Dear Friends,
We’re pleased to announce the Rescue Press fall catalog which includes Jonathan Blum’s dark and hilarious novella, Last Word, as well as The New Census: An Anthology of Contemporary American Poetry, edited by Kevin González and Lauren Shapiro, both of which are available to purchase today at our website or from SPD. Also, on November 15th we will release Todd Melicker’s first collection of poetry, rendezvous, which was selected by Zach Savich as the winner of our second Black Box Poetry Prize.
Happy autumn!
Rescue Press
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Last Word, a novella, tells the story of Kip Langer, a successful orthognathic surgeon, who is trying to raise three children, including Eric, a bright but socially awkward thirteen-year-old from his first marriage. As Eric gets into more and more trouble at his Conservative Jewish Day School, Kip tries to understand Eric and guide him toward making better choices. The story, set in a Southern suburban community, examines patterns of love, anger, intimacy, inheritance, and disconnection within one modern blended family.
Jonathan Blum grew up in Miami and graduated from UCLA and the Iowa Writers’ Workshop. His short stories have appeared in Green Mountains Review, Gulf Coast, New York Stories, Northwest Review, Other Voices, Playboy, Zaum, and elsewhere. He has taught fiction writing at The University of Iowa and at Drew University, and is the recipient of a Michener-Copernicus Society of America Award and a grant from the Helene Wurlitzer Foundation. He lives in Los Angeles.
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Edited by Kevin A. González and Lauren Shapiro, with a foreword by Dara Wier, The New Census captures the kaleidoscopic range of contemporary poetry, spanning a complex array of aesthetic, formal, and social concerns. It includes over one hundred poems from forty poets: Carrie Olivia Adams, Eric Baus, John Beer, Nicky Beer, Ciaran Berry, Jericho Brown, Suzanne Buffam, Heather Christle, Eduardo C. Corral, Kyle Dargan, Darcie Dennigan, Sandra Doller, Timothy Donnelly, Joshua Edwards, Emily Kendal Frey, Dobby Gibson, Yona Harvey, Steve Healey, Tyehimba Jess, Keetje Kuipers, Nick Lantz, Dorothea Lasky, Dora Malech, Sarah Manguso, Randall Mann, Sabrina Orah Mark, Chris Martin, J. Michael Martinez, Adrian Matejka, John Murillo, Sawako Nakayasu, Kathleen Ossip, Kiki Petrosino, Zach Savich, Robyn Schiff, James Shea, Nick Twemlow, Sarah Vap, Jerry Williams, and Jon Woodward. Alongside the work of these forty bright stars, The New Census features twenty census polls of its poets as well as dynamic illustrations by artist Lauren Haldeman.
