BOA Blog

"Whether you believed in it or not, whether you voted for it or not, it happened and the veterans exist and the Iraqis exist." —Hugh Martin BOA Poulin Prize-winner and Iraq war veteran Hugh Martin was featured recently on The Takeaway with John Hockenberry, for his forthcoming collection The Stick Soldiers (BOA, April 2013), to be released on the 10th anniversary of the U.S. Invasion of Iraq. Included on The Takeaway is an audio interview with Martin, which was aired nationally, as well as an article. In the almost-eight minute audio interview, Martin recalls his experiences with the war, the aftermath,...

BOA fiction author Douglas Watson discusses the writing process, his new book, and the best writing advice he has ever gotten. Douglas Watson’s “The Messenger Who Did Not Become A Hero”—the final story in his forthcoming short story collection The Era of Not Quite (BOA, May 2013)—will be published in One Story on April 8. Before releasing the story, the magazine ran an interview with Watson, a Q&A that yields side-splitting laughter and much, much more. In the Q&A, Watson shares his thoughts and insights on the writing process, on how his work for Time Magazine has affected his writing career,...

Last week, an interview with Publisher Peter Conners was aired on Need To Know Rochester, a television program of Rochester's local WXXI News. Conners, along with the last few bookstore owners in the Rochester area, discuss the movement from print books to e-books, as well as the effects of major chains and websites like Barnes & Noble and Amazon.com. Conners gives insight into how an independent publisher like BOA deals with the e-book trend, and notes that BOA’s sales still come primarily from books in print. He also comments that when BOA books are course-adopted for classrooms, students tend to prefer...

Poet and artist Lauren Camp praises Jacek Gutorow’s poem “Origami,” from the new translation The Folding Star and Other Poems, as she takes a moment to "ponder" its essence. On her blog, “Which Silk Shirt,” she calls readers to the same action: "Do you ever have days like this? Moments of absolute conviction that something is happening, when maybe, nothing in fact is? What does a poem like this mean to you? It is both precise and dreamy, a poem of utter compression. And the title — how does that impact your reading of this work?" Camp commends “Origami” as “both...

BOA's newest translation Diadem: Selected Poems (2012) is on NewPages' list of New and Noteworthy Books! The list—which primarily focuses on works from independent and university publishers—comes out a least once a month. Holding comparisons to such writers as Franz Kafka, Julio Cortázar, Russell Edson, and Charles Simic, Marosa di Giorgio is one of the most distinct and recognizable voices in Latin American poetry. "Translator Adam Giannelli’s careful selection of poems spans the enormous output of di Giorgio’s career to help further introduce English-language readers to this vibrant and original poet." Purchase Diadem, today!