Indiana University Press blog

Book review: The Last Studebaker

"With relevance to the way today's economy impacts lives in perverse ways, The Last Studebaker is a novel engineered for long life." —NUVO

 

Celebrate National Short Story Month with Robin Hemley!

May is National Short Story Month! Founded by Dan Wickett at the Emerging Writers Network, this month brings attention to an often overlooked but important literary art form.

In celebration of this month, we're offering a reading selection from the work of IUP author Robin Hemley. His third short story collection, Reply All, will be released later this month. Take a sneak peek inside the book and enjoy National Short Story Month!

To learn more about Robin's writing, listen to this IU Press podcast or visit his website, robinhemley.com

Staff pick: What This River Keeps by Greg Schwipps

Reviewed by journals marketing manager, Linda Bannister

“He was ready to help catch the remaining fireflies. Ready to cram all the lightning bugs into the old jar, all of them, all the light that container of glass could possibly hold.”—What the River Keeps, pg. 266. 
 
What This River Keeps is focused on southeastern Indiana, a place where roots go back for generations, a place about land and gritty ordinary people and their yearnings to make the most of a hard earned living, loss, and love. At the center of the narrative is an elderly couple, Frank and Ethel and their adult son Ollie, who are about to lose, to eminent domain, a farm that has been theirs for nearly a century as the river in the title is flooded to make way for a reservoir—and “progress.”
 
What made this book a gripping read for me is the way the story is revealed in the details. Indiana stones, trees, and wildlife and farm animals are poetically described and intertwined with the unfolding story of heartbreaking circumstances. A drive on a country road on a summer night, brash and crusty young men prowling the fairgrounds for girls, trimming green beans for canning, and junked old cars all are images that reveal the universal pain and hope in ordinary lives.
 
Camping out on a cold sand bar, preparing bait, casting lines, deploying seasoned equipment, launching an old fishing boat, the movement of the river, the deep, dark pools where catfish lurk: all are described with reverence in a way that elevates the ordinary to the important and the treasured.
 
The characters are exposed with both rawness and affection. They are flawed and broken, haunted by regret and guilt, hungry for connection, and yearn for the past. There are no easy answers for the issues and sorrows that the characters face. The author is fair in his representation of the complexity of the conflicting values we are caught in when land and community clash and tragic loss results. But he makes me believe there is beauty that transcends loss and gives hope.
 
This book reminded me of the unique value of my Indiana home, both in its natural beauty and the beauty of family and community. Although I plan to give it as a gift to several Hoosiers I know, the experience it reflects goes well beyond Indiana.

'Life and a Half' nominated for translation award

Life and a Half, written by Sony Labou Tansi and translated by Alison Dundy, was nominated as one of five of the fiction finalists for the French-American Foundation & Florence Gould Foundation 25th Annual Translation Prize. This award is given to the best translated fiction or non-fiction book from French to English in 2011. The winners will be announced in May at the foundation's annual awards ceremony. For more information, visit the French-American Foundation website. 

Podcast: Robin Hemley discusses 'The Last Studebaker' and 'Reply All'

It's been a podcast-palooza around here lately! Robin Hemley's interview is the first of three author podcasts I'll post this month. In this episode, we discuss Robin's two books with us, The Last Studebaker and Reply All, and his thoughts on writing.

Author event: Greg Schwipps to speak at Franklin College

Greg Schwipps, author of What This River Keeps, will speak at Franklin College as part of the Spring Writers Series. His talk takes place March 27 at 3:40 p.m. in Room 103 of the Johnson Center for Fine Arts. For more information, visit the Franklin College website.

Bloom Magazine features story on Break Away Books series

The February/March 2012 issue of Bloom features an article about our newly-launched Break Away Books fiction series. The piece discusses the books released in the fall including The Swan and The Glimpse Traveler, and what to expect from the upcoming books. Pick up a copy of Bloom at these locations or subscribe online. 

Booksignings for two IUP authors at the AWP conference

Two IU Press authors will sign copies of their books at the Association of Writers & Writing Programs' Annual Conference & Bookfair in Chicago March 3. Robin Hemley will sign copies of his novel The Last Studebaker at 11 a.m., followed at noon by Scott Russell Sanders, who will sign copies of his latest release, Earth Works, and A Conservationist Manifesto. Both signings will take place at IU Press's bookfair exhibit space (E10 and E11 on this map) in the Hilton Chicago hotel.

The bookfair is open to the public on March 3, so please stop by to learn more about our new Break Away Books series and to visit with our staff and authors!

Book review: Little Mother

"In this expansive, thoughtful and beautifully crafted work, Ali Farah draws a compelling portrait of Somalia and the Somali diaspora and projects a vision of a Somali people reborn in dignity. ...[A] major contribution to African and global literature." —Kenya Daily Nation

Book review: The Swan

"Funny, poignant and as endearing as its central character, The Swan is a wholly original tribute to childhood resilience." —San Jose Mercury News