Sarah Gerard in conversation with James R. Gapinski

Feb 12, 2023

Sarah Gerard in conversation with James R. Gapinski

Celebrating the launch of Sarah Gerard’s The Butter House

5:00pm, Sunday, March 12th, 2023

Keys Lounge

533 NE Killingsworth St

Portland, OR 97211

About the Event

Join Conium Press at Keys Lounge in Portland, Oregon for a conversation between Sarah Gerard (author of True Love, Sunshine State, and Binary Star) and James R. Gapinski (Conium Press editor & author of Edge of the Known Bus Line). We’ll talk about books, writing, cats, and quite possibly some gossip about our favorite reality TV shows. Don’t miss this intimate gathering to celebrate Sarah’s new chapbook.

This event is free and open to the public. Find us in the back room of Keys Lounge. Paperback and limited-edition hardcovers of The Butter House will be available for purchase. The venue serves beer, wine, cocktails, nonalcoholic beverages, and a wide assortment of food (a 20% gratuity is automatically added to all open tabs).

SARAH GERARD (she/they) is the author of the novels True Love (Harper, 2020) and Binary Star (Two Dollar Radio, 2015) and the essay collection Sunshine State (Harper, 2017). They are the recipient of a 2021 Lambda Literary Dr. James Duggins Outstanding Mid-Career Novelist Prize. Sarah’s short stories, essays, and interviews have appeared in The New York Times, T Magazine, Granta, McSweeney’s, The Believer, Vice, Electric Literature, and the anthologies We Can’t Help It If We’re From Florida, One Small Blow Against Encroaching Totalitarianism, Tampa Bay Noir, Erase the Patriarchy, and I Know What’s Best For You: Stories on Reproductive Freedom. Learn more about Sarah Gerard’s work on their website.

JAMES R. GAPINSKI (they/them) is the author of the novella Edge of the Known Bus Line (Etchings Press; University of Indianapolis, 2018)—named to Kirkus Reviews‘ Best Books of 2018, and a finalist for the 2019 Montaigne Medal. They are also the author of three chapbooks: The Last Dinosaurs of Portland (Bottlecap Press, 2021), Fruit Rot (Etchings; U Indy, 2020), and Messiah Tortoise (Red Bird Chapbooks, 2018). Their short fiction has appeared in The Collapsar, Juked, Monkeybicycle, Paper Darts, Psychopomp, SmokeLong Quarterly, and elsewhere. James teaches for Southern New Hampshire University’s MFA program and edits for Conium Press. Learn more about James R. Gapinski’s work on their website.

About the Book

The Butter House follows a woman who moves from New York to a Florida bungalow with her boyfriend. She navigates contradictory landscapes of love and possession, nature and built-environment, empathy and sympathy. She becomes a surrogate caretaker for a colony of feral cats. She grows a garden. She interrogates what it means to care for somebody or something. This is a delicate story, but it chooses deliberate moments to scratch and bite with the ferocity of a territorial alley cat.

Advance Praise

“Sarah Gerard writes beautifully and precisely about the visceral, secretive feline landscape, and the possibilities that emerge when this world intersects with the human realm—challenging the couple at the center of The Butter House to renegotiate their relationship to care and what it means to feel at home.” —Laura van den Berg, author of I Hold a Wolf by the Ears

“The Butter House incisively considers the simultaneous care and cruelty of pet ownership, and Gerard is masterful in writing into all the nooks and crannies of a relationship. It’s the tale cat people deserve.” —Kayla Kumari Upadhyaya, author of Helen House

“With precise and lush details, Gerard captures a sense of life’s fragility amid new possibilities. The author’s fans are in for a treat.” —Publishers Weekly

Book cover for Sarah Gerard's "The Butter House"

Virtual Reading: Web Features & “Fruit Rot” chapbook

Aug 2, 2020

Virtual Reading

Chapbook Launch & Recent Web Features

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About the Virtual Event

When: August 15th, 2:00pm (PST)

Where: Zoom /// Cost: Free!

Register for the Virtual Event Here

The Conium Review recently re-launched its website. As the world grapples with COVID-19, the Internet’s ability to connect people is more important than ever. Our annual print edition is alive and well, but this virtual space offers a monthly compliment. Most web features post on the 15th of each month, showcasing a single author with a custom-designed, visually striking page for each story. The first two features are Jane Hammons’s “Creature Creator” and Gina Rose’s “Eight Thousand Dollars in 1981.” Yongsoo Park’s “Hausfrau Dad” goes live on August 15th.

Alongside the website’s re-launch, our managing editor also has a new chapbook, Fruit Rot, published by Etchings Press at the University of Indianapolis. Fruit Rot is a contemporary fable that involves magic fruit, comic books, and a few dead bodies along the way. It’s a whimsical and darkly funny read.

This virtual reading celebrates the both new site and our editor’s chapbook. We hope you can join us. Q&A will follow, plus some opportunities to receive free copies of The Conium Review and Fruit Rot.

About the Readers

James R. Gapinski

James R. Gapinski is the author of Fruit Rot (Etchings Press, 2020), Edge of the Known Bus Line (Etchings Press, 2018), and Messiah Tortoise (Red Bird Chapbooks, 2018). His short fiction has appeared in Heavy Feather Review, Hobart, Juked, Monkeybicycle, Paper Darts, and other publications. He teaches for Southern New Hampshire University’s MFA program, and he’s managing editor of The Conium Review.

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“Gapinski has a natural ability to unveil the hidden darkness in life’s inescapable choices with gentleness and care . . . ” –Hillary Leftwich, author of Ghosts Are Just Strangers Who Know How to Knock

“Gapinski skillfully illuminates the deep places where pain, fear and injustice live.” –Emily Koon, author of We Are Still Here

““Fruit Rot is a satire that complicates its subject rather than parodies it; a fable that shuns moralistic conclusions; a rumination on the hexed miracle of finally getting what you want.” –Zach Powers, author of First Cosmic Velocity

“Hallucinatory, savage, but ultimately hopeful, Edge of the Known Bus Line is a bloody bible for our times.” –Maryse Meijer, author of Northwood

“James R. Gapinski’s Messiah Tortoise is like a trip to a zoo after a pink cloud of nitrous has settled overhead. You’re elated, you’re having fun, and you’re in tune in a way that surprises you.” –Lindsay Hunter, author of Eat Only When You’re Hungry

“The dark, smart absurdity of James R. Gapinski’s writing jolts and delights in equal measure. Gapinski responds to today’s zigzag world with innovative form and gut-punching pathos.” –Ashley Farmer, author of The Women

Gina Rose

Gina Rose is an African American and Chinese American writer in Oakland, California. She attended Barnard College in New York City where she received the Howard M. Teichmann Writing Prize. Her work has been featured in Rigorous and Penultimate Peanut magazines.

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Yongsoo Park

Yongsoo Park is the author of the novels Boy Genius and Las Cucarachas, the memoir Rated R Boy, and the essay collection The Art of Eating Bitter about his losing battle to give his children an analog childhood.

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“In Boy Genius, Park has created a unique hero, one who is every bit as memorable as Alexander Portnoy, Augie March or Ignatius Reilly.” –Willard Manus, Lively Arts“

“Park is clever and caustic in depicting America’s treatment of its minority underclass. . .” —Kirkus Reviews

“Park’s affable and low-key style belies not only an incredible courage but weaves a steady-tempoed music that recapitulates a past that I was certain was lost forever. Park’s books are the mirror and lens I have been seeking my whole reading life–and ones I have not yet encountered elsewhere.” –Eugene Lim, author of Dear Cyborgs

“In Las Cucarachas, Park does more than showcase a harsh perspective of life in 1980s New York City. He offers readers an unflinching and unique perspective on the dark side of our contemporary society while retaining a subtle hope for some sort of begrudging multicultural harmony.” –Hirsh Sawhney, The Brooklyn Rail

“Park’s Rated R Boy belongs in the tradition of the classic Korean American writers like Younghill Kang and Richard Kim, who were the literary voices of their generations of immigrants. Like Kang and Kim, Park’s narrative is nostalgic, critical, tragic, and poignant by turns, evoking vital aspects of the Korean American experience not seen in the mainstream of ethnic literature.” –Heinz Insu Fenkl, author of Memories of My Ghost Brother

AWP 2019 Book Signing Schedule

Mar 27, 2019

The 2019 AWP Conference Bookfair opens tomorrow! Stop by booth 8066 and say hello, browse our books, and learn more about The Conium Review. We’ll also be featuring three author signings this year, starting with Simone Person from 1:00pm to 2:30pm on Thursday, March 28th. Next, we have James R. Gapinski signing books from 11:30am to 1:00pm on Friday, March 29th. Finally, Charles D. Brown will be signing from 1:00pm to 2:30pm on Friday, March 29th.

About the Authors

Simone Person is the author of Dislocate, the winner of the 2017 Honeysuckle Press Chapbook Contest in Prose, and Smoke Girl, the winner of the 2018 Diode Editions Chapbook Contest in Poetry. She grew up in small Michigan towns and Toledo, Ohio and is a dual MFA/MA student at Indiana University in Fiction and African American and African Diaspora Studies. In 2018, Simone became the Prose Editor for Honeysuckle Press. She sporadically, and to varying degrees of success, uses Twitter and Instagram at @princxporkchop.

James R. Gapinski is the author of the novella Edge of the Known Bus Line (Etchings Press, 2018) and the flash collection Messiah Tortoise (Red Bird Chapbooks, 2018). His short fiction has appeared in The Collapsar, Juked, Monkeybicycle, Paper Darts, Psychopomp, and other publications. He lives with his partner in Portland, Oregon. Find him online at http://jamesrgapinski.com and on Twitter @jamesrgapinski

Charles D. Brown is a writer and filmmaker from New Orleans. He currently lives in Los Angeles, where he received his Master’s in Professional Writing from the University of Southern California. He has made two feature films: Angels Die Slowly and Never A Dull Moment: 20 Years of the Rebirth Brass Band. He has published two novels Vamp City (as C.D. Brown) and Looking Back On Sodom. His fiction has appeared in The Conium Review, Oddville Press, Writing Disorder, Jersey Devil Press, The Menacing Hedge, plus the anthologies Dimensional Abscesses and Nocturnal Natures. He teaches composition, journalism, and media production at a variety of colleges.

AWP Preview: ARCs of Emily Koon’s “We Are Still Here”

Mar 25, 2019

Emily Koon’s We Are Still Here drops this July. We’ll have Advance Review Copies (ARCs) on display at our booth. Reviewers can contact us to request a sample copy. If you’re not a reviewer, but you still want a sneak peak at this fantastic collection, you may be able to snag a free copy at “Books & Brass” or “Literary Masquerade.” These books and other freebies will only be available while supplies last, so get there early!

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AWP Preview: TJ Fuller’s “Slim Fit”

Mar 24, 2019

TJ Fuller is reading at our March 28th AWP Offsite Event: “Books & Brass.” He won our Flash Fiction Contest, judged by Rebecca Schiff, author of The Bed Moved. In his surreal winning story, “Slim Fit,” the narrator jumps into a commercial for slim fit jeans; the story is rife with creativity, longing, and humor. Rebecca Schiff says “From the first sentence, ‘Slim Fit’ brings us into its strange, funny world. TJ Fuller trusts that the movement of language and his delight in its premise will become the reader’s delight. It does.”

As part of TJ’s contest prize, we’ve made this story into a limited-run micro-chapbook. This micro-chap includes craft cardstock cover, bleached linen interior pages, a more natural and pulpy interior leaf. The binding is hand-sewn, and each copy will be signed and numbered.

“Slim Fit” will be distributed at the reading for free, along with some other Conium Press swag. Take a peak at the images below, and be sure to get your complimentary copy at our event!

Northwest Micropress Fair After Party

Mar 21, 2019

This year at AWP, we’re going all out. The conference is coming to The Conium Review‘s home city of Portland, OR. We’re doing an event every night of the conference, starting with “Books & Brass: An Evening of Prose, Poetry, and Live Jazz” on Thursday, March 28th. Next, we’re hosting a “Literary Masquerade” on Friday, March 29th. Finally, we’re pleased to announce the lineup for our final event, “The Northwest Micropress Fair After Party” on Saturday, March 30th. This particular event follows the Northwest Micropress Fair, which is an independently organized book fair held in the Cleaners at the Ace Hotel. We’ll be tabling at this micropress fair and we’ll also have a booth at the main AWP Conference bookfair. We’ll be selling books and doing author signings at each location.

About the Event

The After Party officially begins at 7:30 when the doors of the Cleaners at the Ace Hotel reopen for business. The readings start at 8:00pm, with music to follow and a cash bar available. The Northwest Micropress Bookfair and After Party includes a ton of presses, including Presses and producers include: Entre Ríos Books, Scablands Books, Chin Music Press, Page Boy Magazine, Sage Hill Press, SPLAB, Short Run Seattle, Blue Cactus Press, Frontera Magazine, Margin Shift Reading Series, Cadence Video Poetry Festival / Northwest Film Forum, Till Writers, Ravenna Press, StringTown Press, Papeachu Press, Rhododo Press, Coast | No Coast, Winter Texts, Crab Creek Review, Poetic Games, Not a Pipe Publishing, Cascadia Rising Review, The Conium Review, Arq Press, Overcup Press, and Floating Bridge Press.

This will be a big event on the final night of the conference. Don’t miss it! Reading for The Conium Review are TJ Fuller, Chelsea Harris, and Simone Person. Find this event on Facebook.

About the Readers

TJ Fuller writes and teaches in Portland, Oregon. His fiction has appeared in Hobart, Vol. 1 Brooklyn, Jellyfish Review, and elsewhere. He won the 2017 Flash Fiction Contest at The Conium Review.

Chelsea Harris has appeared in The Portland Review, Literary Orphans, The Conium Review, Grimoire, and Smokelong Quarterly, among others. She received her MFA from Columbia College Chicago and currently lives in Washington State.

Simone Person is the author of Dislocate, the winner of the 2017 Honeysuckle Press Chapbook Contest in Prose, and Smoke Girl, the winner of the 2018 Diode Editions Chapbook Contest in Poetry. She grew up in small Michigan towns and Toledo, Ohio and is a dual MFA/MA student at Indiana University in Fiction and African American and African Diaspora Studies. In 2018, Simone became the Prose Editor for Honeysuckle Press. She sporadically, and to varying degrees of success, uses Twitter and Instagram at @princxporkchop.