Review by Mack Hassler “…the novel is reflecting upon its own nature” Jean-Paul Sartre, Search for a Method, 1963 Gentle Spirits, this first book-length offering by Conlan, a retired shipmaster and poet, is not exactly an “Anti-Novel” in the tradition that Sartre describes above. It does not use the…
Review by Deborah K. Frontiera Filled with metaphor, reading like a prose poem, the author of Who Am I? speaks through a mother and her young daughter to teach the youngster about the interconnectedness of life on Earth. The child asks who she is and the mother answers with a…
Review by Brad Gischia Have you ever seen a UFO? Perhaps your grandmother told you a scary story as a child and you later found out that it was true? Ever been for a walk in the woods and felt those little hairs on the back of your neck stand…
MARQUETTE, MI (January 4th, 2022)— the Upper Peninsula Publishers & Authors Association (UPPAA) announces the 3rd Annual U.P. Notable Books List this week. UPPAA board member Mikel Classen (Sault Ste. Marie) initiated the effort as a response to the lack of representation of U.P. writers in other Michigan state literary…
Review by Brad Gischia There are many books that detail the history of the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. These are often rigorously researched and documented (some may be less so) and they represent an important aspect of the way we understand this strange little corner of the world. The SideRoad…
Review by Deborah K. Frontiera In U.P. Colony, Phil Belffy asked himself why Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario, was doing so much better economically than Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan, some thirty-plus years ago and ended up writing his master’s thesis on that topic. His search for answers led him to compare…
Review by Deborah K. Frontiera The Home Wind by Terri Martin is an engaging story of two boys, one white and one Native American, who must find their way through the difficulties of life on the road to becoming “men.” It is set during the 1870s in the logging camps…
A Native American Young Adult Crime Thriller Review by Tyler TIchelaar Angeline Boulley’s debut novel Firekeeper’s Daughter tells the first-person story of Daunis Fontaine, an eighteen-year-old from Sault Sainte Marie, who is part Anishinaabe (Ojibwa) and part-Caucasian. Her mother, daughter to one of the wealthiest families in the community, got…
Review by Deborah K. Frontiera At first glance, one might find Luczak’s style of poetry more challenging to read than some because he uses no punctuation of any sort, not even an apostrophe. No capital letters either (though many poets skip capital letters). But then a reader may realize that…
Novel Documents an Historic Experiment in Faith and Society in the U.P. Review by Donna Winters What happens when a compassionate, homesteading preacher invites a power-hungry visionary to transform his community into a product-sharing village? Such is the case in Eden Waits, by Maryka Biaggio. This author, the great-great-great-granddaughter of…
