Incendiary Art

One of the most magnetic and esteemed poets in today’s literary landscape, Patricia Smith fearlessly confronts the tyranny against the black male body and the tenacious grief of mothers in her compelling new collection, Incendiary Art. She writes an exhaustive lament for mothers of the "dark magicians," and revisits the devastating murder of Emmett Till. These dynamic sequences serve as a backdrop for present-day racial calamities and calls for resistance. Smith embraces elaborate and eloquent language— "her gorgeous fallen son a horrid hidden / rot. Her tiny hand starts crushing roses—one by one / by one she wrecks the casket’s spray. It’s how she / mourns—a mother, still, despite the roar of thorns"— as she sharpens her unerring focus on incidents of national mayhem and mourning. Smith envisions, reenvisions, and ultimately reinvents the role of witness with an incendiary fusion of forms, including prose poems, ghazals, sestinas, and sonnets. With poems impossible to turn away from, one of America’s most electrifying writers reveals what is frightening, and what is revelatory, about history.

Festivities such as those exalting the court of Louis XIV, the celebration of James II's London coronation, and the commemoration of the peace celebrations of 1749 at The Hague culminated in dazzling pyrotechnical displays. These were in turn reproduced as prints, paintings, and narrative descriptions. This unique book examines the propagandistic and rhetorical functions these printed records came to serve as vehicles of aesthetic, cultural, and emotional significance.

Fire can fascinate, inspire, capture the imagination and bring families and communities together. It has the ability to amaze, energise and touch something deep inside all of us. For thousands of years, at every corner of the globe, humans have been huddling around fires: from the basic and primitive essentials of light, heat, energy and cooking, through to modern living, fire plays a central role in all of our lives. The ability to accurately and quickly light a fire is one of the most important skills anyone setting off on a wilderness adventure could possess, yet very little has been written about it. Through his narrative Hume also meditates on the wider topics surrounding fire and how it shapes the world around us.

Set in a lushly drawn world inspired by Inquisition Spain, Zoraida Córdova's fantasy is an epic tale of love and revenge perfect for fans of Sabaa Tahir and Sarah J. Maas. As a memory thief, the rarest and most feared of the magical Moria, Renata was used by the crown to carry out the King's Wrath, a siege that resulted in the deaths of thousands of her own people. Now Renata is one of the Whispers, rebel spies working against the crown. The Whispers may have rescued Renata years ago, but she cannot escape their mistrust and hatred—or the overpowering memories of the hundreds of souls she drained during her time in the palace. When Dez, the commander of her unit—and the boy she's grown to love—is taken captive by the notorious Principe Dorado, Renata must return to Andalucia and complete Dez's top secret mission herself. But as Renata grows more deeply embedded in the politics of the royal court, she uncovers a secret in her past that could change the fate of the entire kingdom—and end the war that has cost her everything.

A tragicomic open letter to Osama Bin Laden from a young London woman whose husband and son are killed in a terrorist attack on a soccer stadium.

Fine art, graphic design, underground comics... and zippos? The lines between art and commerce get fully rewired in this art opus documenting the history of FlameRite, the first commercial artists to recognise the potential of the Zippo lighter as canvas. Throw the cross-market appeal of Zippos in the blender with over thirty genre-destroying artists ranging in style from Robt. Williams to Daniel Clowes to Shag, and you have Scorched Art, more than just a collection, but a chronicle of a an art movement. In full-colour, the book features many out-of-print and never-before-seen models.

In her novels, poetry, and prose, Amber Dawn has written eloquently on queer femme sexuality, individual and systemic trauma, and sex work justice, themes drawn from her own lived experience and revealed most notably in her award-winning memoir How Poetry Saved My Life. In this, her second poetry collection, Amber Dawn takes stock of the costs of coming out on the page in a heartrendingly honest and intimate investigation of the toll that artmaking takes on artists. These long poems offer difficult truths within their intricate narratives that are alternately incendiary, tender, and rapturous. In a cultural era when intersectional and marginalized writers are topping bestseller lists, Amber Dawn invites her readers to take an unflinching look at we expect from writers, and from each other. This publication meets the EPUB Accessibility requirements and it also meets the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG-AA). It is screen-reader friendly and is accessible to persons with disabilities. A Simple book with few images, which is defined with accessible structural markup. This book contains various accessibility features such as alternative text for images, table of contents, page-list, landmark, reading order and semantic structure.

National Book Award finalist Patricia Smith chronicles the Great Migration through Motown music and Chicago streets.