Beginning of the Year Address: Updates and Upcoming!

 

Hello dear friends, and welcome to NightBallet's Beginning of the Year Address!  We've turned over the last calendar page of 2014 and begun a brand-new year.  These are exciting times here at NightBallet Press, and it's all because of YOU!                  

 

 

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We are very pleased and extremely honored to announce that Pittsburgh Magazine's January 2015 issue contains an article by Kris Collins about the five Pittsburgh titles NBP released back in summer of 2014:

NB Publishes the Work of 5 Local Poets by Kris Collins (Pittsburgh Magazine-Jan 2015 issue)

The five Pittsburgh poets are Jason Baldinger, Jason Irwin, Karen Lillis, Heather McNaugher, and Nikki Allen.  Check it out!  Thank you Kris Collins for the great article, and thank you Karen Lillis for suggesting these books for review to Kris!

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Four poems from The Paul Simon Project by Karen Lillis are featured in Fusion Magazine: HERE

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We've had a lot of great reviews (will post more as I find them in my emails):

Review of Irwin's Where You Are by CL Bledsoe (Revolution John Magazine)

Review of Lillis' The Paul Simon Project by Michael Fournier (Cabildo Quarterly)

Review of Litzky's Jerry in the Bardo by Mindy Kronenberg (Mom Egg Review)

Review of Burroughs' The Eater of the Absurd by Kristin D. Scott (Knot Magazine)

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Our books now appear as part of the permanent collections in both the Ohioana Library (Columbus, OH), and the Lockwood Library (University of Buffalo).   

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Big congrats to Margie Shaheed, who has sold over 800 copies of her chapbook Mosaic!  NightBallet Press first published Mosaic in May of 2013, and Margie has ordered at least 40 copies a month since then, spreading her poetry throughout Ohio, Tennessee, and New York.  I wish we could bottle her magic!

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NightBallet Press now uses a local professional print shop for our covers, Elyria Print and Copy LLC, instead of a big-box store's printing services.  We are getting more personalized service, and the print jobs are consistently excellent.  I strongly urge you to use small-business services wherever possible; they are unbeatable and invaluable!

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We've had a lot of outside individual orders for titles, and we've had a lot of orders for reprints. This means our poets are out there doing readings and advertising their product.  I've been very busy doing the actual printing, which has slowed down my working on new titles.  But the upswing of it is that more and more people are buying NBP titles, and we are succeeding in getting the Poetry Word out there!

Thank you, thank you, to all the wonderful people who have made this past year a huge success:  you, the poets who have entrusted me with your fine...nay, outstanding!..work, and you, the (obviously discriminating!) readers who have supported us through buying books and attended featured readings by NBP authors.  A big thank you to the artists and photographers who have given us permission to use your work on our covers and helped to make us look so classy.  A bear hug and thank you to you who have sent donations to support the press throughout this past year...I appreciate you, from the bottom of my heart.

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We've had several inquiries about one-year subscriptions, so as a SPECIAL THANK YOU for your support, I am making the NightBallet Press Season Four titles available to you as a one-year subscription for only $100.00 (one hundred dollars).  For this one-time payment of one hundred dollars, you will receive a copy of each and every NBP title, as they are published, between September 2014 and September 2015, including the Lipsmack! anthology to be published in September 2015.  This will include the already-published George Wallace's Riding with Boom Boom and Russ Green's Gimme Back My Radio (published Oct 2014), plus brand new books (scheduled) by

Lyn Lifshin,
RA Washington,
Alan Catlin,
Geoffrey Landis,
Mary Turzillo,
Andy Roberts,
Kathleen Cerveny,
Connie Everett,
Margie Shaheed,
Marisa Moks-Unger,
Steve Brightman,
John Burroughs,
Jake St. John,

and who knows who else!  Postage is included with this special offer.  Many of these books will be selling individually for $10 plus $4 shipping/handling, so you can see where the savings can be had in purchasing a one-year subscription.  I guarantee your money's worth!  The subscription button appears at the top of the right column.  (Please inquire if you wish a subscription to any previous year, and I'm sure we can work it out.)

 

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If you know of any reviews I've missed or special events I should report, please let me know at nightballetpressATgmail.com.  Thank you thank you thank you, and HAPPY NEW YEAR!  I can't wait to see what this year has in store!

Review by Kristen D. Scott of The Eater of the Absurd by John Burroughs

NightBallet Press is giving thanks for poets and poetry, for artists and art, for musicians and music this chilly Black Friday.  Kicking off the day is this awesome review of The Eater of the Absurd by John Burroughs.  Thank you, Kristen D. Scott/Knot Magazine!

                                LINK TO THE REVIEW AT KNOT MAGAZINE HERE



John Burroughs is a northeast Ohio poet (Oct Tongue-1, It Takes More Than Chance to Make Change, Barry Merry Baloney, and many others) and host of the monthly Mondays at Mahall's poetry series. Burroughs won the first poetry slam he ever competed in, formed the association known as Poets of Lorain County, has contributed irregularly to the Cleveland Poetics and Ohio Poetry Association blogs, and is perhaps most proud of his work (since 2008) as the founding editor of Crisis Chronicles Press.


The Eater of the Absurd is his first full-length poetry collection, and makes a striking statement of (in Burroughs' own words) "pleasure, pain, and deprogramming."


Kristen D. Scott is a Pushcart Prize nominee for five works from Opiate (Garden Oak Press, 2014).  An award-winning essayist for her work on Federico Garcia Lorca, she has had work translated into Arabic, Turkish, and Sanskrit.  Scott is currently the editor-in-chief and web designer of Knot Magazine.  She holds an MFA in Creative Writing, an MA in English Literature, and is progressing with her PhD in Global Education. 

Pushcart Prize and Ohioana Book Award Nominations, 2014

It's that time of year again, when NightBallet Press must choose from all the excellent manuscripts published in this past year to make nominations for the Pushcart Prize.

As always, it's extremely difficult to narrow the selections to only six nominations.  NBP believes that every single one of its poets deserves the Prize, and if possible, we would heap awards and accolades on each one of you and your amazing and exciting poetry collections.

However, rules are rules, and with much soul-searching (and hair-tearing), these are NBP's six nominations for the 2015 Pushcart Prize:

Jennifer Hambrick—“Painting Lizards Orange” from Lipsmack! A Sampler Platter of Poets from NBP Year 3


Tsaurah Litzky—“Chicken Livers” from Jerry in the Bardo

Heather McNaugher—“The Outsiders” from Lipsmack! A Sampler Platter of Poets from NBP Year 3

Joey Nicoletti—“ To Diane di Prima” from Shadow Traffic

Amanda Oaks—“How to Pick Up the Pieces” from Hurricane Mouth

George Wallace—“Riding with Boom Boom” from Riding with Boom Boom


Please join with NBP in congratulating these wonderful poets, and wish them luck in the Pushcart Prize judging process!

This year, in addition to nominations for the Pushcart Prize, NBP has made nominations for the Ohioana Book Award, as well.

The following books have been sent to the Ohioana Library* in Columbus, Ohio, and have been nominated by NBP for the Ohioana Book Award:


In Brilliant Explosions Alone by Steve Brightman

The Eater of the Absurd by John Burroughs

As the Caffeine Kicks In by Christopher Franke

Blossoms by Alex Gildzen

Unscathed by Jennifer Hambrick

Unfinished by Jack McGuane

The Green World by Andy Roberts

Mosaic by Margie Shaheed

Selected Regions of the Moon by J. E. Stanley
and

Songs in the Key of Cleveland, published by Crisis Chronicles Press

Please join with NBP in congratulating the authors of these books, and wish them luck in the Ohioana Book Award judging process!

(*Please note:  If you are an Ohioan, or if you have resided in Ohio for five or more years, your book has already been, or will be, placed in the Ohioana Library's permanent collection in Columbus, Ohio.  Only the books they've received this past year are eligible for Book Award nominations.  We are working hard to make sure the Library receives copies of all Ohio-based or Ohio-connected books published by NBP.)


Once again, to all the NightBallet Press poets, I wish we could nominate every poet, every poem, every book.  I am honored and humbled to have had the opportunity to publish your wonderful words.  Thank you from the bottom of my heart. 

Wallace Rides With Boom Boom and Everything's Turning Green!

On October 24-October 26, an exciting event took place in Cleveland, Ohio, as people from all over the United States gathered to celebrate poetry, small presses, and the "mimeograph revolution" poet d.a. levy.

 

                                                      poster designed by Hydeout Press

 

The excitement and celebration of the weekend included the hot-off-the-press book release of George Wallace's Riding with Boom Boom,
and Gimme Back My Radio by Russ Green!

 

 

Gimme Back My Radio by New York poet Russ Green contains 36 pages of dynamic and seductive poems.  Boasting a gorgeous photo by the internationally-known photographer-cinematographer-producer-director Lynn Spinnato, the heavy white cardstock cover is paired with a deep blue cardstock insert.  The 30 poems are printed on thick white paper.  Matt Pasca, Pushcart nominee and author of A Thousand Doors, says:

"In Gimme Back My Radio, Russ Green plays conductor and meteorologist to the awesome fronts colliding in his mind—the smashed barometric boundary where Himalayan flags, American greed, Bayou lovers and city tow trucks squall—where his relentless  attention spins in tricked-out cyclones of alliterative rapture, in tornados of prayer from which Green emerges triumphant—baton both broken and glowing."

In Gimme Back My Radio, Green writes about John Lennon, Jack Kennedy, Amiri Baraka, New York City, Starbucks, "Sultry Tongues" and "High-heeled Honeys" and much more, with keen observation and a unique sense of humor.  His poems at the same time satisfy and leave you hungry for more!

                                          Russ Green at the  Lit Café reading Saturday night.


Gimme Back My Radio is Russ Green's first collection of poems, but he's no stranger to the poetry scene.  Green is co-editor at Great Weather for Media based in New York City.  He hosts, along with his fellow editors, at their weekly Spoken Word Sundays at Parkside Lounge on the Lower East Side of Manhattan.  He also hosts and curates the Green's Revolution reading series at Cornucopia's Noshery in Amityville, NY,  and a quarterly music and poetry series at BrickHouse Brewery in Patchogue, NY.  He has done readings from Sante Fe to Cleveland, New Orleans, NYC, and Lowell Celebrates Kerouac in Lowell, MA.  His work has been published in several print and online anthologies including Long Island Quarterly and the PPA Literary Review.  A graduate of Hofstra University, he lives in Port Jefferson, Long Island.



Gimme Back My Radio is available through PayPal (see column to the right of this posting) for only $10 plus $4 shipping/handling, and is also sold on Amazon!  Get your copy today!  

     

The second fantastic publication released this past week by NBP is
Riding with Boom Boom by George Wallace!

Riding with Boom Boom contains 36 pages of (21) kick-ass poems.  The striking cover image is an artfully-altered photograph by Wallace, printed on a leatherette-textured heavy ivory cardstock.  The second cardstock insert is a rich purple, and the text is printed on thick white paper.  And the poems...ah, the poems!  With lines like

...& I want
my share so walk with me
ice my heart bleed me twice

on Bleecker Street

on Down & Out Avenue
on Mushroom Cloud
on Chili Pepper Red Hot
Panic Button Street

you're Grade A ammunition baby

and titles like "Mad with the Mad-eyed Hipsters" and "Outlaw Angels, Asleep at the Wheel", you know you're in for a very special kind of treat!

George Wallace is a writer and performer living and working in NYC.  He maintains a regular reading, lecture, and poetry workshop touring schedule across the US and Europe.  A frequent perfomer on the NYC scene, he has appeared nationally and internationally in such venues as the Beat Museum, Woody Guthrie Festival, Lowell Celebrates Kerouac, Rexroth Festival, Insomniacathon, Howlfest, John Steinbeck Center, Robbie Burns Center and the Dylan Thomas Centre.  His work has appeared in Poets Against The War, About.com, Socialism and Democracy, Citizen 32, American Watchdog, Sous Surveillance, Pemmican, Pedestal and other publications.  He is First Poet Laureate of Suffolk County, NY and Writer in Residence at the Walt Whitman Birthplace in West Hills.  He has more than 25 chapbooks and books of poems published...Riding with Boom Boom is his fourth chapbook of poems from NightBallet Press. 

 

 George Wallace at the Lit Café reading Saturday night. 

 

 

Riding with Boom Boom is available through PayPal (see column to the right of this posting) for only $10 plus $4 shipping/handling, and is also sold on Amazon!  Don't wait to order!

The only thing better than reading the poems in these books is hearing them from the mouths of the poets themselves...so if you have the opportunity to hear these amazing poets read their work, do not miss it!  Until then, get your own copies of Gimme Back My Radio and Riding with Boom Boom and prepare yourself for a wicked, wild, wonderful, witty wordfest!

Autumn 2014 readings from Riding With Boom-Boom:

Fri Nov 7, 6 pm Four Horsemen, Cornelia Street Café NYC NY
Sat Nov 8, 11 am Whispers Vineyard St James NY
Mon Nov 10, 8 pm Saturn Poetry Series, Shades of Green NYC NY
Fri Nov 14, 8 pm Book Party, Molasses Books Brooklyn NY
Sat Nov 15, 5 pm BJ’s Fredonia nr Buffalo NY
Sat Nov 29, TBA Pittsburgh Pa
Fri Dec 5, 8 pm Dire Literary Series, Cambridge Mass

Autumn 2014 readings from Gimme Back My Radio: 

Wed Nov 5, Matt and Terri's in Bayshore w/ Verless Doran

 

Lipsmack! A Sampler Platter of Poets from NBP Year Three 2014 is here!

 

Lipsmack!  A Sampler Platter of Poets from NightBallet Press Year Three 2014 is here!

We are pleased to present this new anthology: eighteen sparkling new poems by the eighteen poets published by NBP this past year!

Douglas Cole

Bill Gainer

Andy Roberts

James Valvis

Nikki Allen

John Thomas Allen

Amanda Oaks

Jonathan Harris

Joey Nicoletti

Tsaurah Litzky

Jennifer Hambrick

Jason Irwin

Jeffrey Alfier

Heather McNaugher

Karen Lillis

Jason Baldinger

Zach Fishel

dan smith

Featuring poems about song and space, faith and factories,  of "butch baby dykes, trying it on" and of lizards and makeup, this Lipsmack! has something for everyone.  It rocks, it rolls, it grabs you by the ankles and won't let go!

Lipsmack!  A Sampler Platter of Poets from NightBallet Press Year Three 2014 features a sweet cover photo by Catherine Criswell.  The cover is a thick confetti cardstock with a lipsmacking red cardstock insert.  The 36 pages of text are printed on crisp white paper. 

To celebrate the publication of Lipsmack!, we are having a book release party at Mahalls in Lakewood, Ohio tonight (Monday, October 6, 2014), featuring Jennifer Hambrick and Andy Roberts from the Columbus area, Jason Baldinger from Pittsburgh, and Cleveland's own dan smith.  That's 7:30pm at Mahalls, 13200 Madison, Lakewood, Ohio!  We'll have fresh new copies of Lipsmack! Year Three, plus NBP books by all the featured readers, and copies of the two previous Lipsmack! anthologies, as well.  Come and hear some great poetry, groove with friends, and pick up your very own copy of Lipsmack! Year Three!

 

Lipsmack! is only $5 (plus $3 shipping/handling), and is available through mail order right here on this website, or on Amazon!

We are caught up in THORN BUSHES AND FISH HOOKS with Zach Fishel!

NightBallet Press celebrates today's publication of Thorn Bushes and Fish Hooks by Zach Fishel!

 

  

Thorn Bushes and Fish Hooks by Zach Fishel is the eighteenth title in the third season (year) of NightBallet publications, and it's a glorious thing!  Fishel writes honestly about childhood, family, favorite haunts, yellow catkins, sassafras, Ice Tooth and Old Man's Beard,  and Pennsylvania snow.  You will feel the crunch of leaves beneath your boots as you walk through this woodsy mindscape. 

Thorn Bushes and Fish Hooks is 28 pages long and contains 20 beautifully written poems. The cover photo is printed on dove gray cardstock, and the book has a golden yellow cardstock insert.  The text is printed on thick white cotton paper.

Fishel was born in Central Pennsylvania, and is a poet, outdoor guide, and high school English teacher in North Dakota.  He is the author of several books, including Windsock Etiquette, Blue Collar at Best, and Prayerbook Bouquet (published by NightBallet Press in 2013).  His poetry has received multiple Pushcart and Best of the Web nominations.  He still believes in his lifelong dream of being an astronaut, a cowboy, and a hobo.

                                                      

Order your copy of Thorn Bushes and Fish Hooks today, for only $5 plus $3 shipping/handling!  See the PayPal link in the right column on this webpage, or order from Amazon. 

Beep Beep! Move over, SHADOW TRAFFIC is coming through!

NightBallet Press is enormously pleased to announce today's publication of
Shadow Traffic by Joey Nicoletti!

 

Shadow Traffic contains 16 delightful poems about Marvel superheroes, famous Italians, famiglia, and rock and roll,  written with love and skill by New Yorker Joey Nicoletti.  Nicoletti takes you by the hand and leads you into his fantasy life of Spider-Man and Captain Marvel; he whispers into your ear about creating new holidays and baking Onion Pie.  He has a natural story-telling style, and his poems are at the same time quietly sophisticated and  easily accessible.

 

 

 

Joey Nicoletti is the author of Cannoli Gangster (Word tech, 2012), which was selected as a finalist for the Steel Toe Books Poetry Prize by Denise Duhamel.   He is also the author of Earthquake Weather (NightBallet Press, 2012), and Borrowed Dust (Finishing Line Press, 2011).  His poetry, nonfiction, and reviews have appeared in Valparaiso Poetry Review, Stymie Magazine, Two Bridges Review, Voices in Italian Americana, Drawn to Marvel: Poems from the Comic Books, and other magazines and anthologies.  He lives with his family in Western New York, where he teaches at SUNY Buffalo State. 


Shadow Traffic is 24 pages long, and is printed on creamy white paper.  The front cover, boasting a haunting cover photo taken by photographer extraordinaire Chandra Alderman,  is printed on rib-textured white cardstock, with a soft turquoise textured cardstock insert.  The book is saddle-stitched (stapled), and is only $5 plus $3 shipping handling.  You can order it from PayPal here on the NBP website (see right column), or order it from Amazon!




There's a Lot of Life in this TERMINAL ISLAND!

NightBallet Press is enormously pleased to present the publication of
Terminal Island Los Angeles poems by Jeffrey Alfier!

                                         

                                 

In this book, California poet Jeffrey Alfier offers an uncompromising look at the gritty, lonely, hardworking inhabitants of Los Angeles County's Terminal Island.


In the poem "Lesser Alleluias at the Shipwrecking Yard", you can feel the moisture on your skin as you read (excerpt):


Late July, and heat is the huge exhale of a beast.
Sea fog so thick we might appear to deckhands
in the channel as ghouls in a horror flick.


And in "Angelina's Flower Shop on February 14th", you can hear the door open, you can smell the flowers (excerpt):

Angelina knows bouquets are chosen late
each year on this day.  Her bright greetings meet
the jingle of the opening door, a smile for every
halting word, blessings for each footfall that exits
homeward, every rose holding fast to red.


Terminal Island Los Angeles poems  is 48 pages long and contains 38 poems.  The haunting cover photo, taken by Jeffrey Alfier, and used with permission, is printed on thick white textured cardstock; the book has a gunmetal blue cardstock insert.  The text is printed on creamy white paper.

 

Jeffrey Alfier is the winner of the Kithara Book Prize for his poetry collection Idyll for a Vanishing River (Glass Lyre Press).  He is also author of eight chapbooks, and is a five-time Pushcart Prize nominee.  He holds an MA in Humanities from California State University at Dominguez Hills.  Having served twenty-seven years in the Air Force as an enlisted man and an officer, he is a member of Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America (IAVA).  He's also worked as a functional analyst with Science Applications International Corporation, and once taught history for City College of Chicago's European Division.  He has been published in the Birmingham Poetry Review, Crab Orchard Review, Georgetown Review, Iron Horse Literary Review, and Tulane Review, among many others.  He is the founder and co-editor of San Pedro River Review.  With camera poetic eye, he hunts the ruined, abandoned and unheralded places of America.

 

Terminal Island Los Angeles poems is available to order right here on this website for only $10 plus $4 shipping/handling (scroll down the right column and locate the PayPal button), or you can order it on

Amazon.

If you've never read Jeffrey Alfier's marvelous poetry, now is the time to start...get your copy today!

 

 

Go On a DREAM DRIVE for Your Summer Vacation!

So, it's summer, and you want to go someplace special?  How about going on a Dream Drive with Jonathan Harris?

 

 

                                                    
Dream Drive is a brand new, 60-page poetry collection by Los Angeles poet Jonathan Harris.  And what a ride it is!  Harris intrigues us with dreamscapes of childhood memories and complex relationships, delights us with an entire section whimsically titled "Horsies", and teases us with poems named  "Shacking Up with Karma", "Alessandro Volta's First Letter of Resignation", and "John (and Yoko) Write a Haiku".

 

Featuring a richly-colored cover photograph by Californian Jeffrey Alfier on a pale ivory cardstock, with a textured, deep navy cardstock insert, Dream Drive is printed on thick white cotton paper and is a dream to hold in your hands.  You'll want to be wide-awake, though, when you read his words:

"Ode to Joy"

When he sings—sweet
scarecrow of a boy—he goes somewhere
other than here,
                          I think
to a holy place
in his hand-me-downs,
to a world brimming
with the well water

                                of joy,
where I go too,
picking up straw
& the golden notes
my son leaves behind.



"What I Do with My Time"

The past
is a time bomb
I hear ticking.
So I write.

The present
is a gift
I unwrap later.
So I hope.

The future
is a horse
I see winning.
So I bet.

Where I'm
coming from
kids turn cartwheels.
So I whistle.

 

 

                                                                    
Jonathan Harris received a Bachelor's Degree in Liberal Arts from St. John's College and an MFA in Creative Writing from Pacific University.  His first book of poetry, The Wave That Did Not Break, was published by Tebot Bach Press in 2010.  Along with being head of development for the entertainment agency Atoll Productions, he serves as a judge for the Page International Screenwriting Contest.  His work has appeared recently in the Raleigh Review, Spillway, Best of the Net, and the Jacar Press anthology What Matters.  A former Peace Corps volunteer, he lives with his family in Los Angeles.

NightBallet Press is honored and extremely pleased to publish Dream Drive, containing forty-five poems on sixty pages.  Divided into four sections: The Book of Us, The Book of Others, Horsies, and Portraits of Earth, Dream Drive will steal your heart and take you on a journey of discovery and delight.  You may order Dream Drive for only $10 plus $4 shipping/handling, through PayPal right here on this website (scroll down the right-side column), or find it on Amazon.  Of course, if you live in Los Angeles, you can get it directly from the poet himself!

Words Dance in the NightBallet Book-Release Super-Bash and a SPECIAL SALE!

Today, Saturday June 14, 2014, is the BIG DAY...the day of the Words Dance in the NightBallet book-release super-bash in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania!

                                                     poster designed by Amanda Oaks

Beginning at 7:30 p.m., nine poets from Ohio and Pennsylvania will join to read "round robin" style at the Modern Formations Gallery, 4919 Penn Avenue, Pittsburgh, PA:

Amanda Oaks
Jason Irwin
Dianne Borsenik
Jason Baldinger
Karen Lillis
John Burroughs
Heather McNaugher
John Dorsey
Nikki Allen

NightBallet Press is honored to have published Hurricane Mouth for Amanda Oaks in April of this year, and is proud to have published books for John Burroughs— The Eater of the Absurd —and John Dorsey—  Fall of the Ramen Empire and White Girl Problems —as well.

This past week NightBallet Press was thrilled to announce the publication of five new books by five outstanding Pittsburgh poets!

Where You Are by Jason Irwin
The Studs Terkel Blues by Jason Baldinger
Double Life by Heather McNaugher
The Paul Simon Project by Karen Lillis
ligaments of light tigering the shoulders by Nikki Allen

To celebrate the spoken and written word, Words Dance and NightBallet Press have joined together to present tonight's Words Dance in the NightBallet...and YOU are invited! 

As this is a very special event, it deserves a very special sale!  Buy all five books for $25 plus $4 shipping/handling!  That's a savings of $5 off  the price of Nikki Allen's book, and the combined shipping saves you $11!  To purchase all five books for this very special price, see the PayPal button in the right side column of this website—be sure to hit the PayPal Button that says SUPER SALE, and not the PayPal buttons for the individual Pittsburgh poets' books.

We hope to see you tonight at the event—it's going to be a night to remember!