Samuel Johnson’s Eternal Return is the needle and thread that connects life and death, grumpy old man and flâneur. The story revolves around a fellow named Samuel Johnson who dies protecting his son from an armed lunatic. He then enters into the body of the lunatic as a passenger, watching the world like a TV show through the eyes of his own murderer. Eventually, the lunatic dies, and Samuel Johnson bounces from body to body, hoping to one day reunite with his son.

The Lake Michigan Mermaid is a beautiful and haunting collection of poems about a relationship between a young girl and a freshwater mermaid. The poems alternate between the voice of the girl and voice of the mermaid, with Anne-Marie Oomen writing the girl’s poems and Linda Nemec Foster writing the mermaid’s. And woven throughout the book are lovely watercolor illustrations by Meridith Ridl.

Be Brave: An Unlikely Manual for Erasing Heartbreak is tremendous. I came upon this volume by sheer dumb luck—through a professional discussion board on which I was posting my first ever reply after lurking for years—to J.M. Farkas, who had written her first ever post to the group “looking to connect with teachers teaching Beowulf” who were open to unexpected ways of approaching the text. Yes, please! But, as I learned, Be Brave isn’t just about Beowulf. In fact, it’s hardly about Beowulf per say. It is a complex, layered work, starting with its origin.

On the window sill,
in a plastic ice cream cup
a little plant is growing.

Nancy Miller Gomez’s chapbook on her time spent teaching incarcerated men to write poetry at the Salinas Valley State Prison is short . . . too short.

Reading the title of John McNally’s book, The Promise of Failure: One Writer’s Perspective on Not Succeeding, I wondered if, in the end, I would get good news or bad.

When I think of fiction, I imagine literature that takes me far away from my own reality into other worlds. Anticipating Doug Ramspeck’s first fiction book The Owl That Carries Us Away, I almost envisioned a giant owl taking me to a brand-new world. To my surprise, however, I found myself, or rather lost myself, in worlds similar to my own. The familiar places and situations opened possibilities for me to relate to the characters and sympathize with them, while the carefully crafted language became the link offering connections to the author’s worlds.

Thousand of used and rare books, located on the highway in the Indian Cove area of 29 Palms, three miles east of Copper Mt.College. This is an amazing bookstore.

Three floors of fun with over 125,000 books at incredible prices. We also buy and trade books. Over 4000 movie DVDs. Locally owned Bookstore for over 25 years. Hours are Monday thru Saturday 10 to 6pm. Please come in and see us, and join us for events; you will be glad you did!

". . . [ ABLE MUSE ] fills an important gap in understanding what is really happening in early twenty-first century American poetry." - Dana Gioia. This issue opens with an editorial by Alexander Pepple and features art with a Flight theme. Chris Childers interviews featured poet, Aaron Poochigian, and Brooke Clark reviews two books. Fiction by Michael Woodson and Vincent Yu; nonfiction by Charles Martin and Barbara Haas; and poetry by Timothy Murphy, Dan Campion, Charles Baudelaire, Arthur Rimbaud, Catullus, George David Clark, Katy Rawdon, M. Ann Hull, Mark Blaeuer, Ranjani Neriya, Roy Bentley, Susan de Sola, Susan McLean, and Ryan Wilson.

Our latest general issue is crammed with excellent poems by Natalie Crick, Charles Rammelkamp, Marian Christie, Kate Garrett, Lavana Kray, Eric Chiles, Julie Mullen, Mike Bove, Tim Love, Allan Peterson, Richard Weaver, William Ruleman, J.R. Solonche, Korey Wallace, E A M Harris, Fred White, Helen May Williams, Hélène Demetriades, Amy Louise Wyatt, William Park, Samuel Smithson, Goran Gatalica, and Paige Stetson.