And that is what happens in Deborah Brown English‘s debut illustrated novel, Time’s Breath: An Odyssey in words and Pictures.

Dan Fesperman, former foreign correspondent for the Baltimore Sun turned author of intrigue and suspense, is coming out with his thirteenth novel this month. It’s called Pariah, and it was a pleasure to speak to Dan about it.

Image courtesy of Simon & Schuster

You know Claire McCardell through ballet flats, mix-and-match separates, pockets, zippers, leggings, and more, yet she remains the most influential fashion designer you’ve never heard of. Elizabeth Evitts Dickinson has set out to change that with her book, Claire McCardell: The Designer Who Set Women Free.

The Opposite of Cruelty, newly released by Blair Publishing, is the second poetry collection from Steven Leyva. It was an enormous pleasure to catch up with an old MFA alum.

Annie Fullard, Director of Chamber Music at Peabody Conservatory and founding member of the Cavani String Quartet, along with Dorianne Cotter-Lockard, who is on the faculty at Saybrook University and consults in the areas of team collaboration and music education, have published a book called The Art of Collaboration: Chamber Music Rehearsal Techniques and Team Building, published by Oxford University Press. They’re my guests on BookNotes this month.

Hiram Larew, who generously underwrites BookNotes through his Cynipid Fund, is out with his seventh poetry collection, This Much Very, published by Alien Buddha Press. I spoke with Hiram by phone.

Image: www.bancroftpress.com

Amy L. Bernstein—novelist, journalist, speechwriter, playwright, poet, and writing coach—has written a book about that insidious feeling that plagues all creatives: Doubt. I talked to her about wrangling the monster.

Cover image credit: “Faraway Tables” by Gene McCormick

Fiction and travel writer Eric D. Goodman is out with his first poetry collection: Faraway Tables. He’s my first guest on BookNotes for 2025.

Image: Barrelhouse website

Tracy Dimond is following up the publication of four chapbooks of poetry with her first full-length poetry collection, Emotion Industry. She’s my guest on BookNotes this month.

Portuguese Jews and New Christians in Colonial Brazil, 1500-1822: A New Geography of the Atlantic World is the title of the new book being published this month by geographer Alan Marcus. I spoke to him for BookNotes.