New & Noteworthy Books

New & Forthcoming Books from
Independent & University Presses

See full list of noteworthy books by category below

Posted on June 23, 2011

 

AnimalInside

Fiction by Laszlo Krasznahorkai

Translated from the Hungarian by Ottilie Mulzet

New Directions Books, June 2011

ISBN-13: 978-0-8112-1916-7

Paperback: 48pp; $20.00

Susan Sontag describes Krasznahorkai as "The contemporary Hungarian master of the Apocalypse who inspires comparison to Gogol and Melville."

 

Ayiti

Collection by Roxanne Gay

Artistically Declined Press, October 2011

ISBN-13: 978-1-4507-7671-4

Paperback: 110pp; $9.00

"This unique collection blends fiction, nonfiction and poetry, all interweaved to represent the Haitian diaspora experience."

 

Confessions of a Left-Handed Man

An Artist's Memoir

Nonfiction by Peter Selgin

Univ of Iowa Press, October 2011

ISBN-13: 978-1-60938-056-4

Paperback: 244pp; $19.95

Confessions of a Left-Handed Man is a bold, unblushing journey down roads less traveled. Whether recounting his work driving a furniture delivery truck, his year as a caricaturist, his obsession with the Titanic that compelled him to complete seventy-five paintings of the ship (in sinking and non-sinking poses), or his daily life as a writer, from start to finish readers are treated to a vividly detailed, sometimes hilarious, often moving, but always memorable life. //

 

Core Samples from the World

Poetry by Forrest Gander

New Directions Books, June 2011

ISBN-13: 978-0-8112-1887-0

Paperback: 96pp; $15.95

From the press release: "Gander's latest hybrid creation is a compendium of poetry, photography, and haibun (a Japanese form of essay-poem)." //

 

Correct Animal

Poetry by Rebecca Farivar

Octopus Books, July 2011

ISBN-13: 9780980193862

Paperback: 84pp; $12.00

Julie Carr writes, "In these poems narrative is always slipping away just as it's appearing. We feel the urgency of the imagination rewriting the world—as it sees it, as it wants it."

 

The Disinformation Phase

Poetry by Chris Toll

Publishing Genius, June 2011

ISBN-13: 978-0-9831706-3-1

Paperback: 72pp; $12.00

Toll's collection is filled with short […] poems that explore the interplay between sci fi and religious elements.

 

Drifting into Darien

A Personal and Natural History of the Altamaha River

Nonfiction by Janisse Ray

Univ of Georgia Press, September 2011

ISBN-13: 978-0-8203-3815-6

Hardcover: 256pp; $22.95

"Ray writes an account of her beloved river that is both social history and natural history, understanding the two as inseparable, particularly in the rural corner of Georgia that she knows best."

 

Drive Me Out of My Mind

24 Houses in 10 Years

Nonfiction by Chad Faries

Emergency Press, 2011

ISBN-13: 978-0-9830226-2-6

Paperback: 254pp; $16.95

"A coming-of-age story of wildness and wandering set primarily in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan—its abandoned coal mines, desperate small towns, and heart-breaking bars."

 

Heart First Into the Forest

Poetry by Stacy Gnall

Alice James Books, May 2011

ISBN-13: 978-1-882295-87-6

Paperback: 80pp; $15.95

Susan McCabe writes, "Gnall's debut is a tightrope of risky equipoise, of embodied metaphor, bristling insight and gut." //

 

Horses in the Cathedral

Poetry by Kimberly Burwick

Anhinga Press, September 2011

ISBN-13: 978-1-934695-24-1

Paperback: 64pp; $17.00

Winner of the 2010 Robert Dana Prize for Poetry, selected by Brian Turner.

 

Little America

Fiction by Diane Simmons

Ohio State Univ Press, 2011

ISBN-13: 978-0-8142-5178-2

Paperback: 136pp; $24.95

From the back cover: "With deadpan humor, perfect pitch voice, and keen love of place, Simmon's stories illuminate the abiding American desire to "light out"—if not necessarily for something better, at least for something new.”

 

Memory Future

Chapbook by Heather Aimee O'Neill

Gold Line Press, 2011

ISBN-13: 978-193280086-9

Chapbook: 34pp; $9.00

Winner of Gold Line Press's 2010 Poetry Chapbook Competition, selected by Carol Muske-Dukes.

 

Midnight Lantern

New and Selected Poems

Poetry by Tess Gallagher

Graywolf Press, October 2011

ISBN-13: 978-1-55597-597-5

Hardcover: 352pp; $28.00

Collects together work from forty years of writing poetry, along with an ample new section written in the west of Ireland.

 

Milk and Honey

A Celebration of Jewish Lesbian Poetry

Ed. Julie R. Enszer

A Midsummer Night's Press, September 2011

ISBN-13: 978-0-9794208-8-7

Paperback: 86pp; $14.95

Contemporary Jewish, lesbian poets address an array of experiences—relationships between and among women, family relationships, politics, solitude, ethical responsibilities, history, solidarity, and community. //

 

The New Moscow Philosophy

Fiction by Vyacheslav Pyetsukh

Translated from the Russian by Krystyna A. Steiger

Twisted Spoon Press, June 2011

ISBN-13: 978-80-86264-36-3

Paperback: 184pp; $16.00

A communal apartment in late Soviet-era Moscow. An elderly tenant—the daughter of the apartment's original owner—has gone missing after being frightened by a ghost. Over the course of a weekend, the other occupants meet in the kitchen to argue over who is more deserving of the space she has, apparently, vacated.

 

No Brainer Variations

Poetry by Jim Cory

Rain Mountain Press, April 2011

ISBN-13: 978-0-9802211-8-3

Paperback: 36pp; $8.00

Winner of the 2010 Ronald Wardall Poetry Prize //

 

Slant

Fiction by Timothy Wang

Tincture, June 2011

ISBN-13: 978-1590211212

Paperback: 222pp; $15.00

James, an Asian boy who likes video games and romantic comedies, realizes he's gay while attending college in Boston. He begins a whirlwind exploration of the gay world, negotiating its many pitfalls, including the first kiss, his first love and the first drugs.

 

Tamura Ryuichi

On the Life & Work of a 20th Century Master

Nonfiction by Ed. Takako Lento, Wayne Miller

Pleiades Press, June 2011

ISBN-13: 978-0964145429

Paperback: 191pp; $12.99

In this second volume of the Unsung Masters Series, […] editors Takako Lento and Wayne Miller have selected more than 40 pages of representative poetry by Tamura, and they have brought together essays by both Japanese and American contributors who knew Tamura and/or admired his work.

 

War of the Crazies

Fiction by John Oliver Hodges

Main Street Rag Pub Co, May 2011

ISBN-13: 978-1-59948-288-0

Paperback: 160pp; $9.95

Ruth, a young Florida woman, attempts to escape the milieu of waster represented by her middleclass parents, and so finds herself in a re-imagined sixties commune utopia that cannot work because of what?

 

Who in This Room

The Realities of Cancer, Fish, an Demolition

Nonfiction by Katherine Malmo

Calyx Books, October 2011

ISBN-13: 978-0934971270

Paperback: 114pp; $14.95

From press release: Kate's adventerous life is interrupted by a diagnosis of inflammatory breast cancer, giving her a 10% chance of living 5 years. But her story isn't just about cancer. It is a true tale of survival that is both lived and dreamt. //

 

Wilde Stories 2011

The Year's Best Gay Speculative Fiction

Ed. Steve Berman

Lethe Press, August 2011

ISBN-13: 978-1-59021-303-2

Paperback: 290pp; $18.00

This collection brings together "stories of undead lovers, stranded astronauts, ghosts and phantom reflections, men lost in inhospitable wilderness, and fiends who hide under handsome veneers, all written by award-winning authors […] and fresh voices in the field." //

 

You Don't Have a Clue

Latino Mystery Stories for Teens

Ed. Sarah Cortez

Piñata Books, April 2011

ISBN-13: 978-1-55885-692-9

Paperback: 310pp; $16.95

From missing girls to kidnappings and dismembered bodies, the teens in this collection encounter every kind of mystery imaginable. //

 

New & Noteworthy Books

Full list of new & noteworthy books received

Page updated September 6, 2011