Cut Up! An anthology inspired by the cut-up method of William S. Burroughs and Brion Gysin

Coming soon from Oneiros Books, UK. Contains extracts from April in the Moon-Sun by Gary Cummiskey and a cut-up letter by Sinclair Beiles. Read more here

Tennessee Williams in Bangkok, by Eddie Woods

New from Inkblot Publications in the US.

I was trying to urinate in a burning bush, when...

Sun above the wilderness

How do the fish dream in the desert?

A short review of Off-ramp, by Catfish McDaris

It was Alfred Hitchcockish, Twighlight Zoneish, with a bit of Beat/Meat. Burroughs, Buk sort of influenced, but definitely your own voice. I liked the ending of the last story, maybe some folks got upset with too much anal, fuck them, you wrote what you felt. I could say this reminded me of French & British films or stories, not American or Hollywood. Some of the endings I might have done differently, but I'm an American & I respect your South African voice. I know you're well read & everything we come across sort of stick in our minds. My favorite story was the guy finding the bomb on the bus.

Provocative flash fiction: a review of Off-ramp by Kyle Allan

"Off-Ramp, by recently appointed New Coin editor and poet Gary Cummiskey, offers a glimpse into everyday reality tinged with vivid hallucinatory possibilities and existential crises, embued with a powerful sense of the absurd. The stories reveal startling and often brutal juxtapositions of desire, violence, and power...."

Read more here

Black flowers

From Journey West (All in August) by Ira Cohen

Published by Cold Turkey Press (France)

and Sea Urchin Editions (Rotterdam), 2013

Ira Cohen, Amsterdam, 1980

Photo: Eddie Woods, supplied by Sea Urchin  Editions, Rotterdam

When January Begins in Summer

L'oeil d'Horus

Check out the excellent blog of French poet and collagist Bruno Sourdin - collages, poetry, essays and interviews.

Aryan Kaganof's review of Off-ramp

the debt to raymond carver is obvious, nonetheless gary cummiskey forges territory that is all his own in this collection that, bejewelled as it is with his astringent surrealist prose, might well be described as a “gem” were it not for the final story, entitled “space”, that lends the collection a certain brownish pucker. this dark opening of a story is the book’s highlight, brilliantly chosen to end at the bottom so to speak. south african literary fiction has thirsted for a well-written poepgat, but now, having grown curious about gary cummiskey’s anus, our earlier revulsion withdraws into the background as the goal of penetrating and exploring the taboo of unknown darkness becomes foremost in our minds. the poepgat is central in understanding our collective national psyche here in africa south south (ass), where all who, after marikana, still believe in the rainbow mythology are well and truly assholes. bravo!

first published here 

Interview with Gary Cummiskey on Ppigpenn

Name? Gary Cummiskey

Age? 50.

Location? Johannesburg, South Africa.

How long have you been writing? I wrote my first short story, about Mary, Queen of Scots, when I was 11. I wrote my first poem, influenced by Fleetwood Mac’s Albatross, aged 14 – it was about a dying albatross. I have been writing ever since.

Do you have a specific writing style? Not really, but my main influences have been the surrealists and the Beats. These influences probably play a role in my approach to writing, rather than on style. Besides, as Proust said: “Style is a matter of vision, not technique.”

Read more here

A visionary stare at reality: a review of Kobus Moolman's Left Over by Kyle Allan

Kobus Moolman's Left Over reviewed by Sheila Black

Left Over (Dye Hard Press, 2013) by Kobus Moolman is the kind of book that takes you by the scruff of the neck and shakes you. These are poems to wake you up. Well-known in his native South Africa, Kobus Moolman deserves to be better known and better read here. Lyric, vigilant, hyper-alert to the surfaces, textures and sensations of the physical world, the poems in Moolman's sixth collection are beautiful and dangerous, a meditation on the fraught and even perilous relationship of mind and body...Read more here