In Nothing Got Broke, Larry Slonaker does a remarkable thing: He puts you firmly on the Hi-Line of Montana, sends the ceaseless wind swirling around you, gives you a taste of the beer, and sets you up with a view down Main Street and into the hearts, hopes, and broken dreams of the people in that place. That he gets Montana comes shimmering off these pages…. Slonaker reveals it with appropriate measures of reverence and unflinching candor.

—Craig Lancaster, author of And It Will Be a Beautiful Life and 600 Hours of Edward

Doug Rossiter has a secret, and in the spirit of modern Western writers Kevin McCafferty and C. J. Box, Larry Slonaker roots us firmly in today’s Montana as that secret is slowly revealed. Along the way, Slonaker holds up a mirror for us, where we can ponder Rossiter’s ruminations on the truths of Manifest Destiny in the American West, and squirm because they cut so close to the bone.

—Doug Pope, author of The Way to Gaamaak Cove

Larry Slonaker knows the raw world he writes of, in this gritty narrative slashed with liberal dashes of noir. He demonstrates a sharp eye for details that count and a keen ear for dialogue inflected with regional accents.

—Ron McFarland, author of The Rockies in First Person and Appropriating Hemingway

About Cirque Press

Cirque Press was established in 2017, to publish the work of writers from Alaska and the Northwest.

It developed quite naturally from Cirque Journal, established in 2008.

Sandra Kleven and Michael Burwell are founders, editors and publishers.… Read More

“I felt like I was swept downstream in a fastmoving river, bounced off rocks, swirled into eddies, and spit out on the bank to dry. Feldman’s storytelling is expertly crafted, visceral and raw though he skillfully manages to squeeze in charm and tenderness to boot. In other words, this book has it all. A meaty, passionate, sexy mystery that will twist your gut. Take a big bite and chew a while on Feldman’s whodunit. It’s really, really good.”

—Monica Devine, author of Water Mask

“Crisp dialogue drives the action at high-speed in this short novel that takes place in a small town, where a local boy who left to become an LA detective returns from an Internal Affairs Group investigation as a suspect in a gruesome murder. Add romance and lust. What more could you want?”

—Ron McFarland, author of The Rockies in First Person, Subtle Thieves, and Stranger in Town

 
About Cirque Press

Cirque Press was established in 2017, to publish the work of writers from Alaska and the Northwest.

It developed quite naturally from Cirque Journal, established in 2008.

Sandra Kleven and Michael Burwell are founders, editors and publishers.… Read More

Author Index

Buffy McKay is a poet of power. In Salt & Roses, she looks hard at life across a range of free verse, villanelles, and haikus, and leaves us with poignant and glimmering lines that can stop you dead in your tracks. When she captures the ethereal essence of inner and outer landscapes, you can imagine her with the likes of Mary Oliver and Elizabeth Bishop, sipping tea and swapping lines about fish.

— Doug Pope, author of The Way to Gaamaak Cove

The gorgeous poems in Buffy McKay’s Salt & Roses traverse the wilds of Alaska and comb the watery landscapes of Rhode Island and Scotland. McKay’s connection to each place runs deep, and these roots she shares in a generous and loving way. In one poem, she illustrates how ancestry lives in a smoked fish and her mother’s word for it: dunghnak. This collection sensually explores the lands dear to McKay, family homelands which nourish her body as well as her soul. She captures life’s beauty with a wide-angle lens. Yes, there are salt and roses within these pages, but also cancer, death, loss, and regret. More than a book of poems, Salt & Roses is a book of prayers.

— Martha Amore, author of In the Quiet Season and Other Stories

Pomace stubbles the pint glass
Buffy in Scotland
One day of sun, three of rain
Buffy in a cabin in Skagway, Alaska
My hand, fingers spread
Holds my chest
The river is the voice of always
Adept as the moon of your fingernail
Describes the skin on my body
October
Buffy practicing her regret
To her indigenous mother
Her spine creaks
She fiddles with words
To make this beautiful book

— James P. Sweeney, author of A Thousand Prayers: Alaska Climbing Expedition: Marine Life Solidarity… Read More

Margo Waring’s poetry is tuned to the pitch and roll of the seasons. Just as spring returns cyclically to Southeast Alaska’s beaches, forest paths, and mountain peaks, youth too ebbs and flows in the present tense, permeating old age. In this, these poems teach us to let memory carry us forward with the same agility that it carries us back. I will listen to my stream, writes Waring. Hear it dissolve in the sea.

— Corinna Cook, author of Leavetakings

Margo Waring writes beautifully of place, time, memory, and aging. Her years of attention to the changing seasons and climate of southeast Alaska uncover, like March’s melting snows, her awareness of life’s gifts and the losses that come to us all.

— Nancy Lord, former Alaska writer laureate and author of Fishcamp, Beluga Days, and pH: A Novel… Read More

This heartwarming book maps the humor and curiosity of kids as they learn the meaning of words and the logic that underpins their experiences. In these vignettes for grown-ups, Tami Phelps, a Montessori teacher for 20 years, describes encounters with her students as they process the world around them. In their innocence, young children are at once naïve and brilliantly perceptive. They often miss the mark, which is precisely what makes these stories so hilarious. And it’s not often students stay in touch with their kindergarten teachers, but the author’s former student illustrated the book to boot! These stories will make you smile, and remember how the best teachers can make a lasting mark on the rest of your life.

—Monica Devine, author of Water Mask

Our daughter was a Montessori kid through and through. Her journey began with Miss Tami and she loved it. When asked on the last day of her kindergarten year what she wished for, her answer: “another 100 days of school.” Montessori teachers are different and Ms. Tami is one of the best.

—Peter and Cindy Ljubicich, colleague and parents

“Dear Miss Tami,
Thank you for teaching me to think and read. I hope you never die.
Love, Alexander”

(4th grade writing assignment to a former teacher)

 
Circles by Cirque Press
Announcing Circles, a new imprint of Cirque Press designed for illustrated books. Look to these engaging books for image and light, fun and fantasy, mystery and music. Circles focuses on the singing of the spheres, the clock of the seasons, the mirth of the hyena, and the renewal of legend and myth.… Read More