Four children live on an island that serves as the repository for all the world’s garbage. Trash arrives, the children sort it, and then they feed it to a herd of insatiable pigs: a perfect system. But when a barrel washes ashore with a boy inside, the children must decide whether he is more of the world’s detritus, meant to be fed to the pigs, or whether he is one of them. Written in exquisitely wrought prose, Pigs asks questions about community, environmental responsibility, and the possibility of innocence.

Johanna Stoberock is the author of the novels Pigs and City of Ghosts. Her short stories and essays have appeared in numerous publications, including Better: Culture & Lit, The Wilson Quarterly, Copper Nickel, Front Porch, and the 2014 Best of the Net Anthology.

Here Stoberock shares her vision for a trailer of an adaptation of Pigs:

Envisioning Pigs as a movie is hard, particularly because, central to the novel, are a herd of giant, magical pigs. How do you put giant pigs on screen without diminishing their fierceness or their magic? I haven’t come up with an answer yet, other than that maybe you just don’t—maybe in a movie the pigs wo

The Coil dishes the best new books to read this month. Fiction, memoir, history, crime, politics, & poetry for our tough times.

The pigs are beautiful, but fierce, with sharp teeth and insatiable appetites, and they eat anything. When a boy washes ashore in a barrel, the children must decide what to do with him—is he more of the world’s detritus, meant to be fed to the pigs, or is he one of them? The novel explores questions about community, environmental responsibility, and the possibility of innocence.

The days of lounging lazily in the sun, SPF slathered generously all over your skin as you dive into a good book, might be ending, but that means we get to start fresh.  With the dawn of fall comes crisp farmers’ market apples; warm, woodsy candles; and sweater weather—and what could be better to pair with all that than a stack of brand-new reads?

Luckily, this autumn will see the release of plenty of books that deserve a spot on your nightstand. There’s something for everyone—the thrilling follow-up to The Handmaid’s Tale, a celebrity short story debut, and a mix of authors widely admired (Ta-Nehisi Coates! Zadie Smith!) and up-and-coming. So what will you be reading?

WHEN THE SH*T HITS THE FAN: A CONVERSATION WITH PERCIVAL EVERETT

BY DOUGLAS MANUEL

April 15th, 2019

During finals week, right before the semester was over, I was given the opportunity to talk to Percival Everett about his new book, The Book of Training by Colonel Hap Thompson of Roanoke, VA, 1843: Annotated, From the Library of John C. Calhoun. As evident from the title, this book is a mock manual for breaking slaves and is written from the point of view of Colonel Hap Thompson, a slave-breaker. Reading the text, I was amazed by how well Everett could capture the removed, clinical precision of slave-breaking. I kept wondering about the massive act of empathy it would take for a black author to conjure this voice so soundly.

As a black writer myself, the language of the oppressor always feels so sour in my mouth, and I wondered if this was the same for Everett. I was curious: why this book, and why now? I wanted to tap into Everett’s headspace and get a glimpse into the brain of the man who not only gave us this text but also Percival Everett by Virgil Russell, Erasure, I Am Not Sidney Poitier, and so many more powerful and complicated books.

Meryl Natchez conducts a wonderful interview with Red Hen poet Maurya Simon on Poetry Flash!

“

Cai Emmons, Author of Weather Woman, and tammy lynne stoner, Author of Sugar Land, Discuss Their Latest Books for Red Hen Press

Full interview.

“