Pnews

PNEWS update 4/13/2022

We're in National Poetry Month, 2022, which means I'm participating in the usual array of online projects. I'm still not making appearances at readings and events—which is unfortunate, given that I have a poetry collection to promote—but I trust that my time will come.

Meanwhile, you can read my contribution to Luisa Igloria's wonderful postcard poetry project at her blog: http://www.luisaigloria.com/blog. The sampled works are wonderfully varied and inventive. Mine is the April 9th piece.

Mike Maggio is once again a 30 poems by 30 poets feature on his blog. The challenge this year is to write an eleven line poem, each line being of exactly eleven syllables, on the topic "Love on an Imaginary Boulevard." Writers are not permitted to use the words "love" or "you." My offering goes up on April 14. Visit http://mikemaggio.net/

I'm once again writing daily drafts for two groups, one of them founded by the late Shann Palmer well over a decade ago. The other is a private group hosted by the Poetry Society of Virginia Facebook page. I'm responding to prompt words, and my pieces may be light or heavy, tossed off or labored over, or anything in between—but mostly, they're drafts, and not yet polished poems.

Many of them never will be! There's a sample light verse piece posted at the PARTY PIECES tab. The prompt word was "elbows" and the draft is dated April 7, 2022.

March 23, 2022

 

1) MUTT SPIRITUALS, my first full-length poetry collection, is now available directly from the publisher! Here's a link to the San Francisco Bay Press website: https://www.sanfranciscobaypress.com//

 

Or for a signed copy, ping me on this site, or email me at derekkannemeyer@gmail.com!

 

It's also available on Amazon, both in the US and in the UK. Just search for it on Amazon books—although since Amazon took six months to get the listing right, buying through them would be my third-choice option. But if you do use Amazon, could you leave a review?

 

 

2) UNSAY THEIR NAMES is also available from Amazon, except on weekends and on holidays. (This is the case with all photography books printed by Blurb.) But I've run out of copies, and will only reorder by special arrangement: ping me.

 

KIRKUS INDIE gave "Unsay" a starred review, and the Vice President of Kirkus Indie put a spotlight on it in her "Perspectives" column for their February newsletter. You can read both at the PUBLICATIONS tab, under PRAISE & PRESS. A Kirkus feature article writer has also interviewed me via Zoom, for a full-length profile, due to appear in mid-April.

 

My Black History Museum exhibition closed in December 2021. The museum kept some of the fifty blow-up display boards, and may display some photographs again at a future time. Show catalogues are sold out, but the museum may still have a full book or two in their bookshop.

 

 

3) SHORT FORM PUBLICATIONS

Visit the PERIODICALS file under the POTPOURRI tab to get links to my journal publications since October 2021. They include poems in Anmly, Rat's Ass Review, Rigorous, The Pine Cone Review, and three issues of Verse-Virtual (those for October 2021, December 2021, and March 2022). I also have a grasshopper photograph up in the February 2022 Riddled with Arrows. And there's work pending in Light, Lucky Jefferson, Unzipped, and elsewhere.

 

Here's a link to pre-order the Life in Ten Minutes UNZIPPED anthology, whose title is "Bare."

https://www.lifein10minutes.com/unzipped-issues/unzipped-issue-6-bare-anthology

 

See the Life in Ten Minutes Facebook events page to attend the "Bare" Zoom Launch Reading|: https://www.facebook.com/events/7168069689932365

This event is scheduled for March 28, at 7 p.m.—and I'm one of the readers.

 

Of note also is an appearance in a wonderful ANTHOLOGY pairing poems with quilts.

Quilted Poems Book Interview by Bill Glose with the Editors-Kathleen P. Decker, & Terry Cox-Joseph  Here is the link to buying the book on Bookbaby:

https://store.bookbaby.com/websearch/index.aspx?searchterms=quilted+poems

March 7, 2022

 

1) MUTT SPIRITUALS, my first full-length poetry collection, is now available directly from the publisher! Here's a link to the San Francisco Bay Press website: https://www.sanfranciscobaypress.com//

 

Or for a signed copy, ping me on this site, or email me at derekkannemeyer@gmail.com!

 

While it is copyrighted August 2021, and Amazon has had it on file since September 2021, they have listed it in multiple wrong ways, and only under wrong names. It's been an obstacle course to find it! Amazon assures us they'll have this all sorted out very soon. I'd really prefer you use one of those first two options.

 

2) UNSAY THEIR NAMES is still available from Amazon, except on weekends and on holidays. (This is the case with all photography books printed by Blurb.) But I've run out of copies, and will only reorder by special arrangement: ping me.

 

I'm getting great support from KIRKUS. Not only did they give me a starred, review (read it at the PUBLICATIONS tab, under PRAISE & PRESS), the Vice President of Kirkus Indie put a spotlight on it in her "Perspectives" column for their February newsletter, and a Kirkus feature article writer has interviewed me via Zoom. Her profile is due to appear in mid-April.

 

Here's the link to the "Perspectives" review.

https://www.kirkusreviews.com/news-and-features/articles/3-indie-books-that-honor-black-lives/?fbclid=IwAR2So78CJnbTqLGOg1NPKhN6qBDuTV-Qz6_W6kp9mcxhg2nfbCPxagbXXjw

 

A Black History Museum exhibit of about 50 photographs from the book ran from October through December 2021. I now have most of the blow-up display boards, but the museum kept a few. I hope some will be displayed again at a future time. I believe they have sold out of the show catalogues, but they may still have a full book or two in their bookshop.

 

3) SHORT FORM PUBLICATIONS

Visit the PERIODICALS file under the POTPOURRI tab to get links to my journal publications since October 2021. They include poems in Anmly, Rigorous, The Pine Cone Review, and three issues of Verse-Virtual (those for October 2021, December 2021, and March 2022). I also have a grasshopper photograph up in the February 2022 Riddled with Arrows. And there's work pending in Light, Lucky Jefferson, Rat's Ass Review, Unzipped, and elsewhere.

 

Of note also is an appearance in a wonderful ANTHOLOGY pairing poems with quilts.

Quilted Poems Book Interview by Bill Glose with the Editors-Kathleen P. Decker, & Terry Cox-Joseph  Here is the link to buying the book on Bookbaby:

https://store.bookbaby.com/websearch/index.aspx?searchterms=quilted+poems

 

4) As for my forthcoming novel THE MEMORY ADDICTS… I'm getting excited!

1) Unsay Their Names received a starred review from Kirkus. You can find the full review at the PUBLICATIONS tab, under PRAISE & PRESS. Here's how it begins and ends:

"A powerful photographic testament to a series of inspiring protests. Poet, playwright, and  photographer Kannemeyer’s book opens with a compelling preface on the 'great American rift' after the 2020 murder of George Floyd, and goes on to present six months’ worth of images of the author’s home city of Richmond, Virginia, from June to November 2020, as well as two appendices following up on events in 2021. Across eight chronological chapters, anchored with expansive notes throughout, Kannemeyer presents an astounding photographic catalogue of changes… A stirring record of antiracism in a Southern city." —Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

 

2) My photography exhibit at the Black History Museum came down on December 18. Some of the photographs were auctioned off, and some will remain in the collection of the museum. On December 30, 2021, it was announced that Governor Ralph Northam and Mayor Levar Stoney wish for ownership of the disassembled Lost Cause statuary to be transferred to the Black History Museum. BHMVA will work in partnership with the Valentine Museum to resolve the fate of the statuary and of the spray-painted pedestals. This proposal has yet to be approved by Richmond City Council.

 

3) See the PERIODICALS tab (under POTPOURRI) to find links to my most recent publications, in Verse-Virtual, Rigorous, and the Pine Cone Review.

MUTT SPIRITUALS (2021)

 

San Francisco Bay Press is using Amazon to print this book, and for the moment (new website in progress) Amazon is also the only place where you can buy it. Unfortunately, the ISBN Manager assigned duplicate ISBN numbers to several SFBP titles, and it has taken MONTHS to resolve the issue. Or rather, to not yet resolve it. Mutt Spirituals is currently unavailable while SFBP tries to get its recent catalog deleted and resubmitted, and the affected titles listed correctly. Both they and I have been hammering away hard at the problem, but Amazon's reflexes are proving to be slower than slow. I'll update this information as soon as there is anything new to report.

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