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 THE RYGA CHAPBOOKS Some of the individual sections of Ryga: A Journal of Provocations are also published as A Ryga Chapbook, in saddlestitched paperback format, with a specially-designed full colour cover and coloured endpapers, in limited editions of 100 numbered copies, signed by the author. Copies are for sale for $5 each, and are offered first to subscribers.  The second series of chapbooks are shown and described below. Copies can be ordered HERE. 
When Everybody Was Upset by Ed Allen I heard Ed Allen read this story a few years ago in South Dakota and was captivated by the voice and its combination of sincerity and playfulness. Introducing it, he spoke of a goal he was working toward at the time: to write a story that was 100 per cent digression. He described "When Everybody Was Upset" as somewhere between 60 and 80 per cent. What strikes me most about Allen's writing, aside from its effortless eloquence and precision, is its attention to the minute movements of the human consciousness. The sensitivity to the significant details of the physical world is never an end in itself. Instead, Allen captures the way they wound or soothe his characters, or just trigger a beautiful digression. In this way, Allen captures the real story, which is always in the digressions, in the tentative and improvised nature of life. Ed Allen has published two novels: Straight Through the Night and Mustang Sally. That latter novel was made into the 2003 movie Easy Six (retitled in the Showtime DVD release as Easy Sex). He is also the author of The Hands-On Fiction Workbook. His fiction and poetry have appeared in such magazines as The New Yorker, GQ, Story, Prairie Schooner, The Indiana Review, and River Styx. His collection of short stories, Ate it Anyway, was a winner of the 2002 Flannery O'Connor Award for Short Fiction. His first collection of poetry, the sonnet sequence 67 Mixed Messages was published by Ahsahta Press in 2006. He currently teaches in the creative writing program at the University of South Dakota. Not Unlike by Chris Hutchinson I first encountered Chris Hutchinson's poems in his second book, Other People's Lives. Now, when I read his "Notes for a Talk on 'How to Write a Poem,'" I am reminded of "Game," one of the first poems I flipped to after picking up his book. It ends with the speaker asking if poetry doesn't seek "not the centre, but life's ironic fringes - / obsessed not with words, but with their hinges?" What strikes me as I reread the poems that follow is the way Hutchinson honours both the "centre" and the "fringes" - his work has the inclusive, searching, authority of Jorie Graham coupled with Heather McHugh's nimble and playful attention to sound. He's in the desert exposed to the elements one moment and stick-handling in a phone-booth the next. Chris Hutchinson was born in Montreal and has lived in Victoria, Edmonton, Nelson, Vancouver, and Phoenix, Arizona. He now resides in Kelowna, where he teaches English at Okanagan College. The author of two books - Other People's Lives, Brick Books, 2009 and Unfamiliar Weather, Muses' Company, 2005 - his poems have been translated into Chinese and have appeared in numerous Canadian and U.S. publications. Over the years he has led poetry workshops in college, high school, and elementary school classrooms. Raven Can Do Anything by Lee Maracle I first read Lee Maracle's work when I taught her novel,
Sundogs, at First Nations University in Saskatchewan. I remember feeling challenged by
her writing; something in me both shrank from and recognized the
characters' rage. Maracle has an unflinching voice, a commitment to expose the
destructiveness of the "throw-away" culture that has imposed itself on
this land. In her essay, "The Lost Days of Columbus," Maracle writes, "There
is no such place called 'away ...' I grant no one the authority to destroy
anyone's life or toss it away. I extend permission to no one to throw away
stone, flora or fauna in dumping grounds, which are no longer places. There are
a growing number of people in Canada who share this attitude, who sit next
to me and push back on the throwaway culture." In "Raven Can Do
Anything," she writes with profound affection for the salmon, who have an
intelligence about their homeland that far surpasses that of the two-leggeds.
The first series of chapbooks are shown and described below. Copies can be ordered HERE. 
 Studies by Jake Kennedy Jake Kennedy's poems are informed by an impulse toward truth, despite the erudition and education of the postmodern artist and reader, despite the fact we are told there is no such thing. Kennedy begins in the world with meditations on material objects - grass, trees, bullets, the screen of a drive-in - and moves outward from them into a world that is wild and domestic at the same time, a world that is inclusive enough to include the heart in its intellectual investigation of life. The tiger, to paraphrase one poem, is not concerned if its stalking measures up to other performances of stalking - it's out for blood. It hunts to survive. Jake Kennedy is a professor of English at Okanagan College, specialising in modernism and the avant-garde. His poems, prose pieces, and visuals/videos have appeared in over twenty Canadian, American and British journals. His chapbook, Hazard (BookThug, 2006) won the bp Nichol award. He is also on the board of the Alternator Gallery, Kelowna. Endangered Species by Judith Pond Judith Pond has been publishing sharp, perfectly rendered lyrics for years - her book Lovers and Other Monsters is a beautiful exploration of the difficulty of negotiating the boundaries of self while remaining open to the people we are closest to. The multiple voices and allegiances that are contained in every single person are represented formally in Pond's story by its constant movement between speech, thought, textual references and parenthetical asides. We feel the uneasy insinuation of a Grace into her quirky new family. What makes "Endangered Species" exceptional is Pond's affection for each character. Though the young woman, Grace, is the protagonist, each character is generously drawn in this short story. Somehow, in this short space, we know them all, though Grace remains the centre, and we secretly hope she's not tamed. Judith Pond's fiction and poetry have been featured on CBC Radio and in a range of Canadian literary magazines, including Malahat Review, Grain, Prairie Fire, and Event. With Oberon Press, Ottawa, she has published fiction (Coming Attractions) and three collections of poetry. She is currently completing her MFA in creative writing at the University of British Columbia, and working on a collection of short stories. She teaches English in Calgary. Phantom: Graphite Drawings by Mark Rucker In the late 1970s Mark Rucker embarked on creating a series of graphite drawings, we he entitled the 'phantom' series, which grew out of two fascinations. The first was with graphite, which is more commonly called pencil lead. The second fascination was with combining images from different places and times, to create believable situations, which never could have happened. He worked on this series for about a decade, employing pictorial material found in magazine advertisements, stereo views, Victorian cabinet photos, old postcards, and grainy newspaper photos. A few compelling ideas led him to start this project, ideas which kept him interested during the months of doing the intricate and demanding work. Mark Rucker is the author of numerous books, and operates a publishing and picture agency, and his collection has attracted the attention of collectors, publications ranging from the New York Times to children's books, to Ken Burns' Emmy Award winning 1994 documentary Baseball. A tiny fraction of his photographic and lithographic collection appears on his website. Dollhouse by Sheri Benning As William Faulkner wrote "the past is never dead. It's not even past," and what makes Benning's poetry powerful is its acknowledgement of this idea. This essay explores how place underpins the "living archive" of a present that is never removed from its past. It does so while meditating on the power of Heather Benning's "Dollhouse" - a beautiful and stunning example of "regain[ing] living contact with place itself." Sheri Benning grew up on a small farm in central Saskatchewan. Her second book of poetry, Thin Moon Psalm (Brick Books, 2007) won the Saskatchewan Book Award's Anne Szumigalski Poetry Award and The City of Saskatoon Book Award. Her first book of poetry, Earth After Rain (Thistledown Press, 2001) also won two Saskatchewan Book Awards - the Anne Szumigalski Poetry Award and the Brenda Riches MacDonald First Book Award. Benning is currently a PhD candidate at the University of Alberta and a Research Fellow in the University of Glasgow's creative writing program. Copies of these chapbooks can be ordered HERE. |