Pomegranate publishes visual treats

A GREEN-jacketed man offers a treat to an unimpressed dog calmly hovering upside-down in midair. A colonial gentleman, stoic and proud, stands before his latest invention, a freestanding, yard-long coil of processed meat. A seafood salad attacks a would-be gourmand. An imposing man casually removes his goatee.

It may come as a shock, but these bizarre visions of the imagination have something in common with the timeless architectural masterpieces of Frank Lloyd Wright. For that matter, they share something with M. C. Escher, Edward Gorey, Claude Monet, and Maxfield Parrish.

Strange, but true. These world-renowned artists, along with the floating dog and his oddball friends–which are the unmistakable ink drawings of British artist and author Glen Baxter–can all be found in beautifully rendered “coffee-table” books imprinted with the curious little name: Pomegranate. And they were all published in Sonoma County.

Pomegranate Communications, housed in an unimposing business complex in Rohnert Park, is one of the publishing world’s foremost, if unconventional, producers of quality art books–and ancillary merchandise (calendars, note cards, journals, and the like).

Pomegranate was founded 30 years ago by Thomas F. Burke, as a spinoff of his successful efforts printing and hawking psychedelic rock-concert posters at the Fillmore in the 1960s. With an optimistic enthusiasm that could have been born only of the hippie movement, Burke created a company devoted to creating altered states of the mind through the mesmerizing medium of art.

The success of Pomegranate lies in that enthusiasm, a passion shared by the world-class artists that the company is able to recruit. “Artists like to work with us,” says Katie Burke, Pomegranate’s publisher (and Thomas Burke’s wife). “We respect them, and they appreciate that.” For that matter, so do book buyers. Pomegranate’s insistence on quality and attention to detail, says Burke, “is the main focus of who we are. It’s our identity in the marketplace.”

That identity has lead to the company’s position as a primary publisher of books for museums. Pomegranate partners with such lofty names as the Smithsonian Institution, San Francisco Asian Art Museum, and Museum of the City of New York to produce numerous collections.

Given the luster of these associations, it’s a testament to Pomegranate’s versatility that it also published Steve Schaecher’s Outhouses by Famous Architects and Johnny Otis’ Red Beans and Rice and Other Rock and Roll Recipes. “We’re not a stodgy publishing house,” allows Burke with a laugh.

Though Pomegranate’s stable of artists includes such superstars as B. Kliban and the aforementioned Boulet–whose lush paintings of animal spirits and Earth goddesses are almost synonymous with the New Age movement–the company has always sought to find up-and-coming artists to present to the world. The fall catalog includes Gaiastar Mandalas: Ecstatic Visions of the Living Earth, by relatively unknown artists Bonnie Bell and David Todd.

“It’s harder in today’s marketplace to introduce contemporary artists,” Burke says. “There are fewer opportunities for unknown artists. But we will absolutely continue, whenever and however we can, to bring new artists to the world.”

Let’s hope that, as suggested by Glen Baxter’s floating dog and exploding fork–found in the brand-new Unhinged World of Glen Baxter–Pomegranate will also continue to give us the works of famous figures that we’ve somehow forgotten.

“Absolutely,” Burke insists. “We’re always asking ourselves, ‘What other cool stuff can we find and put out there into the world? Just for fun?’ ”

From the September 20-26, 2001 issue of the Northern California Bohemian.

© Metro Publishing Inc.

Dark Angel

Local lawyer gives horror fiction a home in ‘Dark Hollow’

By Patrick Sullivan

“I CHUCKLE a little because I don’t think of myself as a horror writer,” says Peggy Roth. “I’m not a dark, creeping Goth character. . . . But I like that otherworldly element.”

She’s right. If you were picking faces out of a lineup to find the editor of a literary magazine devoted to horror, Roth wouldn’t be your first choice.

Not every horror aficionado has to sport the creep factor of an Edgar Allan Poe. But Roth, a 34-year-old attorney and mother of two, has a bright smile, an easy laugh, and absolutely no trace of the macabre about her. By day, she works in the Family Support Division of the Sonoma County District Attorney’s Office.

At night, though, Roth pours precious time and energy into publishing Dark Hollow, an annual offering of chilling fiction and poetry from local writers, including a piece or two by Roth herself.

“Being scared is raising a passion, like being excited or falling in love or other things that I enjoy,” Roth says. “It’s stimulating. I think anybody that likes riding on a roller coaster can understand.”

Founded by Roth in 1999, Dark Hollow appears in local bookstores on the first day of every autumn to offer stories, poems, and art about restless corpses, murderous lovers, and haunted taxi cabs.

“I’m looking for well-crafted fiction or poetry that gives people a chill,” Roth explains. “It doesn’t always have to horrify, but it should contain some element that’s spooky–though I have published a number of pieces that just speak to the atmosphere of autumn, that don’t really have a real big chill factor.”

Now in its third year, Dark Hollow is slowly expanding its readership: Roth has doubled circulation to 200. Also growing is the magazine’s pool of contributors, who range in age and experience from a talented sixth-grade student to Sonoma County Poet Laureate Don Emblen.

Indeed, among the best pieces slated to appear in this year’s issue is Emblen’s “Rolling Blackout”: “More absolute than night/ that comes on by degrees,/ this black envelops us,/ our faces, arms, and legs/ as though we’ve dropped into a sack,/ unwanted kittens to be drowned.”

Publishing high-quality writing is Roth’s main goal. “Sonoma County isn’t a really big place, and this is a very particular niche,” she says. “So [the magazine] really has to appeal to people who just want to read quality writing. If I only picked things for their shock value or their horror content, I don’t think I’d get very far.”

Some would-be contributors err in the other direction. Roth wants it known that she does not publish break-up stories.

“I would say the biggest disconnect people have is that they interpret dark as psychologically dark,” Roth says. “So I get a lot of stories about, ‘Oh, I’m so miserable and suicidal because he left me.’ And that doesn’t really qualify for me.”

Roth’s interest in horror dates back to a childhood encounter with The Dracula Book of Great Vampire Stories, a bloodcurdling collection of vampire-themed fiction. Masters of the genre like Poe and Stoker teamed up to work their dark magic on her young mind.

But Roth doesn’t want you to get the wrong idea about her as a kid: “I didn’t sit in the library for hours at a time reading horror books,” she says. “But I read a few that really piqued my interest. And I certainly watched tons and tons of television and movies.”

In college, Roth worked on a literary magazine. Although a published poet, she had never seen any of her horror-themed work in print before she started Dark Hollow shortly after moving here from San Francisco. The task of creating a magazine from scratch turned out to offer a few more challenges than she’d expected.

“It still doesn’t seem like a big deal, but I now know there are a lot of tedious elements to it,” she explains. “When you have the vision, it’s all about the creative side of things. You’re going to get all these writers and sift through all this quality material.

“And then you realize, ‘OK, I have to input the work, and I have to edit it, and then I have to format it, and market it,'” she continues with a laugh. “So I think some of that stuff took me by surprise.”

Roth says she’s in for the long haul. She plans to have a website up in the next few months; she also wants to carefully expand circulation. And she hopes Dark Hollow will find new pockets of readers and writers in love with fear.

“I would love to discover that there are lots of people out there who secretly love horror and being scared,” she says, “because have I got a magazine for them.”

The writers featured in the new issue of ‘Dark Hollow’ read their work on Friday, Sept. 21, at 7 p.m. at Copperfield’s Books, 138 N. Main St., Sebastopol. For details, call 707/823-2618.

From the September 20-26, 2001 issue of the Northern California Bohemian.

© Metro Publishing Inc.

North Bay writers serve up poetry, novels, & much more

By Greg Cahill and Patrick Sullivan

HOW BUSY are North Bay authors? Busy enough that we don’t have room to review all the novels, short-story collections, children’s books, or poetry chapbooks produced by local creative types in recent months. But here we offer a broad sample of work produced in the increasingly prolific literary scene.

Marsha Diane Arnold Metro Cat (Golden Books; $19.95)

Susie is the “fanciest cat in Paris”–until her life turns upside down when she gets lost in the subway system in this charming children’s book from Sebastopol author Marsha Diane Arnold. Can the former cover model for Fancy Cat Magazine adjust to a new life performing with an elderly street musician? Believe it, baby!–P.S.

Cydney Chadwick Flesh and Bone (Avec Books; $14)

A short-story collection that opens with a tale of a man’s relationship with his contact lenses is not for everyone. Yet Penngrove author Cydney Chadwick has a gift for using the mundane minutiae of everyday life to weave compelling accounts of postmodern alienation and despair in the lives of such characters as a nameless apartment dweller who comes to rely on a neighbor’s marijuana habit. These accounts also offer a dry, painful humor: “When he ventures down the stairs to his mailbox he is still a famous poet, but while on the street amidst others he is not quite as renowned. The further he gets from his apartment the less well-known he is.”–P.S.

Terry Ehret Translations from the Human Language (16 Rivers Press; $14)

Award-winning Petaluma poet Terry Ehret offers another collection of powerful, profoundly moving poetry. The book’s first piece, “Thirst,” displays Ehret’s kinetic way with words: “This year I’ve felt the push of antlers/ thrusting out of my head.” Particularly relevant in light of current events is a poem titled “Among the Involuntary Missing” and dedicated to Polly Klaas: “Grief, I think, is the only emotion that endures,/ rearranging who we are, living/ alongside us, ghosts/ everywhere, even in the long warm evenings/ where you think they would not dare to follow . . .” –P.S.

Joan Frank Boys Keep Being Born (University of Missouri Press; $17.95)

“All she could claim to have achieved in the past decade, it began to dawn on her, was the avoidance of harm.” With that realization, the lonely woman in the well-crafted opening tale of this short-story collection makes a decision her brain warns her against: she gets involved with a married man. But the result is far from what she–or the reader–expects. Indeed, avoiding the predictable is one of Frank’s strengths as a writer. This Santa Rosa author also has a gift for character and description that makes this collection a pleasure to read. Her subject matter ranges from women confronting the trials and tribulations of middle age to the extraordinary reproductive organ of the beleaguered Carlos Artiga: “When it commands release Carlos has no choice. He will be unable to undertake the day’s appointments until the tyrannical member is given its way.”–P.S.

Suzanne Gold Daddy’s Girls (Perfect Productions; $25)

A mother and her two daughters take turns narrating this sprawling tale of a family disintegrating under the terrible pressures of jealousy, family dysfunction, and madness. Author Suzanne Gold, a Marin County psychologist who has schizophrenia in her family, drew on personal experiences to delve deeply into the impact of mental illness on the three women at the heart of her book. Unfortunately, though the author offers an interesting (and often heartbreaking) perspective on schizophrenia, her characters are all too often one-dimensional and predictable–especially the mother, who seems to have ridden in on a broomstick from Oz.–P.S.

Jonah Raskin More Poems, Better Poems (Running Wolf Press; $6)

The overwhelming superiority of the author in every field of human endeavor is the theme of this collection of 21 poems. One excellent reason to attend local poetry festivals is to hear Raskin–a professor of communications at Sonoma State University–read some of this work aloud. This stuff is pretty funny in print, but the poet gives it enough spin in person to bust a gut or two. From “Sexier”: “I’m sexier than you and/ I have more sex appeal and more sex drive, too/ a libido you’d die for. In fact, I’m the male sex symbol for the 21st century!” Or try “More Buddhist”: “I’m a better Buddhist than you, my beloved/ I breathe better and/ Sit better and meditate more often–I’m more Karmic than you and/ I’m the captain of the Koan.” And so on. You may know a few people who will not realize these poems are satirical. Never trust those people again.–P.S.

Lee Torliatt Golden Memories of the Redwood Empire (Arcadia; $19.99)

Do you remember when Egg Queen Martha King came to town? Probably not. What about the tussle between Women’s Christian Temperance Union members and Sonoma County’s growers of wine grapes and hops back in the Prohibition era? No? Ever hear about the Petaluma car fire of 1912? Quite a conflagration. Sit back and let Lee Torliatt, a fifth-generation native of Sonoma County and vice president of the Sonoma County Historical Society, reminisce about the good–and bad–old days in this thoroughly entertaining and highly informative 128-page paperback. It’ll give you a chance to catch up on the riot that ensued after the 1943 Big Game between the Santa Rosa and Petaluma high schools.–G.C.

Milly Lee Earthquake (Frances Foster Books; $16)

“This morning the earth shook and threw us from our beds. We were not hurt, just stunned.” So begins this children’s book based on the experiences of the Santa Rosa author’s mother in San Francisco’s Chinatown during the 1906 earthquake. Yangsook Choi illustrates this charming adventure, which offers an exciting (but not terrifying) way to introduce young kids to a remarkable slice of history.–P.S.

Tosca Lenci Daughter of the Excision (LP Publishing; $7.50)

“I shall give you poetry, without end,” begins this chapbook by the Sonoma author who two years back gave us Beloved Disciple, Daughter of Logos. Concerned with the issues and imagery of love, sexual politics, and religion, Daughter offers a wide variety of verse, including this: “FUDGE, FUDGE, TELL THE JUDGE/ MOMMA’S GOT A NEWBORN BABY/ WRAP IT UP IN TISSUE PAPER/ SEND IT DOWN THE ELEVATOR/ UPSTAIRS, DOWNSTAIRS/ OUT THE BACK DOOR.” –P.S.

Megan McDonald Judy Moody Gets Famous (Candlewick Press; $15.95)

“You’re not in one of your famous moods again, are you?” Judy Moody’s dad asks. That’s a silly question to ask the moodiest girl in third grade, who is deeply e-n-v-i-o-u-s that her archrival, the pointy-headed Jessica Finch, just scored top honors in the big spelling bee. And the more Judy tries to catch up and win her own 15 minutes of fame by overachieving, the more she gets i-n-f-a-m-o-u-s for getting into trouble. Sebastopol children’s author Megan McDonald has delivered a charming sequel to last year’s award-winning Judy Moody. And once again, Peter Reynolds’ expressive line drawings are an excellent match for McDonald’s lighthearted style. –P.S.

T.E. Watson I Wanna Iguana (Paw Prints Press; $16.95)

The ironic disparity between a young boy’s grand ideas about iguanas and the quotidian reality of the creatures in question forms the linchpin upon which this illustrated children’s book turns. For example, the narrator expresses this belief: “My iguana would speak a foreign language because it comes from a different country.” But, as readers may be aware, most iguanas have abandoned their native language in hopes of landing a job at McDonald’s. John Raptis delivers appropriately whimsical illustrations–P.S.

From the September 20-26, 2001 issue of the Northern California Bohemian.

© Metro Publishing Inc.