A NEW mini-review of "A Red Witch, Every Which Way", a collaborative full-length poetry book by Juliet Cook & j/j hastain (published in 2016 by Hysterical Books)

"This is a compilation to behold. It holds nothing back, and does not deny itself the pleasures of the flesh: horror, macabre, and the grotesque find their home here. Each poem is somehow delicate and horrible..."

Part of a new mini-review by Amy Layton, of "A Red Witch, Every Which Way", a collaborative full-length poetry book by j/j hastain and I, published in 2016 by Hysterical Books

read more HERE - https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2820019598?book_show_action=true&from_review_page=1

***

You can acquire your very own copy of "A Red Witch, Every Which Way" from Hysterical Books HERE - https://www.hystericalbooks.com/product-page/a-red-witch-every-which-way

Or from Amazon HERE - https://www.amazon.com/Red-Witch-Every-Which-Way/dp/0940821044

Or from Juliet Cook's own Blood Pudding Press shop HERE - https://www.etsy.com/listing/473901408/a-red-witch-every-which-way-2016-full?ref=shop_home_active_2

A NEW Mini-Review of "A Red Witch, Every Which Way" by Juliet Cook and j/j hastain (Hysterical Books, 2016)

5 out of 5 stars
"Absolutely beautiful and disturbing at the same time, just the way I like my poetry!" Sarah Peterson's delightful mini-review of "A Red Witch, Every Which Way" by Juliet Cook and j/j hastain

acquire your own copy HERE - https://www.etsy.com/listing/473901408/a-red-witch-every-which-way-2016-full?ref=shop_home_active_1

Also available from Hysterical Books - https://www.hystericalbooks.com/product-page/a-red-witch-every-which-way

Also available from Amazon - https://www.amazon.com/Red-Witch-Every-Which-Way/dp/0940821044

A photo of A Red Witch...

Jennifer E. Hudgens' photo of "A Red Witch, Every Which Way" by j/j hastain and Juliet Cook (Hysterical Books, 2016), nestled in between other poetry books.

A Red Witch available at Hysterical Books - https://www.hystericalbooks.com/product-page/a-red-witch-every-which-way

A Red Witch available at Amazon - https://www.amazon.com/Red-Witch-Every-Which-Way/dp/0940821044/ref=cm_cr_srp_d_product_top?ie=UTF8

A Red Witch available via Blood Pudding Press - https://www.etsy.com/listing/473901408/new-a-red-witch-every-which-way-2016?ref=shop_home_active_1

A recent review of A Red Witch at Luna Luna - http://www.lunalunamagazine.com/blog/review-of-a-red-witch-every-which-way-by-juliet-cook-jj-hastain

NEW! A Review of "A Red Witch, Every Which Way"

"It’s phantasmagoric and it’s not for the faint of heart. It’s seething with instinct of both animal and spirit sources; it burgeons with doll parts, jarred hearts, and cat’s claw."

and

"Bodies as nations, as political armor, as manifested energy flow into a deep introspection as the writers touch both their own reality as well as that of fellow creatures. Here, the focus falls on mixing dream states with nightmare, fact with fiction, all four elements, plus the fifth the ether – the inner voice." 

~samplings from a new review of the collaborative poetry book, "A Red Witch, Every Which Way" by j/j hastain & Juliet Cook (Hysterical Books, 2016)

~thank you very much to Jacklyn La Polita Janeksela for writing this wonderful review

~and thank you to Luna Luna for publishing the review

~read the full review by clicking the link below...

http://www.lunalunamagazine.com/blog/review-of-a-red-witch-every-which-way-by-juliet-cook-jj-hastain

***

You can acquire your own copy of A Red Witch...
directly from Hysterical Books HERE - https://www.hystericalbooks.com/product-page/a-red-witch-every-which-way

or from Amazon HERE - https://www.amazon.com/Red-Witch-Every-Which-Way/dp/0940821044

or from the Blood Pudding Press shop HERE - https://www.etsy.com/listing/473901408/new-a-red-witch-every-which-way-2016?ref=shop_home_active_1

Happy April!

Sharing a photo from Stephanie Kaylor's photos of poetry books on display at the Simmons College library, in honor of poetry month. :)

The one with the red cover and burning witch bodies is A Red Witch, Every Which Way, by j/j hastain and me.

***
A Red Witch, Every Which Way can be acquired here (from the Hysterical Books press that published it - https://www.hystericalbooks.com/product-page/1a2d7e83-4bef-31d5-09e1-3326ee271c09

 Or here from Amazon - 

https://www.amazon.com/Red-Witch-Every-Which-Way/dp/0940821044
Or here from my own Blood Pudding Press shop - https://www.etsy.com/listing/473901408/new-a-red-witch-every-which-way-2016?ref=shop_home_feat_3

A Photo of a Red Witch

The collaborative full-length poetry book, "A Red Witch, Every Which Way" by Juliet Cook and j/j hastain, published by Hysterical Books, in a recent photo taken by Jacklyn La Polita Janeksela, alongside stunning crystal by Jenny Sadre-Orafai.

A Red Witch can be acquired here - http://www.hystericalbooks.com/#!product-page/cl84u/1a2d7e83-4bef-31d5-09e1-3326ee271c09

Or here - https://www.amazon.com/Red-Witch-Every-Which-Way/dp/0940821044

Or within the Blood Pudding Press etsy shop here - https://www.etsy.com/listing/494588398/pre-order-cutting-eyes-from-ghosts-by?ref=shop_home_feat_1

(I will also have a few of them with me at AWP next week, along with some Blood Pudding Press chapbooks too.) 

Another NEW Review of A Red Witch, Every Which Way!

Another wonderful new review of "A Red Witch, Every Which Way" (the collaborative poetry book by j/j hastain & I , published this year by Hysterical Books), written by Stephanie Kaylor on Goodreads. (I'm not sure how I missed this, because it looked as if I had "liked" the review, but I don't remember reading it until today. Maybe I'm having a mental glitch, but in any case, here's the review):

"One side a positive/ healing/fetish violence./One side a negative/stab wound/fantasy/reality./Never ending hemorrhaging hemisphere. Never/ending lavish/light."

This collaborative book felt like a haunted house-- disturbing yet deliciously so, a journey one walks into and doesn't want to leave despite the grotesque nature of it all; the internal, the walls, the decay, the macabre and its traces. The interviews at the end were as rich as the poems, breaking down the barrier between process & product as swiftly as they did the same with the bodily & textual."

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/31395925-a-red-witch-every-which-way

***

The book reviewed is available via Amazon HERE - https://www.amazon.com/Red-Witch-Every-Which-Way/dp/0940821044/ref=sr_1_6?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1483005994&sr=1-6

The book reviewed is also available from Hysterical Books HERE - http://www.hystericalbooks.com/product-page/1a2d7e83-4bef-31d5-09e1-3326ee271c09

And it is also available from the Blood Pudding Press shop HERE - https://www.etsy.com/listing/473901408/new-a-red-witch-every-which-way-2016?ref=shop_home_feat_1

A NEW Review of A Red Witch, Every Which Way!

I just got quite excited because I noticed this 5 star review of j/j hastain and I's collaborative poetry book, "A Red Witch, Every Which Way" which appeared via Amazon earlier this month!

Meanwhile, I didn't know if anyone was even reading the book, so unexpectedly encountering a review that calls it Weirdly Beautiful (and mentions Frank Stanford!) feels pretty giddily great!

Here's the review followed by the Amazon link. Thank you Wayne F. Burke!

"A macabre work full of gory details and with a kind of surrealism that makes the reading of it a delightful adventure. "Pond scum will burst/out the eyes/once the eyes have been/revised into a film" (New Superhero), "...Box/elder stability/yearns for torn pages/in a series of open books" (Clawing At the Confessional), "Meniscus pirouettes/into maximus piranhas/chiming within/broken bones" (Conjured Talisman), "thinning/ossein to massage/scrim by which to scry/mutant shrapnel made" (Access Achieved Then Denied).

Weirdly beautiful language usage, full of surprises, twists and turns, and wordplay: language adroitly used, as in "Paradoxical Flight": "when a road kill/cat/black/silk cradles a/hyper notch/broken down/purring/crotch panel/rotting neural/blotch/an aural/round path/so partial/pussy extract/carefully oozing/from new particles/networks/jet stream/proving/an either or/model..."

Does it make sense to me? Hell, no. Does it matter? Again, no. As someone once said to the late Frank Sanford concerning his work, "I don't understand it, but I know what you mean."

These examples I've used should not be construed as representative of a flighty or loose style of writing because this is a disciplined work of serious stature also with an underlying structural design (3 "Acts"). I gather the last part of this statement intuitively and cannot say I have the slightest idea what the structure consists of. And you know what? It does not matter. This is a book to read and reread. A phantasmagorical journey where "Horses run through hoarse/barns. Hemlines narrow their slits." A book that asks such deep questions as "How do we engrave an orifice?" and answers "Coagulate all the swag/down our throats and then/gag ourselves..." Readers--enjoy."

https://www.amazon.com/Red-Witch-Every-Which-Way/dp/0940821044/ref=sr_1_6?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1483005994&sr=1-6

***

The book can also be acquired via the Hysterical Books website HERE - http://www.hystericalbooks.com/product-page/1a2d7e83-4bef-31d5-09e1-3326ee271c09

And via my own Blood Pudding Press shop HERE - https://www.etsy.com/listing/473901408/new-a-red-witch-every-which-way-2016?ref=shop_home_feat_1

A Red Witch, Every Which Way might make a unique holiday gift!

"A Red Witch, Every Which Way" the 2016 new full-length collaborative poetry book by me & j/j hastain, published by Hysterical Books, includes more than 100 pages of poems and might make a creative holiday gift if you or the recipient are into emotional gore. 

You can acquire a copy from my very own Blood Pudding Press shop here - https://www.etsy.com/listing/473901408/new-a-red-witch-every-which-way-2016?ref=shop_home_active_2

You can also acquire a copy from the Hysterical Books website AND via Amazon.

HERE - http://www.hystericalbooks.com/#!product-page/cl84u/1a2d7e83-4bef-31d5-09e1-3326ee271c09

HERE - https://www.amazon.com/Red-Witch-Every-Which-Way/dp/0940821044

from A Red Witch, Every Which Way

"my so called partner starts
eating them before they're ready.
It feels like every time I eat
it pulps out out immediately,
it explodes itself inside me
instead of growing all the way.

I'm starting to hate my body.
The only way I can control it is if I starve,
stop planting, stop hanging
my art on my own hooked walls."

from the poem "Broken Burial", within the full-length collaborative poetry book, "A Red Witch, Every Which Way" by Juliet Cook and j/j hastain (published by Hysterical Books)

"A Red Witch, Every Which Way" is available within my Blood Pudding Press shop HERE - https://www.etsy.com/listing/473901408/new-a-red-witch-every-which-way-2016?ref=shop_home_feat_1

It is also available via the Hysterical Books website AND via Amazon.

HERE - http://www.hystericalbooks.com/#!product-page/cl84u/1a2d7e83-4bef-31d5-09e1-3326ee271c09

HERE - https://www.amazon.com/Red-Witch-Every-Which-Way/dp/0940821044

A Red Witch, Every Which Way now lives in my home (in time for Halloween 2016)!

Just in time for Halloween 2016, I have received my author copies of "A Red Witch, Every Which Way"!

I have now added a few of them to my Blood Pudding Press shop HERE -https://www.etsy.com/listing/473901408/new-a-red-witch-every-which-way-2016?ref=shop_home_feat_1

***


"A Red Witch, Every Which Way", is the new 2016 full-length poetry book collaboration by j/j hastain and Juliet Cook, newly published by a new small press, Hysterical Books!

More than 100 pages of poems!

Cover image created by Carabella Sands.

"A Red Witch, Every Which Way" is "aboil with the grotesque and macabre. These poems explore the recesses of the body in all its glory and all its shame. No one will read it and come away unscathed."

***

This book is also available via the Hysterical Books website AND via Amazon.

HERE - http://www.hystericalbooks.com/#!product-page/cl84u/1a2d7e83-4bef-31d5-09e1-3326ee271c09

HERE - https://www.amazon.com/Red-Witch-Every-Which-Way/dp/0940821044

NEW Review of A Red Witch, Every Which Way!

"Make no mistake, j/j and Juliet do not shy away from excess—from mysterious risks—from gore or the gruesome bits—in fact, they wallow in it. At times, the book is a dizzy mess of flesh—and other times, an acid-blotted nightmare"

from Susan Yount's darkly delicious review of "A Red Witch, Every Which Way", a collaborative full-length poetry book by Juliet Cook and j/j hastain (newly published by Hysterical Books)

read more HERE - https://www.goodreads.com/review/show?id=1763780654

purchase the book HERE - http://www.hystericalbooks.com/product-page/1a2d7e83-4bef-31d5-09e1-3326ee271c09

"A Red Witch, Every Which Way" inside a library!

Very excited that "A Red Witch, Every Which Way" (alongside another wonderful new poetry book) has found a new home in a library, thank you to Stephanie Kaylor!

"A Red Witch, Every Which Way", a full-length collaborative poetry book by Juliet Cook and j/j hastain, published by Hysterical Books.

"QueerSexWords" a poetry chapbook by Caseyrenée Lopez, published by Yellow Chair Review.

***

You can acquire yourself a copy of "A Red Witch, Every Which Way" HERE - http://www.hystericalbooks.com/product-page/1a2d7e83-4bef-31d5-09e1-3326ee271c09

You can acquire yourself a copy of "QueerSexWords" HERE - http://www.yellowchairreview.com/available-titles-chapbooks

***

Anyone else who acquires this 100+ page book of bloody oddities, if you send me a photo of the book in your space - or in your yard - or next to your face or wherever else you want to place it, then I'll post it. And if I get enough photos, then I might create a special album of these photos.

(Send your photos to Julietcoo@gmail.com)

NEW Reality Beach Issue Three!

The NEW Reality Beach Issue Three includes "Mangled Is Still Alive", an individual poem by Juliet Cook (which you can read and listen to Cook read), "Defenestration Below Ground", a collaborative poem by Juliet Cook and j/j hastain, and oodles of other strange creative powers for you to partake of!

Thank you very much for the creative flow of Reality Beach.

Partake of the new Reality Beach Issue Three!

***

"Mangled Is Still Alive" - http://realitybeach.org/issue-three/cook/

"Defenestration Below Ground" - http://realitybeach.org/issue-three/hastainandcook/

ALL of REALITY BEACH ISSUE THREE - http://realitybeach.org/issue-three/

***

The collaborative poem "Defenestration Below Ground", also appears within j/j hastain and Juliet Cook's NEW full length poetry book, "A Red Witch, Every Which Way", available from Hysterical Books HERE - http://www.hystericalbooks.com/#!product-page/cl84u/1a2d7e83-4bef-31d5-09e1-3326ee271c09

"A Red Witch, Every Which Way" next to a fetal baby skull!

The new collaborative full-length poetry book, "A Red Witch, Every Which Way" by Juliet Cook and j/j hastain, published by Hysterical Books.

In Darryl Shupe's space, next to his fetal baby skull. 

Anyone else who acquires this 100+ page book of bloody oddities, if you send me a photo of the book in your space - or in your yard - or next to your face or wherever else you want to place it, then I'll post it. And if I get enough photos, then I might create a special album of these photos. :)

The book can be acquired here - http://www.hystericalbooks.com/#!product-page/cl84u/1a2d7e83-4bef-31d5-09e1-3326ee271c09

Or here - https://www.amazon.com/Red-Witch-Every-Which-Way/dp/0940821044

(Send your photos to Julietcoo@gmail.com)

Dear Readers! A Red Witch, Every Which Way is waiting for you to explore its strange innards!

Dear Readers:

We are
a combustible
pedigree of bones, bravados
changing
directions we head
through lead
the way please
for us
a chorus of abominable snowman
dolls and stuffed chickens
women or abdominal blood baths.

We are
surging out visceral specters
of tainted debris art.
One eye is filled with magma;
the other eye is an empty hole,
ready to be filled with
your eyes.

~j/j hastain & Juliet Cook

This poem appears on the back cover of "A Red Witch, Every Which Way", which is the NEW full-length poetry book collaboration by j/j hastain and myself, newly published by a new small press, Hysterical Books!

Oodles of poems appear on the inside of the book. More than 100 pages of poem stuff!

"A Red Witch, Every Which Way" is "aboil with the grotesque and macabre. These poems explore the recesses of the body in all its glory and all its shame. No one will read it and come away unscathed."

Available via the Hysterical Books website AND via Amazon.

HERE - http://www.hystericalbooks.com/#!product-page/cl84u/1a2d7e83-4bef-31d5-09e1-3326ee271c09

AND

HERE - https://www.amazon.com/Red-Witch-Every-Which-Way/dp/0940821044

P.S. This photo isn't of the book of course; the photo is of me and my new haircut, as of August 2016 (the month the book came out).

Just because I have what might look like a tattoo on my upper arm doesn't mean it's really a tattoo.

And just because I'm wearing Jesus socks doesn't mean I really believe in Jesus.

(Photo taken by Darryl Shupe)

A Red Witch, Every Which Way - a NEW full-length book of collaborative poetry by Juliet Cook and j/j hastain - published by Hysterical Books!

"They can tell you you’re splatter painting down

the steeples but you’re creating your own

red toned ventricles"

***

I am very bloodily creepily excited to announce "A Red Witch, Every Which Way", which is a new full-length poetry book collaboration by j/j hastain and myself, newly published by a new small press, Hysterical Books!

Hysterical Books is focused on the BEAUTIFUL AND STRANGE.

"A Red Witch, Every Which Way" is "aboil with the grotesque and macabre. These poems explore the recesses of the body in all its glory and all its shame."

Over 130 pages.

Available via the Hysterical Books website AND via Amazon.

HERE - http://www.hystericalbooks.com/#!product-page/cl84u/1a2d7e83-4bef-31d5-09e1-3326ee271c09

HERE - https://www.amazon.com/Red-Witch-Every-Which-Way/dp/0940821044

***

The different sections of the book are as follows:

Act 1, The Secret Carnage Hidden in a Cuckoo Clock 

Act 2, The Mutated Conjoined Twins 

Act 3, An Underworld's Spring Filled With Questions 

Juliet and j/j Interview Each Other