San Pedro River Review Vol 12 No 1 Spring 2020

An international journal of poetry and art. Since 2009

San Pedro River Review is a biannual publication of poetry and art. Representative poets of current or past issues include Naomi Shihab Nye, William Wright, Marge Piercy, Ellen Bass, Afaa Michael Weaver, Joseph Millar, Nathalie Handal, Adrian C. Louis, Alex Lemon, Walt McDonald, Nickole Brown, Vivian Shipley, Sean Thomas Dougherty, Joe Wilkins, Doug Anderson, Frank X. Gaspar, William Trowbridge, Cecilia Woloch, Wendy Barker, Larry D. Thomas and WD Ehrhart.

Of The Moon Reflected Fire and its subject, the Vietnam War, poet James Tate writes: "These are trenchant, wrenching poems. With artistry and honesty they perform an inquest into war and its corrosive after effects."

James H. Duncan is the editor of Hobo Camp Review and the author of Nights Without Rain, Dead City Jazz, What Lies In Wait, and We Are All Terminal But is Exit Is Mine, among other collections of poetry and fiction. Between jobs at daily newspapers, overnight security posts, and magazines like Writer's Digest, he spends most of his time wandering train station platforms, quiet dive bars, and roadside diners looking for a hot meal, a good rest, and a little inspiration. He also reviews indie bookshops at his blog, e BookshopHunter. For more about his work, visit www.jameshduncan.com

Finalist for The Heartland Review Press Chapbook Prize and semi-finalist for the Elyse Wolf Prize, This Girl, Your Disciple explores the history of a family suicide kept secret for almost 50 years.

From the Costa Award winning, bestselling author of THIS MUST BE THE PLACE and I AM, I AM, I AM, comes an intense, breathtakingly accomplished story of a woman's life stolen, and reclaimed. 'Unputdownable' Ali Smith Edinburgh in the 1930s. The Lennox family is having trouble with its youngest daughter. Esme is outspoken, unconventional, and repeatedly embarrasses them in polite society. Something will have to be done. Years later, a young woman named Iris Lockhart receives a letter informing her that she has a great-aunt in a psychiatric unit who is about to be released. Iris has never heard of Esme Lennox and the one person who should know more, her grandmother Kitty, seems unable to answer Iris's questions. What could Esme have done to warrant a lifetime in an institution? And how is it possible for a person to be so completely erased from a family's history?

Poetry. Women's Studies. Addiction. In Eleanor Kedney's BETWEEN THE EARTH AND SKY, a brother's heroin addiction is at the center of a family where love is difficult to accept from one another, yet it is the thing that delivers understanding and forgiveness to a sister who bravely carries the family legacy.

Praise for The Way to My Heart"Let these works of literature remind us that food and drink intrinsically link us to memory. With just a sip of a wine, you can be transported to a first date, a bedside in Paris, or a tapas bar in Spain. In reading these sexy and honest works of fiction and poetry, it is hard not to make a beeline to the kitchen for a little amuse-bouche or nightcap, so just give in. Pour a little Pinot Noir and indulge in this evocative collection."-Rita Mookerjee, PhD Candidate in Literature, Florida State University

"Contraband Paradise is a collection structured around a series of X-ray impressions that explore what can only be described as 'the marvelous clairvoyance of a body that believes in its own ability of live.' It is a book that explores the ways in which the thieve joy, in which we live affirmatively, and astonishingly, amidst all that we inherit. More than anything, it is a book that juxtaposes the beauty and rupture that characterizes this world, this 'contraband paradise' so to speak."-From author's website.