Production Notes: May 25, 2018

  • Dear Evelyn has been typeset and is heading to the printer soon. For this one I chose a classic Garamond type with Garamond Premier pro display for the titles, page numbers and headers. This font pairs nicely with the elegant prose of Kathy Page’s tender love story.

    A spread of Kathy Page’s newest book, Dear Evelyn.

She is also working on some other merchandising ideas for the press and shop so keep an eye out for them in the coming weeks.

 

  • Perhaps the best part of my job is working with Seth on the Ghost Stories and CNQ Covers. The new CNQ 102 cover art arrived this week and I have been busy cleaning up and combining all the elements.

Seth’s original drawings.

 

Converted to all black line art.

 

Layered and coloured to Seth’s specifications..

 

IN THE MEDIA: Not-so-Transparent City

Trade Paper $19.95
eBook $9.99

Ondjaki’s Transparent City (trans. Stephen Henighan) hit shelves in Canada and the US last week and reviewers are raving. Named a Vanity Fair Hot Type Book in April, May has brought a beautiful bouquet comprised of Times Literary Supplement, Toronto Star, and Globe and Mail blooms.

In a review for TLS, reviewer Alev Adil called the novel “Vibrant” and praised Ondjaki’s bold experimentation: “His prose shifts through a kaledioscope of registers, from the poetic to the political, the erotic to the absurd…Stephen Henighan’s thoughtful translation has an energetic lyricism and is alive to the echoes and vestiges of the African languages that imbue Ondjaki’s text…The novel begins and ends with a raging inferno, and yet it is as full of hope, appetite and libidinal energy as it is of grief and mourning.”

Here at home, Trevor Corkum sang similar praises in the Toronto Star: “a lively and invigorating novel…With Transparent City, Ondjaki takes his place among the great fabulists of the past century…so rich in heart, and so startlingly fresh in structure and delivery, [he] has gifted us with a contemporary masterpiece.”

Finally, for The Globe & Mail, Jade Colbert included Transparent City on their “What’s hot to read in translation” roundup.

A captivating blend of magical realism, scathing political satire, and literary experimentation,  Transparent City is a gripping portrait of contemporary urban Southern Africa from Ondjaki, indisputably one of the continent’s most accomplished writers. Originally published as Slow Red, Stephen Henighan’s superb translation brings it to English readers for the first time.

Production Notes: May 18, 2018

Happy long weekend everyone! I’m about to head to the Pinery for four days of camping, but here’s what is going on at Biblioasis this week:

  • CNQ 102 is getting well under way. The genre issue is staring to look pretty exciting as I typeset the pieces. A number of writers tell of their first monsters, sitting alongside pieces on Bruce Lee, Indigenous Sci-Fi, and Jay Stevens’ STUNNING comic adaption of an excerpt from Margaret Atwood’s Oryx and Crake. You don’t want to miss it.
  • This week I am skipping ahead of announced books to let you know about something coming down the pipeline: Le Plongeur by Stéphane Larue. This is a book about a metalhead artist with a gambling problem who ends up working as a dishwasher. As both a metalhead and ex-kitchen worker, I have to say Larue gets it.
  • Finally, my niece was visiting the office, but left Mickey behind, so naturally we put him to work:

First we took him to the board room for some training and instruction.

 

Then he made galleys…

 

…but of course the printer jammed.

 

So we sent him to storage to get some books.

 

Even imaginary workers get breaks, and they use them to read our own books!

 

Last job for the day: helping catch up on  Against Amazon chapbook binding—with a glass of whisky

 

And at the end of the day, he enjoyed a relaxing drink.

 

MICKEY MOUSE IS WATCHING YOU.

New Office and New Arrivals

New office who dis big pile of boxes

A major perk of our new digs: we now have room to receive shipments of books right here in the place where we make, mail, and shout about them. This is a major upgrade to our previous system, which I fondly call “driving furiously to a storage locker to meet the guy with the big truck because there’s nowhere for him to park at the bookshop and he just called to tell us he’d be there ten minutes ago.”

The first arrival:

A two-for-one of Terry Griggs’ The Iconoclast’s Journal (June 12, 2018), which we’re bringing back into print via ReSet, a series that republishes overlooked Canadian classics. If you click the first link, our web store will display the Canadian edition, designed with its place in the series in mind. US stores will carry a second version, which features a cheeky, purple, partially headless angel that captures the spirit of this madcap picaresque, which wheels effortlessly between ribald slapstick and sharp critique of the Victorian era in which it’s set. It’s an addictive read, the perfect summer getaway from a world that’s sadly lacking in companionable pigs. Or maybe that’s just me?

The Iconoclast’s Journal was first published as Rogues’ Wedding in 2002 and hence it is no stranger to multiple covers: check out this photo, featuring the original hardcover and paperback covers in the top row, and down below from left to right: our 2018 ARC, Canadian, and US editions. You can read more about the unusual experience of republishing a novel over at All Lit Up, where Terry herself takes us behind the scenes and between the covers.

The second arrival:

An ARC run of Harriet Paige’s Man with a Seagull on His Head, and I cannot shut up about it.  This book has captivated our entire office with its quiet wisdom and original plot. To wit: on a hot summer day, Ray Eccles, a city clerk “past the age when anything interesting was likely to happen to him,” is struck on the head by a dying seagull, and though he’s never touched a paintbrush in his life, when he wakes he finds himself compelled to obsessively repeat the last thing he saw before he was knocked out: an unknown woman on the beach. As Ray’s paintings take the art world by storm, Paige shifts the novel’s lens to Jennifer, his anonymous muse, who ponders the surprising turns and odd connections that characterize a life. Seagull doesn’t drop until OCTOBER 9 HOW WILL I STAND IT.

Hey, what’s back here…

 

 

 

Productions Notes: May 11, 2018

Hey everyone,

  • Welcome to Production Notes, a weekly roundup of what is going on in the Biblioasis production office. Speaking of… check out our space!
     

Read more

Biblioasis Press’ New Address

We’ve moved!

Our new office is located at 1686 Ottawa St, Suite 100, Windsor ON, N8Y 1R1. Our new phone number is 519–915–3930. We’re *kind of* unpacked. Pardon the stray boxes and assorted hand tools. Those of you who have been to the back of the old Bibliomanse will understand why I insist on typing WE HAVE WINDOWS in all caps.

We have doors!

With doors inside of them!

Here is where the publicity, marketing, and operations management happens. Pay no attention to the stray couch or the stretch limousine.

Dan is doing Dan magic behind the door on the left & production is back there producing things.

Regional history lives in here with Sharon.

For no reason, please enjoy this picture of our printer.

This hallway has more square footage than the entirety of our old office.

I am almost embarrassed by how excited I am re: the new mailroom.

SHELVES!

Coffee comes from here. I guess food, too?

This is where I come to cry.

Biblioasis Bookstore (hi guys!) is still located at 1520 Wyandotte, and I imagine it’s more peaceful than ever, now that the riffraff’s been removed from the back.

IN THE MEDIA: Biblioasis Round-Up

The Discovery of Funny

SPOILER: You will not find it sitting at my desk.

We’re thrilled to learn that Terry Griggs’ The Discovery of Honey has been longlisted for the Leacock Medal . The Leacock is given annually for the best Canadian book of literary humour. Three shortlisted titles will be named May 2, which is today! Refresh! REFRESHI

Speaking of shortlists

K.D. Miller’s “Olly Olly Oxen Free” has been nominated for a 2018 National Magazine Award, as has David Huebert’s short story “Maxi.”  You can also listen to David chat with CBC about Philip K. Dick’s Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?

In the Cage

Our thanks to Prairie Fire for this terrific review of Kevin Hardcastle’s In the Cage. In Simcoe County? This Friday, May 4, at the Maclaren Art Centre, Kevin will read from his work and talk about the import of the region to his writing.

Along the Coast

Rachel Lebowitz and Amanda Jernigan are on road on the East Coast this week. Catch them Thursday in Halifax, Friday in Sackville, Saturday in New Fredricton, and Sunday in New Glasgow. Full details are available on our site.

SPRING 401 TOUR: Wrap-Up

Our spring 401 Tour wrapped up Friday night at the Bibliomanse, where Paige Cooper, Rachel Lebowitz, Amanda Jernigan, and Richard Sanger knocked the collective socks off of everyone in attendance. I’ve been standing in the back of the bookstore, holding up my lighter for an encore ever since, as it was one of the finest readings I’ve ever attended. I assure you I am in no way biased.

If you missed out, the band will be reunited this weekend at the Ottawa International Writers Festival. On the East Coast? Dynamic duo Rachel and Amanda embark on an East Coast tour, featuring events in Halifax, NS, Sackville, NB, Fredericton, NB, and New Glasgow, PEI, next week, May 4-7. See our site for full details.

Many thanks to snapd Windsor for the author photograph!

 

IN THE MEDIA: Events & Press!

Spring 401 Tour

Our Spring 401 Tour kicked off last night and we’re readying the Bibliomanse as Paige Cooper, Amanda Jernigan, Rachel Lebowitz, and Richard Sanger make their way west, spreading brilliance and shiny new books all across the land.

You can catch this super squad tonight in Hamilton (Epic Books, 7 pm), Thursday in Toronto (Monarch Tavern, 7:30), and here in Windsor on Friday (Biblioasis, 7:30 pm). Which means your humble Biblioblogger only has two days to clean off her desk.

Excellent Press

While I weep into this stack of mailing lists, please enjoy this round-up of the week’s excellent press!

    

 

IN THE MEDIA: Biblioasis Round-Up

It’s (Re)Lit

According to the Farmer’s Almanac, longer days means long shortlists from CBC’s ReLit Awards. And even though it’s snowing in Windsor right now, we’re basking in the glow of our six nominees. They are—drumroll please—

The Adjustment League by Mike Barnes, a novel that Maclean’s calls “Masterful …  suspenseful, exquisitely written and—at times—corrosively funny.”

Alice Peterson’s Worldly Goods, a collection of short stories that earned starred reviews from Publishers Weekly and Quill & Quire.

Museum at the End of the World, John Metcalf’s most recent short story collection, which Publishers Weekly calls “Sharp and funny.”

Bad Things Happen, Kris Bertin’s debut short story collection lauded by Library Journal as “smart and nuanced, pulsing with humanity.”

Swinging Through Dixie, a collection of short fiction by Leon Rooke, a writer The Globe & Mail says “is simply not like any other writer out there. He’s a national treasure.”

Sharon McCartney’s Metanoia, a book of poems both Publishers Weekly and Quill & Quire selected for starred reviews.

Congratulations, Bibliobeloveds, and good luck! We’re typing with our fingers crossed! It’s very difficult but you are worth it!

WE FOUND HIM!

 Where’s Bob? is in the house! Can’t wait for you to get lost in this new novel from Ann Ireland. Available May 1!