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At the NewPages Blog readers and writers can catch up with their favorite literary and alternative magazines, independent and university presses, creative writing programs, and writing and literary events. Find new books, new issue announcements, contest winners, and so much more!

New Book :: Secret Agent Gals

Secret Agent Gals a novel by Richard Gid Powers book cover image

Secret Agent Gals by Richard Gid Powers
Livingston Press, February 2023

Called “the female version of a bromance,” Richard Gid Powers has created a world in which quick-witted Secret Agent Gals outwit bumbling Nazi assassins, boneheaded Communist spies, and slick Irish manure cart bombers, and must rescue dimwitted FBI Directors, fellow secret agents, crazy Presidents and First ladies from the dumb messes they get themselves into. Peggy Guggenheim and Baroness Hilla Rebay, both famous art collector/museum directors, are recruited by the FBI to plow through the painters the two women have been helping escape the Nazis, to see if there are any spies. That’s their start as counterspies, and how the story begins. In the end, they win the war and have lots of laughs doing it. They go through Special Agent basic training, bond with each other against their drill sergeant, learn to march, tie knots, practice jabs and jiu-jitsu, shoot John Dillinger and Pretty Boy Floyd targets, work their Secret Decoder rings and get fitted for designer G-girl suits. The plot starts to get complicated à la Indian uprisings, revolts in the Japanese-American internment camps, and Irish terrorists. The Nazis kidnap General Eisenhower’s girlfriend, and Ike refuses to invade France until he gets her back. The G-Girls are sent to England, where they meet James Bond’s dad, Jonquil “Junk” Bond. Ike’s girlfriend is also a secret agent, in fact almost everyone in the book is a secret agent, and she has a plan to rub hair remover on Hitler’s moustache and steal his mojo. There is a supervillain, who is, by turns, a rogue FBI agent, an atomic spy, a Nazi traitor, an agitator at the Japanese-American internment camps, and finally head of a terrorist campaign by rebel FBI agents disguised as Irish manure cart bombers to kill Hoover and take over the Bureau. These Gals have seriously got their hands full, which makes for a rollicking read!

Book Review :: Impossible Naked Life by Luke Rolfes

Impossible Naked Life stories by Luke Rolfes book cover image

Guest Post by Justin Courter

Betcha can’t eat just one! Reading the flash fictions in Luke Rolfes’s Impossible Naked Life, winner of the Acacia Fiction Prize from Kallisto Gaia Press, you’ll tell yourself: Okay, maybe just one more. . . and then read another half-dozen of them. These stories are, by turns (and turns of the pages that keep you wondering what the author will think of next) heartfelt and hilarious. The first sentence of each is a runway from which Rolfes takes an imaginative flight, and the only regret is that sometimes the ride seems too short. Some of the best of these stories are the longer ones—longer, in this case, meaning about ten pages.

One of the funniest, “My Neighbor, Ray,” begins: “On day three of the global crisis, a person crawls out of my mouth. The person is small at first—the size of a marble—but then he grows and grows until full sized.” The person is essentially the narrator’s (Luke’s) alter ego; he befriends the next-door neighbor, who moves in with Luke and his family. Covid cabin fever induces late-night discussions on subjects such as what the concerns of the toothbrush and razor might be if inanimate objects had feelings; and an afternoon when Luke’s kids use some of the overstock of toilet paper to wrap Ray up like a mummy in the backyard.

Not all the stories are surreal but, as does the one described above, all have an emotional accuracy. You aren’t sure where you’re going in Impossible Naked Life, but you’re enjoying a Denis Johnson kind of trip.


Impossible Naked Life by Luke Rolfes. Kallisto Gaia Press, March 2022.

Bio: Justin Courter’s books include the novels The Heart of It All and Skunk: A Love Story. He lives in New York City.

December 2022 eLitPak :: Sixteen Rivers Press 2023 Call for Book-Length Poetry Manuscripts

Screenshot of Sixteen Rivers Press 2022-23 Submissions call flyer
click image to open PDF

We invite Northern California authors to submit book-length poetry manuscripts. All manuscripts will be read blind. Sixteen Rivers values diversity. We encourage poets of color, young poets, and LGBTQ writers to submit. Sixteen Rivers Press is a shared-work collective, with a three-year commitment. PDF email submissions from November 1, 2022 to February 1, 2023. View flyer and see complete guidelines on our website.

View the full December 2022 eLtiPak Newsletter here. Subscribe to the NewPages Newsletter to get first access to these opportunities.

December 2022 eLitPak :: Affordable Poetry, Publishing, & Critique Workshops

Screenshot of Caesura Poetry Workshop's flyer for the December 2022, January 2023, and February 2023 eLitPak newsletters
click image to open PDF

Registration Deadline: Year-round
Caesura Poetry Workshop aims to support, inspire, and energize poets through affordable monthly Zoom workshops hosted by award-winning poet, editor, and teacher John Sibley Williams. All workshops include poem analysis, active group discussion, and writing prompts. Upcoming class themes include experimenting with punctuation, sharpening poem titles, erasure poetry, New Year’s poetry, building a chapbook, monthly critique workshops, and more. View flyer and visit website for more information.

View the full December 2022 eLitPak here. Subscribe to the NewPages Newsletter to get early access to these flyers.

Magazine Stand :: The Woven Tale Press – Vol 10 No 8

The Woven Tale Press Vol 10 No 8 cover image

The Woven Tale Press editors for Vol 10 No 8 promise readers “haunting images, eco-friendly sculpture, unusual mixed media, poetry, fiction and more!” Contributors include Craig Cotter, Stacey Fletcher, Jana Harris, Nell Jungyun, Kenneth Kesner, Roberto Loiederman, Joseph A. Miller, Natalie Oliphant, Craig Palmer, Sara Joyce Robinson, Susan B. Wadsworth. The Woven Tale Press welcomes fiction and creative nonfiction prose writing, poetry, and all mediums in the visual arts, including installation works; galleries are invited to submit the work of artists they represent. For their site, The Woven Tale Press seeks posts by both visual artists and writers, on any aspect of their creative process. Artists can submit their website URL for review consideration. If you are interested in becoming an art correspondent for The Woven Tale Press — to report on your local art scene— WTP would love to hear from you! Visit their website for full details.

December 2022 eLitPak :: Now Open for Entries: The 17th Annual National Indie Excellence Awards

17th annual National Indie Excellence® Awards flyer for the NewPages eLitPak
click image to open PDF

Deadline: March 31, 2023
The 17th annual National Indie Excellence® Awards (NIEA) are open to all English language printed books available for sale, including small presses, mid-sized independent publishers, university presses, and self-published authors. NIEA is proud to be a champion of self-publishing and independent presses. Monetary awards, sponsorships, and entry rules are described in detail on our website.

View the full December 2022 eLitPak Newsletter here. Want to get our eLitPak opportunities delivered straight to your inbox? Subscribe today!

New Book :: Losing the Precious Few

Losing the Precious Few: How America Fails to Educate Its Minorities in Science and Engineering by Richard A. Tapia book cover image

Losing the Precious Few: How America Fails to Educate Its Minorities in Science and Engineering by Richard A. Tapia
Arte Público Press, April 2022

A professor for almost 50 years in Rice University’s Department of Computational and Applied Mathematics, nationally acclaimed scholar Richard Tapia is struck by the number of Chinese students in the hallways and wonders how the United States can remain globally competitive. Tapia asserts it is critical to the nation’s health and well-being to improve the representation of “the precious few,” or domestic minority groups, in STEM education and careers. African Americans and Latinos alone make up 31% of the population, and he writes the country cannot maintain its economic and scientific health when such a large part of the population is left out of science and engineering. In addition, he contends the United States will not have racial justice without educational justice. Underrepresented groups must have equal access to higher education. Providing a road map to increase the representation of domestic minority learners in academia and STEM fields, this is a must-read for university administrators and professors who want to attract and retain a diverse student body. In addition, Tapia includes advice for students, their parents and teachers, who will also benefit from his wisdom and years of experience serving as a mentor to those from diverse backgrounds.

December 2022 eLitPak :: Our Lady of the Lake University’s Online MFA & MA Programs

screenshot of Our Lady of the Lake University Online MFA & MA Program flyer for the June 2022 eLitPak
click image to open PDF

Our Lady of the Lake University’s 100% online Master of Arts-Master of Fine Arts (MA-MFA) and Master of Arts (MA) in Literature, Creative Writing, and Social Justice prepare critically engaged and socially aware scholars, writers, educators, and professionals. This nationally unique, virtual program combines creativity with practical skills and critical knowledge, while keeping in mind the pursuit of social justice. View flyer or visit website to learn more.

If you’re not subscribed to our weekly newsletter, view the full December 2022 eLitPak here.

Where to Submit Round-up :: December 16, 2023

hand holding a pen and writing in a notebook

Sorry for the long delay in getting back to doing our Weekly Where to Submit Roundups! I am including all opportunities from the end of November until now. We were working hard on getting our site ready for its updated launch. We hope you are enjoying the new look and feel of NewPages. Enjoy the round-up of submission opportunities below for the week of December 16, 2023, and earlier.

Want to get alerts for new opportunities sent directly to your inbox every Monday afternoon instead of waiting for our Friday Where to Submit Round-ups? For just $5 a month, you can get early access to new calls for submissions and writing contests before they go live on our site, so subscribe today! Free subscribers get access to the latest submission opportunities on the following Monday.

Continue reading “Where to Submit Round-up :: December 16, 2023”

Book Review :: Our Missing Hearts by Celeste Ng

Our Missing Hearts by Celeste Ng book cover image

Guest Post by Kevin Brown

Our Missing Hearts by Celest Ng is a dystopian novel in the vein of Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale. Ng says she drew everything in her fictional world from real life, which makes her United States scarily believable. The government has passed the PACT act, which prohibits discussion of un-American ideas; targets people of Chinese descent; and uses the government’s right to remove people’s children as a means of control. This law leads to rampant discrimination and violence against Asian Americans, ultimately forcing the mother of the main character to flee. While there are parts of exposition to explain this alternate America, the heart of the book is Margaret’s difficult decision to leave Bird when he was nine. He has spent several years without her, but he ultimately goes looking for her, partly because of a cryptic note he receives, but also because of the disappearance of one of his classmates, Sadie, who has been removed from her family and relocated. By centering the novel on these relationships and the effects of such a law on parents and children, Ng reminds readers that laws don’t exist in a vacuum: there are always real individuals who suffer, whether we choose to see them or not.


Our Missing Hearts by Celeste Ng. Penguin, 2022.

Reviewer bio: Kevin Brown has published three books of poetry: Liturgical Calendar: Poems (Wipf and Stock); A Lexicon of Lost Words (winner of the Violet Reed Haas Prize for Poetry, Snake Nation Press); and Exit Lines (Plain View Press). He also has a memoir, Another Way: Finding Faith, Then Finding It Again, and a book of scholarship, They Love to Tell the Stories: Five Contemporary Novelists Take on the Gospels. Twitter @kevinbrownwrite or kevinbrownwrites.weebly.com/.

Review :: “Porous” by Jessica Moore

Brick summer 2022 literary magazine cover image

Guest Post by Megan Eralie

Published in the summer 2022 issue of Brick, “Porous” by Jessica Moore investigates motherhood and imagines the many types of containers in and around pregnancy, birth, and life. Moore opens by stating, “I have an affinity for the liminal.” This fascination of “spaces between” opens an exploration of moments and feelings “beyond the physical.” Reflecting on motherhood, both years before and after giving birth to twins, Moore muses on the space love contains and the boundaries, containers for love, that also grow with motherhood. A car crash eight years before giving birth results in a head injury which causes Moore to pay closer attention to losses and to memorize a passage from John Berger that sparks an unintended attention towards how the mind “alter[s] and appropriate[s]” our own words—memorized words are, themselves, unable to be contained. The containment of words read and memorized culminates in an observation that words, like fetal cells from a pregnancy, live in the body long after birth. The essay itself is a container of Moore’s words blended with other writers’, a container that goes on to live within the reader, revealing the liminality of language.


“Porous” by Jessica Moore. Brick: A Literary Journal, issue 108, Summer 2022.

Reviewer bio: Megan Eralie (she/her) is a nonfiction writer, poet, and graduate student living in Logan, Utah, who thinks having two cats is a personality trait. You can find her on twitter @smeggggs.

Magazine Stand :: About Place Journal – December 2022

About Place Journal December 2022 cover image

About Place Journal editors invite readers to their December 2022 issue themed “Center of Gravity” with these comments: “Justice is the center of gravity and resistance is how we get there. While the fight for social justice, reproductive rights, and the environment has been an ongoing struggle, the present moment demands an even more urgent response to these grievous times. As James Baldwin reminds us, ‘the role of the artist…is to illuminate that darkness [and] to make the world a more human dwelling place.’ In this light, the Center of Gravity issue explores poetry, prose and visual art that articulate the possibilities of resistance and envision worlds in which justice is a reality.” Contributors include Natiq Jalil, Gerburg Garmann, Michele Reese, Alison Palmer, Helen Stevens Chinitz, Joe Milazzo, Cheryl Byler Keeler, Jeremy Paden, Cristina Correa, Hannah Dierdorff, Lisa Kwong, Mary Newell, Joanne Diaz & Jason Reblando, H. E. Riddleton, Petra Kuppers, Akua Lezli Hope, Ingrid Wendt, Allison Cummings, Carla S. Schick, Joseph Ross, Evelyn Reilly, Julie Runacres, Ariel Resnikoff, Allison Cobb, Mariana Mcdonald, Cassandra Rockwood Ghanem, Gail Folkins, Gerburg Garmann, Jorge Losoya, Bunny McFadden, RBD, Mary Edna Fraser, and Jack Bordnick.

New Book :: Lords of Misrule

Lords of Misrule 20 Tears of Saturnalia Books book cover image

Lords of Misrule: 20 Years of Saturnalia Books
Edited by Henry Israeli and Rebecca Lauren
Saturnalia Books, December 2022

Twenty years ago, Saturnalia Books opened its doors for business, and soon thereafter published, The Babies, an astonishing collection of poetry by Sabrina Orah Mark. Since then, Saturnalia Books has published some of the most innovative new voices in the poetry world, including poets Sarah Vap, Catherine Pierce, Kathleen Graber, Kristi Maxwell, Natalie Shapero, Peter Jay Shippy, Martha Silano, Timothy Liu, Cortney Lamar Charleston, Hadara Bar-Nadav, and Kayleb Rae Candrilli, as well as the groundbreaking Gurlesque anthology. This collection gathers poems from all of our poet’ s books, giving readers a good taste of twenty years’ worth of Saturnalia Books publications. With an introduction by poet and founder Henry Israeli and managing editor Rebecca Lauren.

MAYDAY seeks applicants for the volunteer part-time positions of Production Editors and Poetry Editors

We invite applications for Production Editors and Poetry Editors until the positions are filled.

We will begin scheduling interviews on December 16, 2022.

PRODUCTION EDITORS: As an integral part of the managing editor’s office, production editors are responsible for layout and formatting of all content prior to posting at MAYDAY. In addition to an interest in literary publishing, strong applicants might also have experience with digital journalism, publishing, and/or proofing or editing copy. MAYDAY is published on WordPress, so experience with this platform will be helpful, but it’s not prohibitively difficult to learn, either. We provide staff training and ongoing support. Familiarity with the Chicago Manual of Style will also be helpful, though it is also not an immediate requirement.

POETRY EDITORS: In addition to reading submissions and selecting work for publication, poetry editors will be encouraged to solicit work for the magazine and help develop various feature series and ongoing projects in collaboration with other editors on staff. Ideal candidates for the poetry editor positions may or may not have an educational background in writing or literary studies, but should have experience publishing their own work and/or editing the work of others.

Review :: “Tom Is Dead” by Catherine Sinow

Marrow literary magazine logo

Guest Post by Virginia

A succinct nonfiction essay by Catherine Sinow, but one that will sit in the mind long after you’ve finished reading it, “Tom Is Dead” is about tragedy befalling a family and the complications of grief that come from no longer being close to that family. The work, published in Issue 3 of Marrow Magazine, is about rifts between people but also about closeness, and how those two things can co-exist sometimes in strange and painful ways. Sinow utilizes the small space the essay takes up well, and while the word count is low, the content is packed with effective language, like these opening lines, “Once I was friends with two brothers. I had a falling out with both of them. Eight months later, their dad was hit by a car and killed.” The blend of craft and content makes the essay a real brain-worm of a piece, and it’s a slightly morbid, slightly bittersweet, altogether powerful read.


Tom Is Dead” by Catherine Sinow. Marrow Magazine, Issue 3, 2022.

Reviewer bio: Virginia is an English graduate student at Utah State University. They like talking with cats better than talking with people.

Magazine Stand :: Aji Magazine – Issue 17

Aji Magazine Fall 2022 Issue 17 cover image

Aji Magazine Editor in Chief Erin O’Neill Armendarez writes of Issue 17: “Every poem, story, essay, photograph, or work of graphic art in this issue invites readers to consider alternative experiences and ways of being, coaxes us out of our day-to-day normal into someone else’s world. Pieces in this issue will inspire laughter, pathos, and perhaps deep reflection. In a world where writers, musicians, and artists are being silenced, threatened, imprisoned, even killed, we are so thankful for all of you, for the communities from which you come, for the unique perspectives you share with Aji, a small magazine, to some degree a speck on the stage of contemporary national art and literature.” The online magazine includes partner and director of Continuum Art Studios Shelley Schrieber as the featured artist, an interview with Keith Hamilton Cobb that “delves into critical conversations on racism, action, and difficult truths,” and over 100 pages of writing and artwork from four dozen contributors. All for free online, so head on over and take a look today!

New Book :: Sound Fury

Sound Fury poetry by Mark Levine published by University of Iowa Press book cover image

Sound Fury Poetry by Mark Levine
University of Iowa Press, November 2022

Throughout Sound Fury, poems by metaphysician Robert Herrick are refashioned into phantasmagorical oddities of likeness and difference. Figures from the fringes of popular imagination—Zane Grey, Robinson Crusoe, Porfirio Díaz—surface as cobbled-together avatars on the theme of identity. Brilliantly asserting the necessity of humane and resistant modes of speech against the vapid sounds and enforced silences of orthodoxy, Sound Fury finds the poet “Now, in our former state/ In our current one/ In stately procession,” venturing forth in a world “where things of questionable being go.”

Magazine Stand :: Poetry Magazine – December 2022

Poetry Magazine December 2022 cover image

Poetry Magazine December 2022 includes the special feature “Wholly Seen: The Work of Diana Solís,” which includes Carlos Cumpián’s essay “Encounter Diana Solís,” a portfolio of Chicago poetry community portraits taken by Solís in the 70s-90s, two poems by Solís, and the essay, “Making Light Together” by Robin Reid Drake. Other contributors to the issue’s regular content include Cindy Juyoung Ok, Tacey M. Atsitty, Alan Pelaez Lopez, Peter Mason, Donte Collins, Rebecca Hazelton, Dara Yen Elerath, Dorianne Laux, Marcus Wicker, Diamond Forde, and Charif Shanahan. Poetry Magazine‘s full content can be found on their website along with subscription information for the print copy.

Magazine Stand :: Rivanna Review – Issue 6

Rivanna Review issue 6 December 2022 cover image

Issue 6 of Rivanna Review offers readers an eclectic collection of content “from Virginia and beyond,” with stories by Jerry Gabriel, Christine Schott, Dylan James, and Mitchell Toews; features like “Osoyoos Homecoming” by Sonia Nicholson, “Southwest Petroglyphs” by Edward Boucheron, a tribute to Melody Edwardsen by Ed Meek, an introduction and portfolio of “Venice Watercolors” in full color by Karen Rosasco, a tribute to Isaac Boyd by Carol Cutler, photographs by Raegan Pietrucha, an intriguing series of “Welsh Portraits” by John Thomas (1838-1905), and articles on the Lang Fairy Books and the Little Free Library, book reviews, and the column “News from Hapsburg,” which features “The Bell Ringer,” James Pettigrew. If you appreciate history, literature, arts, and photography – the Rivanna Review has got you covered!

New Book :: The Entre Ríos Trilogy

The Entre Ríos Trilogy fiction by Perla Suez translated by Rhonda Dahl Buchanan published by White Pine Press book cover image

The Entre Ríos Trilogy
Fiction by Perla Suez, Trans. by Rhonda Dahl Buchanan
White Pine Press, November 2022

The three novels in this collection, written by Perla Suez in Spanish, and expertly translated to English by Rhonda Dahl Buchanan, take place in Entre Ríos, the Argentine province where thousands of Jewish immigrants settled at the end of the nineteenth century. Suez weaves history and memory in these tales of passion, violence, and intrigue. Déborah, the protagonist of Lethargy, narrates the traumatic experiences of her youth in Basavilbaso, and captures the stifling atmosphere of intolerance and repression during the 1950s. In The Arrest Lucien Finz, a young Jewish farmer, leaves the rice fields of Villa Clara to study medicine in Buenos Aires, where he becomes a victim of La Semana Trágica, the “Tragic Week” in January of 1919, when government forces arrested, tortured, and murdered striking workers and many innocent people. Complot is an intricate web of lust, deceit, murder, and power, which spans the first three decades of the twentieth century, when Great Britain influenced the growth of the Argentine nation.

Review :: “The Sum of Which Parts” by Beth Kephart

Beth Kephart head shot

Guest Post by Zoe Dalley

“Our ideas of love were different, too. I wanted, I was desperate, to know you truly, Dad.”

Beth Kephart’s [pictured] short nonfiction piece “The Sum of Which Parts” focuses on a collection of items belonging to her now deceased father to let readers into his world at the end of his life during the COVID-19 lockdowns. From his wallet to a picture of his Wii bowling team, Kephart uses these items to help us understand what it was like for her father, and, in turn, what it must have been like at a time of extreme isolation for much of the older generation without the access or mastery over technology. Kephart then pairs the physical distance of the lockdowns, where she wasn’t able to visit her father without the barrier of technology, with the emotional distance she feels existed between her and her father. Beautifully weaving the two together, “The Sum of Which Parts” effectively tackles the complexity of parent/child relationships, in particular during strange and unforeseen circumstances, such as a global pandemic.


“The Sum of Parts” by Beth Kephart. Upstreet, 2022.

Reviewer bio: Zoe Dalley is a graduate student specializing in literature, composition and culture. They have a particular interest in horror, experimental literature, and anything within the realm of the bizarre.

Magazine Stand :: The Greensboro Review – Fall 2022

The Greensboro Review Fall 2022 issue cover image

The Fall 2022 issue of The Greensboro Review (#112) features the Amon Liner Poetry Prize winner, Dom Witten’s “Broken Showerhead,” and an Editor’s Note by Terry L. Kennedy in which he pays tribute to friends who have passed, as well as new work from ​​Todd Davis, Chris Edmonds, Larry Flynn, Cynthia Gunadi, Matt Hart, AE Hines, A. Van Jordan, Sarah MacKenzie, Louise Marburg, Chris Mattingly, Aidan O’Brien, Skyler Osborne, Suphil Lee Park, Carol M. Quinn, Madison Rahner, Sarah Elaine Smith, Caitlin Rae Taylor, Abby Wolpert, and Dean Young, with a folio of Kelly Cherry’s work. This issue is dedicated to Kelly Cherry (1940-2022), Jeff Towne (1929-2022), and Dean Young (1955-2022).

New Book :: Taken to Heart

Taken to Heart: 70 Poems from the Chinese translated by Gary Young and Yanwen Xu published by White Pine Press book cover image

Taken to Heart: 70 Poems from the Chinese
Translated by Gary Young and Yanwen Xu
White Pine Press, November 2022

The seventy poems that comprise this collection constitute an anthology, Elementary School Chinese Textbook (Jiangsu Edition), given to Chinese school children as a text to aid their instruction in Mandarin and to introduce them to China’s rich literary history. The poems are considered representative of China’s highest poetic achievements from the Han Dynasty to the Qing. The study of these poems is also meant to subtly guide students toward an appreciation of traditional Chinese virtues, culture, historical events, and social etiquette. The poems are memorized by every student, and by the end of their course of study, Chinese children will have absorbed a storehouse of Chinese characters and been steeped in a cultural tradition that spans more than two thousand years.

Book Review :: Powder Days by Heather Hansman

Powder Days: Ski Bums Ski Towns and the Future of Chasing Snow by Heather Hansman Hanover Square Press November 2021 book cover image

Guest Post by Keegan Waller

Through a mix of literary journalism and memoir in Powder Days: Ski Bums, Ski Towns and the Future of Chasing Snow, Heather Hansman asks the question: is the ski town dream dead, and did it ever exist in the first place? Hansman uses her own connections and experiences as a former ticket checker, ski patroller, and restaurant worker in a Colorado ski town to tell a story of the realities of working-class skiers who are still “living the dream.”

“We moved to the mountains and let the other facets of our lives fall into place from there.” In dispelling the common perceptions of the archetypical ski bum, Hansman paints a picture of communities in crisis due to stagnant wages and rising housing costs, mental health issues among ski industry workers, racial tensions, and the ever-looming threat of disappearing snow due to climate change. All framed by her nostalgic, months-long road trip to ski towns across the country. Anyone who has ever loaded everything they owned into their car and moved to a ski town – or even considered doing so after a weekend on the slopes – will find something to relate to in Powder Days.


Powder Days: Ski Bums, Ski Towns and the Future of Chasing Snow by Heather Hansman. Hanover Square Press, November 2021.

Reviewer bio: Keegan Waller is a graduate student in Utah State’s creative writing program. His writing has been featured in Door is a Jar, Boston Literary Magazine, and elsewhere. You can find him on Twitter @keeg_wall.

New Book :: Welcome to Dragon Talk

Welcome to Dragon Talk: Inspiring Conversations About Dungeons & Dragons and the People Who Love to Play It by Shelly Mazzanoble and Greg Tito published by University of Iowa Press book cover image

Welcome to Dragon Talk: Inspiring Conversations About Dungeons & Dragons and the People Who Love to Play It
By Shelly Mazzanoble and Greg Tito
University of Iowa Press, December 2022

If you have any D&D fans on your holiday gift lists, then Welcome to Dragon Talk is exactly what you are looking for! Hosts of the official D&D podcast, Shelly Mazzanoble and Greg Tito and their surprising guests show how this beloved pastime has amassed a diverse, tight-knit following of players who defy stereotypes. The authors recount some of their most inspiring interviews and illuminate how their guests use the core tenets of the game in everyday life. An A-list actor defends D&D by baring his soul (and his muscles) on social media. A teacher in a disadvantaged district in Houston creates a D&D club that motivates students to want to read and think analytically. A writer and live-streamer demonstrates how D&D–inspired communication breaks barriers and empowers people of color. Readers will see why Dungeons & Dragons has remained such a pop culture phenomenon and how it has given this disparate and growing community the inspiration to flourish and spread some in-game magic into the real world.

New Book :: All This Thinking

All This Thinking: The Correspondence of Bernadetter Mayer and Clark Coolidge
Edited by Stephanie Anderson and Kristen Tapson book cover image

All This Thinking: The Correspondence of Bernadetter Mayer and Clark Coolidge
Edited by Stephanie Anderson and Kristen Tapson
University of New Mexico Press, December 2022

All This Thinking explores the deep friendship and the critical and creative thinking between Bernadette Mayer and Clark Coolidge, focusing on an intense three-year period in their three decades of correspondence. These fiercely independent American avant-garde poets have influenced and shaped poets and poetic movements by looking for radical poetics in the everyday. This collection of letters provides insight into the poetic scenes that followed World War II while showcasing the artistic practices of Mayer and Coolidge themselves. A fascinating look at both the poets and the world surrounding them, All This Thinking will appeal to all readers interested in post-World War II poetry.

To find more great books from small, independent, and university presses, visit the NewPages Guide to Publishers as well as the New Books category on our blog. Click here to sign up for our weekly newsletter to stay up to date!

Magazine Stand :: Still Point Arts Quarterly – Winter 2022

Still Point Arts Quarterly Winter 2022 issue cover image

Still Point Arts Quarterly says this about its publication: “a truly beautiful and engaging art and literary journal.” Having held this quarterly in my hands and viewed it online many times over the years, I can attest that this is no hyperbole. Produced four times a year, each issue focuses on a theme and features historical and contemporary art, fiction, non-fiction, and poetry. “The Quarterly has been praised for its rich content as well as its splendid layout and design. Intended for artists, nature lovers, seekers, and enthusiasts of all types.” Themed Cities: Centers of Culture and Creativity, the newest issue holds good to these promises, with art and writing spanning the globe from San Francisco with “Walking Through Time” by Mitchell Near; Nanjing, China with “An Intersection of Time” by Dwight E. Watson; to Carl Boon’s “My Chicago,” Vivien Zielin’s “The Artistic Delicacies of Paris,” and David McVey’s “Glasgow in Squares” – just to name a few. Featured artists include Lorin Cary, Laruen Curtis, Linda Woolven, Theodosia A. G. Tamborlane, Lori Arbel, JoAnn Telemdschinow, David A. Goodrum, Deborah McGill, Caroline de Mauriac, MJU Edwards, Rosalie Sanara Petrouske, Mark Saba, Lu Lius, Nanci Stoeffler, and Jane Gottlieb. The publication is free to read online and available to purchase in print.

Magazine Stand :: Hole in the Head re:View – Issue 3.4

Hole in the Head re:View online magazine of poetry and art November 2022 issue cover image

Celebrating their third year of publication, Hole in the Head re:View has attracted readers, writers, photographers, and artists from around the globe – 130 different countries, from Albania to Zambia, with nearly 200,000 page views and 30,000 unique visitors/readers. Sounds like a good place to read and be read! And though the day has passed, there’s much to be gleaned from this issue’s special section, “Headlines – Thanksgiving recipes, real & imagined” with works from Fannie Flagg, Christopher Rubio-Goldsmith, Virginia Elizabeth Hayes, Pamela Sumners, Phyllis Schwartz, William Welch, Anne Rankin, Diana Tokaji, Jeanne Julian, Maxine Susman, and Tricia Knoll. The rest of the issue is rounded out with poetry and artwork from over 30 more contributors – all free to read online.

Review :: “Sufjan Stevens and How I Taught Myself to Cry” by Robin Gow

Mina Weeks review of "Sufjan Stevens and How I Taught Myself to Cry" by Robin Gow published in Cream City Review literary magazine cover image

Guest Post by Mina Weeks

Like the famous Milwaukee cream-colored bricks, Cream City Review’s Winter 2021 issue stands out from the crowd with its focus on marginalized works and experiences. In Robin Gow’s “Sufjan Stevens and How I Taught Myself to Cry,” the beauty and heartache of the trans experience dance with the anguish of familial trauma and bittersweet aftertaste of romance gone wrong. The inability to cry—and its ties to testosterone and holding oneself together with mere stitches—explores the helplessness of bottled-up emotions through the lens of singer/songwriter Sufjan Stevens, whose famously morose lyrics wield the power of tightened chests and melancholic sighs. Through this, Gow expertly captures the trans experience and its ties to emotional suppression and release.


“Sufjan Stevens and How I Taught Myself to Cry” by Robin Gow. Cream City Review, Fall/Winter 2021.

Reviewer bio: Mina Weeks (they/she) is a multi-marginalised K-pop stan who tweets, teaches, and writes fanfiction to get them through their existence. Find them on Twitter @minami_noel or on Instagram @meena.noel.

New Book :: An Audible Blue

An Audible Blue: Selected Poems 1963-2016
Poetry by Klaus Merz translated by Marc Vincenz published by White Pine Press book cover image

An Audible Blue: Selected Poems 1963-2016
Poetry by Klaus Merz, Trans. by Marc Vincenz
White Pine Press, November 2022

Throughout his career, Swiss Poet Klaus Merz has been praised as an artisan of the understatement, and it is precisely in these smallest of details that the great unexpected has the potential to be illuminated. As Merz himself has said: “The poetry nudges toward a secret, hopefully without ostentation, rather through the power of its own alphabet.” This seminal volume brings together selections from Merz’s fifteen collections of poetry (1963-2016). Marc Vincenz is a poet, translator, fiction writer, editor, musician and artist. He has published over 30 books of poetry, fiction and translation. His newest books are There Might Be a Moon or a Dog (Gazebo, Australia, 2022) and The Pearl Diver of Irunmani (White Pine Press, forthcoming 2023).

Magazine Stand :: The Baltimore Review – Fall 2022

The Baltimore Review online literary magazine Fall 2022 issue cover image

The editors invite readers to the Fall 2022 online issue of The Baltimore Review by considering our relationships to reading and writing and the universe, “When we read and write, aren’t we trying to bring order to the intellectual and emotional universe, at least our small piece of it? With whatever tools we have. Though the landscape is bound to change. Or maybe we just need to go outside and be in the world.” Perhaps a little of each, a balance, which readers can seek in the Fall 2022 Baltimore Review filled with poetry, fiction, and nonfiction by contributors Matt Barrett, Michael Beard, Brecht De Poortere, Gustavo Pérez Firmat, Jared Hanson, Marcia L. Hurlow, Kael Knight, Lance Larsen, Winshen Liu, Susan Blackwell Ramsey, ZG Tomaszewski, Donna Vorreyer, Lydia Waites, and Lucy Zhang.

Review :: “A Place I Didn’t Try to Die in Los Angeles” by Jenny Catlin

Taylor Franson review of "A Place I didn't Try to Die in Los Angeles" by Jenny Catlin published in The Gettysburg Review headshot image of Catlin

Guest Post by Taylor Franson

Jenny Catlin’s [pictured] essay, “A Place I Didn’t Try to Die in Los Angeles,” touches on themes of shame, women’s lack of power, and personal agency. Throughout the piece are moments of dry humor, contrasted with surprising moments of tenderness. Catlin’s prose is both incredibly poignant and incredibly scathing. Her ability to create stark and bold images, while commenting on societal issues is phenomenal. You cheer for her, as she decides not to die, and moan as she makes other choices detrimental to her life. You cannot help but cry with her as she cries in “the Nut” (the now-closed seedy Nutel Motel), and understand what she means when she writes, “There is a kind of alone that only exists in cities as big as Los Angeles.” The piece is infused with emotion and power. Catlin’s diction carries the essay and sets the tone for the entirety of the piece as they expertly balance harsh realities with the inner turmoil that follows. Many women who have felt powerless and forced into difficult choices will not only relate to Catlin’s essay but may see a direct reflection of themselves here as well.


“A Place I Didn’t Try to Die in Los Angeles” by Jenny Catlin. The Gettysburg Review,

Reviewer bio: Taylor Franson Thiel is a creative writing graduate student at Utah State University. She wrote this review because she had to for a class, but she means every word. She can be found on Twitter @TaylorFranson

New Book :: Disbound

Disbound poetry by Hajar Hussaini published by University of Iowa Press book cover image

Disbound by Hajar Hussaini
University of Iowa Press, November 2022

Hajar Hussaini’s poems in Disbound scrutinize the social, political, and historical traces inherited from one’s language. The traces she finds—the flow of international commodities implied in a plosive consonant, an image of the world’s nations convening to reject the full stop—retrieve a personal history between countries (Afghanistan and the United States) and languages (Persian and English) that has been constantly disrupted and distorted by war, governments, and media. Hussaini sees the subjectivity emerging out of these traces as mirroring the governments to whom she has been subject, blurring the line between her identity and her legal identification. The poems of Disbound seek beauty and understanding in sadness and confusion, and find the chance for love in displacement, even as the space for reconciliation in politics and thought seems to get narrower.

Review :: “Shame” by Elizabeth Lindsey Rogers

"Shame" by Elizabeth Lindsey Rogers review by Lauren McKinnon from Cincinnati Review issue 19.1 2022 literary magazine cover image

Guest Post by Lauren McKinnon

Elizabeth Lindsey Rogers explores isolation, class, and gender in her nonfiction essay, “Shame.” Set mostly in Guilford County, North Carolina, Rogers recollects her complicated relationship with her grandparents who live secluded on a gothic farm. Rogers sympathizes with her grandmother’s inability to escape a marriage to a man who acts as a family patriarch and predator. When Rogers graduates high school and attends Oberlin University, she fulfills a dream of higher education her grandma could never afford. Despite the liberal, nerdy, queer community Roger finds on campus, she feels out of place and looked down upon because of her ties to small town Guilford County. Rogers explores how humans value themselves above others based on class and education, both unearned privileges. She uses humor and calculated characterization of her grandmother to show readers how isolating it is to exist on the edges. The essay ends with a haunting image of Roger’s grandma, trapped behind the glass window above her sink, washing the dishes, staring at the view of an eroding barn and fields of clay. The image humanizes isolation as women observe the world around them but are unable to fully participate.


“Shame” by Elizabeth Lindsey Rogers. The Cincinnati Review, 19.1, Spring 2022.

Reviewer bio: Lauren McKinnon is a creative writing master’s student at Utah State University. She teaches English and is the Assistant Graduate Director of Composition. Lauren is currently writing her first book of poetry about the Southern Utah desert, motherhood, and woman’s bodies.

Magazine Stand :: Valley Voices – Fall 2022

Valley Voices print literary magazine fall 2022 issue cover image

The call for the Fall 2022 issue of Valley Voices (v22 n2) was themed, “Where Are You From?” and meant to be a simple question that may not have a simple answer. In his introduction, John Zheng writes, “There are different answers because the question can be geographical, political, racial, and ethnic, it can also mean curiosity, attitude, suspicion, or exclusion.” This issue spotlights Mississippi Delta poet and musician Jack Crocker, and in response to the call, includes over 100 pages of nonfiction, fiction, poetry, and reviews. A full table of contents can be found for each issue on the Valley Voices‘ website. Writers – the next call for submissions ends December 30, 2022, and the theme for their spring issue is “Goodbye.”

New Book :: Goddess of Water

Goddess of Water, poetry by Jeannette L. Clariond translated by Samantha Schnee published by World Poetry Books book cover image

Goddess of Water by Jeannette L. Clariond
Trans. Samantha Schnee
World Poetry Books, September 2022

Mexican poet Jeannette L. Clariond’s Goddess of Water draws upon Mesoamerican cosmogony to lament the present-day epidemic of femicides in Mexico. The author’s sixth book in English translation reconstructs the myth of the moon goddess Coyolxauhqui, employing the lyricism of Nahuatl philosophy and investigating gender construction and fluidity in Aztec mythology. Printed in a bilingual edition, the cycle of poems is accompanied by a glossary of the Nahuatl words and Aztec concepts critical to its comprehension. In Samantha Schnee’s keen and urgent translation, this collection of poems presents a surprising window on an invisible war waged against thousands of Mexican women. Clariond astounds us with her ability to painstakingly analyze a phenomenon that has drawn attention around the globe. Translator Samantha Schnee is the founding editor of Words Without Borders. Her translation of Carmen Boullosa’s El libro de Eva, a finalist for the Mario Vargas Llosa Biennial Novel Prize, will be published by Deep Vellum in 2023.

Review :: “Deathbed” by Anna B. Moore

Pembroke Magazine number 54 print literary magazine cover image

Guest Post by Sandra Edwards

Anna B. Moore’s “Deathbed” essay in Pembroke Magazine describes the end of her father’s life from her perspective as his primary caretaker. As a narrator, she questions her relationship with her father, but her feelings seem to change as she navigates his dying state. Rather than being a story of redemption or some other giant paradigmatic shift, it is instead one of understanding as she reflects on her father’s character. Interwoven with this narrative is her experience staying in a rented basement apartment while she is away to take care of her father.

Each scene offers details that serve to characterize her father, such as the description of his bedside table in the hospital: “Cluttered with old books, used drinking glasses, folded newspapers, used Kleenexes, his wallet, some coins and pens, a magnifying glass.” She also emphasizes his breathing throughout the piece, almost rhythmically, so that we not only see his physical deterioration into death, but also gain insight into his feelings just as she does. A seemingly simple piece on the surface, Moore captivates the reader and approaches the subject of death in a familiar yet sincere way.


“Deathbed” by Anna B. Moore. Pembroke Magazine, #54, 2022.

Reviewer bio: Sandra Edwards is a college student and aspiring writer currently pursuing her master’s degree.

New Book :: The Morning You Saw a Train of Stars Streaking Across the Sky

The Morning You Saw a Train of Stars Streaking Across the Sky poetry by CooXooEii Black published by Rattle Poetry book cover image

The Morning You Saw a Train of Stars Streaking Across the Sky by CooXooEii Black
Rattle Poetry, November 2022

CooXooEii Black is an Afro-Indigenous writer and a member of the Northern Arapaho Tribe. He is an MFA creative writing candidate at the University of Memphis and a poetry reader for The Pinch Journal. His poetry has appeared in Eco Theo Review, Palette Poetry, and Carve Magazine. His creative nonfiction has appeared in The Tusculum Review. This collection of sixteen poems came bundled with the December issue of Rattle poetry magazine. Subscribers to Rattle are treated to bonus chapbooks and anthologies with each issue, but each issue and each bonus publication can also be purchased separately from the Rattle website.

Books Received December 2022

NewPages receives many wonderful titles each month to share with our readers. You can read more about some of these titles by clicking on “New Books” under the NewPages Blog or Books tab on the menu. If you are a publisher or author looking to be listed here or featured on our blog and social media, please contact us!

Poetry

After Ward, Wendell Hawken, Cherry Grove Collections
Alone in the House of My Heart, Kari Gunter-Seymour, Swallow Press
Born Under the Influence, Andrena Zawinski, Word Poetry
The Day Gives Us So Many Ways to Eat, Lindsay Wilson, WordTech Editions
Disbound, Hajar Hussaini, University of Iowa Press
Edgewood, Mark Belair, Turning Point Books
Goddess of Water, Jeannette L. Clariond, World Poetry Books
In the Plague Year, W.H. New, Rock’s Mills Press
It’s About Time, J.R. Solonche, Deerbook Editions
John Scotus Eriugena at Laon and Other Poems, Jacques Darras, World Poetry Books
Leaving the Base Camp at Dawn, Daniel Thomas, Cherry Grove Collections
Little Disruptions, Biljana D. Obradovic, WordTech Editions
Little Wife: The Story of Gold, Nuova Wright, The Calliope Group
Lords of Misrule, ed. Henry Israeli and Rebecca Lauren, Saturnalia Books

Continue reading “Books Received December 2022”

Magazine Stand :: Cave Wall – #17

Magazine Stand Cave Wall #17 cover image

In the introduction to Cave Wall #17, Editor Rhett Iseman Trull addresses the feeling I’m sure many of us have experienced – repeatedly – given all we witness in the world around us: What good are we doing writing poems? In response, she writes, “I get it. Language feels futile. A poem can’t cure disease or stop a war or bring back the dead. I hear many poets ask it in time of tragedy/atrocity: What good are poems? Well, here. Read this issue. It’s the only way I know who to answer that question.” Helping Trull answer that question in this issue, readers can find poetry by Angelique Zobitz, Dion O’Reilly, Renee Soto, Jeffrey Bean, Benjamin S. Grossberg, Matt Mason, Roxanne Halpine Ward, Abbie Kiefer, Angela Dribben, Devon Miller-Duggan, Erik Jonah, Julie Hanson, Angela Sucich, Dannye Romine Powell, Brady Thomas Kamphenkel, M.L. Brown, Ellen Kombiyil, Ruth Dickey, John Poch, Han Vanderhart, John Krumberger, Brandon Amico, Laure-Anne Bosselaar, Anne McCrary Sullivan, and artwork by Elvia Perrin.

New Book :: Dancing on the Sun Stone

Dancing on the Sun Stone: Mexican Women and the Gendered Politics of Octavio Paz by Marjorie Becker book cover image

Dancing on the Sun Stone: Mexican Women and the Gendered Politics of Octavio Paz by Marjorie Becker
University of New Mexico Press, December 2022

Dancing on the Sun Stone is a uniquely transdisciplinary work that fuses modern Latin American history and literature to explore women’s lives and gendered politics in Mexico. In this important work, scholar Marjorie Becker focuses on the complex Mexican women of rural Michoacán who performed an illicit revolutionary dance and places it in dialogue with Nobel Prize winner Octavio Paz’s signature poem, “Sun Stone”–allowing a new gendered history to emerge. Through this dialogue, the women reveal intimate and intellectual complexities of Mexican women’s gendered voices, their histories, and their intimate and public lives. The work further demonstrates the ways these women, in dialogue with Paz, transformed history itself. Becker’s multigenre work reconstructs Mexican history through the temporal experiences of crucial Michoacán females, experiences that culminate in their complex revolutionary dance, which itself emerges as a transformative revolutionary language.

To find more great books from small, independent, and university presses, visit the NewPages Guide to Publishers as well as the New Books category on our blog. Click here to sign up for our weekly newsletter to stay up to date!

New Book :: John Scotus Eriugena at Laon

John Scotus Eriugena at Laon and Other Poems by Jacques Darras translated by Richard Sieburth published by World Poetry Books book cover image

John Scotus Eriugena at Laon and Other Poems
Poetry by Jacques Darras, Trans. Richard Sieburth
World Poetry Books, September 2022

John Scotus Eriugena at Laon is the “long overdue volume” of Jacques Darras, celebrated French poet of place and nature, and prolific translator and scholar of American and British poetry. The title poem recounts the journey of a ninth-century Irish monk to the cathedral city of Laon in the heart of Picardy to translate a recently discovered Byzantine manuscript into Latin—the first such transmission of ancient Greek thought northward into Carolingian Europe. Eriugena’s pithy formulation of neo-Platonism—omnia quae sunt lumina sunt—echoes forth in Pound’s Pisan Cantos as “all things that are are lights.” This is the radiance that pulses through the theophanic nature poetry of Jacques Darras, celebrant of northern rivers, islands, seas, and bard of Picardy. His lifelong commerce with the English language as the translator of Shakespeare, Blake, Whitman, Pound, Bunting and MacDiarmid is here met by Richard Sieburth’s wide-ranging and award-winning forays into French. Richard Sieburth is the translator from the French of works by Nostradamus, Scève, Labé, Nerval, Baudelaire, Artaud, Leiris, and Michaux. His translations from the German include Hölderlin, Büchner, Benjamin, and Scholem. In addition, he is the editor of a number of Ezra Pound’s works.

New Book :: Until She Goes No More

Until She Goes No More fiction by Beatriz García-Huidobro translated by Jacqueline Nanfito published by White Pine Press book cover image

Until She Goes No More
Fiction by Beatriz García-Huidobro, Trans. by Jacqueline Nanfito
White Pine Press, November 2022

In Until She Goes No More, Beatriz García-Huidobro simultaneously maps the coordinates of the intimate story of a female teenager and the broader historical and socioeconomic reality of Chile in the early 70’s. The story is narrated in the form of a monologue, through the eyes of a young female protagonist who resides in desolate town in the mountainous region where the landscape is bleak and barren, and men futilely toil in unproductive fields. The aridness of the land mirrors the hopeless and hapless lives of the characters whose dreams are futile and futures are compromised. Like silhouettes in sepia, the protagonist and others are sketched as characters that live out a wearisome, tenuous existence, shrouded in ambiguity, in a circular time that is based upon the repetition of daily chores and the changing of the seasons, marked by the events in the life cycle.

Lit Mag Review :: Reckoning – Issue 6

Reckoning literary art magazine issue number 6 2022 cover image

Guest Post by Jacob Taylor

The sixth issue of Reckoning: Creative Writing on Environmental Justice gathers the words of diverse writers from around the world as they grapple with the future of our planet. This collection of fiction, essays, and poetry tells unflinching stories of Earth’s recent past and speculates on its future in vivid detail. Brothers dive for rare silvery sludge in the submerged streets of Oakland; wildfires tear through dry forests while governors calculate how much the burning lumber is worth (not enough to put out the fires); teens turn into trees (they thought it was just a phase at first), and then mothers do too; another strange chemical leaks into our water supply (GenX); oil rigs rape Mother Earth, and she retaliates without apology; Orocobix battles island-eating machines, and a trash compacter engineered to clean up Earth while humanity evacuates decides to nurture a colony of rats instead. The complex worldbuilding throughout the speculative pieces is particularly engaging and provides a nice contrast to the pieces that evaluate Earth’s present state. Much of the writing draws clear inspiration from recent social movements and the COVID-19 pandemic, making this publication both relevant and relatable.


Reckoning: Creative Writing on Environmental Justice, Issue 6, 2022.

Reviewer bio: Jacob Taylor is a queer writer based in northern Utah, where they are currently completing an MA in creative writing at Utah State University.

Magazine Stand :: Rattle – Winter 2022

Rattle poetry magazine Winter 2022 issue cover image

Rattle #78 is the poetry journal’s annual prize winner issue, featuring the First Prize poem, “Shoes” by L. Renée as well as ten Finalists. The “open section” features a rich mix of eclectic poetry, including reader-favorites Ted Kooser and Kwame Dawes, and a heroic crown of sonnets by Anna M. Evans that attempt to bridge political divides. The conversation section takes a deep dive into the divided brain with psychiatrist and philosopher Iain McGilchrist, who explains the role the two hemispheres, with their completely unique perspectives on the world, play in creativity. The discussion also includes how the modern world has come to be dominated by the left hemisphere’s narrow focus and how poetry is an antidote to “the matter with things.” In addition to the quarterly publication, subscribers also receive a new bonus chapbook from the Rattle Chapbook Series and other stand-alone anthologies, like the annual Rattle Young Poets Anthology. What a lovely gift a subscription to Rattle would make for anyone on your holiday list – that includes you!

New Book :: My Dear Comrades

My Dear Comrades poetry by Sunu P Chandy book cover image

My Dear Comrades by Sunu P. Chandy
Regal House Publishing, March 2023

In this poetry collection, Sunu P. Chandy includes stories about her experiences as a woman, civil rights attorney, parent, partner, daughter of South Asian immigrants, and member of the LGBTQ community with themes ranging from immigration, social justice activism, friendship loss, fertility challenges, adoption, caregiving, and life during a pandemic. Amidst the competing notions of how we are expected to be in the world, especially when facing a range of barriers, Sunu’s poems provide company for many who may be experiencing isolation through any one of these experiences and remind us that we are not, in fact, going it alone. Whether the experience is being disregarded as a woman of color attorney, being rejected for being queer, losing a most treasured friendship, doubting one’s romantic partner or any other form of heartbreak, Sunu highlights the human requirement of continually starting anew. These poems remind us that we can, and we will, rebuild. They remind us that whether or not we know it, there are comrades who are on parallel roads too, and that as a collective, we are, undoubtedly, cheering each other on.

To find more great books from small, independent, and university presses, visit the NewPages Guide to Publishers as well as the New Books category on our blog. Click here to sign up for our weekly newsletter to stay up to date!

Review :: “Plague Novel” by George Estreich

George Estreich author of "Plague Novel" published in Southern Humanities Review v55 n2 2022 headshot image

Guest Post by Zackary Gregory

In the short essay “Plague Novel,” published in Southern Humanities Review, George Estreich [pictured] uses Colson Whitehead’s novel Zone One to make sense of his lived experience through the outbreak of Covid-19.

The essay begins in a small room filled with the “breath and bodies” of people slowly exiting a literary reception. A poet approaches and asks, “You write about science. Should we be worried about this coronavirus thing?” Estreich responds by “disavowing expertise,” but states that from what little he has read, “our behavior mattered.” In “a few weeks the great blur would begin,” people would start hoarding rolls of toilet paper in sparse grocery stores and his “hands would be cracked and raw” from applying hand sanitizer.

Estreich threads in a rich literary analysis of Zone One, drawing parallels and using scenes from the novel to name the mania caused by the pandemic. He describes Americans responding to crises like the characters in the novel, “Zombie-like, they cling to old routines, old stories, as the world falls apart around them.” Estreich claims the novel was “an escape true to the present’s depths,” depths he wouldn’t be able to plumb without Whitehead’s novel.


Plague Novel” by George Estreich. Southern Humanities Review, v55 n2, 2022.

Reviewer bio: Zackary Gregory (He/him) is an English grad student at Utah State University in Logan, Utah. He likes bikes and books.

Magazine Stand :: Blink-Ink – 50

Blink-Ink print literary magazine issue number 50 cover image

Persisting in print despite the rising costs, Blink-Ink continues to delight readers with its zine-style 4×5 format filled with works of no more than 50 words each. The newest issue is themed “Country Roads” and includes 25 works. Additionally, Blink-Ink offers subscribers a bonus publication along with other “goodies and surprises.” With this issue, readers get the “goody” publication Songbirds of North America that features 8 bird-related works. Visit their website for subscription information – and consider gifting this unique journal to arrive throughout the new year!

New Book :: Urbanshee

Urbanshee poetry by Siaara Freeman published by Button Poetry book cover image

Urbanshee
Poetry by Siaara Freeman
Button Poetry, July 2022

Urbanshee is Siaara Freeman’s retelling of fairy tales and mythological stories through a modern and urban lens. This collection discusses the weight of being Black in America, Freeman’s relationships to lovers and family, and how the physical place you grew up can become part of your identity. Urbanshee expertly combines humor, fantasy, and raw emotion to create this astonishing reinvention of classic fables. Freeman’s poems are ventrously unique and are sure to enchant anyone who reads them. Siaara Freeman is from Cleveland Ohio, where she is the current Lake Erie Siren and a teaching artist for Center For Arts Inspired Learning and The Sisterhood Project in conjunction with the Anisfieldwolf Foundation.

New Book :: Best Spiritual Literature Vol. 7

Best Spiritual Literature, Vol. 7 edited by Luke Hankin, Nathan Poole, Karen Tucker published by Orison Books book cover image

Best Spiritual Literature, Vol. 7
Edited by Luke Hankin, Nathan Poole, Karen Tucker
Orison Books, December 2022

Best Spiritual Literature is the new name of The Orison Anthology, under the same editorship and publisher, and it continues the same mission to collect the finest spiritually engaged writing that appeared in periodicals in the preceding year. In addition to reprinted material, each year the anthology also includes new, previously unpublished works of fiction, nonfiction, and poetry by the winners of The Best Spiritual Literature Awards. The award judges for Vol. 7 were SJ Sindu (fiction), Molly McCully Brown (nonfiction), and Leila Chatti (poetry). Contributors to this volume include Ser Álida, Jai Hamid Bashir, Ellen Bass, Jack B. Bedell, Wendy Cheng, Broderick Eaton, B. Tyler Lee, Kenji C. Liu, Nancy Ludmerer, Joy Moore, David Naimon, Darius Simpson, and Gideon Young.