BOA Blog

The Boston Review recently took notice of BOA book Your Father on the Train of Ghosts by G.C. Waldrep and John Gallaher. The book was also just named a finalist for the 2012 Ohioana Book Award for poetry. The review is especially drawn to the book's intriguing use of the second person perspective, and speculates on whom exactly the "you" is addressing: the poem's speaker, the population at large, or "someone on the other end of the line"? It calls the poetry "an example of contemporary work that struggles to express the exhaustion of excess," but its ability to do...

Naomi Shihab Nye, called "one of the most spirited voices in American poetry" by The Philadelphia Inquirer, is consistently in the headlines for her newest collection of poetry, Transfer. While she has been best known for her poetry collections Fuel, You and Yours,  and an extensive list of other writings, The Philadelphia Inquirer calls Transfer (published by BOA in 2011) "her most powerful to date." Reviewer Thomas Devaney calls the collection an ongoing elegy, which draws on her Palestinian-American heritage to "[chart] three central journeys: the journey of her father’s life in exile in America, the journey of his death,...

According to Hayden's Ferry Review, The Innocent Party by Aimee Parkison is irresistible. Her writing is of unique experience that transcends the categorization of imaginative realism, while still doing it a lot of justice. The plot of her short story "Locked Doors" is as captivating as they come: the story is from a man's point of view, whose sister shatters emotionally into three personalities. The review comments on Parkison's characters, unforgettable and walking the line between reality and unreality through familiar and comforting narrative. Another story from The Innocent Party in the review's spotlight is " Murder on the Pasture." The...

This month in Publishers Weekly, Craig Morgan Teicher's upcoming (and highly anticipated) poetry collection To Keep Love Blurry, out on September 11, was featured. Teicher, a young writer, has already published two previous works (including Cradle Book) and is also poetry editor and director of digital operations at PW. The review praises To Keep Love Blurry, saying that it "risks most everything poetry can risk."  Robert Lowell, the famous poet (often considered a father of the craft), is a familiar inspiration for Teicher, and is ever present in much of his new book. Through his poems, "the spirits of dead...

Have you ever wondered what exactly goes on in the minds of your favorite authors? What do they think about, dream about, glean inspiration from? What do they surround themselves with for insight and motivation? In a series of posts on the 2012 short story collections entered for The Story Prize, Aimee Parkison (author of BOA's spring 2012 release The Innocent Party), discusses writing, inspiration, and all that goes into producing a book like The Innocent Party. Parkison confesses she gets most of her ideas just before or as she falls asleep. "Strange and beautiful things" are revealed to her...