BATTLE RUNES: Writings on War is now available. (28% off list price - Barnes & Noble online! - ask about our discounts!) The book consists of twenty-one authors – thirty-seven works (short stories and poems) from all over the world – writing about the physical and psychological ravages of war on individuals and families. Parts of the book are shocking and horrifying, but in the end there is hope.
In the PREFACE, publisher Fredericka Jacks writes: “Battle Runes opens in a child’s voice and ends with a child’s concern; the book begins in horror and terror and ends with care and hope; the collection starts in darkness and ends in color. The stories and poems – while focused on war – include private and public spaces, often addressing family relationships, such as those between husbands and wives, brothers and sisters, or parents and children. While there is blood in these pages, the emphasis is on the complex psychological dimensions of war.”
In her FOREWORD, Professor Wendy Galgan, Ph.D. (English Dept., St. Francis College, NY), says: “These authors possess the remarkable ability to allow the reader to see what they see, to take an unsentimental and painfully clear look at what war – fighting it, witnessing it, surviving it – does to human beings. We experience war and its aftermath through the eyes of victor and vanquished, infantry and insurgent, parent and child. . . . . We are there, witnesses to each battle, observing not from the safety of the sidelines but from the very middle of the action. We watch as soldiers return home to struggle with both the physical and emotional aftereffects of warfare. And we experience the fear of civilians watching their world crumble beneath the machines of war.”
Contributors:
Muhammad Ashfaq; Thom Brucie; John Gifford; John Guzlowski; Alamgir Hashmi; Margaret Kingsbury; Geoffrey A. Landis; Mitch Levenberg; Hunter Liguore; Mira Martin-Parker; Rebecca Newth; Norah Piehl; Nahid Rachlin; C.R. Resetarits; Nancy Riecken; Dawn Sandahl; Lisa L. Siedlarz; Lisa M. Sita; Patty Somlo; Marko Vešović; Jenny D. Williams.
Contributor Awards and Honors:
Nominations: Pulitzer; Georgia Author of the Year; Bakeless Award (Bread Loaf); Pushcart Prize; Best New Poets Anthology. Won: Illinois Arts Award for Poetry; Hugo and Nebula Awards; Rhysling Award; Honorable Mention Award; IFWG Story Contest; NEA Grant; Arkansas Arts Council; Doubleday-Columbia Fellowship; Wallace Stegner Fellowship (Stanford); Bennet Cerf Award; PEN Syndicated Fiction Project Award; Leo Connellan Award; Ross Feld Award; StorySouth’s Million Writer’s Award; Solas Award; Rockefeller Fellowship; The Roberto Cellini Memorial Award
ISBN: 978-0982481943. 186 pages, paperback. January 2011. $15.95US. Amazon/B&N online – Ask your local Bookstore (Distributed by Ingram). Google e-Bookstore (future).
