Literary Nonfiction. Essays. Through these powerful and insightful essays, David Olimpio explores the residual effects of sexual abuse, divorce, and grief. With surprising candor and a disarming sense of humor, Olimpio takes on the outwardly wholesome landscape of his suburban Houston childhood and the complex sexual relationships in his adult life. Both poignant and poetic, THIS IS NOT A CONFESSION leaves us with a sense that our identities have the power to transcend our circumstances. "THIS IS NOT A CONFESSION…is risky, and David Olimpio's voice is modern and insightful. He has found a way to share his journey without ego or shame, and arrives at the center of one of the most important questions we can ask ourselves: Who am I and how did I get here? Olimpio answers these questions with a fearless, sometimes heartbreaking, honesty that speaks truth to the human experience."—Janna Marlies Maron "THIS IS NOT A CONFESSION…a road map, a refutation, and a reminder that while shame and confusion may well reverberate across time, we need not be the products of the transgressions visited upon us."—Ben Tanzer "'In the end, our stories are the most powerful things we have,' David Olimpio writes in THIS IS NOT A CONFESSION. Born not of a singular form but forged from many—essay, memoir, hybrid, collage—this book is as textured and varied as the human experience. It may defy easy classification, but readers will agree: here is an unforgettable debut that will shatter you. With devastating honesty and keen, poetic insight, Olimpio captures the fluidity of time and selfhood as he pierces the heart of the age-old question: What makes us? 'We create our memories; they do not create us.'"—Sara Lippmann "A truly extraordinary piece of writing with a superb, graceful economy of style and zero pretension, THIS IS NOT A CONFESSION is also not 'misery memoir.' It is wry and witty and brutally honest without the cheap shock factor. You will want to read it at least twice."—Sarah Lotz "The ambiguity of time, the confusion of numbers, the cycle of cicadas and the Big Bad Wolf, these are just some of the elements that David Olimpio softly wraps around us before pulling us seamlessly into his past. Heart-wrenchingly brutal memories laid out honestly on the page, THIS IS NOT A CONFESSION is all confession, the reader, a priest, sitting raptly, sometimes teary-eyed, behind a dark screen."—xTx

This Is Not a Confession

Literature & Fiction

Olimpio, David

History & Criticism

Awst Press

Literary Nonfiction. African American Studies. Suspended between continents and cultures, Donald Quist charts the forceful undercurrents of an American identity. Through these essays Quist explores feelings of oppression and alienation as he wrestles with a single act of violence in a Washington, DC suburb, racial tensions in a rural South Carolina town, and the welcome anonymity of crowded Bangkok streets. These personal narratives are rich with Quist's experience growing up as a person of color caught between parents, socioeconomic classes, and the countries he calls home. "In HARBORS, Donald Quist gathers those moments of clarity that shape one man's consciousness about the black experience in a global environment. Whether it's growing up in the American South or seeking adventure in places as far away as Thailand, there's no escaping the fixed perceptions about class, race, and masculinity. Quist's poignant essays show us, however, what it's like to move through tension, conflict, and microaggression with hard-won dignity and grace—not unscathed, not unfazed, though certainly undefeated. A timely stellar collection!"—Rigoberto González "Quist's (Let Me Make You a Sandwich) collection of personal essays is tender, smart, funny, and rich with emotional truths and pop culture references. Each essay covers a range of emotions and topics, blending the serious with the playful...With an unpretentious yet searing quality to his writing, Quist can move from racial politics in the United States to lessons learned from growing up with Jerry Springer episodes, all with vivid detail and visceral imagery...Quist's collection is poignant, shrewd, and delightful to read."—Publishers Weekly

Harbors

Quist, Donald Edem

Poetry. African &amp; African American Studies. Art. BRONZEVILLE AT NIGHT: 1949 is a debut poetry collection by Vida Cross referencing her ancestry as a third generation Chicagoan, a Bronzeville resident, the artwork of Archibald J. Motley Jr., and the poetic research of Langston Hughes. "...the people who inhabit Cross' Poetry are alive and full of energy, but in the creases that line their smiles, there's a certain exhaustion—an anxiety brewing—and a unique pain on the street corner, in the bedroom, and alone beating within the breast." —Ian Bodkin.

Bronzeville at Night: 1949

Cross, Vida

Poetry

Fiction. THE BRICK HOUSE is a place where people dream of love and loneliness, of the world's beauty, and of ongoing environmental degradation. In this short but moving work, travelers confront their lives in the strange, elemental language which dreams allow for, a strangeness mirrored in the accompanying illustrations by Fowzia Karimi. Inspired by Italo Calvino's Invisible Cities and following in the tradition of Armenian illuminated manuscripts, THE BRICK HOUSE is a delight to the eye and mind.

The Brick House

Marcom, Micheline Aharonian

Poetry. IMMORTAL SOFT-SPOKEN is a collection of short prose poems that resonate well beyond the page. In this ecstatic and beautiful book of dervish essays, Robert Vivian uses style, imagination, and stunning feeling to give voice to the small moments of wonder so often overlooked. This book is a tender and joyful reminder of our shared humanity.

Immortal Soft-Spoken

Vivian, Robert

Fiction. African &amp; African American Studies. Troubled souls haunt these thirteen interrelated stories of loss and rebirth. From a cramped passenger van in Ghana to a cash-only roadside motel in Utah to a cursed forest in Japan, Donald Quist's narratives draw connections between the common and inexplicable. The diverse characters that people these stories are foreign and flawed but intimately familiar. At once scrutinizing and tender, FOR OTHER GHOSTS is an ambitious collection of short fiction.

For Other Ghosts

United States

Fiction. LGBTQIA Studies. The last Midwestern traveling circus is due to arrive in a rural village it has visited for a century of summers. Like the village, the circus is on its last leg. It's down to one elephant and a handful of acrobats. The circus boss's sweetheart is dying. The former starring act is recovering from cancer. The assistant, Frank, plans to retire after this show. Meanwhile, twins Heza and Abe wander the hot fields and roads, waiting for the circus or anything better. HEZADA! I MISS YOU is a novel that explores tradition, love, and suicide--set under the fading tents of small-town America and the circus.

Hezada! I Miss You

Pringle, Erin

Fiction. SEMIOTIC LOVE [STORIES] draws upon symbols and objects to explore the loss of relationships. In these pages, Brian Phillip Whalen reaches deep into the throat of anxiety with a graceful hand and understated humor as he confronts mothers and best friends dying slow or sudden deaths, disappointing vacations, and vanishing sisters. While loss of all kinds permeates these compact stories, it is the tenderness and longing that attaches itself to the reader and propels them to turn the page. This book reminds us that for better or for worse, we're all a little rougher with the people we love the most.

Semiotic Love [Stories]

Whalen, Brian Phillip

Parenting & Relationships

Fiction. LGBTQIA Studies. Edited by Tatiana Ryckman. At once light and aching, BEFORE STONEWALL gives voice to a generation of men whose homosexuality forced them into lives of public exile. These stories articulate the tragic comedy of young love, the many ways to lose a family, and the rigid anxiety that comes from the fear of expressing too much. Set against a backdrop of New York's theater scene and looming McCarthyism, this book is about everything love is up against and the smoldering, dormant rebellion in the time before Stonewall. BEFORE STONEWALL is the winner of Awst Press' 2019 book prize, selected by T Kira Madden, author of Long Live the Tribe of Fatherless Girls.

Before Stonewall

Cohen, Edward M.

About the Author\nDonald Quist is author of two essay collections, HARBORS (AWST Press, 2016), a Foreword INDIES Bronze Winner and International Book Awards Finalist, and TO THOSE BOUNDED (AWST Press, 2021). He has a linked story collection, FOR OTHER GHOSTS (AWST Press, 2018). His writing has appeared in AGNI, North American Review, Michigan Quarterly Review, The Rumpus, and was Notable in Best American Essays 2018. He is creator of the online nonfiction series PAST TEN. Donald has received fellowships from Sundress Academy for the Arts, Kimbilio Fiction, and served as a Gus T. Ridgel fellow for the English PhD program at University of Missouri. He is Director of the MFA in Writing at Vermont College of Fine Arts.\nAn examination of Black exceptionalism and the mythos of criminality among African American men. 
Edited by Tatiana Ryckman. Is it possible to be free while bound by an American myth? TO THOSE BOUNDED explores the effects of living in the far-reaching shadow of stereotypes, and the pressures one feels when their actions are always framed as reinforcing or rejecting an ethnic caricature. In this collection the author reflects on how popular media have shaped his identity, and how he's learned to navigate the expectations it creates. Drawing inspiration from MAUD MARTHA by Gwendolyn Brooks and PENS…ES by Blaise Pascal, the personal vignettes that compose TO THOSE BOUNDED examine Black exceptionalism and the mythos of criminality among African American men. 
Literary Nonfiction. African & African American Studies.\nBook Description\nAn examination of Black exceptionalism and the mythos of criminality among African American men.

To Those Bounded

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