The Bookening: New (At Bay Press) Reads in the Region of Rumblings

Time for more books!

This evening, I’m going to highlight some books from a lovely Canadian small press: At Bay Press.¹ A lot of the work ABP releases crossing genre boundaries, as you’ll see from the books below, which wander through poetry, weird fiction, short fiction, graphic novels, and more. Also: these books are gorgeous and have a delightful feel to them (I like touching them).

So what did I get?

1. Of Violence and Cliche by M.C. Joudrey
   I worked on Matt’s more recent work, Fanonymous, which is what I’d say is something Kurt Vonnegut would write if he were Canadian and into video games. It’s a pretty surreal book strapped inside a scifi tech adventure. Of Violence and Cliche appears to have that same weird sensibility. You can count me in!
2. Curb Angels by Christopher Ducharme and Lisa Mendis
   They had me at “in the post-punk, global economy of the 1980s.” Just look at that delicious hair! When I read the blurb for this, I couldn’t help but think “this is kind of like Powerpuff Girls if they were 80s punk-ettes.” Whether it turns out that way, the art style alone is sufficient to keep me interested, as I’m a sucker for this sort of thing!
3. Hot Town and Other Stories by Janet Trull
   A collection of short stories centered on small towns? That’s a huge selling point for this small town dork. You may recall my post about small town life, so it should come as no surprise that the premise of this collection intrigued me.
4. What Fox Knew by Mary Barnes
   Oh my god. This book is absolutely gorgeous. The cover is so simple, but it’s embossed with a copper-y look, and it’s just so nice to touch! I’m not familiar with Barnes’ work, but that isn’t really surprising given that I don’t read a lot of poetry. But I couldn’t resist this collection because it describes itself as a collection to calm and awaken, and that’s kinda what I need a bit of these days.
5. Stars by Lucy Haché
   Monet is my favorite painter, which drew me to the work of Lisel Mueller, who wrote some work on Monet. I’m also constantly in love with space, which made this illustrated story a must have. Haché is also a member of the Gwa’sala-‘Nakwaxda’xw Nations, which certainly plays a role in the way this book examines the sky.

And there you have it. What are you reading?

1. Disclaimer: I have worked for this press before.