Thank you Frank Murphy for your years of service in making Home Planet News Online possible. Issue #10 is truly spectacular!
Proud to be on the editorial team with: Linda Lerner David Gershator Phillis Gershator Lehman Weichsellbaum Matthew Paris Jackie Coleman-Fried Cheryl A. Rice Amy Barone
Dear Poets, Writers, Artist, I am sending out this email to remind everyone that the deadline for this issue is 10/15/2022. That’s an extension from the 10/1. I will do my best to get the magazine out by mid-November—and certainly by the end of November. If any poet, writer, or artist has a book coming out, and is being published in this issue, I will give the details of the publication. What I need for this is The name of the book, author, publisher, the price, and a link to where it may be purchased. Please get materials in asap because there’s still a lot of work to be done on the magazine. Stay well, Frank
May is warming up, and the days are longer, which means more time for reading.
Thank you Alien Buddha Press and my copy editor, Cindy Hochman of “100 Proof” Copyediting Services, for believing in my Angel Fire’s value.
Angel Fire is a novel, inspired by personal experiences and nightmares, that delves into the lives of three women protagonists, Sarah Kahn, Kate Robbins, and Dana Chu, living and working in New York City during the ’90s through the post- 9/11 world and the Obama election. The book is comprised of over 57,000 words, broken down into twenty-one chapters and an epilogue. The narrative contains elements of magic realism/ urban fantasy, and beyond the wry humor, there are bizarre twists involving erotic dreams, curses, cats, and paranormal visitations from a precocious ten-year-old girl named Allie, turning this story into a psychological thriller.
Praise for Angel Fire . . .
From Peter Marra:
. . . In Angel Fire, her debut novel, Patricia Carragon expertly crafts a tale that captures the essence of what life was like in the beginning of the new millennium. What starts out as a drama soon morphs into a supernatural thriller—an emotional roller coaster populated with fantastic characters who will stay with you for a long time. Angel Fire will keep you riveted until the last page.
From Thaddeus Rutkowski:
. . . Through twists and turns, and the disaster of 9/11, the stakes rise for all of the heroines, and we follow their lives with growing apprehension as we discover their fates. Carragon gives us a sharp-edged picture of people we see every day, but whose inner demons are rarely revealed.
From Charles Rammelkamp:
. . . like nested Russian dolls, the stories are contained within other stories written by other writers, until, in a dazzling epilogue, we learn the final version of the puzzle that makes up these words. Or do we? The final sentence revives the delicious ambiguity. Patricia Carragon’s novel is an impressive construction of plot and character, particularly for those who love a gothic tale, and, more philosophically, reflections on the written word, its origins and influence.
Due to in-person venue cancellations, I will be posting the link to purchasing my debut novel, Angel Fire, on Amazon.Since these copies will be shipped from Amazon, they will not be signed.
If you want your signed copy from me, please send a personal message to pcarragon@gmail.com. Payment will be done on PayPal to pcarragon@gmail.com as a friend, not as a business. The cost will be $18, which includes shipping/handling. I do not charge for tax! If you don’t have PayPal, then I will accept a money order. Once the payment is done either through PayPal or money order, I will ship the book to you.Please don’t forget to give me your home address to ship the book.
Dear friends, poets, writers, and artist. Home Planet News is now accepting material for our next edition. We are looking for poems, stories, reviews, essays, plays, memoirs, and graphic art of every type. We accept writing in Spanish with or without translations. We also accept works in other languages with translations and the author’s permission. Our deadline will be 10/1/22, and we will work hard to have the issue published by the end of the year. In submitting your work, please have your name on the first page of the work you’re submitting. In submitting reviews, please give the name of the press, the price, the number of pages, and, if possible, a link to the publisher or to any source where the book can be obtained.
Poet Matt Morris has been added to our list of editors and is incredibly helpful in making this issue possible. Home Planet News could use another editor. Someone who is either familiar with or willing to learn some basic WordPress, and we could always use another proofreader.
Angel Fire, Carragon’s Debut Novel from Alien Buddha Press,
After years in the making, Angel Fire is now a reality. Thank you Alien Buddha Press and my copy editor, Cindy Hochman of “100 Proof” Copyediting Services, for believing in my debut novel’s value.
Angel Fire is a novel, inspired by personal experiences and nightmares, that delves into the lives of three women protagonists, Sarah Kahn, Kate Robbins, and Dana Chu, living and working in New York City during the ’90s through the post- 9/11 world and the Obama election. The book is comprised of over 57,000 words, broken down into twenty-one chapters and an epilogue. The narrative contains elements of magic realism/ urban fantasy, and beyond the wry humor, there are bizarre twists involving erotic dreams, curses, cats, and paranormal visitations from a precocious ten-year-old girl named Allie, turning this story into a psychological thriller.
Patricia Carragon. author of Urban Haiku and More, returns with more Haiku, this time inspired by her favorite muse, our sphinx-like companion, the CAT.
Aaron Fisher, author of Black Stars of Blood: The Weegee Poems (Main Street Rag Press), says,“Patricia Carragon has done something notable, writing and assembling some 30 pages of haiku about cats (hence, meowku) that are neither cute nor cloying. What they are is smart, funny, and satisfyingly complex — quite an accomplishment in seventeen syllables.”
David Dephy, a Georgian/American award-winning poet, novelist, and performer, sums it up: “These poems themselves are warm and mystical like kittens. They crawl from page to page with catlike grace as you caress them with your eyes and breath, as you stare them in the eye you become cautious like them and don’t want your silence to be disturbed by anyone while reading.”
Judy Kamilhor, author of Before the Big Bang and Cat Dreams, notes, “Enjoy a delightful romp of word play through a New York filled with mischievous cats and kittens. Accompanied by lovely photos, Patricia Carragon’s poems capture moments of city life with feline friends and sometimes foes. Who knew that this ancient Japanese forms fit modern New York life with cats so purrfectly?”
And lastly, Ayaz Daryl Nielsen, Editor of Bear Creek Haiku, says, “Patricia Carragon is known throughout our creative and feline worlds as “that Brooklyn girl.” The humor, noblesse, and yes, loveliness of her nationwide nurturing presence are aptly, beautifully encapsulated within these thirty-five pages of photos, haiku, and micro (yet mighty) poems. Meowku is nurturing “cattitude” we all need.
About Poets Wear Prada:
Publishing beautifully designed volumes of well-crafted poetry — and now fiction — you want to read, since October 2006 from Hoboken, New Jersey, birthplace of Frank Sinatra and professional baseball.
Some delicious stories about cupcakes that come to life:
From Alison Ross, publisher and editor of “Clockwise Cat:”It is a testament to her vivacious spirit that Patricia Carragon would think to personify cupcakes as a device to chronicle quotidian activities and as a mode to assuage the anxieties of her daily jaunts. Tasty diary entries mingle humor and contemplative musings in a way that not only tantalizes the tongue but stimulates all of the sensory receptors, as her imagery erupts from the page to entice one’s very soul.”
Linda Lerner, author of Yes, The Ducks Were Real, says, “What begins as a normal work day changes for Carragon when she sees “cupcakes — the size of hobbits — parading the halls” of her office. From that point on, humanoid confections take over her life — and ours — in this allegorical tale depicting the underlying madness of our ordinary lives. No reader will be able to forget holding a kitchen knife to a devil’s food cupcake topped with “pink buttercream clouds” and hearing a scream, or the sight of a “badly bitten banana nut” asking for spare change on the train.”
Maria Lisella, Queens Poet Laureate 2015-2018, writes, “A funny thing happened on activist/writer Patricia Carragon’s way to her favorite sweet shop: a swirling journey peopled with cupcake commuters who are wise and witty, inside a world that sometimes banishes humans in favor of those savvy cupcakes. Carragon writes with humor, deft language, and an energy that sweeps us into buttercream icing. Both participant and spectator, she’s sometimes pressed against glass looking in; other times, the cupcakes lean in and confide in her. Pay close attention to the wisdom her cupcakes impart: “We are her to look delicious and to please the sweet tooth of the human race.”: “Humans are better off as desserts.”
And Susan H. Maurer, author of Josephine Butler exclaims,”A collection of Poetry.Carragon’s cupcake capers? Read this and weep. It is a delight, and a double delight when you get to hear her read it. The fine playfulness of this book is worth three times the cover cost. Own it and get such sweetness, calorie free. “
About Poets Wear Prada:
Publishing beautifully designed volumes of well-crafted poetry — and now fiction — you want to read, since October 2006 from Hoboken, New Jersey, birthplace of Frank Sinatra and professional baseball.
We are kicking off another banner year of poetry and prose on:
Saturday, January 29, 2022
from 2 p.m. to 4:30 p.m. on Zoom
Please follow directions below, completing both steps at least two days before the reading to avoid delays entering the meeting room. Note the order of the open mic follows the order of signup. Sign up early to read early in the program. Last-minute signup means you will read at the end of the program.
Our January 29 features are:
LINDA LERNER SUSAN WEIMAN FRANCINE WITTE
Plus a limited open mic.
Your $5 contribution keeps our annual anthology in print and pays our features. Hosted by Patricia Carragon, our Brooklyn girl and Editor-in-Chief.
Please follow these instructions:
Step 1: Make your $5 contribution: https://bit.ly/3bkqFmO (Note that your contribution is not refundable.)
Step 3: After making your contribution and completing your registration, you will receive a confidential confirmation email containing your unique link to join the event.Looking forward to seeing you at our November reading! For your convenience here is the link to our Facebook event page: https://fb.me/e/1aacCww5F
Bios:
Linda Lerner is the author of 19 collections, most recent, Taking the F train (NYQ books, 2021). Her poems currently appear in, Maintenant,Paterson Literary Review, Gargoyle, Chiron Review, Free State Review, Rat’s Ass Review, and One Art, among others. Previous books includeTakes Guts and Years Sometimes, & Yes, the Ducks Were Real (NYQ Books 2011& 2015) andWhen Death is a Red Balloon (Lummox Press,Nov. 20019).
Susan Weiman is astoryteller, writer of literary nonfiction and fiction. Her chapbooks include Roommates, published by ParksidePoetsPress in 2021 and New York-ish, byNonet Press in 2018. You can find her stories and poems in the Paterson Literary Review, New York State Writers Institute’s Trolley, Home Planet News Online,First Literary Review-East, CityLore – Places that Matter, Silver Tongued Devil Anthology, andelsewhere. She is working on a memoir and a third chapbook. Weiman co-curated, “Third Friday, Queens Writer Series” in Long Island City, NY where she resides. She is also an artist and iPhone photographer.
Francine Witte’s poetry and fiction have appeared in Smokelong Quarterly, Wigleaf, Mid-American Review, and Passages North. Her latest books are Dressed All Wrong for This (Blue Light Press), The Way of the Wind (AdHoc fiction), and The Theory of Flesh (Kelsay Books). She is flash fiction editor for Flash Boulevard and The South Florida Poetry Journal. Her chapbook, The Cake, The Smoke, The Moon (flash fiction) was published by ELJ Editions in September, 2021. She lives in NYC.
After years in the making, Angel Fire is now a reality. Thank you Alien Buddha Press and my copy editor, Cindy Hochman of “100 Proof” Copyediting Services, for believing in my debut novel’s value.
Angel Fire is a novel, inspired by personal experiences and nightmares, that delves into the lives of three women protagonists, Sarah Kahn, Kate Robbins, and Dana Chu, living and working in New York City during the ’90s through the post- 9/11 world and the Obama election. The book is comprised of over 57,000 words, broken down into twenty-one chapters and an epilogue. The narrative contains elements of magic realism/ urban fantasy, and beyond the wry humor, there are bizarre twists involving erotic dreams, curses, cats, and paranormal visitations from a precocious ten-year-old girl named Allie, turning this story into a psychological thriller.
Praise for Angel Fire . . .
From Peter Marra:
. . . In Angel Fire, her debut novel, Patricia Carragon expertly crafts a tale that captures the essence of what life was like in the beginning of the new millennium. What starts out as a drama soon morphs into a supernatural thriller—an emotional roller coaster populated with fantastic characters who will stay with you for a long time. Angel Fire will keep you riveted until the last page.
From Thaddeus Rutkowski:
. . . Through twists and turns, and the disaster of 9/11, the stakes rise for all of the heroines, and we follow their lives with growing apprehension as we discover their fates. Carragon gives us a sharp-edged picture of people we see every day, but whose inner demons are rarely revealed.
From Charles Rammelkamp:
. . . like nested Russian dolls, the stories are contained within other stories written by other writers, until, in a dazzling epilogue, we learn the final version of the puzzle that makes up these words. Or do we? The final sentence revives the delicious ambiguity. Patricia Carragon’s novel is an impressive construction of plot and character, particularly for those who love a gothic tale, and, more philosophically, reflections on the written word, its origins and influence.
Due to in-person venue cancellations, I will be posting the link to purchasing my debut novel, Angel Fire, on Amazon.Since these copies will be shipped from Amazon, they will not be signed.
If you want your signed copy from me, please send a personal message to pcarragon@gmail.com. Payment will be done on PayPal to pcarragon@gmail.com as a friend, not as a business. The cost will be $18, which includes shipping/handling. I do not charge for tax! If you don’t have PayPal, then I will accept a money order. Once the payment is done either through PayPal or money order, I will ship the book to you.Please don’t forget to give me your home address to ship the book.
Spoken Word Sundays Zoom: Patricia Carragon and Robert Anthony Gibbons
Sunday, January 16, 2022
4:00 PM 5:30 PM
on Zoom
Happy to be reading with my Poets Wear Prada brother, Robert Anthony Gibbons. I will be reading an excerpt from my novel, Angel Fire, and from Meowku, plus new poems.
FROM GREAT WEATHER FOR MEDIA:
As COVID transmission rates in NYC are currently high, we have decided to temporarily move our Parkside Lounge show to Zoom.
Please keep checking our website and Facebook page for updates on future readings. If we can’t be at the Parkside at any time, we will be on Zoom.
Featuring Patricia Carragon and Robert Anthony Gibbons
Plus poetry open mic
Hosted by Jerry T. Johnson
Patricia Carragon has been widely published online and in print. Her most recent publications include Acoustic Levitation, Buddha Press, Bear Creek Haiku, Danse Macabre, First Literary Review-East, Jerry Jazz Musician,Muddy River Poetry Review, The Rutherford Red Wheelbarrow, Nirla Press, et al. Her debut novel, Angel Fire, is from Alien Buddha Press. Her latest book from Poets Wear Prada is Meowku. She hosts Brownstone Poets and is the editor-in-chief of its annual anthology. She is an executive editor for Home Planet News Online. Patricia lives in Brooklyn, NY.
Robert Anthony Gibbons, a native Floridian, came to New York City in 2007 in search of his muse Langston Hughes and found a vibrant contemporary poetry community at the Cornelia Street Cafe, the Green Pavilion, Nomad’s Choir, Brownstone Poets, Hydrogen JukeBox, Saturn Series, and Phoenix among other venues.
Robert has been published in over thirty literary magazines and in several notable anthologies. Recent publication credits include Year of the Poet, Killens Review, Tribes, Involuntary Magazine, Peregrine, Expound, Promethean, Turtle Island Quarterly, Killer Whale,Suisun Valley Review, and the Bronx Memoir Project: Vol. 2 published by the Bronx Council of the Arts.
He has received funding from the Puffin Foundation (2021), United States Artists (2020), and most recently the New York Foundation for the Arts.(2021).
Spoken Word Sundays Zoom: Patricia Carragon and Robert Anthony Gibbons
Sunday, January 16, 2022
4:00 PM 5:30 PM
on Zoom
Happy to be reading with my Poets Wear Prada brother, Robert Anthony Gibbons. I will be reading an excerpt from my novel, Angel Fire, and from Meowku, plus new poems.
From great weather for media:
As COVID transmission rates in NYC are currently high, we have decided to temporarily move our Parkside Lounge show to Zoom. Please register via Eventbrite by 3:30 pm on the day of the event. The host will take open mic signups.
Please keep checking our website and Facebook page for updates on future readings. If we can’t be at the Parkside at any time, we will be on Zoom.
Featuring Patricia Carragon and Robert Anthony Gibbons
Plus poetry open mic
Hosted by Jerry T. Johnson
Patricia Carragon has been widely published online and in print. Her most recent publications include Acoustic Levitation, Buddha Press, Bear Creek Haiku, Danse Macabre, First Literary Review-East, Jerry Jazz Musician,Muddy River Poetry Review, The Rutherford Red Wheelbarrow, Nirla Press, et al. Her debut novel, Angel Fire, is from Alien Buddha Press. Her latest book from Poets Wear Prada is Meowku. She hosts Brownstone Poets and is the editor-in-chief of its annual anthology. She is an executive editor for Home Planet News Online. Patricia lives in Brooklyn, NY.
Robert Anthony Gibbons, a native Floridian, came to New York City in 2007 in search of his muse Langston Hughes and found a vibrant contemporary poetry community at the Cornelia Street Cafe, the Green Pavilion, Nomad’s Choir, Brownstone Poets, Hydrogen JukeBox, Saturn Series, and Phoenix among other venues.
Robert has been published in over thirty literary magazines and in several notable anthologies. Recent publication credits include Year of the Poet, Killens Review, Tribes, Involuntary Magazine, Peregrine, Expound, Promethean, Turtle Island Quarterly, Killer Whale,Suisun Valley Review, and the Bronx Memoir Project: Vol. 2 published by the Bronx Council of the Arts.
He has received funding from the Puffin Foundation (2021), United States Artists (2020), and most recently the New York Foundation for the Arts.(2021).
Calling All Poets presents Patricia Carragon plus Open Mic
This Thursday, July 15 at 7 p.m. EST
Hosted by Mike Jurkovic
Patricia will be reading an excerpt from her debut novel, “Angel Fire 🔥 ,” plus some music 🎶 poems
Patricia Carragon’s fiction piece What Has to Happen Next has been nominated for Sundress Publications Annual Best of the Net Anthology. Her poem Paris the Beautiful won Poem of the Week from great weather for MEDIA. She was nominated by Bear Creek Haiku for a Pushcart Prize. Herlatest books from Poets Wear Prada are Meowku and The Cupcake Chronicles and her debut novel, Angel Fire, is from Alien Buddha Press. Patricia hosts Brownstone Poets and is the editor-in-chief of its annual anthology. She is an executive editor for Home Planet News Online. She lives in Brooklyn, NY.
Patricia Carragon's Blog: Words Give Me the Will to Write 