Amanda Roth reviews Paige Ackerson-Kiely’s Book About a Candle Burning in a Shed (above/ground) on the dead (g)end(er) blog;

a review of Paige Ackerson-Kiely’s Book About a Candle Burning in a Shed (above/ground press, 2011) by writer and dg associate Amanda Roth (see the original post here). Thanks, Amanda!

Book About a Candle Burning in a Shed is just that, but also so much more.

Paige Ackerson-Kiely, currently of Vermont, has authored the poetry collections My Love is a Dead Arctic Explorer (Ahsahta Press, forthcoming), and In No One’s Land (Ahsahta, 2007)—which won the Sawtooth Poetry Prize—and a limited edition art folio/collaboration, This Landscape (Argos Books, 2010).

Ackerson-Kiely’s first chapbook from above/ground press is a collection of prose poems which combine to produce a memoir dealing with the death of a girl in a small town, and an authority figure’s pursuit of justice amongst internal struggles of his own. It is with fervor and beauty that the author weaves together individual scenes to provide a unique display the whole storyline.

The immediacy of the title bleeds through the pages of this chapbook, displaying context with a certain severity:

Thicket of weeds upon which her body ballooned. Dark dirty water I had to drink once. / There was nothing else around that I could see.

And yet, there are touches of the sporadic and perplexing tendencies of an overactive mind. This inner conflict is a reoccurring theme throughout the collection.

You’re cold again. Her delicate finger pointing to the hall that touches me some nights until I shivered. You’re so far away. You’re an iceberg in the ocean and you will melt and be forgotten.

The intensity of the narrator’s thoughts is overwhelming and enthralling. It is only by understanding each piece of the puzzle arranged by Ackerson-Kiely in this collection of poems that the audience is able to witness the greater narrative within.

new from above/ground press: On Physical Real Beginning and What Happens Next by Lisa Robertson

On Physical Real Beginning and What Happens Next
Lisa Robertson
$4

go Venus go vernal go turning go
darling by folding sky by buoyant kiss

by plenty (I lie in bed and read Marx)
by secret breezes twisting, contriving

by boulevards by cattle by a springle
a springald a springet rise agile from

water, go down modern to the natal
turn by rapacious meetings by luminous

flowers-- take with you the eagerness of
my submission to the proliferate

immaterial discipline also
called speech as the political feeling

lusts for public light by engorged
rivers by populated foliage

by veering campus the cry of desire
a morning blackbird in the city entirely

secular and generative and I
can’t curtail my life.

published in Ottawa by above/ground press
April 2012
a/g subscribers receive a complimentary copy

Lisa Robertson was born in Toronto and lives in France. Bookthug has just published her new book of essays, Nilling.

To order, send cheques (add $1 for postage; outside Canada, add $2) to: rob mclennan, 402 McLeod St #3, Ottawa ON K2P 1A6 or paypal at www.robmclennan.blogspot.com

The Factory Reading Series pre-small press book fair, June 29: Saikaley, Dunn, Wigmore + Lithgow

span-o (the small press action network - ottawa) presents:

The Factory Reading Series
pre-small press book fair reading

with readings/launches by:

Sonia Saikaley (Ottawa)
Victoria Dunn (Ottawa)
Gillian Wigmore (Prince George)
+ Michael Lithgow (Ottawa)

lovingly hosted by rob mclennan
Friday, June 29, 2012;
doors 7pm; reading 7:30pm
The Carleton Tavern,
223 Armstrong Street (at Parkdale; upstairs)

Sonia Saikaley was born and raised in Ottawa. She grew up in a traditional Lebanese household and much of her writing is influenced by her rich Middle Eastern heritage. She has taught English in Japan. Her fiction and poetry have appeared in Still Point Arts Quarterly, Things Japanese: A Collection of Short Stories, Maple Tree Literary Supplement, and the anthology Lavandería - A Mixed Load of Women, Wash, and Word. She is a graduate of the Humber School for Writers and the University of Ottawa. Her first book, The Lebanese Dishwasher (Quattro Books, 2012), was co-winner of the 2012 Ken Klonsky Novella Contest. Her poetry collection Turkish Delight, Montreal Winter (TSAR Publications) will be published in the fall 2012.

When Victoria Dunn, author of Alice Hearts Welsh Zombies, is not busy writing, she's the ultimate Bond girl, intelligent, accomplished and stunningly beautiful. Men of action fall helpless at her feet every day. She doesn't just blow smoke off her pistol—she blows smoke rings. In a parallel universe, Victoria Dunn is the evil hive mind of Victoria Higgins and Meghan Dunn. Victoria has waged a life-long battle against depression and is a recovering perfectionist who performs with Stand Up for Mental Health (www.standupformentalhealth.com/). She currently works at the local independent bookstore, because what else can you do with a degree in Religion, Sociology and Anthropology? Meghan spent several years with the Canadian Army Reserve before putting down her rifle to study Classical History. She hated selling frozen yogurt, loved working at a comic book store, and has never met a handcraft she doesn't adore. Meghan is happily married, and the mother of two teenagers who are very impressed by her expertise in zombiology.

Dirt of Ages is Gillian Wigmore’s second book.  Her first, soft geography, won the 2008 Relit award.  Her work has been published in magazines, short listed for prizes, and anthologized.  She lives in Prince George, BC.

Michael Lithgow is a PhD candidate in the School of Journalism and Communication. His poetry has appeared in Arc Magazine, The New Quarterly and Fiddlehead. Selections of his work have been included in Rutting Season (Buffalo Runs Press, 2009) and Undercurrents: New Voices in Canadian Poetry (Cormorant Books, 2010).  His first solo collection, Waking in the Tree House, was published in Spring 2012 by Cormorant Books. He is currently a contributing editor at www.ArtThreat.net, research associate with the Canadian Alternative Media Archive project, and director of www.OpenMedia.ca.  His doctoral research explores aesthetics, truth and dissent in digital and performance cultures.

And don't forget the ottawa small press book fair, happening the following day starting at noon at the Jack Purcell Community Centre!

Darryl Joel Berger reviews Phil Hall + Andrew Burke's Shikibu Shuffle

Kingston writer Darryl Joel Berger was nice enough to post this short review of Phil Hall and Andrew Burke's collaborative chapbook, Shikibu Shuffle (above/ground press, 2012), over on his blog (the photo is his as well). Thanks much!

Some author activity: Earl, McElroy, Turnbull, beaulieu, McKinnon, Reid, Brockwell and mclennan

The Easter edition of Amanda Earl's "poetry talk"; a profile I wrote for Open Book: Ontario on Gil McElroy; Chris Turnbull has a poem on Amanda Earl's NationalPoetryMonth.ca, as do Pearl Pirie, Gil McElroy and derek beaulieu (so far--keep checking the rest of the month for updates!); Barry McKinnon and the literary culture of Prince George, British Columbia is written up in Brian Fawcett's scathing "A Poetry War in Prince George" on Dooney's Cafe; Monty Reid and others read as part of the Bridgehead Reading Series on Saturday, to help launch Pearl Pirie's In Air/Air Out; Stephen Brockwell reads at the Dusty Owl Reading Series in Ottawa on Sunday, and again, on May 10 for 17 Poets in New Orleans with rob mclennan and Laura Mattingly; make sure to keep checking the sidebar buttons for upcoming readings (Rob Manery and Robert Hogg on May 25; info tba) and recent publications, and watch for forthcoming titles from Jay MillAr, George Elliott Clarke and Rob Manery, among others!

Helen Hajnoczky's promotional video for her chapbook, A History of Button Collecting (above/ground press, 2010)

Just watch this. She made it. Watch, just watch. You know you want to.

Some author activity: Martin, mclennan, Earl, Armantrout, beaulieu + Robertson,

A new poem from Camille Martin's forthcoming trade book appears online at The Toronto Quarterly as part of Poetry Month 2012; a new poem by rob mclennan's work-in-progress, "How the alphabet was made," appears online at Amanda Earl's NationalPoetryMonth.ca (be sure to check the entire month's worth of poems here), as does a piece by Camille Martin; there's a new interview with Rae Armantrout here, and "CCWWP Pedagogy Interview # 2 with derek beaulieu" is now online as well; see also, Amanda Earl's report on beaulieu's recent AB Series appearances in Ottawa, with Pearl Pirie's photos of same; and Lisa Robertson participates in "A Evening in Conversation with Lisa Robertson" in Toronto on Monday, April 9, 2012.