Bøger udgivet af Balkan Press

Praise for Laura M Kaminski's poetry collections: "The poems of Laura M Kaminski's last penny the sun are rich with enthusiasm and delight. Each lyric presents a sensibility capable of ruminative insight as well as emotional depth. There is the grace of tribute throughout the book: whether the poems are paying tribute to other writers, to figures from literature and art, or to everyday life, Kaminski's poems show the admirable and encouraging efforts to, as is written in the poem 'Capacity': become a heart/that beats with each thing I take in, /refreshes and invigorates." -Jose Angel Araguz, 2014 CantoMundo Fellow and author of The Wall, Tiger's Eye Press, 2012 "The poems in Returning to Awe display a felicity of language and imagery that make them a delight to read. Laura M Kaminski has the poet's eye for insightful observation and just the right words to bring it vividly to life." -William Bernhardt, author of The White Bird, Balkan Press, 2013

Readers can open any page in this book at random and realize that William Bernhardt is a poet of the rarest kind--one who can communicate grace, illumination, and shared experience without the obscurity and obfuscation that sometimes causes people to avoid modern poetry. His everyman approach and direct language draws in readers who might normally never give a poem second glance. Drawing inspiration from forebears such as Billy Collins and Robert Frost, Bernhardt creates a unique voice that is at once accessible and profound. Bernhardt's poems show how the everlasting themes--parenting, severed relationships, loneliness, loss, and love--are all an essential part of membership in community of humanity. With the turn of a phrase, Bernhardt's versatile and often playful poems can move you, thrill you, or make you laugh out loud. Smart, lyrical, observant, and textured, these poems confirm, as American Book Award-winner Rilla Askew wrote, that Bernhardt is "a compelling new voice in American poetry." William Bernhardt is the author of over forty books, and also teaches writing through the Red Sneaker Writing Center.

Readers can open any page in this book at random and realize that William Bernhardt is a poet of the rarest kind--one who can communicate grace, illumination, and shared experience without the obscurity and obfuscation that sometimes causes people to avoid modern poetry. His everyman approach and direct language draws in readers who might normally never give a poem a second glance. Drawing inspiration from forebears such as Billy Collins and Robert Frost, Bernhardt creates a unique voice that is at once accessible and profound.Bernhardt's poems show how the everlasting themes--parenting, severed relationships, loneliness, loss, and love--are all an essential part of membership in the community of humanity. With the turn of a phrase, Bernhardt's versatile and often playful poems can move you, thrill you, or make you laugh our loud. Smart, lyrical, observant and textured, these poems confirm, as American Book Award-winner Rilla Askew wrote, that Bernhardt is "a compelling new voice in American poetry."William Bernhardt is the author of more than forty books, and also teaches writing through the Red Sneaker Writing Center.

Okataloa County, Oklahoma is anything but a sleepy town these days. Special-needs ghost Billy Craig haunts the local Pen & Quill Creative Writing Society, while across town Janice Lynn solves her homelessness crisis by winning self-respect and a lime-green Volkswagen. Celebrity billionaires and Brangelina updates, always one click and inbox away, are virtual distractions as these female protagonists confront life's storms. Mortgages may barely get paid, husbands might drift without warning, and blue eyeshadow sometimes doubles in price at the local Walmart. TV evangelicals and Groupon provide comfort. Both heartache and humor abound within the pages of Fetish.

In this issue, Conclave celebrates "Voices from the Edge," the writers and photographers whose work is not easily categorized or pigeonholed. This issue disregards genre and marketplace and instead focuses on originality and insight, artists fearlessly creating work of the highest caliber.As Editor-in-Chief Lara Bernhardt writes, "Fear holds us back. Fear prevents us from taking chances and reaching for our goals. Fear causes us to hide. Fear of failure. Fear of ridicule. Fear of someone seeing us as we truly are." This, then, is the No Fear issue of Conclave, the no-holds-barred highway whose only toll is vision and talent.We live in troubling times, and many feel isolated, despondent, and worried about the future. In this issue, writers confront our common challenges with courage and optimism, because the greater good lies in unity, not division, including "...[t]hose who feel sidelined, ostracized, and silenced. Those who aren't afraid to speak their truth, share their experiences, and offer a glimpse of something we may fear."

Prepare to be enchanted by Selma Mann's tribute to aging with grace and laughter. With disarmingly simple language, she finds the extraordinary in the ordinary, with whimsical unexpected twists that delight and connect with audiences of all ages, touching on her familiar themes of love, loss, and survival. These poems sparkle with fresh images, delightful wordplay, and a startling perspective on reality."Selma Mann's poetry makes my heart take flight. She has tapped into the source of everything poetry should bring: peace, comfort, and joy." William Bernhardt, author of The Ocean's Edge"Selma Mann's heartfelt poems are an evocative and bittersweet collection of beauty. They fill one with compassion and respect for the urgency and preciousness of every life breath. A wonderful read. A wonderful gift...." Mari McWilliams, author of Out of the Blue Valise and The Love Epidemic.

One couple. Two stories. One truth. Sort of. Jacob Fishman is miserable. His wife, Cindi, is miserable.  His editor wants him to write another book. Suffocating in his own self-consciousness, Jacob decides to explore the frailties, fears, and deficiencies of his life with Cindi including, most tellingly, her desire to have a baby-and his desire not to. He creates Fishman doppelg├ñngers, literary avatars, to see if their lives can be better than his. He wills himself to the intersection of truth, verisimilitude, and fantasy and finds himself paralyzed once there, no longer sure which events unfold in real life and which exist only in his book. Cindi, watching her life being laid bare, sees her husband as a megalomaniacal provocateur and chafes at his cherry-picking of their marriage and identities.  Set in and around the University of Nevada, Reno, Jacob Fishman''s Marriages is the story of an author''s conceit and what the creation of art excuses. It is the story of a husband and a wife and a husband and a wife-the same husband and wife. Sort of.Praise for Barry Friedman:"This masterpiece would blow away the competition, if there were competition for such a masterpiece, which there is not."-Shane Gericke, bestselling author of The Fury "I haven''t been able to get five pages in without having to catch my breath. You''re a brave writer, my brother."-Charles P. Pierce, Esquire "Barry Friedman has written a raw, gut-wrenching book about the game-playing side of a marriage gone wrong. But this ain''t a fairy tale. This is a brilliant look at a walk on the dark side of life."-Jerry Izenberg, Red Smith Award-wining author of Once There Were Giants and After the Fire: Love and Hate in the Ashes of 1967 "Seeing the broken yet still beautiful world through his eyes is cathartic."- Jennifer Taub, author of Big Dirty Money