dulcetly...

a new year...

noreply@blogger.com (kristy bowen) — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 07:53:00 +0000

new and pretty things in the shop
www.dulcetshop.com

5am insomnia

noreply@blogger.com (kristy bowen) — Thu, 31 Dec 2009 12:45:00 +0000

So it has come to this. I cut short the family visit in order to enjoy a few days of R & R before goingback to work and here I am wide awake at 5 am for some inexplicable reason, making a batch of green apple soap and reading blogs. I would normally blame the Peach Nehi sugar rush, but I actually just cracked open the 2 liter now to combat the dryness everywhere, my throat, the apartment, the ridiculous static when I add yet another sweater to combat the radiators that never run quite enough during these terrible bleak days of winter. Of course, I can alway go back to bed later, but there are so many other things I should be doing. I should be cleaning the bathroom or doing laundry. I should be making something or working on a poem. The building is unsually silent with all the Loyola students on break, so no bad music and screeching drunk girls. The dorm building across the way is completely dark and for all I know, I may be the only person awake in the universe. Only 80 or so days til spring and I'm counting every one of them.

noreply@blogger.com (kristy bowen) — Sat, 26 Dec 2009 19:50:00 +0000

I am currently chilling out in post holiday stupor at my parents having endured a couple of days with iffy electricity, so I figured I'd better take advantage of the internets while I can. Besides going it pioneer style on occasion, the holiday was good. Lots of family, presents, and food, and there's still another gathering this evening. I wound up a little mini-fridge for beverages in studio, a mortar & pestle for grinding herbs for soapmaking, some new towels, some luscious lotions, and a wealth of bookstore and Starbucks gift cards that will probably be used up in a week.The weather has been awful, an ice storm on Wednesday that made getting out of the city a nightmare and glassed over the trees until they split. Today, a white blanket over everything and giant, thick snowflakes. I've had my fill of winter and the direct flights to Myrtle Beach for the Rockford Airport seem ridiculously tempting, though I fear if I went, I might not come back.

I also had some unfortunate news from Ghost Road that they are, for all intensive purposes, ceasing any new publications due to a combination of factors (health problems of the editor and the economy) and that they won't be releasing girl show after all this year, which gives me a couple of choices. I can either resubmit it elsewhere (though I'd really like to focus on submitting the new book this year) or just bring the thing out as a dancing girl title later this year. The latter is especially tempting since I would have full say over layout and design, which makes my inner control freak very happy. On the other hand, even though I thankfully have gotten past that self-publication self-doubt and definitely believe this mss is ready to be released, I'm not sure, since I am definitely a newbie at the full-length book business, how much I can get the book successfully out there enough in the way that Ghost Road and Dusie have done such a good job with the previous books. In February dgp will be releasing Robyn Art's photog/poetry collab, and I was hoping to solicit a couple more mss I have my eye on for the coming year, but it's all very much in it's infancy. Of course, perhaps the best thing is trial by fire and just to go with it.

new from dancing girl press

noreply@blogger.com (kristy bowen) — Mon, 21 Dec 2009 19:30:00 +0000

Land Wide to Get a Hold Lost In / Shelly Taylor

A Classic Game of Murder/ Katie Cappello

The Plath Poems / Nava Fader

Silt / Erica Wright

The Chainsaw Bears / Erin Elizabeth Smith

People Who Are in Love Will Read This Book Differently / Cindy St. John

finally...

noreply@blogger.com (kristy bowen) — Sun, 20 Dec 2009 18:10:00 +0000

a new decade

noreply@blogger.com (kristy bowen) — Sat, 19 Dec 2009 22:13:00 +0000

It occured to me this week, and probably for the first time, that we are on the verge of closing out a decade. I guess maybe it seems sorta anti-climactic after the whole Millennium brou-haha..or maybe it's that people don't exactly know what to call this decade (the 70's, th 80's, the 90's, the what? Two-thousands sounds sort of clunky.) All in all, it's been a pretty great decade for me. I moved back to Chicago and found a job I rather liked. Managed to write enough to finish 4 books and somehow miraculously get three of them released(or will be soon). Started an online lit mag, then a chapbook press, then an art & design studio. Finished my MFA and finally learned not to take po-biz so seriously. Somehow aquired three more cats and lost one to old age. I read probably hundreds of books, commuted over 5000 times. Ate alot of Thai food and Starbucks. Have probably assembled close to 8000 chapbooks. Learned to like my body and love my sometimes godawful hair. Learned how I like to dress, what I like in bed, where to find the best thriftstore stuff, and how to fix my computer. Also, how make jewelry, code HTML, and how make a poems not suck so much. Developed an affinity for vintage pyrex and discovered that I was wrong for years about not liking guacamole.

It's been a pretty great 10 years..

last minute gifts?

noreply@blogger.com (kristy bowen) — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 16:51:00 +0000

From December 12th-December 18th, we will be shipping daily and upgrading all US domestic packages FREE to Priority Mail to help ensure pre-holiday delivery. Visit dulcet...

merrily along...

noreply@blogger.com (kristy bowen) — Sat, 12 Dec 2009 17:42:00 +0000

It's been a bit quiet here at the blog the past couple weeks as I've been making and packing things and working on a whole batch of new dgp books. I will be doing a GIANT press update next Friday, and depending how many titles I have done, is shaping up nicely, including titles by Erica Wright, Erin Elizabeth Smith, Katie Cappello, Shelly Taylor, Cindy St. John, and Nava Fader, all ready to print, and others in various stages of completion (about 6 or so) that will hopefully be nearly finished by then. I will also be, before Christmas, announcing the full-on lineup for next year as soon as I iron-out something like a schedule, but I can tell you now, it's pretty freakin awesome. There will also (FINALLY) be the full-length poetry/photo book by Robyn Art & Robin Barcus coming in February, as well as titles by Mary Ann Samyn and Jessica Bozek coming right after the first of the year..also a really interesting quirky little project from Ariana Sophia Kartsonis and Caleb Adler. And, of course, that is merely the beginning. I've resigned myself to lots of early mornings and late nights in the coming year, but what else is new?

Last week's open studio, which was paired with a big holiday celebration in the Fine Arts Building, was a huge success, but I find myself this weekend rushing to restock all the goodies that sold. The soap has been selling like hotcakes anyway, so that's what I will be working on mostly this weekend, in addition to some more flasks, some candles setting as we speak, and a couple other little things. I also have big plans for the shop after the holidays, including a line of wedding invites, some spiral journals and planners, those pesky pillows that I'm still perfecting, and new line of soaps that are more "manly" and less "girly" in all sorts of scents like wild sage, black currant, and sandalwood.

I am going to try, once again to get my Christmas tree up tomorrow..I've talked myself out of it twice now, but hopefully this time I will actually get it up. I think I am down to only the gifts I still have to make. The hardest of course were all the wee ones that seem to have started sprouting in the family, all of which need to be bought for, as well as the usual gifts for the immediate family, and the name exchange ones for both sides (both pretty easy ones). For the little ones, all under 2 years old, I got these puffy little fabric books (yeah, it's a little early for reading, but it's never to soon to start them off on a book addiction). For the oldest, who's 4 and unusually precocious apparently, I was thinking a totebag or pouch filled with all sorts of notebooks, pencils, and art supplies. When I was around 6, my aunt gave me something similar and while I barely remember all the Barbies and the gadgets I amassed at Christmas gatherings, I distinctly remember how I enamoured I was of the pens in different ink colors. Not much has changed. I was looking for cute kawaii stationery stuff on etsy and realizd I had about $40 worth in my cart and figured the 4 year old won't really care whether it came from Japan or the dollar store (where it probably comes from China). But, hell, I wanted the Japanese stuff for ME..(the scented highlighters wand decorative tape were especially covet-worthy.)

noreply@blogger.com (kristy bowen) — Sun, 06 Dec 2009 08:33:00 +0000

december1 by wickedpen featuring Rupert Sanderson shoes

noreply@blogger.com (kristy bowen) — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 00:42:00 +0000

That little sale below made for a very successful Black Friday/ Cyber Monday in the shop, so to keep the holiday momentum going, I've decided to offer free shipping worldwide on all jewelry and accessories all through December. Things are starting to get a little nuts as they always do, so I will most certainly be pulling some earlier mornings in the studio to get done everything I need to get done.

The weekend was the usual mess of family and too much food, and I was definitely feeling the cabin-fever restlessness that might mean cutting my Christmas visit a little shorter than I'd initially planned. I was so happy to sleep in my own bed last night. Plus I always feel like I'm just postponing the inevitable amount of work that I'm not getting done while I'm away, so it's hardly relaxing, not to mention actually getting ready to go out of town, the tying up of ends, the packing, the last minute prep is way too exhausting and I usually wind up spending the time away recovering from that which could have been avoided had I just stayed home in the first place.

noreply@blogger.com (kristy bowen) — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 18:27:00 +0000

dgp angst

noreply@blogger.com (kristy bowen) — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 17:29:00 +0000

I am beginning to wonder if it's more grueling to whittle down to 20 chaps from a current 32 contenders (and that's after 2 rounds of cuts) or to just publish the damn things, which actually seems like less work, or at least less mental work/anguish, than deciding among them which to keep, which to reject. Argh... I am hoping to decide by this afternoon. On one hand, I've been feeling the burn of being too overloaded. Things have been going very well as far as sales and income, so while budget concerns aren't really a determining factor, time is definitely an issue, even if I had some help. I am such a control freak, I doubt I could handle help anyway. I am thinking maybe I could plan for the next year and a half of books, which would work with the 32 I have, and then not accept submissions until the summer of 2011 for the following year. But then I also don't like giving poets such a long lead time until their books are out. Argh...

In the meantime, I am finishing up a couple of galleys to send to poets and just waiting til 5 o'clock when I can head out of town for some Turkey Day festivities, which will no doubt involve excessive stuffing consumption and Black Friday shopping exploits. I plan to buy everything on etsy this year, but I like to window shop and look for decorations. The goal was to get my tree up last weekend, but it just didn't happen, which means it will have to wait til the first weekend in December. I am actually a little excited by all the holiday glitz and twinkle lights for once. Christmas usually blindsides me, but this year I am ready.

new additions

noreply@blogger.com (kristy bowen) — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 06:12:00 +0000

green tea & ginger teacup candle $22 | dusty lavender hand dyed vintage slip $35| lavender hand dyed silk scarf $28 | mimosa goats milk soap $6.50

dulcet

things (both random and profound)

noreply@blogger.com (kristy bowen) — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 01:31:00 +0000

*I have a new poem in the inaugural issue a nifty little UK based journal Blue Eyed Boy Bait. Since I don't have the time to submit much new work out into the world these days, my new publication frisson was badly in need of a jolt. Maybe I will work harder on trying to fix this..

*In dgp news, Critical Mass, the blog for the National Book Critics Circle, gives a nice little nod to Flood Year and dgp...Karen Weyant also has some complementary things to say here.

*I will be announcing final decisions on next years publication slate in this next week, as well as releasing a couple of new titles as I finish them. I have just about every book for this year laid out and ready to go to the authors if they already haven't, so amazingly am feeling pretty much caught up if a little tardy. I have been working like a madwoman to get book stock built back up after the sale craziness and have been in the studio every morning over the last two weeks making books. My arm hurts a little from the trimmer and I have a couple of rather wicked papercuts but we are in good shape, especially since I inherited a hardly used swingline booklet stapler from the library when they were moving departments around that doesn't require me to jimmy the staples every time I use it..

* Next weekend I am participating in a poetry panel during the Open Books grand opening. It's two days of festivities and a bookstore with a great cause behind it. See more details here.

*I'm hitting that point in the year where the lack of daylight starts to make me a little melancholy. I feel like I notice it more on the weekends when I sleep later and then have only 5 or so hours of light in which to accomplish anything. At night, I keep thnking it's later than it is. At least during the week, I am up earlier and notice it less. There aren't any windows within my vantage point at the library, so it's not much different than a couple months ago, the plunge into nightfall so early. This is the time of year when I feel most like I could just give everything up and move toward the sun, how easily I could abandon Chicago and everything here, the life I've built, and run off to Aruba or somesuch. A few years ago, I even went so far as to search for jobs somewhere in the south, but was tethered here by the MFA program at the time. Even I know spring will come around again and I will be in love with Chicago all over again, but the winters just seem to get harder.

*I spent the weekend mostly on random crafty things, wrapping a ridiculous number of bars of soap, making a few more of the japanese teacup candles, tea towels, and some pillows that were actually a bust (well temporarily until I can get something else to do them correctly.) Last night, watched the original version of Quarantine, Rec, which was pretty much shot for shot the same, except in Spanish, but the end was a bit clearer and hell more scary. I also caught up on Fringe, but despite drooling like a schoolgirl over Joshua Jackson, have yet to warm to the characters enough to really like it, even though the premise and plotlines are interesting enough. I have also been reading a book called Ghostwalk by Rebecca Stott that dovetails nicely with that, all weird science and ghostly repetitions. I find myself devouring alot of fiction these days, novel after novel, mostly because of my problem with the sideways seating buses that allow less bouts of staring out the window and daydreaming. It also allows less time for obsessing, so maybe it's a good thing.

oh my, I am in love

noreply@blogger.com (kristy bowen) — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 01:03:00 +0000

Kono Barei, 1883
more

I've been looking over the past couple of days and old antiquarian botanical designs in hopes of using them for the labels of a new line of soaps, one of which will be a sweet green tea, a wine/floral flavored beaujolais, and a citrusy mimosa. I was working on the latter last night and my apartment smelled so delicious I hated to leave it this morning.

in progress

noreply@blogger.com (kristy bowen) — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 23:44:00 +0000

I am heading ever closer to my deadline for completely restocking the shop, which initially was mid-month, but now is looking more like Thanksgiving. I have some new candle projects, new slips in fallish colors, new postcards (pictures above) but also some other things still in the works, including pillows, some lovely hand-dyed silk scarves, new lip balm flavors and more. I will unveil more this week..keep an eye on the twitter feed to your lower right for updates...

people, places, things (November Edition)

noreply@blogger.com (kristy bowen) — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 02:58:00 +0000

to see: Playing with Pictures: The Art of Victorian Photocollage

to read: Marguerite Duras' entire oeuvre

to eat: cinnamon toast

to wear: this sweater dress

to watch:Fringe, Season 1

to listen: Fine Frenzy's Bomb in A Birdcage.

new postcard sneak peak

noreply@blogger.com (kristy bowen) — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 04:22:00 +0000

I've been working the last week or so on some new designs, both collage and some vignette photographs, as well as some new packaging for the cards...I've also been restocking notecards for the holiday season..We always seem to be running out of the dragonfly and the egg ones. My other weekend plans include a batch of flasks for a custom order, some bird ornaments, and some other little crafty surprises...

a review of The Sad Epistles

noreply@blogger.com (kristy bowen) — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 13:57:00 +0000

During my first reading of Emma Bolden’s The Sad Epistles, I was slightly worried that Bolden’s poems weren’t working hard enough, that the honest-to-god ache she relays, akin to the ache we often hear/feel in pop songs, wouldn’t be enough to carry me through the chapbook again and again. However, with subsequent readings, I fell more deeply in love with the poems and their earnestness, humor, and terror.

-Alan May

read more here

13 things I am loving

noreply@blogger.com (kristy bowen) — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 18:43:00 +0000

fall leaves
grey scarves
thick novels
violet pastille soap
cashmere turtlenecks
anything involving almonds
black opaque tights
the 2nd Season of Supernatural
baked potato soup from Corner Bakery
old graveyards
japanese tea sets
lockets
glassine envelopes

Exquisite: A Series of Corpses

noreply@blogger.com (kristy bowen) — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 20:59:00 +0000

Exquisite: A Series of Corpses
October 30, 2009 7:00pm - 11:00pm
NNWAC/St. Paul's Cultural Center, 2215 W. North Avenue, Chicago

Exquisite: A Series of Corpses
Interactive Text/Visual Art Series Launches on Halloween Eve
CIMM Fest to also Exhibit Films, Music
All on Fri., Oct. 30, 7 - 11 p.m.

Consider it Chicago's largest Halloween party for visual artists, poets, and writers.

Plastique Press and the Near Northwest Arts Council present a new interactive poetry/visual art series - Exquisite: A Series of Corpses. Poets and writers will join artists on stage with a live model, drawing materials, and typewriters. Poets and writers are asked to create new works, hand or typewritten, based on the model, the art, the event, the people. Artists are asked to draw about the same, including the written works. The result will be a sort of immediate broadside. Sound and video artists are also invited to come and create new works based on the event.

This event follows in the history of exquisite corpse parlor games. Exquisite corpse is a method by which a collection of words or images is collectively assembled by a group of people. Each collaborator adds to a composition in sequence, either by following a rule or by being allowed to see the end of what the previous person contributed. Exquisite takes place at the Near Northwest Arts Council at St. Paul's Cultural Center where the exhibition Binary: A Pairing of Opposite States is currently on view. This event is an extension of the Wetware Render Machine drawing performance that happened there on Fri., Oct. 9 to great fanfare and with beautiful results.

Plastique Press will then publish an enhanced eBook of the works produced that night, with each poet, writer, and artist being credited as an author. Sound, text, visual art, and video will become part of the final book.

Works produced during Exquisite will be hung in the exhibition space through Nov. 7, 2009.
The eBook will be released in early 2010.

CIMMFest will also present a series of short films during the event. There will be music as well.

EVENT INFO:
Exquisite: A Series of Corpses
Oct. 30, 7 - 11 p.m., FREE, costumes welcome
NNWAC/St. Paul's Cultural Center, 2215 W. North Avenue, Chicago
Event takes place upstairs. CIMMFest will present short films downstairs.

Audience participation welcome; scheduled participants include:

Karen Becker, Ray Bianchi (Cracked Slab Books), Waltraud Haas Bianchi, Kristy Bowen (Dancing Girl Press), Melanie Brown, Mia Capodilupo, Joshua Cotter, Skye Enyeart-Rust, Philip Jenks, Dana Major Kanovitz, Jacob Knabb (ACM), Francesco Levato (Poetry Center of Chicago, Plastique), Lauren Levato, Darrell Roberts, Adam Rust, Fred Sasaki (Poetry Magazine), Larry Sawyer (Milk Mag, Myopic), Momoko Usami, Lina Ramona Vitkauskas, Barbara Wakefield, Jackie White and others not mentioned here, including audience members. Artists models: Dalawn Simpson and another TBA.

About Plastique Press - www.plastiquepress.com

About CIMM Fest - www.cimmfest.org

About NNWAC - www.nnwac.org

For more information contact:
Lauren Levato, Plastique Press, 773/640-4522 or ladybeetle@laurenlevato.com
Laura Weathered, NNWAC, 773/278-7677

sunday reveal

noreply@blogger.com (kristy bowen) — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 03:01:00 +0000

new in the shop...

noreply@blogger.com (kristy bowen) — Sat, 24 Oct 2009 05:23:00 +0000

I've yet again made it to the end of the week and only accomplished about half of the to do list that I made Sunday night, but perhaps I am just being way too dreadfully ambitious when I make the list. I did finally finish up the last two chaps of the latest batch and have been printing and assembling over the past few days, but then there is also the next ones to lay out and a good chunk of new manuscripts left to wade through and make final cuts. Out of the initial batch, I was able to cut them by a third down to a manageable number to read more closely in the second round, but that's still a sizeable number of manuscripts for only so many slots. I am determined yet again to make sure that for every book that I we publish by someone whose work I'm familiar with (via aquaintance, having followed their work or published them before, having solicited a mss, etc..) I want to publish an equal number of folks I've never heard hide nor hair of.

Once again, I am astounded by the things people send us..so much of it, even the things I've had to reject, is at the very least publishable, even if not to my personal taste. I have to admit, I initially worried a little. After the P&W article a couple of years ago, I feared that with a bit higher a profile we might attract the slushiest of the slush pile, but submissions have remained strong, and so many poets have found us by word of mouth. We get more than I ever dreamed we would, and who would have known it from the rather inauspicious first round of subs--I think there were around 20 maybe..

At the same time I'm torn... part of me says keep forging onward and keep publishing as many books as I want, taking whatever mss I just have to have, and the other impulse which wants to kick me in the head and ask me what the hell I was thinking taking on so many books and falling always behind.. There has to be a balance in there, between this year's insane schedule and cutting back too much.

I am also busily packing and filling chapbook orders from the Fall sale, which will continue through the end of this month...we got slammed with orders in the most delightful way, and I'm running about two or so weeks behind, but am progessing slowly, so they should be on their way soon. The stock has dwindled to the point where I have to make everything on demand, so it's taking me a little longer to get thm out than usual..I also have a new subscriber batch of new books set to go out next week as soon as I print the shipping labels.

This weekend it's more manuscripts and the Rock the Vote event tomorrow night. Then Sunday, perhaps some True Blood viewing courtsy of Netflix (I am undecided about the show just yet but am only a couple episodes in) and maybe some jewelry making. I also have alot of listing to do for an etsy shop I am helping one of my co-workers with in terms of the administrative/design side of things. He makes some rather beautiful and interesting earrings of the more earthy, sculptural variety. You can check out his shop here: minerology.etsy.com

saturday night

noreply@blogger.com (kristy bowen) — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 21:01:00 +0000

I will be reading with a few other poets in between the music sets at this event, which looks to be excellent fun and great cause.

Rock the Independent Vote!
Music, Poetry, Candidates, & more!
Saturday, October 24th
8pm-12am
Weed's Tavern
1555 N Dayton St

Old Town/River North, Chicago
312-943-7815
El: Red to North/Clybourn

new from dancing girl press

noreply@blogger.com (kristy bowen) — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 20:15:00 +0000

Deirdre Dore’s poetry and plays have been published and/or produced in journals and on stages in the USA & Canada. Originally from New York, she now lives with her husband alongside a river in British Columbia where she catches horses, pursues an MFA in Creative Writing and works with trees.

sample poem

Jacqueline Lyons is the author of the poetry collection The Way They Say Yes Here (Hanging Loose Press, 2004). Her poetry and essays have appeared in many literary journals as well as the poetry anthology Oh One Arrow (Flim Forum Press, 2007). She has received a National Endowment for the Arts Poetry Fellowship, the Peace Corps Writers Best Poetry Book Award, the Indiana Review Poetry Prize, and a Nevada Arts Council Fellowship. Her nonfiction has been nominated for Pushcart Prizes and cited in Best American Essays. She is a certified instructor of Ashtanga Vinyasa Yoga, and teaches creative writing at Washington State University.

sample poem

Sara Tracey is a poet and PhD student at the University of Illinois at Chicago. Her work has recently appeared in Hiram Poetry Review, Keep Going, Harpur Palate, Wicked Alice, Lily, Hobble Creek Review, and FRiGG.

sample poem

Author of How To Study Birds, a chapbook collection in its second run from Dancing Girl Press, Sarah Gardner is a poet and teacher whose work has appeared in many distinguished journals. She has received fellowships for her writing from Blue Mountain Center as well as the Vermont Studio Center. Her recognitions include an International Merit Award from The Atlanta Review and second place honors from the Juniper Creek poetry contest. She has been proudly affiliated with Houston’s Writers in the Schools, a program the brings creative writing instruction to at-risk youth. Currently she lives in Iowa and teaches for St. Ambrose University. Sarah holds an MFA from Syracuse.

sample poem

Jen Blair spends a lot of time personifying vegetation in writing and photography. She also makes books and pamphlets, and writes essays and poems about her social concerns. For a living Jen tells Returning Adult Students what classes to take in college, but she is perfectly happy to give you advice for free. Her work has appeared previously in wicked alice.

sample poem