BOA Blog

BOA author James McManus is the subject of a recent feature article from Brazos Bookstore. The interview, conducted by Benjamin Rybeck, focuses on McManus's new book The Education of a Poker Player, and where this latest work fits into the author's already-impressive bibliography. In the interview, McManus ruminates on narrative, genre, fame, religion, and of course, poker. According to Rybeck, "On this subject—the literature (and history) of poker—McManus is more qualified than nearly anyone else. Not that he’s the world’s greatest poker player; he would admit that himself. But he is the author of two damn near definitive nonfiction poker books," Positively...

Small BOA exhibit currently on display at the university's Rush Rhees Library. As BOA Editions looks ahead to its 40th anniversary in 2016, the University of Rochester is also reaffirming its belief in the importance of BOA’s history and future. In 2005, the university acquired BOA’s 1996-2005 publishing archives, which include materials related to the publication of BOA books and the organization’s general operations. In 2016, the university will make a Finding Aid for these holdings available online, which will enable scholars to search, utilize, and focus their research on particular pieces of the complete BOA Publishing Archives. BOA is...

Library Journal recently published a refreshingly candid Q&A with BOA poet Devin Becker, author of the A. Poulin, Jr. Poetry Prize-winning collection Shame | Shame. The piece touches on a bit of everything, from inspiration to the MFA experience, to the nitty-gritty details of publishing a book. When asked what inspired his debut collection, which humorously focuses on the everyday sort of shame born of small, socially clumsy moments in life, Becker says, "A lot of the things are mundane. Me and my coworkers sitting outside of a building having coffee, or my wife and I at a smoothie joint in a nearby...

Poets & Writers recently featured Marsha de la O in its "Writers Recommend" section, an online exclusive on all things inspiring to writers in their creative process. Here's what de la O, author of the new Isabella Gardner Poetry Award-winning Antidote for Night, had to say: “Begin with bleakness. Bring yourself to the bare room. Voices will assail you, reminding you how many times you’ve been hit on the head, hard, reminding you of the bad genes, the narrow valley in Bohemia where your ancestors left their lives as factory hands, as milk maids, with their natural and legitimate children in...

The Santa Barbara Independent recently published a compelling interview with David Starkey and Antidote for Night author Marsha de la O, exploring the new collection's noir tendencies, de la O's hypnotizing reading style, and her process of going from elementary school teacher to full-time poetry writer. "Antidote for Night is so rich with imagery and characters and incident. It’s a beautiful book, but it’s also very dark," says Starkey. De la O contrasts topics on themes of darkness and her seer-like reading voice with light, congenial, and insightful humor--even imagining her book being read by Philip Marlowe in a Raymond...