Support small presses and indie bookstores by picking a read from the list below, which features new books forthcoming in July 2021 from CLMP members. (Take a look at last month’s releases as well.)
Class Dismissed by Kevin M. McIntosh
Regal House Publishing | July 1, 2021
According to Lisa Borders, this debut novel “explores the triumphs and tragedies of teaching—and the Kafkaesque bureaucracy that one gifted New York City public school teacher finds himself in.”
Assure Press | July 1, 2021
According to Richard Georges, this poetry collection is “a meditation on the body and the universal sea, of letting go and letting be, as preoccupied with the spiritual as the physical.”
The Song Cave | July 1, 2021
Translated by Austin Carder, this collection from the Egyptian-born, Lebanese-French poet is, according to Cole Swensen, “a text that thrives in its new language, radiating the brilliance of the freshly minted.”
The Unpeopled Season: Journal from a North Country Wilderness by Daniel J. Rice
Riverfeet Press | July 2, 2021
Published in a tenth-anniversary edition, The Unpeopled Season is a daily record of the four months the author spent in isolation in the northern woods of Minnesota.
JackLeg Press | July 3, 2021
According to Donna de la Perrière, in the second edition of this debut poetry collection, “nature’s flux and torque are embodied in a language that is taut, luscious, and musical.”
Big Dark Hole and Other Stories by Jeffrey Ford
Small Beer Press | July 6, 2021
Ford’s short story collection “is about those big, dark holes that we find ourselves once in a while and maybe, too, the big dark holes that exist inside of us.”
Tooth of the Covenant by Norman Lock
Bellevue Literary Press | July 6, 2021
The eighth stand-alone book in The American Novels series “probes storytelling’s depths to raise history’s dead and assuage the persistent ghost of guilt.”
Variations on the Body by María Ospina
Coffee House Press | July 6, 2021
Translated by Heather Cleary, the short stories in this collection “illustrate the intersecting lives of women on various peripheries of society in and around Bogotá, Colombia.”
Quilling Will by Alice-Catherine Jennings
Assure Press | July 7, 2021
In this poetry collection, Jennings “flips lines out of William Shakespeare’s sonnets into the memories and reflections of daily events.”
In the Zero of Sky by Tamra Plotnick
Assure Press | July 7, 2021
The poems in Plotnick’s debut collection “course the dialectic between freedom and containment, banging up against elements and identities along the way.”
Words Become Ashes — An Offering by Cindy Rinne
Bamboo Dart Press | July 7, 2021
According to Kelsey Bryan-Zwick, Rinne’s poems and images “are the shawl one wants to wrap around torso, a visionary quilt one pulls cozy to the neck when longing for home.”
Pelekinesis | July 10, 2021
Edited by Meg Pokrass, Gary Fincke, and Amber Sparks, this anthology provides recognition for outstanding literary stories of 400 words or fewer.
Graywolf Press | July 13, 2021
Mary Jo Bang’s new version of Purgatorio is “a stunning translation of this fourteenth-century text, rich with references that span time, languages, and cultures.”
Wild Animals Prohibited by Subimal Misra
Open Letter Books | July 13, 2021
Translated from the Bengali by V. Ramaswamy, the stories in this collection “record the dark history of violence and degeneration in the Bengal of the seventies and eighties.”
Encircling 3: Aftermath by Carl Frode Tiller
Graywolf Press | July 13, 2021
Translated from the Norwegian by Barbara Haveland, this final book in the Encircling Trilogy is an “astonishing feat of psychological realism.”
Green Writers Press | July 15, 2021
According to Jodi Picoult, this book is a “startlingly lovely memoir about how things die, how things grow, and how we reap what we sow.”
Every Day a Different Daredevil by liam bechen-rockefeller
LUPERCALIA press | July 15, 2021
According to J. P. Seabright, the poems in this chapbook “explore rich themes of gender, identity, sexuality, spirituality, family relationships, class struggle and loss.”
Lone Star by Mathilde Walter Clark
Deep Vellum Publishing | July 20, 2021
Translated from the Danish by Martin Aitken and K. E. Semmel, this novel “splices the vast expanse of Texas with a daughter’s desire to reconnect with her aging father.”
Little Bird by Claudia Ulloa Donoso
Deep Vellum Publishing | July 20, 2021
Translated from the Spanish by Lily Meyer, this collection is “comprised of magical short stories and texts that explore the strangeness of everyday life.”
A Forest on Many Stems: Essays on the Poet’s Novel
Nightboat Books | July 20, 2021
Edited by Laynie Browne, this collection includes original essays “written by contemporary poets about the innovative and unforgettable novels written by their predecessors.”
The River in the Belly by Fiston Mwanza Mujila
Deep Vellum Publishing | July 20, 2021
Translated by J. Bret Maney, Mwanza Mujila’s debut poetry collection in English is “a moving lyric meditation on the Democratic Republic of Congo and its namesake river.”
Father | Genocide by Margo Tamez
Turtle Point Press | July 20, 2021
In this poetry collection, Tamez “reconstructs her father’s struggle to be a man under American domination, tracing the settler erasure, denial, and genocide that he and preceding generations experienced.”
El Paso: A Punk Story by Benjamin Villegas
Deep Vellum | July 20, 2021
Translated from the Spanish by Jay Noden, this novel “explores the history of a Texas border-town punk band that is too good to be true.”
The Whaler’s Daughter by Jerry Mikorenda
Regal House Publishing | July 24, 2021
This novel for young adults is, according to Karen Dionne, “a fascinating saga that takes place in a faraway place and time featuring a courageous and ambitious young heroine who aspires to more.”
Particle and Wave: A Conversation by Daniel Alexander Jones and Alexis Pauline Gumbs
53rd State Press | July 29, 2021
In this conversation, Jones and Gumbs “discuss love as a foundational principle of artistic practice and societal change.”
Eleven Miles to June by Ha Kiet Chau
Green Writers Press | July 30, 2021
This debut poetry collection “focuses on a woman’s journey from childhood to adulthood—her movements, her nuances in black and white, in technicolor and sound.”
