99 Books That Capture the Spirit of Africa + 1 on the verge

From the desert of Algeria to the savannahs of Kenya and the jungles of Equatorial Guinea, A Basket of Leaves: 99 Books That Capture the Spirit of Africa is a quintessential reader's guide that includes reviews and excerpts from notable books for each of Africa's 54 countries.

This collection explores many of the best-known works on Africa, such as Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe (Nigeria), All God's Children Need Traveling Shoes by Maya Angelou (Ghana), The Viceroy of Ouidah by Bruce Chatwin (Benin), Age of Iron by J.M. Coetzee (South Africa), Gorillas in the Mist by Dian Fossey (Rwanda), and When Rain Clouds Gather by Bessie Head (Botswana). The book is published by South-African publisher Jacana Media (worth visiting).

Geoff Wisner is an essayist and book reviewer with a focus on Africa, the Caribbean, and environmental issues. He blogs about African literature in translation at Words Without Borders.

Book on the verge:
Call for Support for "African Lives" anthology
Currently Geoff Wisner is looking for support for his second book, African Lives: An Anthology of Memoirs and Autobiographies. The book will appear next spring from Lynne Rienner Publishers. In order to bring the anthology to print, he still needs to raise an estimated $3,000 by September 5, so far 56% are funded - visit Worlds Without Borders for more: African Lives

Walking the Tiger's Path - Paul Kendel (Tendril)

Paul Kendel's book Walking the Tiger's Path - A Soldier’s Spiritual Journey in Iraq addresses the horrors of war from an extraordinary human perspective.

In 2005, Paul Kendel deployed with his National Guard unit out of Georgia to Iraq, hoping to use his knowledge of that land to bridge the gap between American soldiers and Iraqi civilians. However, the realities of war crushed his idealism when his buddies began dying at the hands of the enemy. Eventually, his ongoing concern for the Iraqi people alienated some of his comrades, and he felt the sting of growing conflict within himself.

Turning to the books on Buddhist teachings he had brought with him, he found solace in the written words. On a whim, he emailed Shambhala International and requested assistance. An unexpected response and ongoing support from Buddhist teacher and meditation instructor Margot Neuman helped him to retain a sane and humble humanity in a situation that often plummeted into lethal insanity.

An excerpt of the book is online at Issuu: Walking the Tiger's Path.

Paul M. Kendel’s (SSG Ret.) first experience with the current “War on Terror” began with a deployment to Saudi Arabia with the California National Guard following 9/11. In 2005, the military deployed him to Iraq. Kendel holds an M.A. in both History and Anthropology, and is currently teaching world history and special education in Jacksonville, Florida.

About Tendril Press
Tendril Press is a selective independent Press publishing thought provoking, educational, inspirational and humanitarian books for adults and children.

Paul Kendel: Walking the Tiger's Path
A Soldier’s Spiritual Journey in Iraq
320 pages

related links: the human condition, east/west, nonfiction

Persist: In Praise of the Creative Spirit in a World Gone Mad with Commerce - Peter Clothier (Parami)

Persist: In Praise of the Creative Spirit in a World Gone Mad with Commerce is a collection of essays spanning thirty years of engagement with the culture of our times. Peter Clothier is a long-time student of the dharma and a meditation practitioner. In this context he examines the qualities of compassion, perseverance, and discernment in his reflections on the artist’s predicament in a world that judges success in terms of celebrity and material reward. Persist explores ways today's artists in any medium can find fulfillment, a sense of purpose, and joy in alternative and more lasting values.

Peter Clothier has served as an educator and an art school dean variously at the University of Southern California, Otis Art Institute and Loyola Marymount University. Clothier left academia many years ago to devote himself full time to his writing. He still describes himself as a “recovering academic.” A student of the dharma who follows a daily meditation practice, he is the author of the online weblog, The Buddha Diaries; his political passions find their outlet in his regular contributions to The Huffington Post.

About Parami Press
Parami Press is an independent book publisher situated in Vancouver, Canada, and focuses on books from a Buddhist point of view. Their book program includes:  "One Monk, Many Masters - The Wanderings of a a Simple Buddhist Traveler" by Paul Breiter; "The Ten Perfections - a Study Guide" by Thanissaro Bhikku and "Mapping the Dharma" by Paul Gerhards.

Peter Clothier: Persist
collected essays
132 pages
ISBN: 978-0-9779774-1-3

note: this book feature was inspired by Jean Morris' blog post "Persist"

Spiral Jetta - Erin Hogan (University of Chicago)

Erin Hogan hit the road in her Volkswagen Jetta and headed west from Chicago in search of the monuments of American land art: a salty coil of rocks, four hundred stainless steel poles, a gash in a mesa, four concrete tubes, and military sheds filled with cubes. Her journey took her through the states of Utah, Nevada, New Mexico, Arizona, and Texas. It also took her through the states of anxiety, drunkenness, disorientation, and heat exhaustion. Spiral Jetta is a chronicle of this journey.

Spiral Jetta is the current free e-book of the month at Chicago Press. There also is an interview with Hogan online.

"Hogan’s pilgrimage, sparsely illustrated, is part well-informed art historical travelogue and part light foray into self-discovery."—Publishers Weekly

Erin Hogan is director of public affairs at the Art Institute of Chicago.

About the University of Chicago Press
The Books Division of the University of Chicago Press has been publishing books for scholars, students, and general readers since 1892. The Books Division has published over eleven thousand books since the Press was founded. It has more than five thousand books in print at the present time.

Erin Hogan: Spiral Jetta
e-book: e-book-of-the-month page
190 pages, 2008
non-fiction, art, travel

editor's note: there is a related review on this book online in the editor's blog, including photo+video links to some of the featured land art, quotes, and a "Spiral Jetty" travel report of an art blogger: "Spiral Jetty & Arches - a road / art trip"

a brief guide to world domination (or: The Art of Non-Conformity) - Chris Guillebeau

The Art of Non-Conformity project by Chris Guillebeau chronicles notes on how to change the world by achieving significant, personal goals while helping others at the same time. In the battle against conventional beliefs, Guillebeau focuses on three areas: Life, Work, and Travel.

Guillebeau is especially interested in the convergence between highly personal goals and service to others. He uses the metaphor of world domination (ruling and changing the world at the same time) to highlight all the things that can be achieved by choosing to live with gratitude and purpose.

His Brief Guide to World Domination was read by more than 100,000 people in 60 countries during the first six months.

The essence of Guillebeua's philosophy is:
1. You don’t have to live your life the way other people expect you to.
2. You can do good things for yourself and help other people at the same time.
3. If you don’t decide for yourself what you want to get out of life, someone else will probably end up deciding for you.
4. There is usually more than one way to accomplish something.

Chris Guillebeau spent 4 years in West Africa as a volunteer. He is a writer, entrepreneur, and world traveler with the goal of visiting every country in the world. When not traveling, he lives in Portland, Oregon and publishes the Art of Nonconformity blog.

Brief Guide to World Domination
free e-book

related links: e-book, non-fiction, the world these days

Outside Voices - Jake Berry & Jeffrey Side (Otoliths)

Outside Voices is the protocol of an 18-month transatlantic email correspondence between poet, musician and artist Jake Berry and Argotist-editor Jeffrey Side, it ranges across and intertwines a variety of topics that include: poetry and music; film and TV; the changes in culture over the past few decades; the differences in regional U.S. and U.K. accents; the difficulty of reaching the famous in order to interview them; the songwriter as poet and vice versa. Two excerpts of the book are online in Jeffrey Side's blog: Published Email Correspondence.

Jeffrey Side is the editor of Argotist Online, a magazine that it is devoted entirely to poetry and poetics and has an own Ebooks-section.

Jake Berry is a poet, musician and visual artist, and the author of Brambu Drezi, Species of Abandoned Light, Drafts of the Sorcery, and numerous other books. He has been an active member of the global arts and literary community for more than 25 years. Recently, he created a cut-up long poem with Craig Hill, which is available as free dowload: SIXIXSIX

About Otoliths
Otoliths is a magazine of many e-things, published by Mark Young, Australia. The online issue of Otoliths appears quarterly, the current issue is: southern spring, 2010. The publishing arm of Otoliths began as print editions of the e-zine Otoliths, but has since expanded to include books & chapbooks by authors associated with the journal. Recent publications include Unable to Fully California by Larry Sawyer and A Marzipan Factory by Grzegorz Wróblewski.

Jake Berry & Jeffrey Side: Outside Voices
Print: $13.45

Ten Walks/Two Talks - Jon Cotner and Andy Fitch (Ugly Duckling)

Ten Walks/Two Talks combines a series of sixty-minute, sixty-sentence walks around Manhattan with a pair of roving dialogues—one of which takes place during a late-night "philosophical" ramble through Central Park. Mapping 21st-century New York, Cotner and Fitch update the meandering and meditative form of Basho's travel diaries to construct a descriptive/dialogic fugue.

Jon Cotner and Andy Fitch have performed their dialogic improvisations across the country and internationally. They recently completed another collaborative manuscript called Conversations over Stolen Food. The audio magazine textsound (which is worth a visit itself) features 8+ hours of their solo and collaborative work in a special issue: Improvisations 2006-2010.

Fitch's critical study Not Intelligent, But Smart: Rethinking Joe Brainard is forthcoming from Dalkey Archive Press. Cotner lives in New York City. Fitch is an assistant professor in the University of Wyoming's MFA Program.

About Ugly Duckling Presse
Created by a group of artists and writers without commercial publishing experience, Ugly Duckling Presse has a unique publishing structure with a non-hierarchical editorial collective at its heart. Growing out of the Ugly Duckling zine of the early 1990s, and incorporated as a not-for-profit art & publishing collective in 2002, UDP produces small to mid-size editions of new poetry, translations, lost works, and artist’s books, averaging more than 25 titles a year. The Presse favors emerging, international, and “forgotten” writers with well-defined formal or conceptual projects that are difficult to place at other presses

Jon Cotner + Andy Fitch: Ten Walks/Two Talks
Poetry/Nonfiction
88 pages, $14
ISBN 978-1-933254-67-8

first issue: #3

#3 is a quarterly, independent not-for-profit journal bringing together art and art theory from various global contexts. The editors of #3 are interested in "collaborations with artists, designers, writers and curators from across all media and cultures."The first issue of #3 now launched - the full issue is available as pdf-download: #3 / Vol.1.

The issue features a wide range of themes: architecture, art, media, sociology, for example: "Trace & Intent" by Daniel Staincliffe, "Welcome to the Labyrinth (an excerpt from Sex, Death and Design in the Digital Culture)" by Ken Hollings, "Faces and Phases - an excerpt from "Mapping Our Histories: A Visual History of Black Lesbians in Post-Apartheid South Africa" by Zanele Muholi and
"A Constructed Conversation (between Kay Rosen and Virgina Woolf)" by Kay Rosen - if you like visuals / wordart, make sure to check out the Kay Rosen link, it leads to an online wordart exhibition room.

Also included: a thought-provoking interview with Paolo Pedercini, an artist and game designer who explores the intersection between gaming and politics - here one of the interview questions: "The anti-WTO slogan often credited to Jello Biafara, “Don’t hate the media, become the media,” is cited on your website, and you teach a course at Carnegie Mellon titled “Game Design for Artists, Mavericks, and Troublemakers.” You seem to theorize resistance to major entertainment corporations and, as you stated, are concerned with the opaqueness of more “serious” games."

#3 is edited by Josh McNamara, Neal MacInnes and Hana Tanimura.

website: http://www.journal3.org/
direct pdf-link: #3 / Vol.1

I Fucked A Girl And I Liked It – Eventually by Kirsty Logan

I Fucked a Girl and I Liked It – Eventually is an essay on the truth about lesbian sex. It's also a story of creative pdf-ing:

Logan says: "I wrote it for an anthology, but then the anthology was never published. Damn, I thought to myself, I wasted a day of writing. And then I went and had a cup of tea.

It is a little-known fact that the genetics of British people mean that tea is linked to thinking. More tea = more thoughts. It took 1,539 cups for John Logie Baird to figure out the TV. It took 2,599 cups for T. S. Eliot to write ‘The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock’. It didn’t take Baudelaire any tea at all to write Les Fleurs du Mal, because he was French and needed only opium and absinthe.

Anyway, the tea fortified my brain and made me wonder if I could perhaps still get that £75 for the essay. And thus my plan was born!

If you have a spare £1 (which is US$1.50 and CA$1.60) and would like to read my personal essay, I Fucked A Girl And I Liked It – Eventually, then great! Visit my webpage, read a bit more about the essay, and if you like the idea, click the Paypal button, donate your £1, and I will email you a beautifully-designed, 1,500-word PDF."

Kirsty Logan won her first literary contest at the age of 8, and has been going mostly downhill ever since. She writes, edits, teaches, reviews books and works in a tea-shop in Glasgow, Scotland. She is currently working on her first novel, 'Little Dead Boys'. She likes coffee cupcakes and sticking pins in maps.

Kirsty Logan: I Fucked A Girl And I Liked It – Eventually
essay

related links: gender+race+age

A Thousand Sisters - Lisa Shannon (Seal Press)

A Thousand Sisters is the story of how a single moment can change a life – and the lives of others. How a life’s mission can come to you, not in contemplation, but sprawled out on the couch, watching TV:

"I had a great life—a successful business, a fiancé, a home, and security. But in the wake of my Dad’s death, and soon-to-be thirty years old, I found myself depressed, camped out in my living room watching Oprah. It was there that I learned about Congo, widely called the worst place on earth to be a woman. Awakened to the atrocities –millions dead, women being raped and tortured, children starving and dying in shocking numbers –I had to do something. A Thousand Sisters chronicles how I raised sponsorships for Congolese women, beginning with a solo 30-mile run, and then founded Run for Congo Women..." - Lisa Shannon

Lisa Shannon recently spoke about Congo and her book with ABC World News, you can watch the interview online here.

Lisa Shannon presently serves as an ambassador for Women for Women International. She previously owned a photography production company, where she served as art director and producer. She lives in her hometown of Portland, Oregon. A Thousand Sisters is her first book.

About Seal Press
Inspired by the simple yet radical notion that a book can change a woman’s life, Seal Press is devoted to publishing titles that inform, reveal, engage, delight, and support women of all ages and backgrounds. Seal Press was founded in 1976 as a small DIY publisher to provide a forum for women writers and feminist issues, and since then, Seal has published groundbreaking books that represent the diverse voices and interests of women. "From cultural revelation to pop culture, our books are smart and fun, insightful and hilarious."

Lisa Shannon: A Thousand Sisters
non-fiction, 336 pages
ISBN: 1580052967

related links: the world these days, gender + race + age, non-fiction

99 Problems - Ben Tanzer (CCLaP)

Why is it that so many full-time writers seem to be full-time runners as well, and what is it about each activity that seems to fuel the other?

In 99 Problems, Chicago author Ben Tanzer tackles this very question, penning a series of essays completed after a string of actual runs across the United States during the winter of 2009, cleverly combining the details of the run itself with what new insights he gained that day regarding whatever literary story he was working on at the time; and along the way, Tanzer also offers up astute observations on fatherhood, middle-age, and the complications of juggling traditional and artistic careers, all of it told through the funny and smart filter of pop-culture that has made this two-time novelist and national performance veteran so well-loved.

A unique and fascinating new look at the curious relationship between physical activity and creative intellectualism, 99 Problems will have you looking at the arts in an entirely new way, and maybe even picking up a pair of running shoes yourself.

Parallel to the book, CCLaP plotted a story from the book into a customized Google map, splitting the text up into a series of placemarkers located at various spots mentioned in the story: Map link. There's a blog entry about the map, too, including an embedded verison of the map and screenshots of it running in Google Earth on an iPhone: Map-Blog.

Ben Tanzer is the author of the novels Lucky Man (Manx Media), Most Likely You Go Your Way and I'll Go Mine (Orange Alert Press) and the forthcoming You Can Make Him Like You, as well as the previous CCLaP story collection Repetition Patterns. He also oversees day-to-day operations of This Zine Will Change Your Life and This Blog Will Change Your Life, the centerpiece of his vast, albeit faux, media empire.

About CCLaP
CCLaP Publishing is an imprint of the Chicago Center for Literature and Photography, an organization dedicated to promoting the best of the underground and cutting-edge arts. On top of the seven books it has put out since 2008, the center also maintains a popular website, produces a bi-monthly podcast, and hosts a growing amount of live events all over the city of Chicago.

Ben Tanzer: 99 Problems
essays about running and writing
electronic book
"Pay what you want" at website

review
a review of "99 Problems" is up in Rose Hunter's blog: 99 Problems / A Picture of a Place

Life In The Slow Lane - Thomas Sullivan (Unical)

Life In The Slow Lane recounts a year the author spent teaching driver education for a cut-rate company in Portland, Oregon. The business playbook for this family-run operation was similar to that of BP -- use something until it breaks, apologize effusively, and then don't change. However, the company became the largest operator in the state primarily because the other companies were worse. Yet, while the cars kept dying, the kids always persevered. Set in a boomtown suburb being overrun by subdivisions and new Starbucks stores, this story portrays the mid-decade shift in America from business integrity to growth and profit by any means possible.

Thomas Sullivan is a former teacher now living in Seattle. His writing has appeared in Word Riot, Dogmatika, and 3AM Magazine, among others. To view samples of Thomas’ published writing, please visit his author website.

About Unical Press
Founded in 2006, Uncial Press publishes finely crafted and well-written eBooks. Uncial believes readers prefer logically consistent stories with believable characters, leading to the magical willing suspension of disbelief that is the hallmark of fine writing. They publish in the categories of Humor, Romance, Mystery, Fiction, Fantasy, and Historical Fiction.

Thomas Sullivan - Life in the Slow Lane
nonfiction / memoir
190 pages, e-book format $4.99
ISBN 13: 978-1-60174-085-4
ISBN 10: 1-60174-085-9

related links: the world these days, non-fiction

Traveling with Virginia Woolf - Kristina Marie Darling (Ungovernable)

Traveling with Virignia Woolf is a nonfiction e-book that explores the role of artist colonies in the careers of women writers. By blending personal narrative with journalistic techniques, the author situates her visit to the Mary Anderson Center for the Arts within a broader literary and historical context. As the book unfolds, autobiography becomes a point of entry to questions about the role of solitude in one's writing life, the extent to which this has been available to women historically, and the rapidly changing literary landscape that contemporary female writers inhabit.

Kristina Marie Darling is the author of Night Songs (Gold Wake Press, 2010) and the editor of narrative (dis)continuities: prose experiments by younger american writers (VOX Press, 2011). She has been awarded fellowships and grants from the Vermont Studio Center, the Ragdale Foundation, and the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts. A graduate of Washington University, she currently studies philosophy at the University of Missouri, St. Louis.

About Ungovernable Press
Ungovernable Press is edited by translator and experimental poet Lars Palm. The press specializes in short e-books of poetry, essays, crime stories, and translations. Recent releases include David Wolach's book alter (ed), Adam Fieled's The White Album, Nate Pritts' Uniquely Constructed Self, and Brooklyn Copeland's Northernmost. Ungovernable Press was founded in 2008 and continues to seek and publish innovative writing.

Kristina Marie Darling: Traveling with Virginia Woolf
nonfiction e-book, 10 pages
online-pdf, free download

related links: on writing, about a place, e-books

Oblivious to the Obvious - KJ Hannah Greenberg (French Creek Press)

Hannah Greenberg's collection of essays Oblivious to the Obvious: Wishfully Mindful Parenting invites all grownups to celebrate, to contemplate, and to gyrate in tempo to the stresses and joys of raising young ones. From mountains of laundry to lizards left roaming among dirty dishes, Oblivious to the Obvious sets up house in the hallowed hindmost region of sleep deprived adults’ minds. Junk mail, endlessly chiming computers and incorrigible kittens are only a sample of the denizens that populate this book.

"Hannah Greenberg has a gift for finding those parenting moments, big and small, that lead us to reflect, to reconsider, and to smile. With a great deal of heart, and plenty of humor, she writes about her family, and in doing so, leads us to embrace the best in ourselves and to appreciate the best in our own children." - Jeffrey Zaslow, coauthor, The Last Lecture

Online excerpts: Fiction and Phobias & Negotiating with a Kitten

Although KJ Hannah Greenberg is currently a fiction writer, essayist, and Pushcart Prize-nominated poet, she has played in other sandboxes. She worked for organizations such as The Weizmann Institute of Science and The University of Pittsburgh’s Medical Center, and as a blogger and columnist for venues such as The Jerusalem Post and Type-A Mom. As a rhetoric professor, she received National Endowment for the Humanities monies and National Communication Association honors.

About French Creek Press
French Creek Press offers all traditional publishing services. In addition French Creek Press uses print on demand for the do-it-yourself author and full social media support as the primary marketing drive.

KJ Hannah Greenberg
Oblivious to the Obvious: Wishfully Mindful Parenting
Collection of essays
paperback, 144 pages, $18.00 (US)
ISBN 9789655440034

Field Guide to Prose Poetry (Rose Metal)

A wide-ranging gathering of 34 brief essays and 66 prose poems by distinguished practitioners, including Nin Andrews, Joe Bonomo, Denise Duhamel, Arielle Greenberg, Carol Guess, Bob Hicok, Maureen Seaton, Mark Wallace, and many more, The Rose Metal Press Field Guide to Prose Poetry is as personal and provocative, accessible and idiosyncratic as the genre itself. With its pioneering introduction, this collection provides a comprehensive history of the development of the prose poem up to its current widespread appeal.
Half critical study and half anthology, The Field Guide to Prose Poetry is a not-to-be-missed companion for readers and writers of poetry, as well as students and teachers of creative writing.

About the Editors
Gary L. McDowell teaches writing at Western Michigan University where he is studying for his PhD in Contemporary Poetics and American Literature. His first collection of poems, American Amen, won the 2009 Orphic Prize and will appear in late 2010 from Dream Horse Press.
F. Daniel Rzicznek teaches English composition and creative writing at Bowling Green State University. In 2007, he won the May Swenson Poetry Award for his debut full-length collection, Neck of the World. In 2009 his second collection of poems, Divination Machine, appeared on the Free Verse Editions imprint of Parlor Press. (full bios of both editors are available on the Prose Poetry Field Guide website)

About Rose Metal Press
Founded by Abby Beckel and Kathleen Rooney in 2006, Rose Metal Press is an independent, not-for-profit publisher of hybrid genres specializing in the publication of short short, flash, and micro-fiction; prose poetry; novels-in-verse or book-length linked narrative poems; and other literary works that move beyond the traditional genres of poetry, fiction, and essay to find new forms of expression.
The press’s upcoming 2010 season includes We Know What We Are by Mary Hamilton (winner of the fourth annual Rose Metal Press short short chapbook contest) and Color Plates by Adam Golaski. Their 2011 season will include The Louisiana Purchase by Jim Goar and the chapbook anthology They Could No Longer Contain Themselves by Elizabeth Colen, John Jodzio, Tim Jones-Yelvington, Sean Lovelace, and Mary Miller.

The Rose Metal Press Field Guide to Prose Poetry
essay anthology
224 pages, paperback, $16.95
ISBN: 978-0-9789848-8-5

Gristle (The New Press)

More than ever before, people are increasingly concerned about the impact of our factory-farming system of raising animals for food - and rightfully so. Gristle is for the growing number of people - from ominvores to vegans - who are thinking twice about the consequences of our industrial farm animal prodcution practices on workers, our health, the environment, communities, the animals, and more.

Multi-platinum musician Moby and leading food policy activist and expert Miyun Park have brought together fifteen of the country's leading voices on this issue--an eclectic group from such diverse backgrounds as farming, workers' rights activism, professional athletics, science, environmental sustainability, food business, and animal welfare advocacy--who together eloquently lay out how and why industrial animal agriculture unnecessarily harms workers, communities, the environment, our health, our wallets, and animals.

In the tradition of Michael Pollan’s The Omnivore’s Dilemma, Gristle combines hard-hitting facts with a light touch and includes fascinating charts and illustrations depicting the stark realities of America’s industrial food system

About the New Press
Established in 1990 as a major alternative to the large, commercial publishers, The New Press is a not-for-profit publishing house operated editorially in the public interest. It is committed to publishing in innovative ways works of educational, cultural, and community value that, despite their intellectual merits, may be deemed insufficiently profitable by commercial publishers. The New Press publishes about fifty titles each year.

Gristle
on factory farms & food safety
paperback, 160 pages, $14,95
ISBN: 978-1595581914

Predicate - volume one (Brown Paper)

Predicate is a bi-annual journal of literary dialogue from Brown Paper Publishing. Each edition features dialogues from a variety of independent novelists, poets, and authors of short-fiction. These authors participate in a three-tiered dialogue process with novelist and Brown Paper Publishing founder Pablo D’Stair. The dialogues are set through a particular filter selected by D’Stair, but the subject, direction, nuance, and conclusion of each dialogue is dictated by the artists. These dialogues are not offered as simply introductory Q & A sessions, nor as advertisements for any particular volumes—these rather are Portraits of the Artist: their individual drives, their thoughts on influences and contemporaries, and their in-depth feelings as to every minutia and nuance of the question "What Is Literature?"
Predicate is meant to position independent literature where it rightfully should be—at the forefront of earnest, imperatively considered literary discourse. Every edition of Predicate is sold as inexpensively as possible and is made available as a free PDF download on the site.

The first edition features dialogues with authors Mel Bosworth (When The Cats Razzed The Chickens), Darrell Epp (Imaginary Maps), Michael Paul Gonzalez (Angel Falls—currently in the semi-finals of the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award), Natalija Grgorinic and Ognjen Raden (Mr. And Mrs. Hide), Caleb J Ross (Charactered Pieces), and xTx (I Dreamed I Fucked Stephen King While We Were Both On Vacation In The Cayman Islands With Our Spouses).

Pablo D’Stair’s own works (Kaspar Traulhaine; approximate; i poisoned you; bleed the ghost empty, bleed the ghost dead (forthcoming in June 2010) and witness nothing (forthcoming in September 2010) are distributed through Brown Paper Publishing in print editions absolutely free of charge in exchange for active reader feedback—positive, negative, or ambivalent. In the event readers do not wish to offer feedback, a purchase at cost option exists and the novels sell for either $3 or $3.50.

About Brown Paper Publishing
An independent literary press representing the works of novelists and writers of short fiction, Brown Paper Publishing is dedicated to presenting contemporary works of progressive literature. As a not-for-profit press, to Brown Paper Publishing literature is something that must be a direct expression of an individual concerned only with the craft and nuance of the art form, something created entirely outside of the demands of a marketplace–ideally, it is something created without regard for publication, distribution, critique or even readership: Literature-for-the-sake-of-Literature.

Predicate - volume one
dialogues on literature
350 pages, trade paperback, $6.50
also available as free download
ISBN 978-1-43829-199-4

Field Guide to Writing Flash Fiction (Rose Metal)

With its unprecedented gathering of 25 brief essays by experts in the field, The Rose Metal Press Field Guide to Writing Flash Fiction meets the growing need for a concise yet creative exploration of the re-emerging genre popularly known as flash fiction. The book's introduction provides, for the first time, a comprehensive history of the short short story, from its early roots and hitherto unknown early publications and appearances, to its current state and practice. This guide is a must for anyone in the field of short fiction who teaches, writes, and is interested in its genesis and practice.

Featuring essays by: Steve Almond, Rusty Barnes, Randall Brown, Mark Budman, Stace Budzko, Robert Olen Butler, Ron Carlson, Pamelyn Casto, Kim Chinquee, Stuart Dybek, Pia Z. Ehrhardt, Sherrie Flick, Vanessa Gebbie, Tom Hazuka, Nathan Leslie, Michael Martone, Julio Ortega, Pamela Painter, Jayne Anne Phillips, Jennifer Pieroni, Shouhua Qi, Bruce Holland Rogers, Robert Shapard, Deb Olin Unferth, Lex Williford.

Tara L. Masih is editor of The Rose Metal Press Field Guide to Writing Flash Fiction, and author of the short story collection, Where the Dog Star Never Glows (Press 53, 2010). She received an MA in Writing and Publishing from Emerson College.

About Rose Metal Press:
Founded by Abby Beckel and Kathleen Rooney in 2006, Rose Metal Press is an independent, not-for-profit publisher of hybrid genres specializing in the publication of short short, flash, and micro-fiction; prose poetry; novels-in-verse or book-length linked narrative poems; and other literary works that move beyond the traditional genres of poetry, fiction, and essay to find new forms of expression. The press’s upcoming 2010 season includes The Rose Metal Press Field Guide to Prose Poetry, edited by Gary McDowell and F. Daniel Rzicznek; We Know What We Are by Mary Hamilton (winner of the fourth annual Rose Metal Press short short chapbook contest); and Color Plates by Adam Golaski.

The Rose Metal Press Field Guide to Writing Flash Fiction
essay anthology
208 pages, paperback, $15.95
ISBN: 978-0978984861