2015 Able Muse Book Award: ~ 48 HOURS Only Before Deadline; Plus, New Book Releases & more

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** ~ 48 HOURS Only Left before entry deadline in BOOK AWARD! **


Peter Campion - final judge for the Book Award
ABLE MUSE BOOK AWARD (Poetry) - $1000 prize, plus book publication
Judge: Peter Campion
Deadline: March 31, 2015
Read the guidelines and ENTER now!

** Collections from PAST WINNERS: Able Muse Book Award ***
** Forthcoming **

 

 


2014

*** Forthcoming ***
CAUSE FOR CONCERN
(2014 Winner:
Able Muse Book Award, selected by final judge
Molly Peacock)

Poems by Carrie Shipers  


 
 
 
 
 
Walking in on People - poems by Melissa Balmain


2013

WALKING IN ON PEOPLE
(2013 Winner:
Able Muse Book Award, selected by final judge
X.J. Kennedy)

Poems by Melissa Balmain  


 
An infectious, often hilarious blend of the sweet and the lethal, the charming and the acidic.
— Billy Collins
. . . read more
Order
 
Virtue, Big as Sin - poems by Frank Osen - front cover (click to enlarge)


2012

VIRTUE BIG AS SIN
(2012 Winner:
Able Muse Book Award, selected by final judge
Mary Jo Salter)

Poems by Frank Osen  


 
Frank Osen’s poems revel in beauty and pleasure, in technical dexterity and high-gloss finish.
— Dick Davis
. . . read more
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Dirge for an Imaginary World - poems by Matthew Buckley Smith - front cover (click to enlarge)


2011

DIRGE FOR AN IMAGINARY WORLD
(2013 Winner:
Able Muse Book Award, selected by final judge
Andrew Hudgins)

Poems by Matthew Buckley Smith    


 
Mental and linguistic agility generously challenge the reader in poem after poem.
— Greg Williamson
. . . read more
Order

 


** NEW PRE-RELEASES from Able Muse Press ***
NEW PRE-RELEASE

Bad Fame –
Poems by Martin McGovern

Bad Fame - Poems by Martin McGovern
Bad Fame

Poems by Martin McGovern

ISBN 978-1-927409-50-3 • June 3, 2015 release • 88 pp.


Martin McGovern’s long-awaited, well-constructed first book gives itself away slowly, artfully. It is carefully considered, quietly passionate, and deeply humane.
    —Edward Hirsch

Bad Fame darkens, deepens, darkens through its sections, understanding with Joyce the tidal pull of place that will never let us survive if we resist the current.
    —David Lazar (from the foreword)

The sentences, like the centuries, are treated pitilessly, as you can hear, yet there is what the poet calls “the shimmer of a teen movie” throughout. Resilient art, and no loitering.
    —Richard Howard

Read More
Order

NEW PRE-RELEASE

Slingshots and Love Plums –
Poems by Wendy Videlock

Slingshots and Love Plums - poems by Wendy Videlock
Slingshots and Love Plums

Poems by Wendy Videlock  

ISBN 978-1-927409-52-7 • June 22, 2015 release • 120 pp.


Slingshots and Love Plums offers a delicious variety of treats, from witty send-ups of contemporary mores to somber reflections on mortality, love, and friendship.
    —David Caplan

What begins as a taste for her work can quickly turn into a craving—for deliciously cryptic spiritual riddles.
    —David J. Rothman (from the foreword)

Wendy Videlock’s poems in Slingshots and Love Plums sometimes hint at their Colorado origins but are never pinned down by a locality or a life story.
    —Maryann Corbett

Playfully wise, sharp-tongued, and surprising as ever, Slingshots and Love Plums is yet another treasure to be read and reread at your leisure.
    —Timothy Green

Read More
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In Pre-Release:
Sea Level Rising - Poems by John Philip Drury
Sea Level Rising

Poems by John Philip Drury  

ISBN 978-1-927409-42-8 • Mar 23, 2015 release • 94 pp.


John Philip Drury’s new poems will please many and please often as he celebrates, and with mastery, the inexhaustible waters before and within each of us.
—Dave Smith

John Philip Drury is a Marylander; it makes all the difference. The ever-changing sea defines these poems; Drury explores impermanence—destiny, the future, love, fame, desire—anchored by a rock-solid formal mastery.
    —James Cummings

Drury introduces us to a world of love and literature, nostalgia and new experiences—a world where water pervades everything: a constant and comforting reminder that what we depend on is, like us, also always in flux.
    —Erica Dawson

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In Pre-Release:
Uncontested Grounds - Poems by William Conelly
Uncontested Grounds

Poems by William Conelly  

ISBN 978-1-927409-39-8 • Mar 24, 2015 release • 90 pp.


The perceptions fueling his art are equally alert to the world’s kindness and cruelty, and his work is impressive not only for its elegance but for its quality of lived experience—in short, for a kind of wisdom rarely found these days in verse .
    —Robert Shaw

Here is a poet who finds extraordinary dimensions in ordinary experience . . . Conelly commands both strict form and free verse, and his language is often fresh and unexpected. Uncontested Grounds will stand as a notable book in this or any year.
    —X.J. Kennedy

William Conelly is smart and imaginative, and brings a thriving intelligence to life’s experiences. I found the poems in Uncontested Grounds original, diverse, and lucid.
    —William J. Smith

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** NEW COLLECTIONS from Able Muse Press ***
Cup - Poems by Jeredith Merrin
 
CUP
(Special Honoree, 2013 Able Muse Book Award)
Poems by Jeredith Merrin  
 ISBN 978-1-927409-34-3 • Dec 1, 2014 release • 96 pp.
In these forthright and moving poems written in restrained, disciplined stanzas, the stories are told of how we each, “trying to make it better,/ whatever . . . it is,” have to find our own cup, and find it acceptable.
— David Ferry
. . . read more
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Greed: A Confession - Poems by D.R. Goodman
 
GREED: A CONFESSION
Poems by D.R. Goodman  
 ISBN 978-1-927409-38-1 • Dec 2, 2014 release • 114 pp
Goodman is greedy for things of this world—not in the rapacious, bottom-line manner of plutocrats, misers, and Wall Street brokers but for the enlightenment of the senses and the enrichment of her poetry. She’s sharing the wealth she accumulates.
    —John Drury (from the foreword)
. . . read more
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All the Wasted Beauty of the World - Poems by Richard Newman
 
ALL THE WASTED BEAUTY OF THE WORLD
Poems by Richard Newman    
 ISBN 978-1-927409-31-2 • Oct 15, 2014 release • 102 pp.
Newman’s poems, with their formal, lapidary precision, their indelible portraits of life in the cheap bars, back alleys, and rough hewn edges of the Midwest, surprise a hunger in us for a language larger, wilder, and unabashedly loftier than daily speech.
— George Bilgere
. . . read more
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Vellum - Poems by Chelsea Woodard
 
VELLUM
Poems by Chelsea Woodard
 ISBN 978-1-927409-35-0 • Nov 17, 2014 release • 106 pp.

Not the least of the attractions of this gifted young poet’s first book is the exquisite, searing precision of her language—the obsessively exact diction; the tropes that map with such stunning accuracy the emotional contours of her narratives.
— B.H. Fairchild

. . . read more
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** RECENT COLLECTIONS from Able Muse Press ***
House Music - Poems by Ellen Kaufman
 
HOUSE MUSIC
Poems by Ellen Kaufman    
 
The intelligence behind Ellen Kaufman’s wonderfully realized House Music is poised and observant, its reflections unfolding in sinuous sentences that are effortlessly elegant and deceptively plainspoken.
— John Koethe
. . . read more
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Heaven from Steam - Poems by Carol Light
 
HEAVEN FROM STEAM
Poems by Carol Light  
 
Heaven from Steam marks the debut of a vivid poet already at ease with her art.
— Linda Bierds
. . . read more
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Pumpkin Chucking - Poems by Stephen Scaer
 
PUMPKIN CHUCKING
Poems by Stephen Scaer    
 
This is a wonderful and entertaining book of poetry. Stephen Scaer’s poems are full of wit, sarcasm and humor.
— Robert Crawford
. . . read more
Order
 
Able Muse Translation Anthology - Summer 2014 - Guest Edited by Charles Martin
 
ABLE MUSE
TRANSLATION ANTHOLOGY
Guest-Edited by Charles Martin     
 

Summer 2014 special translation issue of Able Muse with poetry translations by-  X.J. Kennedy, A.E. Stallings, Rachel Hadas, William Baer, Willis Barnstone, Tony Barnstone, Michael Palma, Dick Davis, Jay Hopler, and others

. . . read more
Order

Subscription to Able Muse - Print EditionSubscribe to Able Muse - Print Edition - a review of poetry, prose & art.
Read More
| SUBSCRIBE
 
 
 
Credo for the Checkout Line in Winter - Poems by Maryann CorbettSailing to Babylon - poems by James Pollock (Finalist, 2013 Griffin Prize).
Read More | ORDER
 

Also Available from Able Muse Press
The Able Muse Anthology - the best of the poetry, fiction, essays, art & photography, book reviews Corporeality - stories by Hollis SeamonThe Dark Gnu and Other Poems by Wendy VidelockGrasshopper - poetry by M.A. GriffithsNevertheless - Poems by Wendy Videlock (with a Foreword by A.E. Stallings)Life in the Second Circle - Poems by Michael Cantor (with a Foreword by Deborah Warren)Strange Borderlands - poems by Ben BermanCredo for the Checkout Line in Winter - Poems by Maryann Corbett

Now available from Able Muse Press, Amazon and other online & offline bookstores:
The Able Muse Anthology - the best of the poetry, fiction, essays, art & photography
Corporeality - stories by Hollis Seamon (Winner, Gold Medal for the 2014 Independent Publisher Book Awards)
The Dark Gnu and Other Poems by Wendy Videlock
Grasshopper - the poetry of M.A. Griffiths
Nevertheless - poems by Wendy Videlock (Finalist, 2011 Colorado Book Award)
Life in the Second Circle - poems by Michael Cantor (Finalist, 2012 Massachusetts Book Award)

Strange Borderlands - poems by Ben Berman
Credo for the Checkout Line in Winter - poems by Maryann Corbett


The new issue of Able Muse: Winter 2014

The new issue of Able Muse, Print Editon (Number 18) - Winter 2014, has just been released, with order/subscription information (for print & Kindle, NOOK, Kobo & iBooks editions), with online excerpts and the subscribers' online edition at: www.AbleMuse.com

Able Muse, Number 18 - Winter 2014with Able Muse WRITE PRIZE for Poetry & Fiction —
Includes the 2014 winning story & poems from contest winners and finalists.


editorial:
Alexander Pepple • featured artist: Gustavo Thomas • featured poet: Wendy Videlock (interviewed by David Mason) • art & photography: Adel Souto • fiction: Tamas Dobozy, Maxine Rosaler, Michael Lacare, Bridget Apfeld, Anthony Mastroianni, J. Preston Witt • essays: N.S. Thompson, Michael Cohen, Barbara Haas, Derek Furr • book reviews: Martin McGovern, Hollis Seamon • poetry: Hailey Leithauser, Catharine Savage Brosman, Katharine Coles, Susan McLean, Jeredith Merrin, Lisa Huffaker, Len Krisak, Gail Tyson, Stephen Kampa, Terese Coe, Robert W. Crawford, Marilyn L. Taylor, Catherine Chandler, Judith Kunst, Paul Verlaine, Diane Furtney, Teresa Milbrodt, Kathryn Locey, Peter Austin, Kyle Potvin, Roy Bentley, Pierre de Ronsard, Frank De Canio, Dorie deWitt LaRue, J.P. Grasser, Zara Raab, Duane Caylor, Anne-Marie Thompson, Scott M. Miller, Eric Berlin.
----
With special thanks for an outstanding new issue to -- Stephen Kampa, Callie Siskel, Reagan Upshaw (Assistant Poetry Editors); Gregory Dowling (Nonfiction Editor);  Karen Kevorkian (Fiction Editor), Jonathan Danielson, Janice D. Soderling, Rob Wright (Assistant Fiction Editors).

Alex Pepple, Editor
www.AbleMuse.com

 



All applicable links are at the Able Muse homepage
 - www.ablemuse.com
Or, at the Able Muse Press website - www.ablemusepress.com

Cheers,
...Alex