Batykefer, Erinn. Allegheny, Monongahela. Los Angeles, CA: Red Hen Press, 2009. Erinn Batykefer’s Allegheny, Monongahela may be her first collection of poetry, but it displays a mastery of form and content that underscores the awards and publications listed in the book’s acknowledgements. “Dog Poem” begins the collection with an image of what it means to …
Category Archives: Early Reviewer
Stephen March, Strangers in the Land of Egypt
March, Stephen. Strangers in the Land of Egypt. Sag Harbor, NY: The Permament Press, 2009. Available May, 2009. There’s much to like in Stephen March’s Strangers in the Land of Egypt. The protagonist is that likable high-schooler who somehow is much more self-aware and wise than his peers but who still has lots to learn. …
The Live and Loves of Mr. Jiveass N*****
Brown, Cecil. The Life and Loves of Mr. Jiveass Nigger. 1969. Berkeley, CA: Frog Books, 2008. “All the publishers are interested in selling books and if you say something about sex and being a nigger then you got a bestseller” (206). C.S. Lewis writes that fiction allows you to be a thousand men whilst always …
The Book of the Unknown by Jonathan Keats
Keats, Jonathan. The Book of the Unknown: Tales of the Thirty-Six. Random House, 2009. $13.00 When one reads “modern-day fairy tales for grown-ups, reimagined from Jewish folklore” on the back of a book, one is prepared for ironic tales in which that which we see the good side of the bad. We’ve been prepared for …
Time Bandit: Two Brothers, The Bering Sea, and One of the World’s Deadliest Jobs
Hillstrand, Andy, Jonathan Hillstrand, and Malcolm MacPherson. Time Bandit: Two Brothers, The Bering Sea, and One of the World’s Deadliest Jobs. New York: Ballantine, 2008. $25. I have an image in my head of Malcolm MacPherson sitting at a table surrounded by piles of audio-cassettes and notebooks, head in hands as he tries to figure …
The Enchantress of Florence
Rushdie, Salman. The Enchantress of Florence. New York: Random House, 2008. “Wherever goodness lay, it did not lie in ritual, unthinking obeisance before a deity but rather, perhaps, in the slow clumsy, error-strewn working out of an individual or collective path.” Strangers wearing long leather coats. Mughal kings reigning over an exotic court. Imaginary idealized …
Jorgy: A LibraryThing Early Review
Lester, Jean. Jorgy: The Life of Native Alaskan Bush Pilot and Airline Captain Holger “Jorgy” Jorgensen._ Ester, AK: Ester Republic Press, 2007. $25 In the late 60′s my grandfather purchased an 8mm film camera complete with light bar. It was a hand-wound model that would only capture a minute or two of action before needing …
