Bookmark - University of Arkansas Press Blog

Booklist: "The Best"

2010-10-15T16:08:00.003-05:00

"Let’s get Hauser’s credentials out of the way. He has written an outstanding Muhammad Ali biography (Muhammad Ali: His Life and Times, 1991) as well as 17 other books about boxing. His first boxing book, Black Lights (1986), remains a classic study of a young fighter’s perilous journey in the fight game. He is a frequent contributor to Secondsout.com, where most of these articles first appeared. The collection begins with a detailed biographical examination of the career of Sugar Ray Robinson, considered by many to be the greatest pound-for-pound fighter ever. It’s a sadly familiar tale of poverty, ascendancy, fame, and decline, related in a respectful, objective style. The rest of the book is focused on the boxing events of 2009, from the high-profile career of Manny Pacquiao to the progress of several relatively unknown young fighters learning the trade in New York’s gyms. Hauser also explores the business end of boxing, especially its painful relationship with television, but above all, he is drawn to the people of the sport: the fighters, trainers, promoters, and hangers-on. Virtually every piece is notable for its carefully drawn characters who will linger on the edges of readers’ minds long after the book has been shelved. As always, Hauser is the best."
--Wes Lukowsky, Booklist, September 1, 2010

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"unforgettable"

2010-10-11T15:30:00.002-05:00

"I found A Sunday in God-Years unforgettable. The voices Boisseau conjures speak from varied yet connected circumstances and lives. Boisseau's linguistic and prosodic gifts provide a memorable music for the comic and tragic."
--Robin Becker in Women's Review of Books

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"thorough and excellent"

2010-10-06T16:35:00.003-05:00

"Brown v. Board of Education (1954) may well be the greatest and most morally inspiring decision issued by the U.S. Supreme Court in its history. But it is also a decision wherein, preeminently, the devil lies in the details -- in the story of how Brown was implemented and of how the decision shaped both education and society in states where schools had formerly been segregated by law. Therefore, this volume of thorough and excellent essays, edited by Brian J. Daugherity and Charles C. Bolton, is especially valuable."
--Journal of Southern History

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Choice: "Essential"

2010-09-30T10:05:00.003-05:00

"In conjunction with his previous work, Hill Folks: A History of Arkansas Ozarkers & Their Image, Arkansas / Arkansaw solidly establishes Blevins (Ozark studies, Missouri State Univ.) among the foremost scholars of Ozarks social history. Blevins explores the origins and evolution of the state's popular images and the reactions of its citizens to those characterizations. This analysis is thorough, beginning with the earliest known travelers' observations and continuing to the contemporary Bubba personifications of Bill Clinton and Mike Huckabee. The narrative is a scholarly but not too serious examination of the 'socioeconomic implications inherent in the Arkansas image' paired with the 'reactions Arkansas people have to the Arkansaw image.' Describing his effort to balance these personas, Blevins writes '... I try to label as an Arkansan anyone who would choke on his roast beef if called an Arkansawyer.' Richly illustrated and thoroughly explained, this work belongs in every academic library that collects southern history and every public library that serves southern constituents. Summing up: Essential. All levels / libraries."

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"Rich ... lovely"

2010-09-21T08:46:00.002-05:00

Read the review of Live Nude Girl in The Colorado Review.

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2010-09-09T16:33:00.002-05:00

"Turning odd bits of archaeological study collected over 25 years into a coherent, meaningful, and useful narrative for a general readership would challenge the best of writers. In Digging for History at Old Washington, Mary Kwas demonstrates that it can be done and done well."
--Historical Archaeology, 2010, 44(2)

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"a rich history"

2010-09-08T14:32:00.003-05:00

"Mary Kwas' latest publication provides a rich history, both in content and design, of Washington, Arkansas, a National Historic Landmark community and state park. This book was designed for the general public with nearly 80 colorful images and an introductory chapter on the importance of archaeological research. Professional archaeologists will also find the information offered useful as Kwas highlights the role of archaeology in Washington's transformation from an economic and political center in the nineteenth century into a major heritage tourism site in the twentieth century. This narrative of 'Old' Washington's preservation legacy is similar and contemporaneous to that of Colonial Williamsburg or to Midwestern towns like New Harmony, Indiana, and Arrow Rock, Missouri."
--Midcontinental Journal of Archaeology, Spring 2010

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The Un-Natural State in Arkansas Times

2010-09-02T10:37:00.003-05:00

Arkansas Times on The Un-Natural State, coming this fall.

Read the article

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Interesting article on winner of the 2010 Miller Williams Arkansas Poetry Prize

2010-08-05T10:44:00.003-05:00

The Salt Lake Tribune ran a nice story on Danielle Cadena Deulen, a Ph.D. candidate at the University of Utah.

Read the article

"Essential additions to most library collections."

2010-08-03T13:25:00.002-05:00

7 University of Arkansas Press books have been selected for AAUP's "University Press Books for Public and Secondary School Libraries" and 4 of those were picked as Outstanding.

OUTSTANDING:

Jim Crow America: A Documentary History

"This history takes an unflinching look at the sources and the results of the Jim Crow Laws appearance in Southern America prior to the turn of the 20th Century. The book includes multiple illustrations which, in our age, are simply unbelievable but just simply scratch the surface of the reality of that time." -Sonja Plummer-Morgan (PLA)

OUTSTANDING:

An Unforgiving Sport: An Inside Look at Another Year in Boxing

"Thomas Hauser, a member of the Boxing Writers' Association, columnist at ESPN.com and secondsout.com has become one of the better known writers on boxing. This collection of columns is perhaps his finest yet. In this collection he takes on the somewhat seedy connection between cable television and fight promotion, individual fighters and promoters." -Hilary Albert (PLA)

OUTSTANDING:

Don’t Leave Hungry: Fifty Years of Southern Poetry Review

"From the 1950's to the present, this anthology presents the best poems from this prestigious journal over the past 50 years. Although it does have some regional slant, the poets are from across the US. Editor James Smith has grouped the poems by decade beginning each sectino with an essay highlighting the context. Here we find some of America's most important poets, William Stafford, Billy Collins, Carolyn Kizer, and Annie Dillard along with some more obscure, yet powerful voices. The variety of poems and poets makes this a collection that students and teachers will use." -Suzanne Metcaclfe (AASL)

OUTSTANDING:

Dinarzad’s Children: An Anthology of Contemporary Arab American Fiction

"This is an example of Arab American fiction. These short fiction stories reveal adjustments Arab Americans make when they immigrate, and other challenges they face." -Elizabeth Hope Willoughby (AASL)

Showdown in Desire: The Black Panthers Take a Stand in New Orleans

A Paler Shade of Red: The 2008 Presidential Election in the South

Live Nude Girl: My Life as an Object

Rick Bass' Nashville Chrome

2010-08-03T10:15:00.002-05:00

From Publishers Weekly

Starred Review. In his grand return to fiction, Bass (Why I Came West) summons--with a lyrical style befitting his best nature writing--Arkansas and backwoods trio the Browns, the true-life country music trailblazers who pioneered the 1950s sound from which the novel takes its title. Now half-blind and living in obscurity in west Memphis, the group's oldest sibling, Maxine, ruminates on the trio's fateful rise and subsequent fall from grace, and her struggle to recover fame. (Or is it recover from it?) Maxine sets out to have a documentary made and relives on the page a yearning that perhaps only a song or accomplished novel could intone. We revisit her childhood in the woods; live through brother Jim Ed's and father Floyd's bloody struggles in the wood mill; witness sister Bonnie's love affair with a young Elvis; and experience Maxine's reverie in front of "a standing ovation more powerful than any drug." Like the sound Chet Atkins pulls from the Browns in the studio, the narrative has a pitch-perfect chorus of longing and regret, with an undertone that connects and heals.

To read the true story of Maxine Brown's life, check out Looking Back to See: A Country Music Memoir

"Gordy has written an important book on the 'lost year'"

2010-07-14T10:02:00.003-05:00

James Ross reviews Finding the Lost Year in this month's Journal of American History:

For many, the story of the 1957 Little Rock, Arkansas, high school crisis is a tragedy that ends triumphantly with the 1958 graduation of the first African American student, Ernest Green. In moving beyond the events of the 1957–1958 school year, Sondra Gordy joins John Kirk and others in showing the consequences of the Central High School crisis on the development of the Little Rock community. Gordy has written an important book on the “lost year,” when Arkansas governor Orval Faubus closed the Little Rock high schools to prevent them from integrating. Gordy narrates the events of that year very nicely, and, using extensive interviews with former students, administrative records, and newspaper accounts, she is able to show the frustrations and fears of white and black students, school administrators, teachers, and parents.

Related interest:

Beyond Little Rock: The Origins and Legacies of the Central High Crisis, John A. Kirk

An Epitaph for Little Rock: A Fiftieth Anniversary Retrospective on the Central High Crisis, Edited by John A. Kirk

The Long Shadow of Little Rock: A Memoir, Daisy Bates

Turn Away Thy Son: Little Rock, The Crisis that Shocked the Nation, Elizabeth Jacoway

Reviews of Michael Walsh's The Dirt Riddles

2010-07-12T14:13:00.003-05:00

Michael Walsh’s The Dirt Riddles is a focused and autobiographical first book. It mines his experience growing up on what is surely the most revolting farm I have ever seen lovingly depicted. Much of the book pushes back against a pastoral and eco-romantic tradition (think of this as the anti-“Goodbye Yellow Brick Road”) to insist on the primacy of waste, rot, mold and filth as the foundation of his childhood, and moreover, as the foundation of all flesh. His father is a violent, unpredictable man, though with a penchant for singing around the house and dropping his towel. His mother is more nurturing, but as powerful and muscular. Walsh discovers his sexuality in violence, an internal and external violence continue to hover over his grown up life.

—Lamda Literary...click here for more

Michael Walsh’s first book, The Dirt Riddles (winner of the 2010 Arkansas Poetry Prize) offers a corrective to the hyper-romanticized vision of rural life that has long dominated the American imagination. He does this through short, delicate lyrics that observe life on and around a dairy farm, crafting an anti-pastoral pastoral marked by an attitude of tenderness towards their land, even as our speaker(s) eye does not flinch from the ugly, gross, aggressive or uncomfortable. It’s possible that many poems we consider classically pastoral contain these anti-pastoral threads. In this light, Walsh does not eschew a tradition as much as he simply updates its expression. Furthermore, while the pastoral is indeed aesthetic, “farm life” is experiential, and these poems write through the latter even more than it adopts the conventions of the former.

—Constant Critic...click here for more

The Dirt Riddles is a sober and quiet reflection on rural life, composed by Michael Walsh. The poems highlight many of the themes of agrarian life: the constant attendance to the sky, the soil, and the wind as well as the more routine chores of keeping the home place in order. There is a solitary feel to the poems, a reflection on the inner mood rather than the outside. In fact, reading these feels like eavesdropping...hearing a quiet voice observe and evaluate their surroundings unsuppressed by inhibitions. And yet, these aren't sullen or gloomy either. The introspective voice is aware, calm, and natural. There are no awkward metaphors or complicated allusions. The simplicity is deceiving.

—The Black Sheep Dances...click here for more

Harm's Way reviewed in Bay Area Reporter

2010-07-09T11:26:00.004-05:00

"Prize-winning San Francisco poet Eric Leigh has produced a striking meditation on the dull pain translated through the ways we damage and injure ourselves and the ones we love, Harm's Way. With a sure hand, he guides his universal theme along, using a wide array of characters, settings, and moods. This is a debut collection with a literary confidence rarely seen in introductory poetry works... Leigh's compilation is something to savor."

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"tells an important event in the history of the civil rights movement"

2010-06-24T09:49:00.003-05:00

Brent Aucoin's A Rift in The Clouds: Race and the Southern Federal Judiciary, 1900--1910 was reviewed by H-Net:

"Brent J. Aucoin’s brief book thus tells an important, and one could even argue a central, event in the history of the civil rights movement. His focus is on three southern judges who served on the federal district bench: Jacob Treiber, Emory Speer, and Thomas Jones. As a group, they offer an interesting insight into the world of nineteenth-century southern white dissent."

Read the review

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Maxine Brown subject of new novel and Oxford American's Featured Artist

2010-06-23T15:36:00.003-05:00

Maxine Brown, author of L ooking Back to See (now in paperback), is the Oxford American Featured Artist of the Month, and along with The Browns, the subject of a forthcoming novel by Rick Bass.

At Oxford American's website you can read the interview with Maxine and also listen to music from The Browns.

Rick Bass's novel, Nashville Chrome, will be available in September from Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. Click here for more information.

Michael Walsh and Miller Williams

2010-06-10T14:08:00.003-05:00

Michael Walsh, winner of the first Miller Williams Arkansas Poetry Prize for his collection The Dirt Riddles, at Williams’s home in Fayetteville, AR, the day of Walsh’s scheduled poetry reading at the Arkansas Festival of Authors, April 20, 2010

American Review of Politics review Readings in Arkansas Politics and Government

2010-05-17T14:15:00.005-05:00

"While Readings in Arkansas Politics and Government is at its core a textbook, it is considerably more. It will certainly prove useful for classroom instruction, but the appeal of this book is that it has much to offer inside or outside an academic setting. I've lived in my adopted state for 15 years now, and I teach Arkansas Government, but I lost count of the new things I learned while reading this book."
--Lori Klein, Harding University, in The American Review of Politics, Winter 2009-2010

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2010-05-11T11:49:00.004-05:00

A great interview with Mark Spitzer, author of Season of the Gar, with Mark Smirnoff, editor of the Oxford American magazine!

"Recommended": Long is the Way and Hard

2010-05-10T10:01:00.004-05:00

From the May 2010 issue of Choice:

This essay collection is devoted to critically assessing the history of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) since its inception in 1909. The volume opens with a succinct introductory chapter that highlights the important historiographical developments and omissions in historical literature on the NAACP over the last 100 years. The book is divided into two sections and contains 15 primary document-based essays. The first section comprises six essays that document overlooked aspects of the NAACP's national campaigns against lynching, disenfranchisement, segregation, and anti-black representations. Jenny Woodley's essay on the NAACP's cultural campaigns between 1910 and 1950 and George Lewis's essay on the NAACP's public relations department are particularly informative and engaging. The second section contains nine essays that examine the NAACP at the state and local levels. A particular strength of this section is its broad geographical coverage and analysis of often-neglected NAACP chapters in the US Midwest and West. In sum, this volume makes important contributions to NAACP and civil rights movement historiographies. Graduate-level researchers and professional historians will be the primary audience.

Summing Up: Recommended. Libraries serving graduate students and faculty. -- K. K. Hill,
Texas Tech University

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Fate of Texas: " a remarkable job"

2010-05-07T08:28:00.004-05:00

"These eleven historians have done a remarkable job in providing new and groundbreaking areas of research tht contribute to an even deeper understanding of the Lone Star State's experience in the Civil War ... historians will greatly benefit from this latest round of original research on both Texas's wartime and postwar role.
--Southwestern Historical Quarterly, April 2010

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Terese Svoboda and the UA Press in Shelf Awareness

2010-05-06T08:49:00.002-05:00

It's a matter of words and words matter. As NPM comes to an end, I wondered what poetry publishers and poets were thinking. Since I couldn't ask all of them, I opted for one of each.

"National Poetry Month is a great idea (thank you Academy of American Poets) and many good things are done to support it, but I can’t really say we’ve seen a significant growth in our sales of poetry books during April. We’ll sell more poetry books when more people are reading poetry books," observed Tom Lavoie, director of marketing and sales at the University of Arkansas Press, which was founded in 1980 and this year launched the Miller Williams Arkansas Poetry Prize, named for its first director.

Army Life wins Basil W. Duke Award

2010-05-06T08:43:00.003-05:00

We would like to congratulate Robert G. Schultz, the editor of Army Life: From a Soldier's Journal for winning the 2010 Basil W. Duke Award. The Basil W. Duke Award is given annually by the Military Order of Stars and Bars for the best reissued work in Confederate History.

For more information on Army Life, click here.

Daniel Donaghey recognized by The Poetry Center

2010-05-03T16:26:00.004-05:00

Daniel Donaghy's Start with the Trouble was selected for the 2010 Paterson Award for Literary Excellence for previous finalists of the Paterson Poetry Prize.

Here's a poem from the collection:

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Weapons Grade in The Nation

2010-04-30T09:28:00.004-05:00

From The Nation:

Terese Svoboda hasn't published plays yet, but it's one of the few genres she hasn't busted into. Weapons Grade (Arkansas; paper $16) is her fifth book of poems; she's also published four novels, a memoir about her late uncle's involvement in secret executions of black GIs in postwar Okinawa and a translation of songs of cattle herders along the Nile. She's no provincial. Personable without stooping to ingratiation, her work is free of stylized narcissism. This isn't to say she's an exemplary character or, even deadlier, a plain-spoken chronicler. In fact, she's a little odd. Take the opening of "Mom as Fly," a poem with a touch of Electra complex:

A fly with a human head
heads for your screen. It's Mom,
toting groceries and laundry

If you've been some time away from poetry, this might look like the start of a confessional sitcom, the outcome of decades of poets competing to retail the most outlandish family disasters. But during Svoboda's career, it's been increasingly fashionable for poets to bleach out anything as messy as a true story or an awkward word, reducing poems to mood extract--the bleakest confrontations and direst predictions. Svoboda likes that too, but she can't help making musical comedy out of it.

Previous books centered on long narrative verse sequences: reimagining Faust as a starlet, uncovering incest on a family farm. The new Svoboda poem is short, touches on a fear or wish and is a kick to decode:

The lake stood and pudding--
shook, the sails slack and dry.
Two men sang wholly songs--
No oaths--then drank a toast to me.

Svoboda likes to play with words. She also likes always to be saying something worth your time, which is less of a universal practice. In Svoboda's case, it comes down to surviving without turning sour. We can always use more examples of how to do that.

--Jordan Davis

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"Recommended for many sports buffs."

2010-04-22T12:52:00.003-05:00

Rivals, a new book edited by David K. Wiggins & R. Pierre Rodgers, was recently reviewed by Library Journal.

Rivalries kick sports up a satisfying notch, as almost all fans have a big game or big match they look forward to on a regular basis. These 16 essays by academics in recreation-related fields-no beat sportswriters here-are all naturally on the scholarly side, yet they are accessible in their examination of famous rivalries and what stoked them (parity in skills, polarities in team or athlete personalities that enable fans to bestow a meaning greater than sports on their contests, and, yes, media hype, to name a few factors). Some will quibble with the choices: why not Dempsey-Tunney, Army-Navy, 1950s-era Yankees-Dodgers? Does anyone on this side of the Atlantic truly hang on the outcome of the Davis and Ryder Cups? But no one can dispute the importance of Ali-Frazier, Bird-Johnson, Navratilova-Evert, Ohio State-Michigan, Yankees-Red Sox, and most other picks.

VERDICT Reader interest may flag when the editors, both professors at the School of Recreation, Health, and Tourism at George Mason University, move out of the mano a mano realm and into team rivalries, but this book will be appreciated by a wide audience. Recommended for many sports buffs.
—Jim Burns, Jacksonville P.L., FL

For more info on the book, click here.

Indivisible authors at AWP

2010-04-19T14:59:00.004-05:00

For more on the book, click here.

"Fills a void in the historiography on the Black Panther party"

2010-03-31T12:30:00.007-05:00

Journal of American History Review of Showdown in Desire

"Orissa Arend’s Showdown in Desire is a fascinating story that documents the history of the Black Panther party chapter in New Orleans. The author’s objective, which she accomplishes, is to allow former participants to tell the story of the New Orleans Panthers to provide a more holistic perspective of the party and the issues (racism, police brutality, and poverty) that it combated. In addition, the author tells this story to generate greater awareness of a post-Katrina New Orleans that is still ravaged by the same problems that the Panthers fought forty years ago. One of the standout features of this work is that Arend uses over twenty interviews to help tell the story of the New Orleans Panthers. Arend’s interviews range from former Panthers to high-ranking city officials to police officers (including two who infiltrated the party). Furthermore, the work fills a void in the historiography on the Black Panther party, as very few works examine southern chapters of the party."
March, 2010

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"Mud, Apples, Milk" at The Writer's Almanac

2010-03-31T09:43:00.003-05:00

Michael Walsh's poem "Mud, Apples, Milk" was the featured poem on The Writer's Almanac for March 31, 2010.

Click here to read and listen to the poem.

Click here for more on Michael Walsh's debut collection, The Dirt Riddles, winner of the 2010 Miller Williams Arkansas Poetry Prize.

Booklist on Dirt Riddles

2010-03-25T14:59:00.004-05:00

"Walsh’s first book tells us he started out as a farm boy, though on the evidence of three sharply poignant poems in its second part and one in its fourth, he wasn’t on the farm all his growing years. He observed and now remembers deeply and acutely, however, so that his poems about cows and milking, haying and rock picking, feel and taste and smell of that life as well as bring it before us in vivid visual images. He retained, too, the rich connection with a grandmother that animates the three past-as-present poems of 'Stalk, Root, Scissors' in the volume’s third part and the past-as-memory poem 'Handmade for Disasters' in the fourth. And he recalls how being gay has cropped up in his life, from 'First Kisses' to 'Bully' in childhood to 'Camouflage' and 'Pinup' and others in his teens to 'On Kissing My Husband at the Gas Station' and 'Wish' as a man. Altogether these remarkably well-enjambed, short-lined free-verse pieces, whispering and crooning with consonances and assonances, tenderly conjure an integral life."
--Ray Olson, Booklist, February 15, 2010

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ForeWord Magazine Book of the Year Awards

2010-03-17T09:58:00.005-05:00

The ForeWord Magazine Book of the Year Award finalists have been announced, and two University of Arkansas Press titles are among them.

Don't Leave Hungry: Fifty Years of Southern Poetry Review, Edited by James Smith is a finalist in the anthologies category.

Live Nude Girl: My Life as an Object, by Kathleen Rooney, is a finalist in the memoir category.

"A fitting tribute."

2010-03-16T10:20:00.005-05:00

Sacred Spaces was recently reviewed in Booklist.

Sacred Spaces: The Architecture of Fay Jones.
Feb 2010. Univ. of Arkansas, DVD, $19.95. (9781557289384).
Structured like a series of postcards, this stylish program chronicling the life and work of architect Fay Jones opens with the Jones accepting an award in 1990 from the American Institute of Architects (AIA). Jones, who studied under Frank Lloyd Wright, pursued a similar vision of “organic” architecture, blending designs and natural surroundings. Jones focused solely on more intimate structures, including houses and small chapels. Fellow architects, students, teachers, clients, and workers remember him as intense but unfailingly gentlemanly. Proud owners of Jones-designed homes lead tours and share details about construction. Intercut with interviews of family and colleagues are clips of Jones (who died in 2004 at the age of 83) talking about his work and drawing a sketch. Named one of the 10 most influential architects of the twentieth century by the AIA, the late Arkansas resident left a legacy of beautifully designed structures. This nicely shot program is a fitting tribute.
— Candace Smith

Click here for more on Sacred Spaces: The Architecture of Fay Jones

Check out Grif Stockley's new website!

2010-03-12T09:06:00.003-06:00

UA Press author Grif Stockley (Blood in Their Eyes, Ruled by Race) has a new website: grifstockley.net.

"An excellent addition to the Portraits of Conflict series."

2010-03-08T13:16:00.002-06:00

Material quality and overall presentation are excellent. Naturally, the clarity of the image reproduction varies with the state of the original, but the quality, high gloss paper used by the publisher enhances the visual and tactile experiences of the reader. The Missouri volume is an excellent addition to the Portraits of Conflict series, and well worth the effort of libraries, researchers, and period photography enthusiasts to obtain.

read more at Civil War Books and Authors

Sacred Spaces film to receive Best of Festival award

2010-02-23T10:10:00.004-06:00

Congratulations, Larry Foley and Dale Carpenter, producers of Sacred Spaces, for winning the 2010 Broadcast Education Association's Festival of Media Arts award for best documentary!

The Broadcast Education Association is the professional association for professors, industry professionals and graduate students who are interested in teaching and research related to electronic media and multimedia enterprises.

Sacred Spaces will also be shown on the Arkansas Educational Television Network at 9 p.m. March 25 and at 1 p.m. March 28. The film is available on DVD, as part of a new collaboration between the University of Arkansas Press and the University’s Fay Jones School of Architecture.

"easy to delight"

2010-02-02T14:58:00.003-06:00

The Gettysburg Review reviewed A Sunday in God Years, by Michelle Boisseau:

"It is easy to delight in poems that weave history with modernity, and use form in innovative ways to comment on the connection between the two."

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"A phenomenal reference"

2010-01-12T16:37:00.008-06:00

"Cherry has created an invaluable catalog of headpots. The book is printed on heavy, high quality paper which allows the numerous photographs to shine. Cherry made the early decision to photograph each vessel from all angles and to present them in the book, for which I am grateful. At least four views are presented nearly all of the 138 classical headpots. This book is a phenomenal reference for anyone interested in native American ceramic sculpture."
--Missouri Archaeological Society Quarterly, January--March 2010

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"Sure to provoke future research"

2010-01-06T10:41:00.002-06:00

From H-Net, October 2009

"Most studies of the Confederacy understandably have focused on the areas that saw most of the fighting and where Southerners endured Union occupation, but this book, and the series to which it belongs, indicates the way in which scholars are taking increasing interest in how the war affected frontier areas like Texas. Texans dealt with many of the same stresses endured in other parts of the South, but they also encountered unique challenges associated with their frontier location. In The Fate of Texas, Grear has put together a volume that reveals both of these aspects of the Texas experience. The contributors highlight both the distinctively Southern and the uniquely Texan experience of the Civil War and its aftermath in the state, and they ask questions and make conclusions that are sure to provoke future research into the way Texans both affected and were affected by the war."

Read the review

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"a go-to book for those studying race in the South"

2009-12-15T14:00:00.005-06:00

"In this in-depth regional analysis of race relations tracing the history of race in Arkansas, Stockley (Butler Center for Arkansas Studies) briefly recounts the role of slavery prior to the Civil War. However, the majority of his study focuses on the post-Reconstruction era. In detailing the struggles of blacks and whites to coexist, Stockley depicts a state where race appears in every major decision in Arkansans' lives. With the focus on the 20th century, Stockley covers the major events of the Civil Rights Movement, including the desegregation of Central High School; but he also introduces readers to less known stories, like the Elaine Race Riot in 1919. In doing so, Stockley taps into a diverse collection of resources from primary accounts of slaves to secondary accounts from celebrities like Maya Angelou. Offering deeper insight not only into Arkansas race relations but race relations across the US, this will become a go-to book for those studying race in the South. Summing up: Highly recommended. All levels/libraries. -- M.A. Byron, University of Arkansas

Brooks Blevins on KUAR

2009-11-18T10:44:00.003-06:00

KUAR, Little Rock's public radio station, ran this interview with Brooks Blevins on October 21.

Reminder: Brooks Blevins will be in Northwest Arkansas on December 5!

Signings

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"Belongs on Every Arkansas Bookshelf"

2009-11-16T14:02:00.004-06:00

"... a tribute to one of Arkansas's pioneers, whose work was the foundation on which not only the university museum but the University of Arkansas Anthropology Department and renowned Arkansas Archeological Survey stand ... it takes only a glance at the photos to understand why this volume belongs on every Arkansas bookshelf. For creating this great enduring artifact of an important transitory exhibit, everyone connected with this project deserves thanks and praise from all Arkansans."
--Arkansas Historical Quarterly, Autumn 2009

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"The bible of all things hick"

2009-11-13T15:25:00.003-06:00

From Arkansas Times:

"This book is the bible of all things hick, yet it also strives to render a thorough post-mortem on Arkansas's corpus of low self-esteem ... Blevins cleverly serves up a double-wide helping of Arkansas's rugged individualism and rustic charm."

Read the article

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Indian Artifact Magazine: "just great"

2009-11-06T15:48:00.002-06:00

"Twenty-five years in the making, this final result is just great. It will be, already is, the finest work ever done on this topic and I don't know how anyone could ever do better. Get this classic for your library while it is still available. It will be a good investment, and you will learn from, and enjoy, the photos and information presented."
--Indian Artifact Magazine, November 2009

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Indiana Magazine of History: "an exceptional volume"

2009-11-05T13:30:00.004-06:00

"Without question, With All Deliberate Speed adds much to our understanding of the history and legacy of the Brown decision and also raises significant questions about the broader civil rights movement. This carefully researched and lucidly written volume is a must-read for those interested in this crucial period in American and African American history. All parties involved in this venture should be highly commended for their pathbreaking and much-needed collection."
Indiana Magazine of History, September 2009

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Choice Review of Jim Crow America: "Essential"

2009-11-03T16:28:00.004-06:00

"Historian C. Lewis and educator J. R. Lewis have compiled this eminently useful collection of primary source documents that will most certainly be invaluable to any history student trying to understand the complexities of Jim Crow segregation. Divided thematically into five chapters, this volume features documents that demonstrate the manner in which the US's apartheid system was invented, built, lived, resisted, and finally dismantled--none of which was an easy task. Clearly designed for classroom use, the volume includes a time line, a list of Web resources, an annotated bibliography, and even discussion questions--all of which are a bonus to the extremely functional collection of documents. Although many of the documents have been published previously, such as the Emancipation Proclamation, many have not; never have all these documents been published together. Most histories of Jim Crow segregation have focused either on one region or on a specific topic such as gender or law. This volume endeavors to sample all and does so admirably. The editors provide newspaper articles, letters, essays, political cartoons, legal documents, and photographs from both sides of the divide and from all around the nation; they flesh out Jim Crow's strange career in a manner that will help students understand the craft of history. A few typos are evident but do not distract overall from the outstanding content. Summing Up: Essential. Upper-level undergraduates through
researchers/faculty."
-- D. W. Bilal, University of Illinois at Springfield

"Rewarding"

2009-11-02T11:43:00.003-06:00

Weapons Grade reviewed by Fogged Clarity: "Svoboda’s poems are rewarding. She is brave–but the road she travels is not easy or for the faint of heart."

Read the review

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Arkansas and Its Image

2009-10-13T08:40:00.006-05:00

The Morning News of Northwest Arkansas ran this story on Arkansas / Arkansaw.

Brooks Blevins will be reading and signing his book at the Old Statehouse Museum in Little on October 26!

More on the book.

"should be considered by anyone serious about contemporary poetry"

2009-10-08T14:06:00.004-05:00

From October's Library Journal:

"Whether she's writing about slave children ('necessity a little bracelet
of sound'), Jeanne Baret's voyage on a late 1700s expedition disguised
as a man ('I recall how these islands roast and eat white women/ if
there's a question of whose'), or the absolute ghastliness of war
('There are soldiers in mother's hair/ and soldiers peeling the
screen'), Svoboda takes a fiercely uncompromising stance. These are
often angry political poems, but they never descend into agit-prop;
other writers could learn something from her brilliant management of
language and emotion. As in previous sharp-minded work, whether poetry,
fiction, or nonfiction (e.g., Black Glasses Like Clark Kent), Svoboda
does not tell things straight but delivers cracked, impressionistic
fragments bound and delivered by an incredible drive. She's particularly
good when condemning U.S. military engagement ('Resistance fighters
resist,/ not insurgents/ who just want to live/ where they live'), which
she takes back to a shocking poem on black GIs in occupied Japan. In
fact, power mongers everywhere get her goat; after Henry VIII proclaims
'I'm what matters,' a baby picks his royal spittle off dog fur and
mutters, 'Ah-blue-gabe.' Verdict: Not for casual readers or right
wingers, this collection should be considered by anyone serious about
contemporary poetry."
-Barbara Hoffert, Library Journal

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"an interesting account of a remarkable woman of color"

2009-09-22T14:24:00.003-05:00

Janice Sumler-Edmond has written an interesting account of a remarkable woman of color who, along with her offspring, managed to carve out self-supporting businesses in Georgia from the antebellum era through Reconstruction.... [Sumler-Edmond] has offered readers a well-structured and thoroughly argued presentation of a part of history still overlooked and long forgotten."
H-Net, June 2009

Read the review

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"Highly Recomended"

2009-09-14T13:53:00.006-05:00

"These 11 essays, each written by an outstanding history authority, examine the Civil War in Texas with emphasis on its role as part of the Confederacy. The authors include Joseph G. Dawson III, Richard Lowe, Richard B. McCaslin, Angela Boswell, Dale Baum, Walter D. Kamphoefner, Randolph B. Campbell, Carl H. Moneyhon, Alexander Mendoza, and Julie Holcomb. The authors take a broad-based approach in considering both Texas's role in the war and the impact that the conflict had on the state. Several selections deal with behind-the-scenes issues such as German Texans, the 1862 Great Hanging in Gainesville, women in the war, and the life of slaves. Other selections comment on why so many Texans fought with Confederate armies in the main theaters of the war or examine postwar issues, including reactions to the Confederate defeat in Texas, the construction of public monuments to Civil War leaders from the state, and the role public history has played in interpreting the Texas experience in the war. Meticulously researched, artfully written, and historiographically exciting, this book will set a new standard for historical literature dealing with Texas and the Civil War. Summing up: highly recommended."
--Choice, 10/09

A labor of love for 25 years

2009-09-02T14:36:00.002-05:00

Jim Cherry shared with us today some of the comments he has gotten about The Headpots of Northwest Arkansas and Southern Pemiscot County, Missouri, and he said he didn't mind if we shared them here.

"Congratulations again on your headpot book! I still pick it up almost every day and marvel at those fine vessels. I especially appreciate your careful documentation of the provenances of the pieces, the various tables, and the drawings. The information provided in the book is incredible; it is certainly a labor of love on your part. This is the finest book for collectors in my memory."
-- an Illinois Reader

"The two copies of your book arrived in great shape. I believe you understated the amount of time you must have applied to this project. It looks to me like it took thousands of hours, not just hundreds. You have created a true masterpiece. Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!"
-- a Missouri reader

"It’s easy to see why it took over 25 years to get all of the information together. If I couldn’t replace it, I wouldn’t take $1,000 for it."
-- an Arkansas reader

"Congratulations for the successful publication of your book ... if only more persons would dedicate twenty-five years of of their life to such a worthwhile endeavor the world would be a better place."
-- an Arkansas reader

"The book arrived today and it is wonderful! It is truly a great contribution to American archeology. Thanks so much for your efforts."
--a Missouri reader

"What a handsome headpot volume! Congratulations. Its publication is the culmination of your career, or I should say, your career besides medicine. The book will serve as a baseline of knowledge about headpots for archeologists and collectors...."
--a Michigan reader

"An Excellent Collection"

2009-09-01T10:30:00.003-05:00

"Many journalists have written fine boxing pieces, but none has written as extensively or as memorably as Hauser. His book-length work on the subject includes Black Lights (1985), an account of a young boxer’s attempt to crack the big time, and, of course, Muhammad Ali: His Life and Times (1992), considered to be, along with David Remnick’s King of the World (2003), one of the definitive accounts of the champ’s life. These days Hauser prowls both the back alleys and the pay-per-view boulevards of the sport for espn.com and secondsout.com. This collection, mostly of his online work from 2008, ranges from a reexamination of John L. Sullivan, the first professional fighter, to an analysis of the murky relationships between cable television and the sport’s top promoters. Hauser has great respect for the fighters; not so much for those who lurk outside the ring. He seems to have a special place in his heart for the champ on the downslide: courage and smarts compensating for diminished reflexes and heavy legs until, inevitably,
they don’t. His account of the Roy Jones–Felix Trinidad bout, two aging warriors slugging it out, is one for the ages. By any standard, an excellent collection; Hauser remains the current champ of boxing literature. — Wes Lukowsky
--Booklist, 9/1/09

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Four Great Reviews for With All Deliberate Speed

2009-08-28T15:11:00.005-05:00

“These essays offer a rich portrait of individuals struggling to turn the constitutional principal of Brown into educational opportunity for the nation’s African American children … by attempting to lay out the varieties of experiences with school desegregation across the nation …. this volume serves a valuable purpose.”
Journal of American History, June 2009

“Covers significant ground by exploring various local and state approaches to desegregation. Recommended.”
Choice, November 2008

“An important addition to the literature on the subject.”
Georgia Historical Quarterly, Spring 2009

“The collection is well researched and the articles are cogently argued.”
Alabama Review, July 2009

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Don't Leave Hungry in Bloomsbury Review

2009-08-25T16:44:00.003-05:00

"Southern Poetry Review, one of the most influential literary journals in this country, has published a wide variety of poets for decades. Some of its best work is gathered in Don't Leave Hungry, a substantial anthology celebrating that long tradition. The roll call of names is a reminder of the rich history of 20th-century American poetry: James Dickey, David Ignatow, Charles Wright, Ted Kooser, Sharon Olds, Denise Levertov, and more than 150 others. Crucial anthologies like this illustrate how publication of and support for poetry in this country remain with small journals, whether they are university supported or tiny independents."
--Bloomsbury Review, May/June/July 2009

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Weapons Grade: Haunting, funny, pleasurable, powerful

2009-08-20T16:48:00.003-05:00

"Svoboda's fifth collection of poems walks the borders where the personal and the political meet, and where ironic humor and foreboding overlap. Her contemporary America is both 'finger-licking digital,' and a place where there are 'soldiers in mother's hair.' In this book's first section, war is everywhere, from a lab in Tokyo where AIDS-infected blood was used for transfusions to 'the cavities of your body.' Section two takes up notions of mistranslations, misunderstandings and missed opportunities: in one poem, 'a man walks into a bra'; in another a son asks of a missing father, 'Is he back or forth?' The final section takes up more personal subjects, as in a poem titled 'To My Brother, on the Occasion of His Second Breakdown.' Throughout, Svoboda's poems are as haunting as they are funny, as pleasurable as they are powerful."

--Publishers Weekly

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Inclined to Speak featured in Perihelion

2009-08-19T08:27:00.003-05:00

The journal Perihelion has produced an Arab American issue featuring Naomi Shihab Nye's essay "In Celebration of Inclined to Speak: An Anthology of Contemporary Arab-American Poetry."

See the story

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"Die Zwei Ist Zweifel" by Michelle Boisseau a Poetry Daily Pick

2009-08-13T15:07:00.003-05:00

Read the poem at PoetryDaily.

Check out Michelle Boisseau's collection A Sunday in God-Years.

Andrei Codrescu on Arkansas / Arkansaw

2009-08-12T13:02:00.002-05:00

"This is an exhaustive investigation into two centuries' worth of images of Arkansas, from stereotypes of backwardness to romantic ideas of wildness. For a newcomer like myself, this book is a revelation that equips me for living in this complex region, while for natives it should be a welcome review of their state's representations in the eyes of others. At a time when Americans are re-evaluating once more their priorities, and rethinking ideas of progress, urban sprawl, and the environment, this book offers a thoughtful and timely analysis, useful well beyond the scope of its subject. Arkansas will be reimagined many times yet, and this book will be a lasting reference."
--Andrei Codrescu, NPR commentator, LSU Emeritus Professor of English, and author of "Jealous Witness: New Poems."

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Guide to Missouri Confederate Units "deserves high marks"

2009-08-04T16:55:00.003-05:00

From the Journal of America's Military Past:

"The author has produced a most useful guide to a subject that has long been neglected, and he deserves high marks for the tremendous amount of research that obviously was required. All those who are interested in Missouri's support for the Confederate war effort will find this volume to be of great interest."

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Two UA Press titles receive "Outstanding" rates by the 2009 University Press Books Committee

2009-07-28T14:56:00.004-05:00

Sloan, Kay
Not Without Honor: The Nazi POW Journal of Steve Carano
The University of Arkansas Press
“As a POW in Nazi Germany, life was not easy. Steve Carano’s journal documents his life as a POW and those that were with him. He looks at how men from other countries were treated, the day to day life and how the Red Cross helped them. The journal, which was given to the prisoners by the Red Cross, includes his artwork, addresses of the men that were with him and details about himself and other prisoners on the camp. A gripping true tale.”—Elizabeth Willoughby (AASL)

Sumler-Edmond, Janice L.
The Secret Trust of Aspasia Cruvellier Mirault: The Life and Trials of a Free Woman of Color in Antebellum Georgia
The University of Arkansas Press
“Fabulously documented biography of a 19th Century free black in Savannah, Georgia, Aspasia Cruvellier Mirault. Mirault’s secret agreement with a young white Georgian led to her family’s success and shows how through the efforts of all people, our American culture has prevailed and we have survived as a people.”—Sabrina Carnesi (AASL)

link

Ron Koertge's poem "Fault" on The Writer's Almanac

2009-07-22T08:58:00.004-05:00

Fault

by Ron Koertge

In the airport bar, I tell my mother not to worry.
No one ever tripped and fell into the San Andreas
Fault. But as she dabs at her dry eyes, I remember
those old movies where the earth does open.

There's always one blonde entomologist, four
deceitful explorers, and a pilot who's good-looking
but not smart enough to take off his leather jacket
in the jungle.

Still, he and Dr. Cutie Bug are the only ones
who survive the spectacular quake because
they spent their time making plans to go back
to the Mid-West and live near his parents

while others wanted to steal the gold and ivory
then move to Los Angeles where they would rarely
call their mothers and almost never fly home
and when they did for only a few days at a time.

Click here to listen.
Click here to download (mp3).

Thank you, Nightbird Books!

2009-07-14T10:36:00.003-05:00

We'd like to give some love to Nightbird Books, our own fabulous independent bookstore right here in Fayetteville. Owner Lisa Sharp brings creativity, passion, and no small amount of savvy to her work to make it happen in today's challenging retail environment. There is always something happening at Nightbird, and having the store here does no less than make Fayetteville a better place to live. Thanks Lisa, for all you do!

Nightbird Books Blog and Website and Facebook page (see what we mean about that creativity, passion, and savvy?)

Melody Moezzi interviewed on CNN

2009-06-24T15:27:00.001-05:00

Click here to watch the video.

During Wind and Rain Reviewed in Arkansas Review

2009-06-19T14:09:00.004-05:00

"One of the many strengths of Bolsterli's writing is her deft handling of the contradictions inherent in her life and history, and in the Delta itself. current members of the family, like many of their fellow Southerners, freely admit to romanticizing times past that were grueling and often tragic for those who lived through them. Like many white Southerners she is both proud and ashamed of what has made her. She fiercely loves the farm but is haunted by the pain of knowing it couldn't have existed without the systematic exploitation of slaves and their descendants, some of whom are driving tractors in the Delta today."
--Arkansas Review, April 2009

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Our Fall 2009 Catalog Is In!

2009-06-12T12:47:00.003-05:00

Check it out here.

Thank you, Fort Smith Public Library!

2009-06-05T12:43:00.007-05:00

The UA Press loves the Fort Smith Public Library! We work with Jeanne Pillar, the circulation supervisor, who has hosted several of our authors at the library's Food For Thought program, held the third Friday of each month at noon. Our authors have unfailingly had a wonderful time, with a reliable turnout of loyal and interested patrons ensuring great discussions. To make it extra special, the mayor even gives the featured author the key to the city! This month, Roy Reed will be the at the library on June 19th. Thank you Jeanne and FSPL!

Fort Smith Public Library

Looking Back at the Arkansas Gazette

War on Error chosen for University of Dayton "First Year Read"

2009-06-03T08:38:00.004-05:00

The book was chosen to "get students thinking and talking about cultural diversity."

Read the story

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Law and History Review reviews There When We Needed Him

2009-05-27T09:20:00.004-05:00

"Kilpatrick's book touches on historiographic themes of interest to African-American legal, political, and social historians . . . contributes to a growing literature on the overlooked but pivotal role less-prominent leaders played in the civil rights movement."
--Law and History Review, Summer 2009

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"remarkable... an important addition to our literary record"

2009-05-26T13:29:00.002-05:00

"Don't Leave Hungry is by no means just a regional magazine .... here are the country's best poets with some of their best work."
Raleigh News & Observer, 5/10/09

Read the review

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"Black Magic" Film Wins Peabody

2009-05-19T11:07:00.005-05:00

ESPN Films was honored with one of the oldest and most prestigious awards for electronic media, the Peabody Award, for its documentary “Black Magic,” a look at the lives of African American basketball players and their coaches at historically black colleges and universities during the civil rights era. The movie prominently features Milton Katz, author of Breaking Through: John B. McClendon, Basketball Legend and Civil Rights Pioneer, being interviewed about John McClendon.

Read more about the book

Read more about the award

Learn more about the movie:

NPR

Newsweek

"versatile and provocative"

2009-05-18T15:50:00.005-05:00

"Badger's observations are characterized by intellectual honesty, an imaginative mind, stylistic clarity, realism and sound judgment. Versatile and provocative, his research merges originality of with synthesis. A probing, sophisticated intellect that asks large questions and deals with them thoughtfully is evident throughout. Scholars and students of recent southern history will profit from reading New Deal / New South: An Anthony J. Badger Reader."
-- Journal of Southern History, May 20

More on the Book

2009-05-13T13:42:00.003-05:00

Today's Times Picayune includes a story about Orissa Arend, author of Showdown in Desire: The Black Panthers Take a Stand in New Orleans, and her work with Robert King, a member of the Angola 3 who was imprisoned for 29 years.

The two will appear together at two community forums in the coming weeks, along with others who either participated in the events -- such as priests William Barnwell and Jerome LeDoux; and Bob Tucker, who worked for Mayor Moon Landrieu; and Malik Rahim, one of the founding Panthers.

Read the Times Picayune article

More on Showdown in Desire

Click here for Orissa Arend's speaking schedule

More on From the Bottom of the Heap: The Autobiobraphy of Black Panther Robert Hillary King, published by PM Press

Updates on "a fine-textured recounting"

2009-05-12T08:34:00.005-05:00

Thank you University of Arkansas Libraries special collections and the Walter J. Lemke department of journalism for the wonderful signing you recently hosted for Roy Reed!

If you missed this signing, Roy Reed will be reading, discussing, and signing Looking Back at the Arkansas Gazette at Nightbird Books this weekend, Saturday, May 16 at 6:00 (at their new location on Dickson) and he will be at the Fort Smith Public Library June 19 at noon.

And, good words from the esteemed Columbia Journalism Review:

"Looking Back offers a fine-textured recounting of the Gazette and its journalists, of a kind beyond the reach of conventional histories."
--Columbia Journalism Review, May/June 2009

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"appeal for general readers and scholars alike"

2009-05-08T11:23:00.003-05:00

Confederate Guerrilla was reviewed by Blue & Gray Magazine:

"will have appeal for general readers and scholars alike, both for its superior presentation and a glimpse into the rarely examined world of unconventional war in the 1860s."

more on the book

"an excellent collection of essays"

2009-05-05T08:58:00.002-05:00

"This is an excellent collection of essays, and any student of southern history since the New Deal should find something of value in it."
--Southern Historian, 2009

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GUEST BLOGGER: Kathleen Rooney's Tour Discoveries

2009-05-01T08:49:00.005-05:00

The bulk of my touring behind Live Nude Girl is over and done with, but the value of having done it keeps going on and on.

Said value isn’t just in terms of the higher profile the book hopefully got as a result of spending the better part of two months on the road, but also in terms of the influences and ideas that being on tour exposes the tourer to. I’ve done an exhaustive round-up of these influences over on the book tour diary blog (see the entry on April 14) I share with my tour partner Kyle Minor. But here on the University of Arkansas Press blog, I thought I’d take the chance to a) refer you to the other blog post, and b) explain what I was thinking when I put the list together.

I mention this concept briefly in my other University of Arkansas Press book, Reading with Oprah, but in his novel High Fidelity, Nick Hornby puts forth the suggestion that a person’s personality and identity are less defined by what that person is like, and more defined by what that person likes, e.g. the books they read, the food they eat, the films they watch, the music they listen to, etc. Is that right? Is that wrong? I don’t know for sure, but one thing I do know is that I love lists and I love checking things off them, and this tour has given me a lot of satisfaction on both counts. If you happen to be reading this, and you happen to be from one of the cities I visited on the tour, but maybe didn’t get a chance to give me any of your recommendations, then please be sure to leave a comment either here or on the book tour diary of something you like that you think I (or some of the other people who read things on the internet) might like too.

--Kathleen Rooney

Roy Reed on University of Arkansas campus

2009-04-28T11:54:00.002-05:00

Roy Reed will be speaking on the history of the Arkansas Gazette and discussing his new book, Looking Back at the Arkansas Gazette: an Oral History on April 29 at Giffels Auditorium in Old Main at the University of Arkansas. There will be a reception at 3:00 p.m., followed by a lecture at 3:30 and a book signing. The event is free and open to the public.

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Waking Stone Reviewed in Rattle

2009-04-23T15:20:00.002-05:00

".... as Miller Williams is famous for saying, 'a poem lies its way to the truth.' This poem—this collection of poems—does just that, and does it very successfully."

Read Review

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Roy Reed interview on Little Rock's KUAR

2009-04-20T12:21:00.003-05:00

Click here to listen

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Roy Reed Wins the Porter Prize

2009-04-14T09:29:00.006-05:00

The prestigious Porter Prize, awarded annually by the Central Arkansas Library System, goes to UA Press author Roy Reed for 2009, for his body of work in journalism and biography. Reed will be honored at "A Prized Evening" on Sunday April 19, 2009, from 6:30 to 8:00 at the Main Library, Darragh Center, 100 S. Rock Street, in Little Rock. This event is in conjunction with the Arkansas Literary Festival, where three of our other authors, Grif Stockley, Sondra Gordy, and Marc Smirnoff, will be featured authors. We'll also be there with the vendor tables selling lots of books at great prices!

More on the literary festival

Adventures in the Wild a Choice Monthly Pick

2009-04-09T12:57:00.004-05:00

"The stereotypical caricature of the biologist with the bright white lab coat, safety goggles and beakers full of mysterious colored liquids is cast aside in this book that chronicles the scientific adventures of the biology faculty at Arkansas State University. Trauth and Romero, both faculty at Arkansas State, have assembled what amounts to a scientific travelogue of sorts. From the seemingly benign adventures of studying anticancer agents in medicinal plants, to the nail-biting accounts of exploring blind cave fish, there is a story here that will interest readers of all levels and backgrounds. The chapter on black-water diving in the Cache River comes complete with stories of mysterious 'monsters,' pesky alligators, and 'Mardi Gras Hallucinations.' This book will appeal to any biologist who has ever sat around a table with colleagues and exchanged entertaining stories related to his/her work. The true value-added nature of the volume may be in its potential use as an advising tool. Any faculty member who ha ever been asked "What do biologists do?" will want to have a copy of this work. The book not only represents a diverse cross-section of the discipline, but it reflects the adventurous nature of science in a way that is both educational and entertaining. Summing Up: Highly recommended, All levels/ libraries."
Choice, January 2009

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POEM OF THE WEEK: Dictionary Johnson by Christopher Bursk

2009-04-03T13:56:00.003-05:00

2009 is the 250th anniversary of Samuel Johnson's "Dictionary." This poem is
from Christopher Bursk's Patterson Poetry Prize-winning collection The
First Inhabitants of Arcadia. It is about the human side of Johnson and
about language and words, and letters. The book itself is a sort of homage
to the alphabet, and to a man whose famous Preface to the "Dictionary"
provided Bursk with the title for his collection.

Click the image to expand and read the poem:

Christopher Bursk's book is included in our Poetry Month Sale, marked down to just $5! Click here.

Live Nude Girl in the February issue of Chicago Social Magazine

2009-04-01T15:40:00.003-05:00

Kathleen Rooney was profiled in the February issue of Chicago Social magazine. Click the image to load a larger one.

You can follow Kathleen's book tour on her blog: click here!

Goodbye, Book Review Editors

2009-03-27T14:47:00.004-05:00

A few weeks ago, I was talking to David Mehegan, book review editor at the Boston Globe, who was doing his job so well that he was contacting me in Arkansas about one of our authors who was traveling in the area. He joked that amid all the book review editors being let go from newspapers, he was glad to be "still here," unlike, sadly, the book review editor at the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, Ed Gray, who had lost his job a few weeks before.

Today I got an email saying that David Mehegan and Gail Caldwell are no longer at the Boston Globe. Last week, we heard the same about John Mark Eberhart, who'd been let go from the Kansas City Star. We worked with him, too, and found him to be one of the energetic newspaper book review editors around.

Below is a letter written by beloved Arkansas novelist Donald Harington to the Democrat-Gazette:

It's a day for mourning when the state's only newspaper to give attention to new books kills off its book review section. This is a national tragedy, of course. Last month, The Washington Post buried its respectable Book World section, leaving only The New York Times with a monopoly on stand-alone book sections. Ironically, people are no longer reading, and once they stop reading, then newspapers themselves are the next to become extinct. In cutting out a key part of your brain, you have hastened the demise of your whole body. I can't say I didn't see it coming. Over the years, I've watched in dismay as your book review pages have [changed] from prominence in the Perspective section to the status of an afterthought in the Travel section. People still believe in the ivorybilled woodpecker. Ages and ages hence, when there is no sign of either a Democrat or a Gazette, I will remember your paper with fondness and nostalgia, and wonder whatever happened to good guys like Ed Gray. DONALD HARINGTON / Fayetteville

It seems like once a week these days I am deleting another contact from our database. We're very sorry not to be working with good guys like Ed Gray. Best of luck to them all.

POEM OF THE WEEK: Introduction to Poetry by Billy Collins

2009-03-24T08:51:00.006-05:00

In a new feature here at Bookmark, UA Press Marketing Director Tom Lavoie will be selecting a poem from among the UA Press list each week to be featured. For the opening poem he's chosen Billy Collins's "Introduction to Poetry."

From Tom Lavoie:

This poem is from former Poet Laureate Collins's first published collection
of poetry, The Apple That Astonished Paris (1988), one of the Press's
all-time best-sellers. The poem itself is the Press's all-time leader for
the most permissions requests; it has been reprinted in books and articles
and read on the radio numerous times, including recently being read by
Garrison Keillor on The Writer's Almanac on Collins's birthday. Listen to
it here.

Click to expand and read:

"an important collection of essays"

2009-03-17T16:40:00.001-05:00

From the Alabama Review

"Out of the Shadows' wide chronological coverage and concern for larger historical trends in African American history make it an important collection of essays that is well-suited for use in undergraduate African American history survey courses. It is also an accessible and informative read for non-academics-especially those with an interest in sports beyond the statistics of wins and losses."

JOSEPH M. TURRINI

Auburn University

More on the book

GUEST BLOGGER: Orissa Arend reads in New Orleans

2009-03-11T09:33:00.008-05:00

Orissa Arend writes from the Garden District Book Shop in New Orleans, where she read from and signed copies of her new book, Showdown in Desire, on March 7th.

Since it was my very first reading and signing ever, and I’m much more comfortable writing than speaking, I was a little nervous as Saturday approached. Add to all that, that the Garden District, New Orleans’ most traditional well-heeled neighborhood is hardly Panther territory, so I wanted to make sure that I was well prepared for my discussion of Showdown in Desire: The Black Panthers Take a Stand in New Orleans.

I practiced a lot, because Melissa had warned me that some authors cry when they read their stuff. I invited the whole world (mostly my good friends came, which was fine with me). I put four little jars of hot pink azaleas on the book table to soften the effect of a black panther jumping out of a red cover.

Standing at the podium in a little mall outside of a quintessential New Orleans book shop surrounded by fine china and embroidered baby clothes and curious tourists waiting for their walking tour, I counted the puzzled expressions as people looked at the posters a win already. It brought back memories for a man named John, but he thought he’d skip the reading because it looked to be a pro-Panther thing.

I delivered my little speech about how I’d gotten involved in the story and I spelled out the dramatic outline. There were some great questions from the audience before I launched into a reading of the Piety street shootout from the point of view of a Panther and of a black cop (same age as the Panther). But before I began reading, the audience was wishing for the perspective of some of the white officers who had tried to evict the Panthers in 1970. The only one I had interviewed was the Chief.

As I was reading the quotes of the black officer, John returned from his walking tour and said to himself, “Hey, I know that guy.” He sat down and when I finished, he introduced himself to the group as a white police officer on the force in 1970, who had ridden in a squad car with Larry Preston Williams, the black officer. I said, “Well, we were just wishing you would show up.”

A spirited discussion ensued and John bought a copy of the book and promised to email me with his reactions.

New Orleans is a small town (smaller than it used to be). It was one of those dazzling spring days, a Saturday when everyone is out, and so you can hardly miss some mystical convergence of unlikely people that remind those of us who are still here why we stay.

—Orissa Arend

Kathleen Rooney interviewed on NPR's Talk of the Nation

2009-03-10T11:12:00.001-05:00

Talk of the Nation, March 9, 2009 · Writer Kathleen Rooney supplements her income with gigs as a nude model. She started when she was a graduate student, and has been modeling for artists for six years. "It's a weird way to earn money," she writes, but it's not how she makes her living. She calls it more than a hobby — a "compulsion."

Click here to listen to the interview (17:16).

"arresting and liberating"

2009-03-09T12:43:00.006-05:00

Michelle Boisseau is a go-to poet for readers leery of poetry. Not that her work isn’t avidly admired by poetry-lovers. It is, but the traits poetry-phobes dread the most — incomprehensibility, pretension and narcissism — are wholly absent in her welcoming, lucid and provocative lyrics.

A Sunday in God-Years reviewed in the Kansas City Star

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"something great"

2009-03-06T09:24:00.002-06:00

From Atlanta's Creative Loafing, January 30, 2009...

"...Smirnoff has accomplished something great with this book. Stubbornly against the interests of an industry preoccupied by fads, he’s putting the spotlight on good writing and good music instead."

read the article

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"thrilling .... a crisp page-turner"

2009-03-04T13:25:00.003-06:00

From the Journal of Southern History, February 2009

Confederate Guerrilla: The Civil War Memoir of Joseph M. Bailey contains the Civil War reminiscences of Joseph Marion Bailey of Carroll County, Arkansas, written some sixty years after the end of hostilities. Bailey chronicles his adventures as a soldier in the regular Confederate army, where he saw action at Wilson's Creek, Pea Ridge, Corinth, and Port Hudson, and as an irregular in the Ozark Mountains of northwestern Arkansas. Despite his advanced age, Bailey recounted his story with clarity and detail, providing an uncompromising account of his experiences. The book is strengthened by T. Lindsay Baker's careful editing through which he combines several different versions of Bailey 's memoir and painstakingly identifies the people and places that the old soldier discussed. The endnotes make up a full fifty-five pages of the book.

Bailey's reminiscences of his service in the regular army portray some well-known trans-Mississippi battles, including a noteworthy relation of the death of Confederate general Ben McCulloch at Pea Ridge. Of particular interest is Bailey's account of the fighting at Port Hudson, Louisiana, where his keen eye for detail brings life to the misery and squalor that the southern soldiers suffered during weeks of Federal siege and that did not end until after the rebels were reduced to eating horse, mule, and rat meat. After a daring escape from Port Hudson and return to Arkansas with future governor James H. Berry, Bailey entered the irregular warfare in the area around his Ozark Mountains home.

Bailey's period as a guerrilla began after the murder of a rebel captain (Baker's meticulous notes point out that the victim was actively recruiting soldiers for Confederate service), and Bailey barely survived his first encounter with the so-called Mountain Federals against whom he would fight for the next several months. His account of the cat-and-mouse warfare fought in the mountains of northern Arkansas is thrilling, and he shares the hard lessons learned there: "A house was liable to be surrounded or waylaid at any time, and many lives were lost in that way, by parties venturing to sleep in their homes," he notes; and "if man or horse was disabled, death was almost certain as very few prisoners were taken" (pp. 45, 47). This was indeed a far different war from that fought by the regular armies. Bailey eventually returned to the army, and he recalled that, as the Confederacy was collapsing, "[m]any favored the disbandonment of the regular army . . . and a resort to guerrita [guerrilla] warfare"; it is with the bitter view of experience that he concludes with relief that "wiser and more conservative counsel prevailed" (p. 63).

Confederate Guerrilla is a crisp page-turner and provides a southern counterpoint to such books as A. W. Bishop's Loyalty on the Frontier; or, Sketches of Union Men of the South-west (1863; Fayetteville, 2003) and a first-person companion to such excellent academic studies as Daniel E. Sutherland's edited collection Guerrillas, Unionists, and Violence on the Confederate Home Front (Fayetteville, 1999) and Robert R. Mackey's The Uncivil War: Irregular Warfare in the Upper South, 1861-1865 (Norman, Okla., 2004). Bailey's memoir will be of interest to anyone studying guerrilla warfare in the American Civil War.

[Author Affiliation]
MARK K. CHRIST
Arkansas Historic Preservation Program, Little Rock

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"spirited and thought-provoking"

2009-03-03T14:02:00.002-06:00

Live Nude Girl was reviewed by Utne Reader... check it out!

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Live Nude Girl on Huffington Post

2009-02-27T08:34:00.006-06:00

Kathleen Rooney and her book Live Nude Girl: My Life as an Object. In a forest of somber literary magazines and grad students at the Associated Writing Programs conference in Chicago, it stopped us cold.

LNG is a memoir of Rooney's career as an art model that wrestles with the headier issues of the naked form as inspiration, objectification for the sake of art, and the role of a muse throughout history. Since Rooney has 3 other books (including a cultural study of Oprah's Book Club) to her credit, we felt sure that her latest effort wasn't of the "I'm hot and wrote about it" efforts we've been seeing too much of lately.

Like many authors who get that there's a 21st century going on, Rooney is rolling out Live Nude Girl on a long carpet of sass. The second half of her 25 city "traveling literary circus" rolls through Arkansas, Memphis, Campaign, IL and Ann Arbor over the next few weeks with guest appearances by a cabal of young writertly talent.

Given the subject, we shudder to imagine what flavor of loon and goofball will show up. Sadly, not us as Ms. Rooney's closest west coast gig is an imposing 5 hours south of TST HQ. But we'll be watching as Ms. Rooney seems as compelling a talent in her future off the pedestal as on.

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More on the tour

"an important contribution"

2009-02-25T08:00:00.000-06:00

From the Journal of Southern History, November 2008

Wiley Austin Branton is an often overlooked personality in the history of the civil rights movement. Judith Kilpatrick highlights the contributions of this Arkansas native son and in doing so reveals the complexity of race and race relations in the Natural State as African Americans straggled for first-class citizenship in the twentieth century.

Branton was bom in Pine Bluff, Arkansas, in 1923. At the time African Americans composed one-third of the town's population, and from the time of Reconstruction the black community had benefited from limited political and economic advantages. Although the members of the Branton family enjoyed middle-class status due to their entrepreneurial ventures and fair complexions, the Brantons were not immune to racial prejudice in Pine Bluff. Wiley's earliest experiences with racism left him determined to fight against its ravages. Such was the case when, after being drafted into the U.S. Army in 1943, he and a friend questioned the treatment of African Americans in the military in a 1944 pamphlet titled "Waste of Manpower." Branton was investigated but was honorably discharged in 1946.

Returning to civilian life, Branton was determined to ensure African Americans' access to first-class citizenship. In the late 1940s he was a member of the Arkansas NAACP State Conference Board, and he participated in voting drives and developed workshops that helped African Americans learn how to vote. Also during this time he and a friend attempted to enroll at the University of Arkansas in Fayetteville after reading about other African Americans who had successfully desegregated institutions of higher learning. Branton's friend was admitted, with restrictions, to the university's law school in 1948; after finishing undergraduate credits in Pine Bluff, Branton entered the law school in 1950.

Branton's attacks on racial injustice continued into the 1950s and beyond. After establishing a law practice in Pine Bluff, he joined Thurgood Marshall as counsel for the Little Rock Nine. In the 1960s Branton, as the executive director of the Voter Education Project, was once again instrumental in registering black voters, and he was the executive secretary of Lyndon B. Johnson's President's Council on Equal Opportunity. In the late 1960s Branton turned his attention to the nation's pervasive poverty and became the executive director of the United Planning Organization. As the federal government increasingly cut funding to poverty programs, Branton was attracted by the platform of the Alliance for Labor Action (ALA) and its dedication to unionizing workers, particularly those in the South. In 1969 Walter Reuther, president of the United Auto Workers and a supporter of civil rights for African Americans and working people, recruited Branton to become the director of social action for the ALA. In the 1970s Branton returned to private law practice, but his civil rights activism did not wane. He worked with the Voter Registration Fund and a host of organizations, including the NAACP and the National Bar Association, until his death in 1988.

Kilpatrick's exploration of the life of this "civil rights warrior" is an important contribution to the growing scholarship on African Americans and civil rights activism in Arkansas.

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Publishers Weekly Starred Review

2009-02-23T08:40:00.002-06:00

Author, award-winning poet and professional artists' model Rooney (Reading with Oprah, Something Really Wonderful) uses everything from Roland Barthes quotations to sitcom episode synopses off the internet (specifically, fortunecity.com on Growing Pains) to explore the myths and realities of nude modeling. Despite the fact that it largely consists of sitting still for hours on end, Rooney keeps work stories compelling: "with the sculptors continually approaching... to rotate you slightly... [it's] like you're on the world's slowest and most boring Teacup Ride." Posing for an advanced sculpting class working on life-sized renderings, Rooney merges her experience with a look at China's ancient Terra Cotta Army; elsewhere she tackles semantics, quoting art historian Kenneth Clark on the difference between "naked" and "nude." Happily, Rooney is perfectly willing to satisfy readers' curiosity upfront in order to move in more philosophical directions, going from awkward first impressions ("the first thing they ask is, 'Like, naked?'") to questions of safety and empowerment ("I feel safer from sexual predation [naked] in the art studio than I do... [clothed on] the street"). This esoteric, organic meditation on life as an art object is itself a model of personal writing, perfect for those on either side of the easel. (Feb.)

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Los Angeles Times Review of Live Nude Girl

2009-02-20T13:29:00.004-06:00

"a compelling memoir that blends observation, personal revelation and scholarly inquiry"... read the review

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"poignant... recommended"

2009-02-11T12:48:00.005-06:00

Military History of the West recently reviewed Confederate Guerilla: The Civil War Memoir of Joseph M. Bailey, edited by T. Lindsay Baker, and had this to say.

"This memoir provides a poignant portrayal of guerrilla warfare and its effect on society... Bailey's memoirs offer insight into the relationship of guerilla warfare with military, gender, and social history... this memoir, with its references to both the battlefield and the home front, is recommended for those interested in the social and military history of the Civil War."

Military History of the West

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Live Nude Girl in the Devil's Territory

2009-02-09T11:42:00.007-06:00

Check out Kathleen Rooney's (Live Nude Girl) very funny blog about the tour she's on with fellow writer Kyle Minor, author of the short story collection In the Devil's Territory, published by Dzanc.

They're in Minnesota today, I think, but it's hard to keep up.

Here's some recent press:

The Oregonian

Time Out Chicago

Working Our Way through the Ice

2009-02-03T12:01:00.005-06:00

Fayetteville was caught up in the ice storm that affected so much of the South last week and kept most of the city out of power for days. Our McIlroy office is still without power, but our warehouse was up and running as of yesterday. Please excuse any delays with communication and we're hopeful that things will be back to normal within a couple of days.

For more information on how the University is handling cleanup after the storm

UA Press author signings at AWP

2009-01-16T08:24:00.003-06:00

The 2009 AWP Annual Conference will be held February 12-14 in Chicago. For more information, click here.

University of Arkansas Press events at AWP include:

Thursday February 12 2:00-3:00
LIVE NUDE GIRL: My Life as an Object Cloth $22.50
KATHLEEN ROONEY
Kathleen Rooney is the author of Reading with Oprah: The Book Club that Changed America, now in its second edition, and the poetry collection Oneiromance (An Epithalamion). Her essay “Live Nude Girl” was selected for Twentysomething Essays by Twentysomething Writers.

Friday February 13 2:00-3:00
SUNDAY IN GOD-YEARS Paper $16.00
MICHELLE BOISSEAU
Michelle Boisseau is professor of English at the University of Missouri-Kansas City where she also serves as associate editor of BkMk Press. She is the author of three books of poetry, including Trembling Air.

Saturday February 14 11:00-12:00
THE FIRE LANDSCAPE Paper $16.00
GARY FINCKE
Gary Fincke is professor of English and creative writing at Susquehenna University. He has published nineteen books of poetry, short fiction, and nonfiction. Standing Around the Heart was a finalist for the 2007 Paterson Poetry Prize.

Join us at our University Press Reception!
Thursday, February 12 at 7:00 | Hilton Chicago
Stop by the booth to get information about our $5000 Miller Williams Poetry Prize and information about the reception!