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Encounter at an Abandoned Church: A Novella (DOUGLAS J. OGUREK) ISBN 978-1-988397-86-3
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A man in the wrong place at the wrong time. A parallel between past and present. Danger and survival. If you like a suspense story with an interesting turn, then this is the book for you.
The Visitors (Penelope Gristelfink) ISBN 978-1-988397-92-4
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A tornado whips the dry plains of New Mexico. It is the early 80s, and the ghastly boogeyman of nuclear war has long threatened America’s nuclear families. An aging priest scared of death takes acid in the hopes that it will quell haunting visions brought on by war trauma. A mesmerizing, drug-addled waif confronts her own lack of identity and purpose. A conflicted mother wonders if her daughter’s addiction to methamphetamines is her own fault.
Two Baby Boomer misfits seek shelter with an older couple after their car breaks down not far from Los Alamos, where the first atomic bomb was built. Unwanted by their families, runaways from Christian fundamentalism, they bring with them a bag full of drugs and their own marital turmoil. As the tornado approaches the couple’s house, their hosts share their memories of growing up and falling in love at “Lamy,” where both their fathers were scientists recruited by the Manhattan Project. Tempers flare and intergenerational rifts erupt after it becomes apparent that the guests are anything but upstanding citizens.
The Visitors is a riveting and poignant sketch of vagabonds, veterans, rebels, housewives and antiheroes. This book is like a highly entertaining Rorschach test. You will either cheer for everyone or no one, but you will not fail to find in The Visitors a very moving and entertaining tale about what keeps us moving forward and trying to relate to one another even when the world appears dark, chaotic and absurd.
Profane Feasts: Story-Chapters (Tom Tolnay) ISBN 978-1-988397-99-3
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Profane Feasts, 13 stories by Tom Tolnay is a sequence of thirteen story-chapters focusing on a family of Greek immigrants who settled in Brooklyn, New York in the 1970s, with their misadventures extending up to the present day. With humanistic and humorous intent, the subplot follows the Hestiakos-Dropoulos family as part of an unconscious “movement” to reinvent the greatness of their ancient culture by “taking over” North America one coffee shop, one hot dog stand, one neighborhood at a time. The surface story line is how these individuals--each story focuses on a particular family member--make their way as transplanted products of that early great culture into the "upstart societies" thriving across the Atlantic. Subliminally their lost greatness makes them feel part of something important even though they are far removed, by time and circumstance, from the civilization upon which the western world was founded. The word “Feasts” in the book's title refers to various human “celebrations” which act as signposts in their journey, including a wedding, baptism, funeral, Christmas, Easter, Greek Independence Day. The “Profane” from the title refers to the wacky occurrences which arise as these celebrations unfurl or, in some instances, unravel...
Tom Tolnay is a writer whose keen insights into the myriad ways in which culture can shape character always make for rewarding reading. Nowhere is that more true than in these stories of a family of immigrant Greeks trying to assimilate to the streets of Brooklyn. Here you’ll find grit and tenderness, mystery and pathos, comedy and tragedy, and dreams fulfilled and unfulfilled. The characters are all beautifully drawn, and some are infused with such indomitable spirit that they lift off the page and remain in memory long after the cover is closed. Several of the stories have appeared in Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Taken together they comprise a “novel in stories,” a much bigger tale told with vivid prose, compelling style, and a lot of heart. —Janet Hutchings, Editor-in-Chief, Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine
"Tom Tolnay is a fine, tough-minded writer as Profane Feasts demonstrates once again. Tolnay has mastered the compressed language of the short story, which by leaving so much unsaid, is able to say so much more. These stories of a Greek immigrant family in New York are serious in the way that only humor can be serious. They are both funny and wise. I hope readers enjoy them as much as I did."--Gwendolyn Jensen, former President, Wilson College, author of Graceful Ghosts.
"Tom Tolnay never fails to bring a sense of wonder to his work. In Profane Feasts, thirteen tales of life among Greek immigrants in America seat the reader front and center…"--Philip Wagner, Editor-Publisher, The Iconoclast.
"The moods that prevail in this book of short stories are mostly humoristic and a sympathetic approach. The writer has been able to treat very serious themes like loss and death with a sense of skillful humor without any tinge of cruel mockery. These have been very well expressed in The Miracle of Uncle Stavros:
“Although I saw with my own eyes how it had happened, the spectacle of my dead uncle, sitting up, grinning queerly, gave me goose pimples.” (Page167).
To any reader which a clear logical mind a corpse suddenly becoming alive may bring some laughter for a while but at the same time there is a call to avoid any offensive criticism.
The language used by Tolnay in Profane Feasts is simple and yet each word and sentence has the effect of the eye - catcher and gradually becomes impregnated in the mind of the reader. The writing style has a spontaneous flow that makes it hard to put this book down once the very first page has been read.
Profane Feasts by eminent writer Tom Tolnay is undoubtedly an excellent read for short-story lovers and this must not be certainly missing from any bookshelf."
A Noble Conspiracy (Bobby Cohen) ISBN: 978-1-990822-21-6
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Cohen brings you the complete recipe: twists and turns, suspense, relationships and betrayal.
A Noble Conspiracy narrates life and death in a succession of events that will take your breath away.
“I feel better off for having read Bobby Cohen’s A Noble Conspiracy. It’s a novel about friendship and betrayal, love and heartbreak, life and death. In other words, it’s the kind of story that lingers in your mind long after you’ve read the final page.”
William J. Donahue, author of Crawl on Your Belly All the Days of Your Life and Burn, Beautiful Soul.
Honey The Nature's Gold Recipes for Health (Mona Illingworth and Daniel Andrews) ISBN 978-1-988827-42-1
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Honey and Health - they go hand in hand.
The book brings in the foreground the multiple benefits of honey. The nature' s gold stands out because of its multiple therapeutic characteristics, in particular the anti-oxidant, anti-inflammatory and anti-microbial features. These properties play a significant role in preventing aging and averting and treating degenerative, as well as chronic conditions, such as cardio-vascular and pulmonary diseases. By regular consumption, honey also boosts the immune system, so that it helps in preventing and treating infections. Overall, honey consumption reduces fatigue and is one of the most effective energizers in nature.
The book represents a guide with numerous recipes for many conditions, also briefly and simply depicted. The authors never tired to warn about the importance of precisely following the recipes, and kept advising that the treatment should be applied under medical supervision.
We hope you will appreciate the information presented and will take advantage of the nature's gold benefits shortly.
Fourth of July (Lewis J. Beilman III ) ISBN 978-1-988827-15-5
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Set in New York City, Fourth of July is a dark tale of privilege run amok. Ogden Goodman is a wealthy lawyer who, harried one evening by boredom, hires a homeless man to perform for his family. The success of that evening's performance leads Ogden--and others in his circle--to engage a variety of characters in a host of increasingly outrageous and disturbing activities. Lewis J. Beilman III crafts this satire with skill and humor and creates a world that seems, at the same time, both absurd and all too real.
"[Lewis] Beilman casts the satirist's stink eye on the gilded lives of the bored and wealthy. Fourth of July is a clever, absurdist tale for the Opposite World where we all dwell now."
Debra Dean, author of The Madonnas of Leningrad
"Grounded in scene and propelled forward by a satirically dark portrayal of white privilege, Fourth of July boldly depicts the bigotry, racism, and sheer absurdity that still plague contemporary American life. Refusing to offer easy answers or feel-good resolutions, this daring novella forces us to confront issues of class, race, and culture through a seemingly hyperbolic lens that at times can feel all too real. Anchored by self-assured prose, Lewis Beilman skillfully balances an incrementally disturbing plot and cast of central characters with a touch of humor, all of it leading to a powerfully unsettling conclusion. In today's social and political context, Fourth of July is sure to linger long after it has been read."
Dariel Suarez, author of In the Land of Tropical Martyrs
YOU HAD ME AT GOODBYE - A POEM COLLECTION (Alan Berger) 978-1-990822-08-7
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Alan Berger always says: "The best decisions in life that you make are the ones where you have no choice," and this collection of poems reflects exactly that. A lifetime experience in verses, these poems will make you think, laugh, or cry. They evoke love lost and found, everyday life, morose memories, or reveal the light and darkness of the human soul.
The quintessence of these poems lies in the verses below:
YOU HAD ME AT GOODBYE
All the things you left behind.
Your toothbrush, your pillow, where you would rest your restless mind.
The book you wrote and read out loud.
The way you couldn’t blend in with the crowd.
A dog and cat that still wait by the door.
Your last pair of socks still laying on the floor.
I remember you saying that when you were just thirteen,
You knew you would walk always with a melancholy sheen.
Some call it shadows that disappear in the fog,
Sir Winston Churchill called it his “Black Dog”.
I am more than deadly serious,
We almost had a near life experience.
I’ll still feel the same rain and breeze,
But my head on your shoulder gave me my peace.
All the wars we could have done
All the memories we could have won
They say time heals,
It doesn’t.
They said it was all just a dream,
It wasn’t.
I still don’t know the what or why,
You had me at goodbye.
~ Scarlet Leaf Review Editor in Chief, Roxana Nastase
Black Dove (Robin Wyatt Dunn) ISBN 978-1-988397-46-7
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"A terse , taut read sometimes miserably bleak splintered with moments of dark humour and heightened poetics."
-- Saira Viola, author of Jukebox
Love and war in the Middle East:
Robert is a disillusioned reporter; Rachel an agent for Mossad. Modeled on the Song of Solomon, Black Dove explores the intricate interconnectedness between love and war, violence and friendship, and the complicated relationship between the United States and Israel.
When Robert moves to Jerusalem to chase his beloved, he finds that changing addressees changes something within him, and he abandons the role of disinterested observer to aid in the transformation of the Middle East, and the United States. But what he discovers is that Mossad is actually working against a Jewish-only state, and that to aid the Palestinian people they must subvert parts of their own government.
Black Dove reveals how the Middle East is a crucible for change around the world, and in the human heart.
Remarriages (Robin Wyatt Dunn) ISBN 978-1-988397-72-6
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“Remarriages” is for the outcast and the disappointed. Dark poems riding wildly through the mind of an angry man who both loves and hates the world. The words reveal a bitter struggle to reconcile with the horrors and the violence inherent in the world.
Dunn’s poetry is psychological and raw, with a delicate balance between light and darkness.
Dunn’s poems are valiant in expressing the darkness many fear, yet others embrace. Some of his poems nudge the reader to take time to examine the bizarre existence we call life.
Sunsborne (Robin Wyatt Dunn} ISBN 978-1-988397-82-5
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Sunsborne pitches darkly into another world. Often the world and characters is hazy, but ''Sunsborne'' is a true picture of the reality, conflict and tensions.
In the midst of a conflict torn situation there is love. Robin Wyatt Dunn presents an uncanny story of past and present, darkness and light. His way with language and its thick opacity create a stunning impact on the mind.
If you are looking for ''meanings'', leave it. If you are looking for legerdemain stunts, leave it. But if you are looking for a fabulous world, in mythic settings, here it is, in the manner that only Dunn can achieve - credulity climaxing into incredible and fascinating story.
Inamorata at Twilight (Blanca Alicia Garza & Ken Allan Dronsfield) ISBN 978-1-990822-03-2
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Two of the most compelling contemporary voices in American poetry, Blanca Alicia Garza and Ken Allan Dronsfield, collaborated in the creation of this poetry chapbook, which tugs at heart and fills the spirit.
The poets reveal never-seen-before poetry of longing, love, and nature communion.
Delight yourself in these raw, passionate, and profound verses, and immerse yourself in feelings and thoughts.
Honey The Nature's Gold Recipes for Health (Mona Illingworth and Daniel Andrews) ISBN 978-1-988827-42-1
CA$6.25
CA$4.50
Honey and Health - they go hand in hand.
The book brings in the foreground the multiple benefits of honey. The nature' s gold stands out because of its multiple therapeutic characteristics, in particular the anti-oxidant, anti-inflammatory and anti-microbial features. These properties play a significant role in preventing aging and averting and treating degenerative, as well as chronic conditions, such as cardio-vascular and pulmonary diseases. By regular consumption, honey also boosts the immune system, so that it helps in preventing and treating infections. Overall, honey consumption reduces fatigue and is one of the most effective energizers in nature.
The book represents a guide with numerous recipes for many conditions, also briefly and simply depicted. The authors never tired to warn about the importance of precisely following the recipes, and kept advising that the treatment should be applied under medical supervision.
We hope you will appreciate the information presented and will take advantage of the nature's gold benefits shortly.
Life After Schizophrenia (Anders M. Svenning) ISBN 978-1-990822-02-5
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Life After Schizophrenia breaks down the theory, or thought form schizophrenia into many different levels starting with the opening essay which is titled, "Schizophrenia: Real or Imagined." The science known as ontology which delineates the bases of existence is a device used to further scrutinize schizophrenia from the oblique angle of those diagnosed, or as put in the book misdiagnosed as per misconstrued symptoms which are spiritual or religious in origin.
Individuals many times are taken against their will to mental health offices and even institutionalized for deviant thoughts which are in turn verbalized and which are in all of actuality the subconscious surfacing and in effect initiating pansophism in the individual which is as C.G. Jung has put it the ultimate objective of man as an individual and as a whole.
The hindering of pansophism and even corporeal atonement with one's subconscious is perpetuated through the misplaced faith systems of many a mental health professional; and within the pages of Life After Schizophrenia lies the collinear processes of the how and the why regarding the so called schizophrenic thought form, its prevalence, and its transforming into hysteria, but also incorporates the causation of supposed schizophrenic ideas on individualistic, societal, spiritual, and even religious levels.
Now, Then And Again (Ananya S Guha) ISBN 978-1-988397-58-0
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Enjoy this poem collection!
“The fifty-two new poems in this collection are primarily driven by Ananya S Guha’s raw emotion — that of anger, disappointment, and sometimes helplessness at the political state of affairs. These are words of protest, dissonance and dissent that speak out loud against the wrongs of society and its people.”
— Sudeep Sen, author of EroText (Vintage: Penguin Random House) and The HarperCollins Book of English Poetry (editor)
In the words of the poet Robin Wyatt Dunn:
Anaya Guha is a delicate writer, aiming to please, and then changing his mind, and taking out his guns instead.
But Ananya only fires into the air; is it a challenge? Perhaps only for the sound of the gunshot.
A race?
Ananya's English is the English of the British Empire, still alive, still polite, still concerned, still incapable of doing what it most wants to do, because English cannot do that, must not, have what it wants.
Instead, it circles around, cycles around, tearing out its hair.
The colonial English of the British Empire seems especially concerned with misdirection, obfuscation, willful ignorance, and Ananya is obedient to some expect to this regimen, but is aware of his obedience and wants to show the reader the limits of the conversation he is allowed.
But in the best traditions of a language over several continents, Ananya Guha infuses his English with the lush life of his subcontinent. In "flowers," we can see both the rich fecundity of his native Shillong, and the dual nature of these blooms evanescence: is their leaving an Eastern koan, describing some mystery of the spirit, or is it a colonial doom, pressing in on the viceroys and their adjutants, overcoming their delicate blue blood sensibilities?
Ananya Guha is aware too of his own status as a kind of blue blood, shielded from the poverty and the death and destruction of so many of his countrymen. For Victoria, the poor were unfortunates, bad cousins of that medieval courtroom drama in heaven sung in carmina burana, O Fortuna, and then of course this morphed into what we still know as a neoliberal / neo conservative Social Darwinism come again, of the poor as personal failures, deserving their fate.
A Season To Reason: The Irony Of A Loud Silence (Ndaba Sibanda) ISBN 978-1-990822-01-8
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Ndaba's poetic voice invokes people, and places, and a life style specific to Southern Africa.
Social and activist stanzas are intertwined with melancholy, pathos, or derision. The critical voice of the poet doesn't forgive and doesn't forget. His incorruptible vision demands changes and whips harmful attitudes and concepts.
Melancholy is woven in his words, and sadness shadows disapproval.
Ndaba's verses always deserve a second or a third reading. The depth of the ideas and subjects is compelling and makes you think.
Don't miss your chance to see through the eyes of the poet. The trip is worth it.
Three awarded short-stories for 2016: a short-story full of suspense and thrilling events showing how to murder someone, pinning the kill on someone else; a quasi-biographical short-story revealing embarrassing moments in a woman's life and her decision to take her life back (better later than never); the revelation of a quirks in the life of the inhabitants of a building that is about to be sold, the owner not knowing what he'd bring upon himself, had he sold the building. Enjoy mathematical planning, humor and good writing!
Our very first collection of award winning essays submitted by authors like you. Learn about the struggles of being a girl in a massively-multiplayer online game, about how to build a computer (or not) or about how to properly budget your life (or not). Humor, triumphs and defeats all to be found in this winning collection.
Remarriages (Robin Wyatt Dunn) ISBN 978-1-988397-72-6
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“Remarriages” is for the outcast and the disappointed. Dark poems riding wildly through the mind of an angry man who both loves and hates the world. The words reveal a bitter struggle to reconcile with the horrors and the violence inherent in the world.
Dunn’s poetry is psychological and raw, with a delicate balance between light and darkness.
Dunn’s poems are valiant in expressing the darkness many fear, yet others embrace. Some of his poems nudge the reader to take time to examine the bizarre existence we call life.
Sonnets and Scribbles (Ken Allan Dronsfield) ISBN 978-1-990822-00-1
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You don't even have to be a fan of any one genre of writing with this writer's style as anything he writes is sure to guarantee images flashing through your cerebral as if you've just put on specially select goggles to enhance a reading; it's a theatre of the mind of which this writer offers us and it is a gift that a reader should never deny themselves a chance to partake.
Sunsborne (Robin Wyatt Dunn} ISBN 978-1-988397-82-5
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Sunsborne pitches darkly into another world. Often the world and characters is hazy, but ''Sunsborne'' is a true picture of the reality, conflict and tensions.
In the midst of a conflict torn situation there is love. Robin Wyatt Dunn presents an uncanny story of past and present, darkness and light. His way with language and its thick opacity create a stunning impact on the mind.
If you are looking for ''meanings'', leave it. If you are looking for legerdemain stunts, leave it. But if you are looking for a fabulous world, in mythic settings, here it is, in the manner that only Dunn can achieve - credulity climaxing into incredible and fascinating story.
The Blackstock Children (Denis Stokes) ISBN: 978-1-990822-12-4
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Another poem collection from Denis Stokes, a poet that surprises at every turn.
The poems involve an engagement between Canada and Ireland/England/Scotland/Wales.
Part One involves family background, first experiences.
Part Two is a meditation on child poverty through the fictionalized imagining of the writing of the Christmas Carol. It is a protest poem about the lack of effort directed towards Campaign 2000, addressed to Dickens's son (and us, the inheritors of a social vision...alas).
Part Three involves the loss of the poet's brother-in-law and good friend, Henry Crealey.
Part Four goes deeper into present relationships and spiritual explorations.
Tunnel Jumping (Denis Stokes) ISBN 978-1-990822-10-0
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A compelling native voice from Ontario, Canada, Denis Stokes remembers the province and the city of Toronto in verses. His verses portray an age, a city, a province, and the people inhabiting them.
Though the author's childhood was unlike mine, all the same these poems resonate, drawing me backward into my own. The poems are tightly crafted, but gently, rooted in the area where he grew up, and where I have recently landed as a stranger, not relating to it, not really feeling it at all. And yet, now, perhaps, I do.
I have so many favourite poems, especially Kiss `n' Ride, with its beautiful hypnotic rhyme scheme. Other readers will discover favourites of their own.
These are poems paying homage. they are heavily rooted in nature, honouring childhood experiences, childhood friends. And family, especially a father and grandfather. I love that grandfather! A reader would give anything to have that grandfather. I know I would, despite already having a beloved one of my own.
This is not a book to be scanned quickly. Slow down. Savour it. Enjoy the ride.
