The February 2012 Newsletter is Here! INTERVIEW WITH SUSAN TEPPER BY PAUL STEVEN STONE Interviewed on the publication of her new work of fiction, "From The Umberplatzen ~ A Love Story" published by Wilderness House Press.

November 20, 2011 A new Fiction chapbook:
Baptism by Michael J. Atwood

Baptism by Michael J. Atwood

Michael J. Atwood is the author of the short story collection, HiStory of Santa Monica (Aqueous Books 2010) and a columnist and editor for the website, FastertThanForty.com. His work has appeared in a number of literary magazines and online journals. He is a graduate of the University of Southern California's Master of Professional Writing program, where he focused on fiction and screenwriting. As an undergraduate, Atwood studied at Boston College, majoring in English and interning for The Boston Globe. He now resides in North Attleborough with his wife, Melanie, and children, William, Megan, and Kelsey and is an English teacher in the Boston area. He is currently working on his first novel. For more information see www.mjatwood.com and www.historyofsantamonica.com.

Forward
"Baptism" was a story written out of hunger. I had been working on a collection of short stories for around seven years and no one wanted to publish it. It was lacking that final story, the single that every band needs to make their album a success. In fact, the only success I had realized as a writer was a story published by Gloria Mindock on her online journal called Istanbul Literary Review. The story was entitled "Ancient Hibernians." It the story of a young comedian's return from Santa Monica, California back to Boston to attend his favorite Irish uncle's funeral. With the recent capture of Whitey Bulger in that very same seaside city where I drafted "Ancient Hibernians," a Boston-Irish mob tale, "The Shebeen," and "Baptism," the fact that I wrote it and other tales about crime, addiction, and death seems quite eerie. As we all found out recently, Whitey Bulger lived anonymously just eight blocks away from me during the years 2002-2005 (we both had highly sought after "rent-control" apartments). For all I know, the leader of the Winter Hill Gang smiled walked past me as I pushed my son, William in his carriage on the 3rd Street Promenade.

"Baptism" is a story of an addict healing, being born again, and returning to his roots, his family. It is about a sacred Catholic ritual that few choose to take part in. Gabriel Bradley is a hesitant godfather in this story but he's also the baptized as he meets a new love and is anointed by the cold New England rain as he stares out to the Charles River thinking about his failure in sunny California. In the end, Gabriel has found himself again and realigns his values that have been corrupted by Hollywood and his semi-success there.
Michael J. Atwood
June 2011

$7.00 | 31 Pages | In Stock

October 23, 2011 A new poetry chapbook:
The Hallelujah of Listening by Preston H. Hood
CD Version available also!

The Hallelujah of Listening by Preston H. Hood

The Cover Art is a photo of G. Buddy Swensons Elusive Liberty (August, 2001) Paint on Wood Panel (48X36)

Preston Hood was born in Fall River, Massachusetts and grew up in Swansea, Mass. He served in Vietnam with SEAL TEAM 2 (1970), and was a graduate of the University of Massachusetts, Boston, Bachelor of Arts in English, Magna cum laude, the University of Southern Maine, Bachelor of Science, and the University of Maine, Orono, Master of Education. For fifteen years, he was a member of Veterans for Peace. He published a poetry CD, Snake Medicine (2002), which was recorded by Berred Ouellette, and produced by Master Mind Audio. Summer Home Press published his first book of poetry, A Chill I Understand (2006). The Hallelujah of Listening is his first Chapbook (2011).

A CD of Preston H. Hood reading his poems is also available for $7.00. It was recorded by Berred Ouellette and produced by Disc Makers. The cover art of the CD face is a photo of G. Buddy Swensons Elusive Liberty (August, 2001) Paint on Wood Panel (48x 36).

After attending The William Joiner Center for the Study of War and Social Consequences for 9 years, he edited with Jacqueline Loring and Gary Rafferty the Summer Home Review I (2002), and II (2005).

Through the Cape Cod Writers Center, he was interviewed with John McHugh, Secretary of the Henrich Bll Association, County Mayo, Ireland for Books of the World Television Program in Harwich MA (2006).

With Jacqueline Loring, he co-presented an overview of the Sixties Beat Poetry for The Wrinkle in Time: San Francisco Summer of Love (1967) Conference at Osher Life Long Learning Institute at University of Southern Maine. At the same workshop, he served on a panel discussion of both Civil Rights Issues and Why We Were in Vietnam (2009).

His poetry has been published in national and international journals and anthologies. He is a retired teacher and administrator currently writing his memoir. He spends his other time bicycling, kayaking, and hiking with his spouse Barbara J. Noone. He lives in Lyman, Maine.

The Hallelujah of Listening

From Dooniver were lured
   by angels in the sun-dappled wind. They dance
      with shadows, their radiant hair,
         a seascape of waves & salt sundog air.

Some of us walk through Achills mist
   anointed by the whispering surf. Or charge into a valley
      of an image, rave about the lowered moon
         behind Slievemores cloud-covered top.

Like first-light finches, I dart
   into the thicket, feel the cool
      morning silence. I climb with pilgrims
         under a salmon-coral sky, voices chant invocations.

The red-bellied fuchsias lift & sway
   on this steep path, bloodstones of penance. Even sheep
      turn to listen. I wish I knew if Croagh Patrick could be mindful
         of them, & us, rapt in our chorus of hallelujahs.

With this stunning collection, THE HALLELUJAH OF LISTENING, Preston Hood will take his place among the greatest of the poet-warriors and poet veterans of our times. Hoods poems bear witness to how the human spirit survives that which would kill it. One speaker stitches up the opening in the sky before the dead crawl out (Opening in the Sky). Another, painting naked in the yard among the blue jays and bees, draws a door in the sky to enter, hoping to find whats lost (first born). Im awed by the poetic joining of courage and beauty in these fierce and precise poems.
Cynthia Hogue, Professor, Maxine and Jonathan Marshall Chair in Modern and Contemporary Poetry at Arizona State University, Tempe; Or Consequence (2010).

I love Preston Hoods new poems, and I cherish the spots of time he has been able to hold still in these poems just long enough to change your life. (From the Forward)
Bruce Weigl

With Preston Hoods The Hallelujah of Listening, I see a newfound confidence in the expression of his art. His beautiful images are often intimate and passionate, illusive and questioning, then shocking, real and haunting. As with other veteran poets, even when Prestons poem is not about war, it forces you to think about warring, keeps you out of your comfort zone. In this new book, Preston asks us to enter the mist, sit down in the fire of thought to let go of sorrow, let sorrow go and promises, the spirit lives to a renewal. The journey is worth taking.
Jacqueline M. Loring, Poet, Playwright, and Editor, Summer Home Review Anthologies, Volumes I and II

The poetry of Preston Hoods The Hallelujah of Listening is indeed a climb from the struggle into the marvelous as he says in his poem, Our Singing. His new book reads almost like the scripture of Psalms such is its beauty and transcendence. Indeed, a tongue of the sky slipped into his mouth and our soul is awakened to the realms in which only poetry has a voice.
Lamont B Steptoe, Publisher/founder of Whirlwind Press, Winner of the American Book Award (2005)

$7.00 | ISBN: 978-0-9831041-7-9 | 56 Pages | In Stock

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October 17, 2011 A new poetry book:
Now I See It Shaped Poems by Diana Der-Hovanessian

Now I See It Shaped Poems by Diana Der-Hovanessian

DIANA DER-HOVANESSIAN, author of 15 books of translations and ten volumes of her own poems, has been a Fulbright professor of American poetry twice and led workshops in poetry and the literature of human rights at many universities including Clark, Harvard, MIT, Southern Connecticut. Her awards include prizes from American Scholar, Prairie Schooner, the Paterson Prize, the Columbia U. Armand-Erpf Translation prize, N.E.A. and P.E.N. awards.

From the Forward
Poets have been playing with forms since the beginning of printed poetry. In the Middle Ages, many poems appeared in the shapes of altars and crosses, And in the fifties European poets began a combination of poster art and poetry, using flung words on the page and/or shaped verse.

Diana Der-Hovanessian in her twenty years as a visiting poet in the Massachusetts schools found her students, especially younger ones, not only were fascinated by the forms, but enjoyed shaping their own.

"Among our most readable and enjoyable American poets, Diana Der-Hovanessian stands high... if you think you don't like poetry, (her work) will quickly change your mind; if you're already a hopeless poetry addict, you'll be lavishly rewarded."
X.J.Kennedy

"The range and variety, (of her poems) from the witty and wry to the sad and poignant create a unique portrait of our time, as only superb poetry can"
F.D. Reeve

"Profoundly touching."
Adrienne Rich

"A brilliant poet who has opened up the book of her people to the English speaking world"
D.M. Thomas, London Times Literary Supplement

"Compelling , funny, sad, moving, doing all the things poems are supposed to do and usually don't"
Joel Oppenheimer

Cover Art: Maro Dalley

$13.00 | ISBN: 978-0-9831041-6-2 | 33 Pages | In Stock

September 14, 2011 A new poetry book:
After Shakespeare: Selected Sonnets by George Held

After Shakespeare: Selected Sonnets by George Held

George Held is a teacher, translator, writer, and poet whose work has appeared in such places as The Philadelphia Inquirer, Confrontation, Notre Dame Review, New York Quarterly, and Rattle, as well as on NPR and in two dozen anthologies. A five-time Pushcart Prize nominee, he has published a book, ten chapbooks, and two e-books of poetry and edited Touched by Eros, an anthology of erotic verse. He holds a B.A. from Brown, an M.A. from University of Hawaii, and a Ph.D. from Rutgers, taught at Queens College for 37 years, was a Fulbright lecturer in Czechoslovakia (1973-76), and serves on the executive board of The South Fork Natural History Museum, Bridgehampton, NY. He lives in Greenwich Village, with his wife, Cheryl.

George Held's new collection of sonnets, After Shakespeare, is, at every turn, funny, surprising, and sharply observed. In poem after poem, Held follows Ezra Pound's injunction and "makes it new." Whether they are about Edmund Spenser on the E-train, painter Alice Neel or the Kennedy family, Held's poems delight with their music, and at the same time offer a deep wisdom. I love the way Held reinvents poetic tradition here and the way these poems, as he writes in "Discord," bring "joy beyond harmonic motion."
Nicole Cooley

Beginning with his cheeky title (a chronological placement rather than a stylistic description) there is much to enjoy and admire in this new collection of sonnets from George Held. It is as though the awareness of his own belatedness is liberating to the poet, allowing him to explore all manner of interesting topics in a variety of sonnet forms and styles. Anyone interested in the vitality and accomplishment of the contemporary sonnet will want George Held's After Shakespeare.
Charles Martin

To Hope

You're the thing with feathers, flying skyward
To inspire us when we lack the divine
Afflatus, lifting our spirits, like prime
Vintage or even swill like Thunderbird.

You're what springs eternal in the human
Breast, though eternity remains unproved,
Just hyperbole to cheer an unloved
One or fodder for some preacher's sermon.

But skeptical as we may be, inured
To loss of jobs and sinking stock prices,
Unfaithful friends and false mistresses,
Past the point where pride can still be injured,
Ears still prick up to your springtime twitter,
Unhibernating souls long in winter.

$15.00 | ISBN: 978-0-9831041-9-3 | 71 Pages | Restocking

Currently Restocking.
If you order this book it will ship on or about March 28, 2012