Events

Road Trip Advisory!

Is anybody out there? More precisely, is anyone in Austin, Texas, preferably within the realms of this particular universe / dimension, interested in taking a road trip to St. Louis, Missouri? Maybe you just need a ride up there? Maybe you like sitting in a car for 36 hours? I don’t know. What I do know, is that I need to drive up to St. Louis before the end of the month of July. I do know that I am not entirely sure whether or not my car can make the trip – that bit of information will start to come to light after I take my car in for a check up. If it can make the trip, there is a working AC and there will be a large dog in the back seat. His name is Brutus, and he is very nice. However, he does have a tendency to slobber a lot and let out an atomic fart every once in a while. Other than that, he is totally harmless.

The reason for this trip? I need to deliver several boxes of books to Elva Maxine Beach who happens to live in St. Louis where she just bought a house. I could very well use some sort of shipping company, but I figure it would end up costing more or less the same amount, and I not only need to deliver lots of boxes filled with books to Maxine, I would also love to sit down with her, have a couple of beers, and have a conversation or two. You see, the boxes in question will be filled with hard copies and soft cover copies of the book “NEUROTICA,” a collection of short stories that Elva Maxine Beach wrote and that I published.

This trip will be an official New Belleville Press trip. Our first NBP road trip.

Who would like to take part of this historic occasion?

Contact me!

Francois Pointeau

Writing on the Air

A small step for just about anybody, a large step for me. Okay, okay, that doesn’t really work. Nonetheless, on Wednesday evening, for the very first time in Francois Pointeau’s little life, I entered a radio studio and took part in a live show. I didn’t do much. I looked up a couple of advertisements, to be read live on the air by one of the two co-hosts. He asked me if I wanted to read them, and I shied out. Admittedly I was a bit intimidated by the large microphone, and I’m going to have to get used to it. I think this issue is not a real problem.

The show: Writing on the Air with Dillon McKinsey & Lee Davis, is a News & Public Affairs program of Public Radio station KOOP, Austin, Texas, and is broadcast on Wednesdays from 6 to 7 PM (CST) at 91.7 FM. They interview writers! Which, to me, is exciting. For the most part, I stood and watched and listened. Which is exactly what I wanted to do: Observe and take as much of it in as I could.

It think me and radio are going to have a fun relationship. I’m looking forward to take part in the show, and learn as much as I can from Dillon and Lee. I hope to be able to interview writers whom I enjoy reading, those few writers I have published and hope to publish, such as Elva Maxine Beach and Robin Blackburn, and possibly even be interviewed myself as F.K. Needles by the co-hosts.

Wherever this goes, I’m looking forward to it!

Books

Check this review of Neurotica!

Really cool review of Elva Maxine Beach’s Neurotica by Christian Prozak from the Exquisite Corpse.

You can read it here: Exquisite Corpse review of Elva Maxine Beach’s Neurotica.

Beer Songs For The Lonely

“Obviously a book meant to read while you’re drinking beer, but Needles’ poetry is redolent of Paris, red wine and camembert bien fait. For me it conjures long conversations in Parisian apartments, over plates of roasted turkey legs, garlic and sweet potato soup…Endless rows of empty wine bottles and endless plans to buy more over steak and eggs in the raw mornings..If you love the real Paris, what’s left of it, not the prepaid touristic packages of the Latin Quarter, but the much lesser known arrondissements to the east, north and south, take a walk with Needles. You won’t be disappointed…”

R.T. Mitchell, author of ‘Tattoing Violet’.

“Applause, applause to new poet on the scene, F.K. Needles for taking poetry off of its pristine pedestal and bringing us all back to earth. Beer Songs for the Lonely is a visceral, sometimes shocking, collection of poems written about everyday moments, moments we don’t usually think of in terms of poetry

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New Belleville Press News

Thursday July 2 News from Austin, Texas

Well today is Thursday, which means that yesterday was Wednesday, which in turn means that I was on “Writing on the Air” last night with Dillon McKinsey and Lee Davis on KOOP 91.7 Austin Community Radio. The guest, Shelley Seale, wrote a book about her visit and her volunteer work with children in Indian Orphanages. You can check out her book here.

I actually SAID something on the air. That was my first time … well, last week, I uttered a couple of words … last night, I actually took part in a little repartee. During the interview, though both Dillon and Lee told me to ask question and take part, I just couldn’t figure out the right time to ask something. I didn’t want to break the flow of questions and answers and storytelling that Dillon and Shelley were going through. In any case, when you sit behind that microphone, and you take part in the show, that 1 hour goes by REALLY quickly.

Make sure to tune in next week, and every week, from 6:00pm to 7:00pm Texas Time. You can tune in on 91.7 if you’re in central Texas, but you can also tune in online and stream the program live. Unfortunately, the shows are not currently being archived, though I’m told they will be soon. So, for the time being, you can only listen to us LIVE.

In other news, Robin Blackburn has completed phase 1 of going from a few poems to manuscript and soon to the printing press and to book! As you might remember, Robin is the third and upcoming New Belleville Press author. She has been working hard the last few months at re-writing every single poem she picked for her collection. She has now rewritten every single one, and we are on our way to Phase 2. Yeah!

Phase 2 is when all those lose leaflets of paper with poems and ideas on them start to take the shape of a manuscript. We will go the a third party to edit the poems, and make more suggestions on word choices, line breaks, et cetera. This is the time where we also start working with an artist for potential illustrations, cover art, et cetera. Phase 3 is when everything is set, and we hire a graphic designer to create the lay-out of the book, the front and back covers, the fonts, margins, and overall look and feel of the future book / object.

It’s exciting! Basically, first we start with the content, and then once the content has been finalize, we move on to the object that is a book.

I read a lot of books, and I see that all too often, and especially with small publishers, they concentrate on one or the other. Often time, when you have a beautiful book-object, what’s inside isn’t worth reading; and when you have a great book, a great story, a beautiful collection of poetry, then the package is lacking and it’s hard work just picking up the book.

To me, both are VERY important, and that is part of my goal here at New Belleville Press, to not only publish great reads, but also to create beautiful objects that you won’t mind showing off to your friends, holding and admiring yourself at all time of the day, and just setting on your coffee table … An object that keeps shouting: Pick Me Up and READ ME!!!!

In yet more exciting news, I am preparing a road trip to St. Louis, MO, for the end of this month. On July 31th, I will be taking off in my little station wagon. It will be loaded with boxes crammed with copies of “Neurotica.” My goal is to deliver lots of copies to Elva Maxine Beach, who happens to live in St. Louis, MO. So, St. Louis, beware, here I come! Chill that beer, please!

You can of course purchase a copy of “Neurotica” right here on this website, at Alibris.com, or in Austin at Sonny’s Vintage, Book People, and Oat Willies.

That’s the news here at New Belleville Press, in Austin, Texas.

Take care, come back often, say hi, leave comments, and most of all, enjoy life and have fun!

Francois Pointeau

Road Trip Advisory!

Is anybody out there? More precisely, is anyone in Austin, Texas, preferably within the realms of this particular universe / dimension, interested in taking a road trip to St. Louis, Missouri? Maybe you just need a ride up there? Maybe you like sitting in a car for 36 hours? I don’t know. What I do know, is that I need to drive up to St. Louis before the end of the month of July. I do know that I am not entirely sure whether or not my car can make the trip – that bit of information will start to come to light after I take my car in for a check up. If it can make the trip, there is a working AC and there will be a large dog in the back seat. His name is Brutus, and he is very nice. However, he does have a tendency to slobber a lot and let out an atomic fart every once in a while. Other than that, he is totally harmless.

The reason for this trip? I need to deliver several boxes of books to Elva Maxine Beach who happens to live in St. Louis where she just bought a house. I could very well use some sort of shipping company, but I figure it would end up costing more or less the same amount, and I not only need to deliver lots of boxes filled with books to Maxine, I would also love to sit down with her, have a couple of beers, and have a conversation or two. You see, the boxes in question will be filled with hard copies and soft cover copies of the book “NEUROTICA,” a collection of short stories that Elva Maxine Beach wrote and that I published.

This trip will be an official New Belleville Press trip. Our first NBP road trip.

Who would like to take part of this historic occasion?

Contact me!

Francois Pointeau