BOA Blog

Nikola Madzirov has hit the festival circuit this spring to marvelous acclaim! Check out Balkan Insight's review of his most recent readings and for information on upcoming appearances. For Nikola's book Remnants of Another Age, jump over to the Boa Bookstore where you will find it on sale for a special price!

Oxford Brookes Poetry Center greets the week with Naomi Shihab Nye's poem, "Moment." The Center's Poem of the Week service delivers a new selection to your inbox each week, and though Naomi is no new-initiate to the program, we are thrilled to see her work recognized "here," on "this fresh morning." For more information on the Weekly Poem, check out the Center's website, and of course, you can peruse through Naomi's other works at Boa's online bookstore.

[caption id="attachment_1518" align="alignleft" width="100" caption="BOA author and NBCC finalist Aracelis Girmay"][/caption] "There is a saying in Spanish, "Cada cabeza es un mundo," which translates "every mind is a universe unto itself." And Girmay's world, universe, opens new ways of seeing the simplest things and giving them voice. Everything contains some clue of another self, body or kindred spirit. Like an archeologist, she digs deeply finding herself in every living thing, even in the inanimate. Her magic is poetry at its best." So concludes Gregg Barrio's article on National Book Critics Circle finalist and Isabella Gardner Award-winning poet Aracelis Girmay's Kingdom...

The Texas Institute of Letters has named the finalists for their annual awards. We're pleased to say that Transfer by Naomi Shihab Nye is a finalist for the Helen C. Smith Memorial Award for Poetry! Dallas News Reports: "The Texas Institute of Letters has been promoting the state's best writers since 1936... The competition is limited to authors who have lived in the state for at least two years or have entries pertaining to Texas subjects. Not surprisingly. some of the best-known writers in the state -- such as Stephen Harrigan, C.W. Smith and Naomi Shihab Nye -- are among...

As hardcore book fans know, the winners of the National Book Critics Circle Award will be announced tonight. No matter the results, we are so proud that Aracelis Girmay's astounding new collection Kingdom Animalia is among the finalists. The book was published in fall 2011 as winner of BOA's biennial Isabella Gardner Award and was immediately honored as a Rumpus Poetry Book Club selection. In the few months since publication, Kingdom Animalia has garnered rave reviews and many, many fans. We count ourselves among those fans. On behalf of everyone at BOA, we wish Aracelis Girmay good luck tonight and...