Governor General’s Award finalist Ruth Pierson’s third collection of poetry articulates the oppositional emotions that develop with the loss of a loved one.

While humour, fond remembrance, and wry awareness break through, contrariness tinges many of the poems in this collection, a contrariness rooted in rueful self-examination, in feelings of living at cross purposes with the expected and the polite, of seeing the world aslant.

At the heart of Contrary is an unflinching portrayal of the emotional maelstrom that overtook the poet as she faced the dying and death of her only brother.

These are poems that mount an opposition, poems that contradict and argue, sometimes in jest, sometimes in deadly seriousness, poems that read unexpected messages into paintings and photographs, poems that are attuned to the dialectic undercurrents of living.

About the Author

Ruth Roach Pierson took up the pen in pursuit of poetry after a distinguished career in academia. Her poems have appeared in ARC, Event, The Fiddlehead, Literary Review of Canada, The Malahat Review, Pagitica, Pottersfield Portfolio, Prism International, Queen’s Feminist Review, Quills, Room of One’s Own, and Vallum as well as a number of anthologies. She lives in Toronto with her partner and their two cats, Haiku and Orange Roughy.

Cool-burning with the strange and the sensual, Come Closer takes the imposing realities of political, environmental, and social upheaval, and infuses each with the personal.

From poet and award-winning filmmaker Leanne Averbach comes a new collection of poems. Come Closer draws on themes as widespread as Averbach’s left-wing-activist and trade-union-organizer past, the loss of her parents, the Iraq War, and the homeless, all seen through the gritty lens of New York City and with a persistent inner dialogue about love, family, and doubt.

Praise for Fever:

“Witty, cynical and startlingly lusty, Averbach’s lushly lyrical, ‘thick wet strokes’ of irreverence are finely wrought with haunting immediacy. Her work provides a must-read collection: highly charged eroto-comic and compelling snapshots that linger.”
—Adeena Karasick

“Averbach’s poems swing from worldly to wild.”
—Georgia Straight

About the Author

Leanne Averbach is a Canadian poet and filmmaker. She has been published and has performed with musicians across Canada, in the US, and in Italy. Her first book, Fever (Mansfield Press), was shortlisted for the Gerald Lampert Memorial Prize in 2006. Her companion CD Fever is a fusion of her spoken words and the blues/jazz accompaniment of the Vancouver group Indigo. Averbach’s second short film based on her poetry, Teacups & Mink, has garnered numerous awards.For more information visit www.leanneaverbach.com.

Sex is casual, but conversation is a serious matter in the outrageous adventures of this contemporary cougar.

In Myna Wallin’s second book, a reluctant cougar tells all. She feasts on young men of all kinds, in a world where sex isn’t dirty but love is coated in grime. In these raucous short stories, she runs the gauntlet of men, including a Harley-riding bikini salesman, a semiotics professor, a foot fetishist, a jaded brand consultant, a homeless man, and a bisexual mime. Written with Wallin’s signature wit, this semiotics of dating is given a postmodern twist.

Click to read an excerpt from Confessions of a Reluctant Cougar.

Myna Wallin is an author and editor born and living in Toronto. She is also an organizer and host of the Art Bar Reading Series. Myna’s first full-length poetry collection, A Thousand Profane Pieces, was published in 2006 by Tightrope Books. Her poetry and prose have appeared in numerous literary journals and anthologies, including The Algonquin Square Table Anthology, Contemporary Verse 2, Existere, Eye Weekly, Kiss Machine, In the Dark: Stories from the Supernatural, the Literary Review of Canada, Matrix, Nod, and Rampike. She recently received an Honourable Mention from Contemporary Verse 2 for their 2009 2-Day Poem Contest. Myna also hosts “In Other Words” on CKLN, where she has been interviewing authors since 2004. After receiving her MA in English Literature from the University of Toronto, Myna taught Effective Writing at George Brown College for several years. For Tightrope she has edited Sandra Kasturi’s The Animal Bridegroom, Phoebe Tsang’s Contents of a Mermaid’s Purse, and co-edited I.V. Lounge Nights with Alex Boyd.

Praise for A Thousand Profane Pieces:

“Wallin’s book is exhilarating: a dollop of sugar-coated acid. Its subtitle should be, Love and the Older, Single Woman: The persona has been hurt, has snapped back, but vows her vulnerability … The tone? Ms. Sylvia Plath Atwood: Satire and Cynicism for the Discriminating Reader. Wallin’s wit exudes wisdom and wrath. Perfect.”
—George Elliott Clarke

Poems that are like incantations, love spells spoken in a young lyrical voice.

These poems are an existential exploration of love and mortality via fairytales and nature.

Travelling freely among the shattered confines of identity and gender, travel and environment, the dreamlike narrative unfolds in lyric language, telling of love lost and found, and mythologies that inform the journey with passages in the rhythm of fairytales.

Click to read an excerpt from Contents of a Mermaid’s Purse.

Phoebe Tsang was born in Hong Kong, grew up in England and currently resides in Canada. She is the author of the poetry collection Contents of a Mermaid’s Purse (Tightrope Books), due to be launched 05 November 2009. Phoebe’s poetry can be found in the anthologies Garden Variety (Quattro Books) and Not a Muse (Haven Books). Journal credits include Asia Literary Review (Hong Kong), Atlas02 (UK & India), Brand (UK), Room and  Freefall (Canada). Her chapbooks are Solitaires (Lyricalmyrical Press, 2006) and To Kiss the Ground (Press On! 2007). A professional violinist, she is a multi-genre artist who holds a BSc in Architecture from the University of London.