I got a stapler for my birthday. It’s a Bostich long reach, to replace the Swingline that now jams with pretty much every staple. The new one staples real smooth. I don’t need to get a lot of leverage or smash down with both hands to push a staple through. Feeling real bougie but I have a lot of stapling to do.

The Walls Are Closing In On Us is the title of our next book but also kind of a description of how I am feeling at the moment. We just put in the big print order for Trent’s book, pretty late in the game but with just enough time to get the books to him for signing. He’s going to mail some out and then take a bunch with him to AWP. As is our new tradition, there will be two versions of this book: a print on demand version, orderable through Bookshop, B&N, etc., as well as a limited run of copies printed by Bookmobile up in Minneapolis, Minnesota. These first run Bookmobile copies are always just a little bit nicer, and at the moment there are only two ways to get one: order through our website or pick one up directly from Joshua Trent Brown at AWP or one of his readings. We printed 280 copies. The walls are closing in on AWP prep. I still have books to send, still have zines to print and fold and staple.

For one week, get 15% off any Malarkey order with this code: wallsareclosingin.

If you order a copy of Trent’s book through the Malarkey website you’ll also get a copy of Sick Sad Queer by Ly Faulk. This is a zine featuring a small collection of Ly’s poems, with a cover by Daniel Miller. I’ll also be sending copies of this zine out with any orders that come in for returns, as well as in-stock books, which right now include Your Favorite Poet, First Aid for Choking Victims, The Barre Incidents, My Ardent Love for the Pencil, Boxcutters, Hair Shirt, Sleep Decades, and Man in a Cage. Book club subscribers will all receive Sick Sad Queer, along with the other four poetry EPs we’re putting out this year. While supplies last I’m also sneaking in a misprint copy of Guess What’s Different, essays by Susan Triemert. We had to reprint a big batch of this book when it came out because we had a messup in the files after a revision to the print proof. These misprint copies are perfectly readable; they just weren’t up to our standard. Rather than destroy them, though, or have them sit in box forever, I’m just giving the rest of them away.

From a recent netgalley review: “The Walls Are Closing In is a quiet, emotionally weighty novel that follows one man’s life across hardship, displacement, and the search for belonging. Told through a reflective, memory-driven lens, the story traces George, a half-Choctaw boy growing up in the rural South whose life is shaped less by his own choices than by the forces around him — poverty, racism, violence, and chance encounters.”

Preorder a signed copy of The Walls Are Closing In On Us

I stapled about 60 copies of Sick Sad Queer last week and I need to do at least 100 more, ideally 200, so that’s enough emailing for one day because I’m also behind on filling orders.

Please create more work for me buy ordering books!

Subscribe now