June 11, 2002

AHSAHTA Press Releases Two Best-Sellers in New Editions

Two of the recent poetry best-sellers from Ahsahta Press at Boise State University have been completely redesigned for their second printings and are now available.

“The Widow’s Coat” by popular New Mexico poet Miriam Sagan and “Chopstix Numbers,” a first book by Los Angeles poet Craig Cotter, were released recently in new editions. Both books had quickly sold out of their first printings, according to Janet Holmes, a poetry professor in Boise State’s MFA program in writing and director of the press.

Written in the two years following her husband’s early death, “The Widow’s Coat” is a roadmap of the journey between grief and recovery. Sagan writes of her bleak astonishment that her husband is no longer alive, gives vivid images of his continued presence in the everyday experience of memory, and displays jumbled ranges of confusion and surprise as she finds herself once again in love with a childhood sweetheart.

“The book is an elegiac and wild dance with the knives of love and longing on the very threshold of being,” wrote reviewer Rebecca Sieferle of Sagan’s 1999 work.

Joan Logghe, a New Mexico poet who frequently reads her work in Boise, wrote, “Miriam Sagan eulogizes and exalts so that we’re able to feel our own griefs while rejoicing that she has articulated loss so bravely and well.”

Sagan is scheduled to appear in Boise as a featured poet at the Log Cabin Literary Center Book Fest in September, according to Holmes. “It’s good to have this new edition available for readers new to Miriam’s work,” Holmes said.

Sagan, a resident of Santa Fe, N.M., is author of more than a dozen books of poetry, fiction, and nonfiction. She has won a number of awards for her work.

“Chopstix Numbers” — Diary-Like in Form

Cotter’s 2000 debut “Chopstix Numbers” presents a series of meditations set in a Los Angeles nightclub called Chopstix that once a week caters to a gay Asian clientele.

Using fragmentary materials — overheard bits of conversation and excerpts from notes passed inside Chopstix — in his diary-like form, Cotter’s character Daryl Cooper echoes the themes of longing, loss, immigration and belonging that possess all the book’s characters.

“A daily world and its amiably accompanying person make it all for real here — with deft and accurate surmise,” wrote poet Robert Creeley of Cotter’s book.

Reviewer Diane Wakoski noted, “Cotter’s spare experimental poems are written in the idiom of William Carlos Williams, with lyrical and tender moments of epiphany interspersed with narrative sketches ... It’s an exciting beginning for a new writer.”

Cotter was born in 1960 in New York and has lived in California since 1986. His hobbies include sailing, baseball, American arts and crafts, and package design for outdated Beatle memorabilia.

Ahsahta’s History and New Contest

Ahsahta, Mandan Indian for “Rocky Mountain bighorn sheep,” has produced 57 volumes over its 27 years of publishing, including books by such poets as Sandra Alcosser, David Baker, Linda Bierds, Katharine Coles, Wyn Cooper, Linda Dyer, and Leo Romero.

The Ahsahta Press Sawtooth Poetry Prize, inaugurated in 2001-2002, awards $1,500 for the best manuscript submitted to Ahsahta Press. This year’s competition, judged by poet Joe Wenderoth, will accept manuscripts from Jan. 1 through March 1, 2003. More information on the competition is available at http://ahsahtapress.boisestate.edu.

“The Widow’s Coat” ($12.95) and “Chopstix Numbers” ($14.95) are available at the The Bookstore at Boise State, 1910 University Drive, Boise, ID 83725; from Small Press Distribution at http://www.spdbooks.org or from Ahsahta Press at http://ahsahtapress.boisestate.edu.

“The Widow’s Coat” by Miriam Sagan
ISBN 0-916272-71-0 paper
6" x 8" 70 pages price: $12.95

“Chopstix Numbers” by Craig Cotter
ISBN 0-916272-68-0 paper
6" x 8" 118 pages price: $14.95

Contact:
Janet Holmes
English
208-426-2195