BOOK RELEASE ANNOUNCEMENT
The poems are inspired by the life and artwork of Frida Kahlo, Georgia O'Keeffe, and Emily Carr.
The collection includes prose poems, haibuns, golden shovels, and found poems created from words, lines and phrases in the artists' journals, letters, writings, and titles from their body of artwork.
Here are the blurbs from the back of the book:
Karen George takes us into the heart of three passionate, determined, brilliant, creative women, one from each nation in North America, and shows us her heart, her words, her work. These are imaginative, intimate, beautiful poems. A collection to treasure. — Lorette C. Luzajic, founder and editor, The Ekphrastic Review
These ekphrastic poems, written to the paintings of three diverse artists, often culled from their own words, are exquisite. Karen George masterfully weaves Frida Kahlo, Georgia O’Keeffe, and Emily Carr into a seamless, feminist exploration that held me in thrall, first page to last. “I will heal better,” the poet declares in the opening poem of this remarkable collection. She longs for a whole “new me” eager to dissolve into embryo, embrace life anew. Join her on this quest. You won’t be disappointed. — Alexis Rhone Fancher, author of Brazen, and Triggered
Karen George’s Caught in the Trembling Net is a delightful delving into the art and lives of Frida Kahlo, Georgia O’Keeffe, and Emily Carr. The collection includes so many lovely particulars, as when she writes about the shapes in O’Keeffe’s “The Lawrence Tree”: “ulnar, cervical, /radial, intercostal--a litany/ to tickle the tongue.” Yet more than that, George invites readers to see larger truths in these works. In “The Two Frida’s,” she asks, “Isn’t everyone twinned, /split in two, bifurcated, /whittling ourselves/down to one true self?” Ultimately, in every poem, George urges us “to step into/that aisle of light, / whelm in that gleam” (“Forest Interior in Shafts of Light,” Carr) of the art. — Taunja Thomson, author of The Profusion and Plunge
It’s also
available at Amazon
and Barnes & Noble.
How We Fracture is a literary collection of
sixteen modern-day stories told from female points-of-view of teenagers to
women in their fifties and sixties at points of fracture in their lives. The
stories delve into conflicts surrounding financial instability, reproductive
rights, body image, sexuality and sexual preference, relationships, illness,
death of loved ones, aging, infertility, addiction, and mental health. The main
characters are students, visual artists, fashion designers, a legal secretary,
house sitter, vet assistant, jewelry maker, a collector of miniatures, a nurse,
and a breath facilitator.
Here are what several authors have said about the book:
“How We Fracture is a captivating literary collection that
gives readers incredible insight into the lives of women facing pivotal moments
of fracture. With sixteen phenomenal stories, George expertly weaves together
narratives that span generations, giving voice to characters ranging from
teenagers to women in their fifties and sixties. George fearlessly explores a
wide range of complex issues in a way that is elegant and evocative. These
stories serve as a reminder that despite our individual struggles, we are all
connected by the shared experiences and emotions that shape us. George’s
collection will leave a lasting impression on anyone who reads them. Once
again, George has illustrated her masterful ability to take readers on a
journey they will never forget.” —Angela
Jackson-Brown, author of The Light Always Breaks
"How We Fracture is an outpouring of sixteen short stories,
encircling a startlingly wide sweep of human emotion and experience. At the
point of ‘fracture’, characters encounter loss and fear, doubt and indecision;
they also break through into hope and unforeseen new life. Karen George’s keen
observations—of both the human and the natural world—are revelatory. At the
core of this beautiful collection are the complexities and intricacies of love:
the setbacks and betrayals as well as the moments of dazzling beauty." — Eleanor Morse, author of Margreete’s
Harbor and White Dog Fell from the Sky
"The lives of the women and girls in Karen George's How We Fracture are rendered in exquisite detail as they mourn, covet, bear witness, seek the truth and fall in love. These compelling stories are a strong testament to the power of women and girls to navigate a complex world." — Ellen Birkett Morris, Lost Girls.
Here is what the contest judge Anjali Enjeti said about HOW WE FRACTURE:
My third poetry collection, Where Wind Tastes Like Pears, was released August 13, 2021. It is available at: Dos Madres Press. The poems are meditations on imagination, memory, wildness, and wonder, how we connect and transform, seen through the fertile landscape of dreams. Below are the blurbs:
“Where Wind Tastes Like Pears is a unique and moving collection that nudges the world of poetry ever closer to its true self, where words create their own meanings, sing their own songs. In a series of “found” poems, Karen George takes you on a wild, supernatural journey to find your alternate self—that person you may recognize only in your dreams. In her dreamscapes, objects become animated, and people come back from the dead. She takes you to that place where a mountain may propose to the moon, or where a mother and a child “speak in a secret language/that sounds like a lark’s radiance.” Read these poems and you, too, may awaken to a world ‘buttered with wonder.’” – Cathryn Essinger, Apricot and the Moon
“The poems in Karen George’s Where Wind Taste Like Pears create little universes, complete unto themselves, where anything can happen. You might “come back from the dead/covered in lilies cupping light” or discover that “a scarf of live salamanders lines a door/only your voice will unlock.” George weaves her poems with such assurance, we willingly surrender to their unfolding visions. Most of the poems in this collection are “found” poems – assemblages of language gleaned from poets and novelists, essayists, and scientists. Their effect is at once intimate and impersonal, as if spoken by a voice loosed from personality. The poems in this wise and vivid collection speak to the heart of our deep need to dream, our hunger for poems to shelter dreaming.” – Leatha Kendrick, And Luckier
“Karen George’s third book of poetry Where Wind Tastes Like Pears is a compelling and lush dreamscape. A master of the found poem, George deftly remixes words and phrases from existing poems to create found poems, and in Where Wind Tastes Like Pears, she combines these with her own original work. In Where Wind Tastes Like Pears, you will find not only a celebration of the senses, but a celebration of language—language that our ears cannot help but “drink and drink.” Through image-rich and haunting poems, George shepherds us headlong into a world where ‘hands gloved, feet bare, [we] climb the night.’” – Nancy Chen Long, Wider than the Sky.
Poetry chapbook, The Seed of Me (Finishing Line Press, 2015):
Poetry chapbook, Into the Heartland (Finishing Line Press, 2011): Into the Heartland by Karen L. George – Finishing Line Press
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