Forthcoming
... in fall 2010
Swampy Jo, a Young Adult novel by Jennifer Rouse Barbeau
ISBN 978-1-896350-40-0, 5.5x8.5, 150 pp. approx., trade pbk, $16.95
Illustrations by Jennifer Rouse Barbeau
Anorexia, suicide, a brave imagination and an absurd world: Swampy Jo brings a wry smile to YA fiction.
How do you find the truth when the adults in your life are crazy? This is the dilemma of fourteen-year-old Sarah Joanne Bradley--alias Swampy Jo. Swampy Jo is a heroic tale of a young girl setting aside her personal need to disappear, in order to save the life of a brooding love interest--because she is the only one aware that he needs saving. Puberty and love aren’t easy when you’re navigating a minefield of secrets in your divorced, formerly upper-middle class family, while the adults in your life hinge their hopes on religious superstitions and palm reading.
Jennifer Rouse Barbeau is a graduate of the Ontario College of Art and Design in Toronto, and is now a professor of Advertising--Creative Media at Canadore College in North Bay. She lives in Sturgeon Falls. Barbeau has published a number of short stories, including "Grumble" in the 2006 YSP anthology Bluffs: Northeastern Ontario Stories from the Edge. She illustrated La Laineuse by Rachel Desaulniers (Le Centre FORA, 2006). Swampy Jo is her first novel.
Pith & Wry: Canadian Poetry, an anthology edited by Susan McMaster
ISBN 978-1-896350-41-7, 5.5x8.5, 160 pp. approx., trade pbk, $19.00
In Pith & Wry: Canadian Poetry highly respected poet and editor Susan McMaster brings together 40 active, well-established Canadian poets from coast to coast who have a stake in their communities and country, and whose direct, human voices call their fellow citizens into a broadened horizon.
The contributors include Sylvia Adams, Cameron Anstee, Margaret Atwood, Ronnie R. Brown, Jan Conn, Lorna Crozier, Kat Eichhorn, Marty Gervais, Katia Grubisic, Maureen Scott Harris, Penn Kemp, Ben Ladouceur, John B. Lee, Alice Major, Blaine Marchand, Dave Margoshes, Don McKay, Susan McMaster, Colin Morton, Mary Ann Mulhern, Roger Nash, Marilyn Gear Pilling, Claudia Coutu Radmore, Monty Reid, Grant D. Savage, Rachael Simpson, Carolyn Smart, Betsy Struthers.
They have won the Acorn-Plantos People's Poetry Award, CBC Literary Award, Canadian Jewish Book Award, Gerald Lampert Memorial Award, Governor General’s Award, Griffin Poetry Prize, Harbourfront Festival Prize, Lampman-Scott Poetry Award, Pat Lowther Memorial Award, and the Trillium Book Award for Poetry.
The contributors hail from St. John's, Bay of Fundy, Montreal, Gatineau, Luskville, Waltham, Ottawa, Peterborough, Toronto, Hamilton, Brantford, Sydenham, London, Windsor, Port Elgin, Georgian Bay, Parry Sound, Sudbury, Regina, Calgary, Rocky Mountain House, Burnaby, Victoria, Prince Rupert.
A leading figure in the Ottawa literary scene for 20 years, Susan McMaster has authored or edited 12 books of poetry and literary arts, has performed across Canada with First Draft, SugarBeat, and Geode Music & Poetry, and has broadcast nationally on Morningside, As It Happens, WordBeat, Richardson's Roundup, and GO! Her poetry has been shortlisted for the Ottawa Book Award and the Archibald Lampman Poetry Award. Susan founded the first Canadian feminist magazine, Branching Out, and edited Waging Peace: Poetry and Political Action (Penumbra), Dangerous Graces: Women's Poetry on Stage (Balmuir), and Siolence: Poets on Women, Violence and Silence (Quarry).