Arsenal Pulp Press

Sub Rosa

gwen — Thu, 24 Mar 2011 20:00:00 +0000

The story of Sub Rosa is bizarre, surreal, intensely wonderful, and horrible at the same time. You must read this with an open mind and heart. The story focuses on Little, a runaway girl who is lost in the world and herself, who gets rescued by a "daddy" and whisked away to the land of Sub Rosa, a magical street of Glories and their working families. Glories are sex workers with charms—they all have different magical powers. There's always food and sunny days on Sub Rosa—no one gets killed or cries. You're taken care of. But there is an underlying feeling of loss on Sub Rosa, too. Your real name can be forgotten, and cherished memories of your life before coming to Sub Rosa are hard to dig up. You're protected on Sub Rosa, but you still lose your identity. There's plenty of work, filled with "live ones" (johns) and some of the nights detailed in the story seem to drain all the energy and power out of the girls. They are empowered though, by the large sums of cash they receive and the ability to heal the live ones and make them "right" again.

I embraced these characters. They are decked with butterfly adornments and glitter make-up, eat pastries from a bakery called Babycakes, and wash and buy their gorgeous clothes out of the most appealing sounding laundromat I've ever heard of. They study science and marine biology. They live on a street where people make offerings to the tar patches in front of their houses. There was so much weird beauty in their existence. At the same time, I felt weighed down by their constant need for attention from the men, both the daddies (pimps) and the lives ones. I had to think about this journey again and again. Do Little and the rest of the Glories really live a life of salvation? What I realized is that I don't think that's the main point of this story. The more I thought about it, the more I realized that this magical tale of prostitutes and a street where goodness prevails is showing the light and dark of sex work. It's where the grit of working streets becomes a fantasy rich with complexity. A hint of glow-in-the-dark nail polish flashes through my mind, the smell of freshly laundered dresses. Little's story and the rest of the Glories' stories continue to stay with me, a testament to Amber Dawn's vivid storytelling.

Written by: Maleka Fruean, March 24th 2011

Ripe from Around Here

barbara — Mon, 08 Nov 2010 00:00:00 +0000

By jae steele

Arsenal Pulp Press

I'm an avid vegan cookbook collector, and Ripe From Around Here is more than a vegan cookbook. jae steele, a holistic nutritionist from Toronto, offers a neat little package of sustainability, mindfulness, and the politics of food in addition to vegan gourmet recipes in the end. She really does pack it in—the first five chapters alone touch on local eating, container gardening, mindfulness, canning, natural housecleaning, worm composting (vermicomposting), and a four season overview of how to be healthy through the perspective of traditional Chinese medicine. I really enjoyed reading the paragraphs on how to eat an apple mindfully, and what to holistically focus on during each of the four seasons to promote overall well-being.

But what about the recipes? Yay! The rest of the chapters are a vegan journey, taking us through how to make your own oat milks, nut milks, and rice milks (how much more local can you get?) to West African Groundnut Stew. My mother-in-law and I tried the Tomato Chard Bake the first few days I had the book, and were definitely pleased. A little warning though... the bake took an hour to prepare. This is not fast food, folks. If you have three hungry children waiting for dinner, you have to be strategic about making these kinds of entrees.

You can definitely tell that steele is a nutrition counselor too, because many of her recipes call for spelt and oat flours, coconut oils, and other ingredients you might not immediately have lying around or can pick up at your local corner store. Some of the ingredients will be more expensive. Convenience and price are two big factors for myself and most struggling people I know. I've come to a personal revelation though that perhaps as people in the U.S., maybe we should be spending more money on the food we eat. Michael Pollan, of Omnivore's Dilemma fame, mentioned once that our portions of income on food has declined but our spending on health care has increased. Food is health care.

Ripe From Around Here comes right on time, adding to the zeitgeist of getting back to the basics, eating more locally (and with real food!), and supporting a growing sustainability movement. It can be challenging sometimes to find the time and money, but after finding ways to work it, sitting down to your own homemade Grandmother Palmer's Baked Beans (baked for over four hours!) will be worth it. Mine are just starting to simmer and they smell delicious.

Written by: Maleka Fruean, November 7th 2010

Ripe From Around Here

andrea — Thu, 04 Nov 2010 00:00:00 +0000

By jae steele

Arsenal Pulp Press

When jae steele’s Ripe From Around Here arrived, it joined a pile of vegan library books on my kitchen table. I needed inspiration and fresh ideas, and hoped one of the books would help. steele’s book was the star. These are the recipes that will become everyday favorites, and the ones that omnivores will devour, blissfully unaware that no animal products are present.

The first part of Ripe From Around Here lays out steele’s philosophical interests and approach to food. As a holistic nutritionist, steele hopes readers will slow down and eat healthful foods. She presents helpful health information without sounding preachy or heavy-handed. I especially appreciated her emphasis on mindful eating—the importance of taking time to notice our food with all of our senses. The section on seasonal influences, inspired by traditional Chinese medicine, has interesting and practical ideas. steele lays out the numerous food choices available to North American consumers—organic, local—and offers advice on the various benefits.

The recipes are flexible enough to work for cooks who find it challenging to prepare any dinner at all, as well as those who aspire to do things as much from scratch as possible. These dishes are not just for the virtuous; plenty of dessert is included too. Some of the recipes put a tasty twist on dishes I already make, such as root and barley soup and Mexican stuffed bell peppers. Others, created more for special occasions, I look forward to hungrily. Blueberry lavender ice cream, made with coconut milk, tops this list, followed closely by rosemary mushroom gravy. The tomato chard bake and herbed garden biscuits are sure to become staples in my house.

steele strikes me as a very practical idealist. She does not expect diet purity from readers, but offers up options so that we can make informed choices. For example, many of the recipes call for spelt flour and sunflower oil; steele cites why these are her preferred options, but also knows readers will substitute to suit individual preferences.

As her title hints, steele encourages the use of local ingredients. She also recognizes (as a resident of Toronto) that many delectable ingredients would have to be omitted, and sorely missed, if one sticks to a strictly local diet plan. The key, I think, is to appreciate a lemon as a gift from a warmer climate, and to not take it for granted. Thoughtful, reflective eating can help our health and our local economies.

I actively seek out vegan recipes for their flavors as well as healthfulness. I love the creative use of produce and the variety of grains found in innovative vegan kitchens. Ripe From Around Here provides plenty of tasty options to explore, and steele’s blog offers additional recipes and kitchen ideas. Overall, steele presents food as an opportunity for joy and pleasure.

Written by: Lisa Rand, November 3rd 2010

The Nearest Exit May Be Behind You

admin — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 17:01:00 +0000

By S. Bear Bergman

Arsenal Pulp Press

Gender, sex, and queer theory aren’t exactly what come to mind when I think of an easy read. I remember being duped into reading one of Anne Fausto-Sterling’s books, Sexing the Body, which begins with the story of a female athlete, Maria Patino, stripped of her medals when it was determined by doctors that she had been born with a condition known as androgen insensitivity. She was biologically male, but her body did not respond accordingly.

After this first anecdotal queer foray, Fausto-Sterling dives head first into the theory and science of it all. Although wildly interesting, theory is something that I can only take in small doses, and Sexing the Body took me some time to read. This is where S. Bear Bergman’s book enters at a seemingly oppositional point in style. The Nearest Exit May Be Behind You is a collection of essays on queer and transgender issues that begins like the story of Maria, and continues in this vein for the duration of the book while still getting the important, theoretical points across and engaging the reader in a way that almost no queer theory book has before.

This is not to say that Bergman’s book isn’t smart. It is. It’s full of big words and heady concepts, but ze delivers them in a way that is thoughtful to the reader, a kind of fireside chat of topics that are usually spoken about in academic settings. Bergman’s gift of storytelling illuminates the evolving nuances of queer and trans life, and one of the greatest elements of hir book is that ze has a way of making the personal not only political, but public and shared as well.

Most essays begin with a story from Bergman’s life, and then weave the details of the stories, which deal with queer life in practice, into queer life in theory. Some essays are on the cutting edge, like “Passing,” which deals with the use, or misuse, of a word that inflicts responsibility of understanding onto the person in question. Not only does Bergman discuss the problematic use of this word, ze offers a solution-reading-that assigns responsibility to the observer. Other essays, like “The Velveteen Tranny,” is an honest and heartfelt look at Bergman’s dissatisfaction with the sexes and genders that are culturally provided–even the non-normative ones-and ache that surrounds the desire to feel real.

The essays in The Nearest Exit May Be Behind You are at times hilarious, thought provoking, sad, and even painful. Few books discuss queer and trans topics in such a personal way, and this book does a great service to contributing to the growing canon of queer literature. By making hir experiences visible, Bergman provides yet another narrative within the LGBTQ discourse, and lengthens the spectrum of possibility even further, one essay at a time.

Written by: Krista Ciminera, January 14th 2010

The SimplyRaw Living Foods Detox Manual

admin — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 16:16:00 +0000

By Natasha Kyssa

Arsenal Pulp Press

Which should I do first, save my butt or save the planet? The SimplyRaw Living Foods Detox Manual contains much useful information, but it appears that any local food aspirations may conflict with many of the program's staples. Some recipes incorporate avocados, bananas, and papayas. The modern world that poisons us also includes the technology that permits year-round tropical fruits.

SimplyRaw is a company that assists people in improving health and well-being. Natasha Kyssa, a raw foods cook and lifestyle coach, is its founder. This manual details her twenty-eight-day raw-and-living-foods-only detox program. Raw and living foods are those that have been soaked, sprouted, or fermented.

The last time I followed a naturopathic food plan, I definitely felt better, but I am not certain that it would be considered 'gentle.' This method claims to be kind and effective, purging poisons from the body and supplying healing nutrients. Her site cites National Geographic: "Chemicals that suffuse modern life—from well-known toxins to newer compounds with unknown effect—are building up in our bodies and sometimes staying there for years."

Given decades of accumulation, it seems rather ambitious to clean out one's system in a month, but the claimed benefits include increased energy levels, better digestion, weight loss, clear sinuses, and improved sleeping in addition to decreased toxicity. This book provides over one hundred recipes nutritional information and implementation suggestions. There are descriptions of complementary therapies such as dry skin brushing, tongue scraping, mini-trampolines, saltbaths, and colonics. Lists of recommended whole foods and herbal teas are also included.

Written by: Erika Mikkalo, October 5th 2009

Fist of the Spider Woman: Tales of Fear and Queer Desire

admin — Thu, 14 May 2009 10:34:00 +0000

Edited by Amber Dawn

Arsenal Pulp Press

A clever play on the seminal novel Kiss of the Spider Woman by Argentine writer and political exile Manuel Puig, Amber Dawn’s anthology Fist of the Spider Woman: Tales of Fear and Queer Desire promises a transgressive alternative to traditional horror literature and its stereotypical, categorical portrayals of women and their sexuality. Packed in this slim volume are seventeen individual works by sixteen authors, primarily short stories with poems dispersed in between. The very existence and formation of a work like Fist of the Spider Woman is deeply political and feminist through its aggregate of queer and progressive writers as well as its subversive representations of women, sex, love and relationships.

That being said, I really wanted to like this book. I wanted to love it with a capital L. Unfortunately, for such an exciting and politically charged production, this book ultimately failed to hook me as its reader. As is a reality for many anthologies, the quality and effectiveness varied from work to work. I did not expect shivers, gasps nor stiffened hairs as part of my reading experience; however, most of the pieces failed to render any kind of response other than blasé tolerance as I turned their pages. The promise this book carries is great, but unfortunately lacking in its execution. They did, however, contain an element of playful twistedness and imagination. I appreciated that the writers did not shy away from taboo subjects, with stories such as Michelle Tea’s “Crabs” (which I found quite enjoyable, and ended being my personal favorite) exploding in raw, corporeal descriptions fused with humor.

Overall, Fist of the Spider Woman's countering portrayal of women characters (especially its villains) is refreshing in comparison to the saturation of femme fatales and damsels in distress one is offered in typical literature, but these radical character productions are sadly overshadowed by tepid prose. Queer horror literature has such transformative potential, and though I wouldn’t say this work embodied that, it is an honest start.

Written by: Yujean Park, May 14th 2009

Scrapbook of My Years as a Zealot

admin — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 22:43:00 +0000

By Nicole Markotić

Arsenal Pulp Press

Previous portrayals of Mormonism in popular media have been widely negative, expressed primitively through cheap jokes about polygamy. Recently, with the emergence of the HBO show Big Love, a positive light has been shown on the teachings of Joseph Smith, founder of the Latter Day Saints movement. We find ourselves rooting for the Mormon family in the show, which fights to keep together despite the banning of polygamy by the Church of Latter Day Saints over 100 years ago. Informative to some extent yet largely based on shock value, I wanted to learn more of the cultural elements of Mormonism than Big Love provides. Nicole Markotić’s new novel, Scrapbook of My Years as a Zealot, offers the reader a closer look into the tenets of Mormonism through the fictional narrative of an adolescent girl.

Growing up in Western Canada, the anonymous female narrator navigates the reader through a non-linear story of her time as a member of the Mormon Church. The daughter of European immigrants, she struggles to maintain a relationship with her atheist Croatian mother while also coping with her ailing German father’s sudden conversion to parenting. At such an impressionable age in junior high school, she gravitates towards Mormonism through her best friend Vera. She uses Mormonism as a way to isolate herself from her stifling family and immerse herself in a uniquely North American culture. Starting with her wardrobe and trickling down into her daily diet, she adheres to a rigid following of the religion in order to create stability within her life.

The novel shifts back and forth between adolescence and adulthood, when she ultimately leaves the Mormon Church. As an adult, the narrator begins working with delinquent children, and becomes involved with a “Jack” Mormon named Darius who, like her, was once apart of the church and knows what it is like to leave. Their vapid relationship, due to Darius’s sexual guilt leftover from his involvement with the church, Vera’s return into her life, and the constant scrutiny she receives for once being involved with Mormonism, only furthers her self-discovery while also pushing her closer to her family.

Upon first hearing about Scrapbook of My Years as a Zealot I was led to believe that it would be a nonfiction narrative of a young girl’s journey through joining the LDS church. While initially disappointed to learn that the book was fiction, I was quickly drawn into the relationships between characters and the use of Mormonism as a means to figure out ones adolescence. While it may not have been the most forthcoming writing on Mormonism, Scrapbook of My Years as a Zealot is definitely an entertaining read for one looking to skim the surface of the controversial religion.

Written by: Cynthia Schemmer, April 30th 2009

Comfort Food for Breakups: The Memoir of a Hungry Girl

admin — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 13:09:00 +0000

By Marusya Bociurkiw

Arsenal Pulp Press

“Soup can sometimes take the place of language...” Marusya Bociurkiw writes in Comfort Food for Breakups, and as the aroma of my mother’s broth, sipped to ease sickness, floods my tongue, I too hunger for my mother’s absent touch, for my young daughter knees, for my queer body.

Born in Canada to Ukrainian exiles, Bociurkiw weaves stories interspersed with recipes, travels, and tales of other refugees. Food is the conduit that allows her to traverse centuries and continents, a movement that turns meals and particular dishes into landmarks. Between two or more people, the preparation and ingestion of food becomes for her a conversation, one that revolves around fullness and emptiness, absence and presence.

In Bociurkiw’s hunger-propelled memoirs, food, entwined with the senses, connects her to blood, to her body, to stories and memory. Eating and cooking are central to rituals of celebration, mourning, and gossip that engage her family, friends and lovers. During a romantic break-up she loses her appetite, yet the death of her brother makes her hungry.

It is through the landscape of the kitchen that Bociurkiw explores her connection to her mother’s body, her grandmother’s body and a matriarchal lineage in which she finds herself entangled. Her relationship to food allows her to break apart her own constructed femininities, against which her queerness acts as a transformative catalyst, informing how she inhabits her desire.

As Bociurkiw repeatedly returns to Ukraine and Vancouver, both in journey and in memory, she searches for the precise ingredients that feed her hunger. Whether opening her door to a stranger or taking care of a loved one, food becomes her language, a form of communication that stands in for what she finds difficult to say. Between immigration, silence and belonging, she hungers to taste something familiar in a strange place. She eats to get back home.

Written by: Alysha Wood, August 31st 2007