Review by Douglas Stockdale • Coal mining in American is predominately in a region known as Appalachia, a divisive term applied to parts of Eastern Kentucky, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Virginia, and West Virginia which can extend into parts of Ohio and Georgia. At one time, coal mining required deep tunneling to access the underground deposits, which since the... Continue Reading →
Kirk Crippens – So Long
Review by Gerhard Clausing • When the title of a book has a double meaning, I am delighted from the start. “So long” can mean saying goodbye, particularly to an unpleasant time period, and it can also mean that whatever is referred to has been going on for a long while. Both meanings certainly fit... Continue Reading →
Sonia Lenzi – Take Me to Live with You
Review by Gerhard Clausing • What we find missing in our childhood can sometimes be filled in a bit later in our lives in various ways. So it was with Sonia Lenzi, whose father had not been as accessible in her earlier years as she had wished; in recent years she gained personal access to... Continue Reading →
Fred Mitchell – If You Go All the Plants Will Die
Review by Douglas Stockdale • I may not be a relationship expert, but I highly suspect that stating the reason for another person to stay in a relationship is that otherwise if they left all of the plants would die may not be the most enticing of rationales. The book’s title appears to be a retrospective... Continue Reading →
Rafal Milach – I Am Warning You
Review by Douglas Stockdale • Living in Southern California, I have a familiarity with border walls, specifically the American-Mexican wall that lies less than 100 miles south of my home. After relocating to California, a trip to the Tijuana tourist shops in near-by Mexico was usually on the list of go-to places for visiting relatives, parking... Continue Reading →
Alejandro Cartagena – A Small Guide to Homeownership
Review by Wayne Swanson • With its familiar yellow-and-black color scheme and blocky cover design, A Small Guide to Homeownership appears to be just another addition to the shelves of “For-Dummies” how-to books. And with a table of contents featuring chapters that progress from “Home Sweet Home: Still the Best Investment You Will Ever Make” to “Protecting Yourself... Continue Reading →
Ken Light – MIDNIGHT/LA FRONTERA
Review by Melanie Chapman • Have you ever enjoyed a novel, or fallen in love with a painting or film, only to later learn something uncomfortable about the creator or the situation in which the work was produced? Did you find yourself rethinking your reaction based on that new information, or were you able to... Continue Reading →
Dotan Saguy – Nowhere to Go but Everywhere
Review by Melanie Chapman • During these past few months of the pandemic, haven’t we each found ourselves staring out windows, looking for signs of life, and longing to travel near and far once again? Dotan Saguy’s newest work Nowhere to Go but Everywhere arrives at a perfect time. Even if the book’s title, taken from... Continue Reading →
Jamie Johnson – Growing Up Travelling
Review by Wayne Swanson • There’s a classic Irish short story in which a child in a village asks an Irish Traveller girl “Do you never tire of the road?” The girl’s quick response is “Do you never tire of being fettered?” That pretty much sums up the world views that divide mainstream society from the... Continue Reading →
Zora Murff – At No Point In Between
Review by Lodoe-Laura Haines-Wangda • The first image in Zora Murff’s photobook At No Point In Between is actually just half an image; a tiny loose color print, six-centimeters tall, tucked in between the pages. In the fragment, Walter Scott is running, but he is separated from what he is running from. In Slow Violence and... Continue Reading →