Mark your calendars! Next week, Hidden Book Press heads to Peterborough to officially launch a fundraiser anthology on the theme of family.
More than just poetry! More than a book launch!
They Have To Take You In is a cross genre publication including mainstream, slipstream and magic realist work by writers from across the country. “ – Ursula Pflug, anthology editor
Below is information received from both the editor and publisher:
About the book:
“We are reading our way out of sadness.” So writes Linda Rogers in her fine poem, “Paper Stairs.” And as our relationship with home and family is a complicated and varied one, Ursula Pflug’s Hidden Brook Press anthology They Have to Take You In, provides the reader with ample evidence of the profound complexity of blood and clan. The Welsh word “hiraeth” translates roughly as “longing for home,” and yet there are those for whom home is not so positive and the fine line between being homesick and being sick of home is just as often not so fine. “I remember being put out on the street/ at the age of nine or ten/ by my father for reasons that still remain a mystery/ even to me,” writes Darryl Salach in his poem, “On the Road”. None of the mushy sentimentality, false memory and treacly greeting-card nostalgia for these writers-no, these writers are interested in the healing truths we tell when writers are writing their way out of sadness for the sake of love. Herein they tell the entire grumble of the story, sometimes in memoir, sometimes in fiction, sometimes in a poem, but never in the candy-coated dithyrambs that populate the pages of those ‘chicken soup for the soul’ books. This anthology is filled with serious truth, the kind that goes deep and heals from well within the wound. – John B. Lee, Poet Laureate of Brantford and Poet Laureate of Norfolk County
About the Dana Fund:
“The Dana Fund was created in July of 2010 at the Canadian Mental Health Agency (CMHA HKPR) in Peterborough Ontario, at the suggestion of friends and family who wished to make donations in her memory. Dana Tkachenko inspired many people through her own experiences of struggling against tremendous obstacles and succeeding in creating a stable and fulfilling life for herself and her family. Dana’s memory is honoured through the Dana Fund, by dedicating donations to the cause of supporting young women and families in transition, experiencing similar challenges, who could benefit from some help along the way.” – Gordon Langill
About the writers:
Writers who have contributed fiction and poetry include both internationally published award winners and those who appear here in print for the first time. Dana Tkachenko’s remarkable contribution closes the anthology.
Table of Contents
Fiction
Edited by Ursula Pflug and published by Hidden Brook Press 2014; Cover painting by Christiane Pflug. Introduction by Gordon Langill.
Life Skills by Jan Thornhill
The Doppelgängers by Silvia Moreno-Garcia
Orange and Amber by Tapanga Koe
Murky Pinks by Georgia Fisher
Winterstorm by Barbara Ponomareff
Just Like Rain by Michelle Berry
Giiwedinong by Leanne Simpson
Foxford by Sandra Kasturi
The Missing Elephant by Robert Runté
Up, Away, Here, Gone by Andrew MacDonald
A Better Closet by Mela Brown
Zhezhi by Michael Matheson
Witness by Ruth Clarke
Arnold Pepper Doesn’t Care by Joe Davies
The Corner of Crack and Ho’ by P.J. Thomas
Belvedere by Margaret Slavin Dyment
Leadfoot Sally: An Excerpt from Uranium City Return by Tim Becket
Anna’s Story by Dana Tkachenko
Poetry
About The Creation of Life On Earth by Robert Priest
McLoneliness by Ron Chase
Paper Stairs by Linda Rogers
100 Percent Acrylic by Debbie Okun Hill
Family Tree by Colleen Anderson
Metro West by Ariel David Skelly Langen
On the Road by Daryl Salach
ode’min giizis (heart berry moon) at Couchiching First Nation by Gord Bruyere
Lethe by Donna Langevin
Note: There will be a second event in Toronto: Sunday, October 19, 2014 from 3 to 5 p.m. at the Black Swan Tavern, 154 Danforth. Doors open at 2:30 p.m. More info here.
Order info here.
Kites Without Strings 