some author activity: Poe, McKinnon, Anstee, Pirie, Brockwell, Maguire, Stewart, Butler, Barbour, macLean + Burke

Deborah Poe [who took the above photo, by the by] has some new work in the fifth issue of seventeen seconds: a journal of poetry and poetics; Barry McKinnon does as well, with his lecture from the 2nd annual VERSeFest Poetry Festival; a new series of lectures will be presented at a VERSeFest fundraiser on November 15th in Ottawa, by Cameron Anstee, Pearl Pirie and Stephen Brockwell, hosted by The Factory Reading Series; Shannon Maguire reads in Toronto on November 7 with Melannie Gayle and Katie Jordan to help Sarah Pinder launch her new Coach House Books poetry collection (you should totally go); and various authors from moons back, including Christine Stewart and Jenna Butler were part of Douglas Barbour's month-long TRUCK (they all had above/ground press chapbooks in the "Alberta Series," all of which appear online as free pdfs), as do kath macLean and Andrew Burke; and above/ground press makes the Tarpaulin Sky list of titles one can possibly review! (we choose to remain optimistic)

above/ground press authors MacLean and Dachsel make the Robert Kroetsh Award shortlist!

Congratulations to all who have made the Robert Kroetsch Award shortlist: Kathy Mac, Kath MacLean, Michael Nardone, Laura Broadbent, Nathan Dueck, Marita Dachsel and Jeremy Stewart.

Kath MacLean's above/ground press chapbook, ten: ways to skin a cat (2003), is still available for $3, but, unfortunately, Marita Dachsel's Learning to Breathe (1996) is long out of print. Still, other items of hers are still available here and here.

Looking forward to seeing the finished book by the winner, and perhaps, a few others as well.