Listen to Ferenc Barnas, author of THE NINTH, interviewed by host Bill Marx. Click through to read Bill's introduction and to listen to the complete interview.

Watch a video interview with Irene Silverblatt, co-editor of Harvest of Blossoms: Poems from a Life Cut Short at either of the links shown below:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RAmBCRH8x3c and http://www.duke.edu/today/archive/oncamera.php?id=25411.

Read Michael Dirda's rave review of Jeffrey Couchman's book, after the jump...

Listen to Nomi Stone's interview with Jerome McDonnell, and hear her read her poetry, after the jump...

Paquito D'Rivera's latest New York City stand was reviewed by Ben Ratliff in the January 4, 2009 edition of the New York Times.  His memoir, My Sax Life, says Publishers Weekly--"like his music--is infused with zest," is newly released as a paperback reprint by Northwestern University Press.

Adam Stone of the Baltimore Jewish Times sat down with Nomi Stone to discuss her new collection of poems, The Stranger's Notebook. Follow the link below to read the complete story. 

Read Northwestern University Press poet Christina Pugh's poem "Inflection" in the December 2008 issue of The Atlantic! Follow the link below to the complete poem.

"Every once in a while, a writer comes along with an offbeat vision that gets the world just right, tilts it just enough so that you can laugh along at our common, bemused humanity, see it in a new, appreciative way, lifted out of everyday dullness and irritation."  So begins reviewer Susan Larson in her rave review of Cooley Windsor's Visit in Me in California.  Read the complete review, below...

Tune in to the Charlie Rose Show tonight to see the acclaimed poet and essayist (and perennial Nobel favorite) discuss his art, politics, etc. Follow the "read more" link to learn more about Adonis's collection of poetry with us, THE PAGES OF DAY AND NIGHT.

More information on The Charlie Rose Show, including air times: www.charlierose.com

For his inaugural essay in Newsweek, Jeremy McCarter chooses to discuss the influence of the critic Lionel Trilling:

"a hero—one of my heroes, anyway. And for the Trilling devotee, this has been an annus mirabilis. Over the summer, Northwestern University Press published a paperback edition of "The Moral Obligation to Be Intelligent," a career-spanning selection of his essays on Keats, Orwell, Austen and more. They showcase his genius for literary sculpting, which is what great critics like Trilling do: use hammer and chisel and inspiration to carve meaning out of a block, whether the substance is marble or something less agreeable."

EVANSTON, Ill.: The open road, with its promise of new horizons, has always been a vital part of American myth and identity.

In her latest novel, All That Road Going: A Novel (Northwestern University Press, May 2008), A. G. Mojtabai rejects the romanticism that surrounds the notion of travel in order to depict the sobering realities that face many of those who find themselves on the road.

All That Road Going focuses on the passengers of a bus trekking through the heart of the country. Mojtabai brings a fresh perspective to the rich American tradition of road novels. She highlights the irony that the passengers must remain cramped and still, mulling over their problems, even as the bus speeds down the highway.

Mojtabai rotates her point of view from one anxious denizen of the bus to the next, creating a pastiche of voices, each with its own particular, yet ordinary woes. The world-weary driver surveys his passengers: "the walking wounded, all too many of them, on the move because the dream crashed-the job folded, the rent was overdue, the car got repossessed, the casting call never came."

In All That Road Going, the road loses its magnetic appeal, and instead becomes a stage for paranoia, desperation and aimlessness. An aging salesman deserting his girlfriend on her deathbed, an overmedicated divorc� hoping to make it in the carpet-cleaning business and a teenage mother trying to numb herself to the pain of giving up her child all weave their voices into the fabric of the novel.

A. G. Mojtabai is the author of eight books, including Called Out, Ordinary Time and Soon: Tales from Hospice. She lives in Amarillo, Texas.

ABOUT NORTHWESTERN UNIVERSITY PRESS
The mission of Northwestern University Press is the publication of books that disseminate knowledge and further understanding of cultural, political, social, and community issues. Since its inception in 1893, Northwestern University Press has produced important scholarly works in various disciplines as well as quality regional and Chicago books, fiction, poetry, literature in translation, literary criticism, and books on drama and the performing arts. Northwestern University Press authors have been the recipients of numerous prizes, including the Nobel Prize for Literature, the National Book Award, and the Tony Award. For more information and a complete list of Northwestern University Press titles, please visit www.nupress.northwestern.edu.

Book Details:
Title: All That Road Going: A Novel
Author: A. G. Mojtabai
Publisher: Northwestern University Press
Publication: May, $21.95, cloth, ISBN: 978-0-8101-5200-7
Fiction, 182 pages, 5-1/2 x 8-1/2

All That Road Going is available at your local bookstores or by calling 1.800.621.2736 or visiting www.nupress.northwestern.edu

EVANSTON, Ill.: The American satirical novel is here, in the unexpected form of this twisted and relentlessly funny debut about choice and chance.

With Blind Speed (Northwestern University Press, May 2008), new voice Josh Barkan has crafted a novel of prophetic wit and potent immediacy. The writing is ambitious and experimental, but enriched by the author's honesty and heart.

The literary buzz on Blind Speed is enthusiastic. Tom Perrotta, author of Little Children, describes Barkan's "energetic modern-day picaresque" as "part farce, part political satire, part metafiction," a "rich fictional stew." Steve Almond, author of Candyfreak, beams, "Blind Speed is a crazy-assed adventure of a novel, one that hilariously explores the issues of this era and every other: faith, love, ambition and its discontents, the possibility of spiritual regeneration, not to mention sibling rivalry."

In Blind Speed, protagonist Paul Berger receives a horrible palm reading whose prophecy begins to become true. His fianc�e, a former soap opera actress, is shot at a Revolutionary War reenactment in Concord. His astronaut brother dies at the Pentagon on September 11. And his most famous brother is about to kidnap him in a media campaign to win an election. But is Paul's life controlled by chance or choice?

Deftly weaving an epic multilayered story, Blind Speed pursues far-flung subplots from ecoterrorism to rock bands with gleeful anarchy. Barkan aims high and captures the zeitgeist through his exploration of global warming, government deceit, immigration, race relations and gun dealers. The novel also touches on personal themes of sibling rivalry, disconnection among distant families and the quest for fame and ambition. The balance of satire and heart, and a perfect evocation of Boston, makes Barkan's work a truly satisfying adventure and a revolutionary novel.

Josh Barkan was awarded a literature fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts in 2006. He has taught writing at Harvard, NYU, and Boston University and is the author of the story collection Before Hiroshima. A graduate of the Iowa Writers' Workshop and Yale, he lives in New York City.

ABOUT NORTHWESTERN UNIVERSITY PRESS
The mission of Northwestern University Press is the publication of books that disseminate knowledge and further understanding of cultural, political, social, and community issues. Since its inception in 1893, Northwestern University Press has produced important scholarly works in various disciplines as well as quality regional and Chicago books, fiction, poetry, literature in translation, literary criticism, and books on drama and the performing arts. Northwestern University Press authors have been the recipients of numerous prizes, including the Nobel Prize for Literature, the National Book Award, and the Tony Award. For more information and a complete list of Northwestern University Press titles, please visit www.nupress.northwestern.edu.

Book Details:
Title: Blind Speed: A Novel
Author: Josh Barkan
Publisher: TriQuarterly Books, an imprint of Northwestern University Press
Publication: May 2008, $21.95, Paper
ISBN: 978-0-8101-2493-6, Fiction, 304 pages, 6 x 9

Blind Speed is available at your local bookstores or by calling 1.800.621.2736 or visiting www.nupress.northwestern.edu.

EVANSTON, Ill.: Neither Etta nor Claribel Cone had any formal artistic training, yet self-taught and guided by only their bold inclinations, they assembled a renowned collection of twentieth-century art.

In The Cone Sisters of Baltimore: Collecting at Full Tilt (Northwestern University Press, June), Ellen B. Hirschland, great-niece of the Cones, and her daughter Nancy Hirschland Ramage recount their ancestors' unlikely rise to greatness in the world of art collecting. The Cone Sisters of Baltimore is lavishly illustrated with works from the Cone collection, and photos of Claribel and Etta themselves.

Hirschland and Ramage narrate the sisters' travels between their Baltimore home and Paris, where they met many of the great artistic minds of the early twentieth century. From their deep and complicated relationship with Gertrude Stein to their improbable friendships with Picasso and Matisse, The Cone Sisters of Baltimore exposes the personal connections that underlie now-historic artistic movements.

Hirschland and Ramage shed light on each sister's distinctive personality. Confident and independent Clara broke social barriers to become a doctor. Quiet, lady-like Etta placed a tea-caddy over a Degas nude whenever she had guests.

In spite of their world-travels and coterie of famous friends, Etta and Claribel Cone remained committed to family and to their home city, Baltimore. They left their incredible collection of works by Manet, Gauguin, C�zanne, Seurat, and Degas and more to the Baltimore Museum of Art.

Ellen B. Hirschland (1918-99) was an art history teacher, a collector of nineteenth- and twentieth-century art and a frequent lecturer on the Cone sisters and on modern art. As the great-niece of the sisters, in 1936 she traveled with Etta Cone to Switzerland and Paris, where she met artists, dealers and collectors and developed a friendship with Henri Matisse.

Nancy Hirschland Ramage is the Charles A. Dana Professor of the Humanities and Arts Emerita at Ithaca College. She too is an art historian and has written and lectured widely in her fields of Greek and Roman art, eighteenth-century neoclassicism, and the history of collecting.

ABOUT NORTHWESTERN UNIVERSITY PRESS
The mission of Northwestern University Press is the publication of books that disseminate knowledge and further understanding of cultural, political, social, and community issues. Since its inception in 1893, Northwestern University Press has produced important scholarly works in various disciplines as well as quality regional and Chicago books, fiction, poetry, literature in translation, literary criticism, and books on drama and the performing arts. Northwestern University Press authors have been the recipients of numerous prizes, including the Nobel Prize for Literature, the National Book Award, and the Tony Award. For more information and a complete list of Northwestern University Press titles, please visit www.nupress.northwestern.edu.

Book Details:
Title: The Cone Sisters of Baltimore
Author: Ellen B. Hirschland and Nancy Hirschland Ramage
Publisher: Northwestern University Press
Publication: June, $34.95, cloth, ISBN: 978-0-8101-2481-3
Biography/Art History/Jewish Studies, 352 pages, 8-1/4 x 9-1/2
48 color and 58 b/w images

The Cone Sisters of Baltimore is available at your local bookstores or by calling 1.800.621.2736 or visiting www.nupress.northwestern.edu