PICS from Federal Dust and Cabin/Fire’s Joint Reading

Two Baltimore reading series, Federal Dust and Cabin/Fire, joined forces earlier this month to throw “Federal Fire,” their first joint reading and cook-out. Hosted by Justin Sirois and Matthew Zingg, the reading featured Michelle Dove, Mark Cugini, Eric Nelson and Adam Wilson.

There were well-crafted words. There were hot dogs. There were marshmallows, a fire pit and a giant Mother’s Day card. A good time was had by all—see the pics below!

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Michelle Dove reads at Federal Fire

Mark Cugini reads at Federal Fire

Justin Sirois with giant Mother’s Day card at Federal Fire

Eric Nelson reads for Federal Fire

Adam Wilson reads for Federal Fire

 

PICS: Justine Post Talks at Houston MenilFest Indie Book Panel

Frances Justine Post Speaks at Houston MenilFest—Photo by Brenda Cook

This year the Houston MenilFest, an annual one-day festival of visual, literary and performing arts (“Art, Words, Noise”), featured Augury Books’ Frances Justine Post (author of BEAST, 2014) in its Indie Book Panel, Approaches to Publishing Your First Book, with fellow participants Martin Rock, David Tomas Martinez, Matthew Salesses and Jonathan Wells.

Frances Justine Post with former students Gabrielle Langley and Stacy Nigliazzo

If you’re in the Houston area, see Justine next read at Brazos Bookstore’s Monday night event (May 19th, 7 p.m.), “I Have to Go Back to 1994 and Hustle a Beast.” She will be reading with Elizabeth Lyons, Karyna McGlynn (I Have to Go Back to 1994 and Kill a Girl: Poems, Sarabande Books, 2009), and David Tomas Martinez (Hustle, Sarabande Books, 2014).

Read this great blog post about the upcoming Brazos reading from Inprint’s Open Book Blog.

More on BEAST

Look for BEAST new from Augury Books

 

 

 

Augury Books’ reading period is open — Submit your manuscript!

PICS: Halina Duraj Reads at D.G. Wills

Thanks to everyone who came out on Saturday night to see Halina Duraj—2014 O.Henry Prize recipient and author of THE FAMILY CANNON (Augury Books, 2014)—read at D.G. Wills Books in La Jolla, CA. Thanks to Dennis Wills for the amazing venue and the wonderful audience for their enthusiasm and support. See photos from the event below.

Courtesy Halina Duraj and D.G. Wills Books

 

Courtesy Halina Duraj and D.G. Wills Books

Courtesy Halina Duraj and D.G. Wills Books

 

Courtesy Halina Duraj and D.G. Wills Books

Courtesy Halina Duraj and D.G. Wills Books

Courtesy Halina Duraj and D.G. Wills Books

Courtesy Halina Duraj and D.G. Wills Books

Courtesy Halina Duraj and D.G. Wills Books

 

More on THE FAMILY CANNON

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VIDEO: Frances Justine Post and Kate Angus Visit ‘The Casserole’ Online Reading Series

BEAST author Frances Justine Post stopped by The Side Dish, part of the online reading series, The Casserole, to read from her new book (available here) and talk with series runner Chelsea Kurnick about the imagery of the book, its narrative arc, and writing “creepy poetry.”

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Also check out Augury Books editor Kate Angus’ reading on The Casserole:

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The Casserole is a weekly online reading series hosted by Chelsea Kurnick and featuring poetry and prose writers every Sunday. Writers hang out with Chelsea on Google Hangouts and the result is aired live on Youtube. The Casserole goes live at 6:30pm until 7:30pm PDT each week. If you miss an episode, you can come back any time to watch the recordings.

Submit your manuscript to Augury Books — Our reading period is open!

"The State Of The Union, 1998" by Alison Espach

We are very excited to present work from our readers at next week’s Augury Books & Friends offsite AWP reading/shindig in Seattle. The reading will be at Noble Neon, 3130 Airport Way S on Friday, February 28th from 7:30 until we all feel like going back to our hotels. If you’ll be in Seattle, please join us! Afterwards we can all go dance at the VIDA party.

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This is an excerpt from Alison Espach’s “The State Of The Union, 1998”

THE STATE OF THE UNION, 1998

It is 1998, and everybody we know has moved to Florida.  Everybody we know is obsessed with their porch. The president is always on TV. He won’t leave us alone.

Our leadership in the world is unrivaled, Bill Clinton says.  Ladies and gentlemen, the state of our union is strong.

The President has bags under his eyes.

I am taking notes. Mrs. Klausterman is going to quiz us on the State of the Union first thing in social studies.  She said, “Write down anything you feel is important,” though I know from experience that everything I think is important usually turns out not to be important, so I decide to be safe and write down everything.

The President seems very tired.

But this is not a time to rest.

My brothers are playing Bloody Knuckles on the couch.  The point of the game is always to see who can stomach being the bloodiest, the longest.  Usually, nobody can.  It is the only game my brothers and I play where at some point, we all agree it’s better to lose.

My mother sips a gin and tonic, sitting Japanese-style on the floor. She looks like we do when we are watching Wheel of Fortune after dinner, noses close to the screen. She sits like this, so close to him, as though they are on a date.

It is a time to build a new America!

And find cures for diabetes.

(and AIDS!!!)

It’s no secret: my mother wants to fuck the President. These were my father’s exact words, last night, when my parents thought we had gone to sleep.

“It certainly is our business,” my mother said. “The president’s character is our business.”

“You only say that because he’s the only president you’ve ever wanted to fuck,” my father said.

I seized with panic in the stairwell. I had no idea there were people in this world who wanted to fuck the president. Fucking the President, I think, sounds like a kind of crime.  Something you should get arrested for.

Alison Espach is the author of the novel The Adults. The Adults was a Wall Street Journal Top 10 Novel of 2011, New York Times Editors’ Choice, Barnes and Noble Discover Great New Writers selection, and Chicago Tribune #1 Reader Recommendation.   Alison’s other writing has appeared in Salon, the Daily Beast, Lincoln Center Theater Review, Fiction Writer’s Review, Del Sol Review, Sentence, and others.

A poem by Camille Rankine

We’re happy to continue presenting work from our readers at the upcoming Augury Books & Friends offsite AWP reading/shindig in Seattle. The reading will be at Noble Neon, 3130 Airport Way S on Friday, February 28th from 7:30 until we all feel like going back to our hotels. If you’ll be in Seattle, please join us!

Photo by Dave Bledsoe of FreeVerse Photography

Camille Rankine is the author of Slow Dance with Trip Wire, selected by Cornelius Eady for the Poetry Society of America’s 2010 New York Chapbook Fellowship. The recipient of a 2010 “Discovery”/Boston Review Poetry Prize, her poetry has appeared in numerous journals, including American Poet, The Baffler, Boston Review, Denver Quarterly, Indiana Review, Octopus, Paper Darts, and  Tin House. She was selected for a MacDowell Colony Fellowship in 2013, and was named an Honorary Cave Canem Fellow in 2012. She is Assistant Director of the MFA Program in Creative Writing at Manhattanville College, Editorial Director of The Manhattanville Review, and lives in New York City.

This Friday, Jan 24 — Launch Party for BEAST and THE FAMILY CANNON

Photo by Dave Bledsoe of FreeVerse Photography

You’ve saved the date, you’ve told your friends.

Now all you have to do is show up at 7 pm on Friday, Jan 24, to Augury Books’ 2014 launch party for our new books: Frances Justine Post’s BEAST, and Halina Duraj’s THE FAMILY CANNON, Augury’s first fiction publication. Enjoy the friends, the wine, and the readings by Post, Duraj, Timothy Donnelly, and Ely Shipley. Then come join us after for drinks down the street.

Details

What:  2014 launch party for Augury’s new books! Complete with readings, drinks, and irresistible new books for sale.

Who:  Augury Books’ new authors, Frances Justine Post and Halina Duraj, as well as special guests Timothy Donnelly (The Cloud Corporation) and Ely Shipley (Boy with Flowers).

When:  7:00 p.m. — Friday, January 24, 2014; Join us after the event for drinks in the neighborhood.

Where:  Berl’s Poetry Shop — 126A Front Street / Brooklyn, NY 11201 (next to Superfine in D.U.M.B.O.)

Why:  Because we all love new poetry, new fiction, wine, and each other.

How:  Take the F to York Street or the A/C to High Street. And you can RSVP to this event on Facebook.

Secure your copies of THE FAMILY CANNON and BEAST now by pre-ordering!

Halina Duraj Preview: Read Excerpt from THE FAMILY CANNON Then Pre-Order!

Photo and THE FAMILY CANNON Cover Art by Dave Bledsoe, FreeVerse Photography

From “Tenants,” THE FAMILY CANNON by Halina Duraj

My mother scrubbed the blood all evening. She dipped the hard-bristled brush in a bucket of ammonia while my father ate pork chops and sauerkraut at the kitchen table. She came downstairs to make him a cup of tea—he’d never made one for himself—and she turned on the TV for him while he put his feet up on the coffee table. Then she went back upstairs to paint. She painted that same night so the room could be advertised the next day. I didn’t have to sleep in the trundle that night, because she never came to bed. I crept up the stairs, and at the top, I rested my chin on the banister. On the other side of the wall, I heard the slap of the brush against the plaster and my mother crying. A strip of light appeared under Don the Barber’s door, and then I heard bedsprings and floorboards and I turned and went down the stairs. From the darkness at the bottom, I watched him cross the hall, and I heard murmurings and mumblings and then my mother’s voice a little louder, a little firmer, then a shushing noise. ‘Please,’ I heard my mother say. ‘Don’t.’

And then Don the Barber walked back across the hall, shut the door. His light didn’t go off, but I went to bed anyway. I woke up at six o’clock when my mother came downstairs and made my father breakfast and packed his lunch and carried it out to his car and went down to the Tribune to place a new ad: Room for rent. Just painted. Please inquire.

In the afternoon, she painted a second coat, and then you almost couldn’t see the stains.”

Don’t forget our launch party with a reading by Halina Duraj, on January 24, 2014 — RSVP now or simply save the date. We will see you there!

Order Now on Amazon — Look for it new from seller Augury Books

Thank you!

Announcing Augury’s 2014 Launch Party: Friday, January 24th at Berl’s Poetry Shop

Hamlet’s terrace, Kronborg, Denmark

Hello friends! It’s almost time to celebrate the launch of Augury’s 2014 catalogue: Frances Justine Post‘s poetry book, Beast, and Halina Duraj‘s book of short fiction, The Family Cannon

Help us celebrate putting these two books out into the world. At the same time, enjoy readings by Augury’s debut authors, Frances Justine Post and Halina Duraj, as well as guest readings by Timothy Donnelly and Ely Shipley.

Details

Who: Augury Books’ new authors, Frances Justine Post and Halina Duraj, as well as poets Timothy Donnelly (The Cloud Corporation) and Ely Shipley (Boy with Flowers).

What:  2014 launch party for Augury’s new books! Complete with readings, drinks, and irresistible new books for sale.

When:  7:00 p.m. — Friday, January 24, 2014; Join us after the event for drinks in the neighborhood.

Where:  Berl’s Poetry Shop — 126A Front Street / Brooklyn, NY 11201 (next to Superfine in D.U.M.B.O.)

Why:  Because we all love new poetry, new fiction, wine, and each other.

How:  Take the F to York Street or the A/C to High Street. Also, please RSVP to this event on Facebook.

Secure your copies of The Family Cannon and Beast now by pre-ordering!