Penny Blubaugh

By day, the Nicollet Mall winds through Minneapolis like a paved canal. People flow between its banks, eddying at the doors of office towers and department stores. . . .

But late at night there's a change in the Nicollet Mall.

From War for the Oaks by Emma Bull:

POWELLS.COM

Winner of the Locus Award for Best First Novel
War for the Oaks, which first appeared in 1987, is one of the novels that helped define the genre of modern urban fantasy.

Eddi McCandry sings rock and roll. But her boyfriend just dumped her, her band just broke up, and life could hardly be worse. Then, walking home through downtown Minneapolis on a dark night, she finds herself drafted into an invisible war between the faerie folk. Now, much more than her own survival is at riskand Eddi's goals and preferences, musical and personal, are very much beside the point.

By turns tough and lyrical, fabulous and down-to-earth, this novel is as much about this world as about the other one.

"A contemporary fantasy classic."Publishers Weekly

"Emma Bull is really good."Neil Gaiman

"One of the most engaging fantasies I've read in a long time."Minneapolis Star-Tribune

"[This novel] knifes through the fantasy genre like a sharp blade of wind."Charles de Lint Read More 

Strange things can happen at a crossroads.

It might look like nothing but a place where two dusty roads meet, but a crossroads can be something more.

From The Boneshaker by Kate Milford:

KIRKUS REVIEW

In 1913 Arcane, Mo., 13-year-old Natalie Minks loves mechanical things, and her father’s bicycle-repair shop is the perfect place to tinker. Naturally curious, she is intrigued when a medicine show comes to town with promises of healing potions and an array of unusual machines. Folks in town are skeptical of “snake oil salesmen,” but Natalie suspects that the strangers are more sinister than mere con artists. At the same time, she experiences visions that may be connected to the town’s history and these mysterious travelers. These visions heighten her fears that her family and town are in danger from unresolved deals made with the Devil himself. This unusual story, with elements of folklore, tall tales and steampunk, has rich details of small-town America in the early 20th century as well as the impact of budding technology. Natalie is a well-drawn protagonist with sturdy supporting characters around her. The tension built into the solidly constructed plot is complemented by themes that explore the literal and metaphorical role of crossroads and that thin line between good and evil.  Read More 

Meeting

George and Ivan met
seventeen years ago in

Miss Julie’s second grade class
at Pinewood School, one of those

disappeared one-room
schoolhouses – forty kids, eight

grades, and Miss Julie.
Ivan’s family had a

farm, George’s parents
owned Popo’s “So Fresh and So

Clean” car wash. “Only
one for seventy miles,”

Old Popo would boast.
Farmers would bring their trucks, their

Sunday church cars, their
tractors, even, if they were

passing through town, done
with plowing, covered with dust.

The business shouldn’t
have lasted, but somehow it

held on until George
was old enough to learn to

chamois the hoods and
windows, to buff the tires

and polish the rims.
By this time he and Ivan

were the oldest class
at Pinewood, getting ready

to take a bus each
morning to Carruthers High.

One hour and fifteen
minutes each way. “Got to leave

at 6:30 each
morning,” George groans. Ivan just

shrugs. “I’m up before
then, anyway. Cows to milk.”

“Carruthers High School.
Two hundred kids there, Ivan.”

“Don’t need to worry,”
says Ivan. “You’ve got me.” Read More 

Something I've been playing with -- a story in poems. Here's the first one. Others to follow.


Nights

Both George and Ivan
long for adventure, a path

to divine freedom.
They just don’t know where it is.

Tonight they slump on
the hood of George’s old, green

gas-guzzler Lois,
a 57 Chevy

with white sidewalls and
leatherette steering wheel

cover. The sky is
clear and country road black. Mars

is so red it glows
like a mad, baleful eye,

and maybe that’s a
comet, the kind you wish on.

“I’m going places,:
says George. Ivan’s heard it all

before. George says he’s
going places, but he still

works at Popo’s car
wash, still comes home every night

damp, with soap in his
shoes. Ivan points to the tail

of the comet with
his beer can, taps his fingers

on Lois’ warm
hood, says, “Did you use it? Did

you wish?” And George says
“Of course I did. I told you.

I’m going places.”
For one sharp minute Ivan

believes. They stare at
the sky and imagine France,

the coast of Peru,
the length of the Amazon.

Then Ivan laughs, gulps
his beer, drops his head against

Lois’ windshield.
“Sure George.” “Sure Ivan,”

George echoes, and the
boys settle in to see who

Can stay awake till
dawn.
 Read More 

Sharon Bryant has created a whole, wonderful world in Rockydale. If you love stories told in pictures here's great one. And you can view the whole story at once, now that Christmas is over.

Meet everyone in Rockydale and enjoy!

Ron Koertge's wonderful book Lies, Knives and Girls in Red Dresses has been chosen as on of the best books of 2012 by Publishers Weekly.

They're right! These sideways retellings of traditional fairy tales -- in verse -- are funny, snarky and downright scary. The illustrations, by Andrea Dezso are a perfect compliment. The cover with the gigantic wolf and the tiny Red Riding Hood lets you know just what you're in for even before the book is opened.

Full disclaimer: I know Ron and saw this in advance and loved it. But the "real" book is a stunner.

Pair this with Phillip Pullman's new Fairy Tales From the Brothers Grimm and you'll be able to find something to read all winter.  Read More 

This is an amazing article by Elizabeth Harball about an amazing place -- the Institute of American Indian Arts. But more than that, it's a story about finding your own voice no matter what everyone tells you. The link is on the right sidebar.

Bianca Stone is the granddaughter of Ruth Stone, poet extraordinaire. Now a poet in her own right, Bianca is also a poem illustrator. As she says, "Words and images can react on the same plane." And sometimes having those images can change the meaning or the beats of the words. Read more here in her interview with Elizabeth Harball on the Poetry Foundation website. (Click the link on the right!)  Read More 

Why is writing like walking the dark passageways of a labyrinth? Compare and contrast! Check out my review of Lisa Goldstein's Walking the Labyrinth that just posted on Hunger Mountain and find out.

I am the worst blogger ever. And really, I don't care because that's not where my heart is. But every now and again I see something that makes me sit up and say, "I need to share this. I want everyone to know."

So follow the link on the side to read an interview with Emily Kendal Frey, author the the Poetry Center of America's Norma Farber First Book Award for "The Grief Performance." Her ideas on writing and being open to the world, being a "sieve" to absorb and then define the world, and loving the path to description are perfect for any writer.

And you get to read a poem, too!  Read More