Books and Authors
Since 1993, Three Rooms Press has been a leading independent publisher of poetry, literature and drama. Inspired by Dada predecessor Arthur Craven, TRP publishes and promotes work that inspires in unique, thrilling, fearless and intimate style. In addition, TRP produces and promotes a variety of events; since 1992 it has staged more than 400 events in San Francisco, New York, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Las Vegas and Europe, including poetry readings, plays, writing workshops, seminars, musical events and one-of-a-kind madcap concoctions.Hidden Wheel
by Michael T. Fournier
- Hidden Wheel by Michael T. Fournier
“Don’t be surprised if, upon finishing this book, you long
for an art form you’ve never encountered.” — Selah Saterstrom; author of The Pink Institution
(U.S. Orders only; International orders via Amazon)
A trust fund kid, posing as a drug dealer to maintain street cred, opens an art gallery designed to fail. A self-employed drummer sells sperm to raise funds for a new kit before his band embarks on their first-ever tour. A former chess prodigy-turned-dominatrix paints sixty words a day on a giant canvas to stave off the coming Singularity. A hipster blogs about his fictional tagger alter ego and bumbles into quick fame with a series of paintings on CD covers. Hidden Wheel, Michael T. Fournier’s debut novel, is an unflinching reflection of the growing complexities of navigating art, commerce, and the internet. Its use of intersecting plotlines illustrates the confusion and potential of the early 21st century and the evolving ways in which its inhabitants try to make a mark in the specter of financial upheaval and shifting technologies.
Michael T. Fournier teaches the history of punk rock class at Tufts University. He is the author of Double Nickels on the Dime (Continuum Press), an insightful analysis of legendary punk trio, the Minutemen and their classic 1984 album.
Contact: info@threeroomspress.com
You Are White Inside
by B. R. Lyon
- You Are White Inside by B. R. Lyon
“These poems confront and tantalize, soothe and unsettle, proffering a sensual world of clashing and merged cultures: hookahs and HIV, talismans and apps. What I enjoy most is that they challenge one’s perception — which to me is the burning core of a good book of poetry.” — Richard Loranger, Author, Poems for Teeth
(U.S. Orders only; International orders via Amazon)
You Are White Inside by B. R. Lyon (Three Rooms Press) is a thrilling first collection of poetry by a fine and fearless New York-based poet, featuring work largely inspired by his real-life intimate relationship with a Muslim man in Cairo. Daring and innovative, the work seeks out fresh angles and inspiring language with equal touches of awe, shock, and tenderness. “In Rimbaud’s ‘Voyelles’ the color white reveals a mystical beauty unlike any white we’ve seen before. Likewise, B. R. Lyon’s revelation of whiteness is “’he weltanschauung of dewdrops’ — a presentiment of beauty in possibility. ‘What’s beautiful or ugly wants a comparison. To what is the question. For what is the other.’ Inside, find an understanding of the astral design.” — Sharon Mesmer, author Annoying Diabetic Bitch and The Virgin Formica.
Poet, fiction writer, and musician B. R. Lyon splits his life between Brooklyn and Egypt. He recently gave up twenty-five years of administration in juvenile justice and clinical social work practice, leaving it to others to work out their problems while he ponders his own. His other publications include a chapbook, Your Infidel Eyes (Poets Wear Prada Press, 2006), and his ‘poemusic’ CD, Beauty Keeps Laying Its Sharp Knife Against Me (Logochrysalis Productions, 2008). He is an editor for Uphook Press, and is the founder and producer of Hydrogen Jukebox, a New York City reading series that combines poetry with music, which, besides his life partner, are his greatest loves.
Contact: info@threeroomspress.com
- A Journal of Contemporary Dada Writing and Art
MAINTENANT 5:
A JOURNAL OF CONTEMPORARY WRITING AND ART
Editors: Kat Georges & Peter Carlaftes
MAINTENANT 5, A Journal of Contemporary Dada Writing and Art, is a journal that represents a broad range of contemporary dada art and literature from an international group of poets and artists, all inspired by the tenets of the original dada movement of the early 20th century.
Maintenant 5 is named in honor of the mother of all dada magazines and all ’zines in general, Maintenant, edited by the man who inspired the dada movement before Breton’s infamous manifesto against manifestos existed: Arthur Cravan. This issue is dedicated to his enduring legacy.
Maintenant 5: A Journal of Contemporary Dada Writing and Art is the fourth edition of the Three Rooms Press Maintenant series, named in honor of Arthur Cravan’s original journal, Maintenant. Slip and slide into its groove and dig the germs and gems. Talk a trip. Now is always now. See you at the end of the road.
- ISM is a Retrovirus, by Matthew Hupert
ISM is a Retrovirus
by Matthew Hupert
“Matthew Hupert has an eye, an ear (such an ear!), a heart and a tongue. He sees how the words work, listens to them working, feels their meaning and spits ’em out. I love his poetry.” –Dennis McNally, Author, A Long Strange Trip: The History of the Grateful Dead
Ism is a Retrovirus by Matthew Hupert (Three Rooms Press) is a rock solid collection of 87 poems that examine life, lust, love, religion and politics in a word play phantasmagoria in which, according to poet Dean Kostos, “sound is meaning and syntax is thrummed like strings on a guitar.” A native New Yorker, Hupert probes his subjects like an true urbanite—in short, accessible works that seem like passing glances, yet resonate and bring increasing pleasure on multiple readings. Mondo 2000 editor R.U. Sirius raves, “Matthew Hupert had me at ‘shell my pistachio eyes.’” Beat Generation and Grateful Dead historian Dennis McNally enthusiastically applauds Hupert’s writing: “He sees how the words work, listens to them working, feels their meaning and spits ‘em out. I love his poetry.” Funny, insightful and to the point, Matthew Hupert’s Ism is a Retrovirus is a song in a true modern American style praising beauty and grit of life with new insights in a determined, fresh voice.
Matthew Hupert is a multi-media artist, a writer, and that rarest of birds—the Native New Yorker. He believes the primary role of the Artist is to be the stick that your Zen master smacks you in the head with. His poetry has been published in The Formalist, the contemporary dada poetry and art journal Maintenant, and the anthology 150 Contemporary Sonnets. He is also a multimedia artist and has done extensive work with musicians to create psychedelic visual environments. He currently lives with his son in Manhattan.
Contact: info@threeroomspress.com
- Inheriting Craziness Is Like a Soft Halo of Light, by Thomas Fucaloro
INHERITING CRAZINESS IS LIKE A SOFT HALO OF LIGHT
by Thomas Fucaloro
“Thomas Fucaloro is a force. His poems are ball-peen hammers. Don’t be misled—they come at you politely, offer a warm smile, and when you least expect it, knock you senseless.” –Jeanann Verlee
Thomas Fucaloro’s spectacular first collection of poetry is a beautiful, raw, intense read. According to Emily Kagan Trenchard, curator of the louderARTS Project, “Thomas Fucaloro’s particular gift is to harness the crazed wisdom at the bottom of the bottle, to scrape a fleck of beauty from the underside of a binge, and to call madness by a name so familiar we can’t help but recognize it in ourselves.” In these 57 poems, Fucaloro brings to light new angles of perception of madness, addiction and modern urban living. Each poem takes risks in form and content. As author Jon Sands notes, “To read Thomas is to literally discover each line with him. There’s really nothing he won’t say. He’s as surprised as you are.”
Born in Brooklyn, raised on Staten Island, now resides in Harlem, poet Thomas Fucaloro has survived 3 out of 5 boroughs. He is a graduate of New School University and is a junior editor at New York-based Uphook Press.
Contact: info@threeroomspress.com
- Drunkyard Dog, Poems, by Peter Carlaftes
DRUNKYARD DOG
by Peter Carlaftes
“A brilliant poetic voice, filled with drop-dead humor, searing insight and resilient originality, even while resonating with overtones of Bukowski, Baudelaire and Bogart . . .”
DrunkYard Dog by Peter Carlaftes is a long-awaited collection by a poetic master who honed his intense, insightful and inspiring poetic voice on the playgrounds of the Bronx, and, after seeing the world, moved onto the bars of Manhattan. Tales of bartender blues and bliss, injected with hope in a milieu of madness. Lush portraits of urban personas like Goodtime Charlie, the Battling Brothers, Ronnie the Cop and Uncle Willie. Cinematic swirls of downtown denizens in stark raving shades of shot-infused clarity. A poetic pub crawl that picks up the pieces of a dismantled present and puts them back together in a brand new cocktail. “If the sun set in the East, Carlaftes would be Bukowski.”
Carlaftes is the author of six chapbooks including The Bar Essentials, Sheer Bardom, Nightclub Confidential and Progressive Shots (all Three Rooms Press). Nine of his original plays have been staged to critical acclaim, including Anity, Spin-Dry, Handout, and Closure. He has also written and performed his one-man show, Lenny Bruce: Dead & Well, and is the author of two other books: A Year on Facebook (humor) and Triumph for Rent (three plays).
Contact: info@threeroomspress.com
- Triumph for Rent, 3 Plays, by Peter Carlaftes
TRIUMPH FOR RENT
3 Plays
by Peter Carlaftes
Three inventive and thoroughly enjoyable dramas by a new master of modern stagecraft. “As with STRINDBERG, BECKETT, or even SARTRE, PETER CARLAFTES’ message seems to be something we intuit . . . like music.” —SF Weekly
Playwright Peter Carlaftes presents three compelling, funny and biting dramas in TRIUMPH FOR RENT: Three Plays (Three Rooms Press, 184 pages, 2010, ISBN: 978-0-9840700-6-0). The plays include SPIN-DRY: An hilarious wild ride through a 90s rehab center for celebrities; HUNGER: a heartfelt drama—inspired by the Knut Hamsun novel—about a starving writer trying to survive and keep his integrity alive as the borders blur between fantasy and reality in a world of rocker chicks, hookers and convicts; and FRONTIER-A GO-GO, a tragi-comedy in which a man living on a man living on the Nebraska plains circa 1872 uses a time machine to summon a hippie drifter and a budding feminist who have just conceived a daughter at a rock concert in 1972, and then summons the daughter, aged 25, from her 1997 date with a cybergeek.
Peter Carlaftes began his theatrical career on the playgrounds of the Bronx, and after seeing the world, branched out to Manhattan. Nine of his plays have been staged, to critical acclaim, among them Anity, Frontier A-Go-Go, Spin-Dry and Closure. He also created and staged a deconstruction of Knut Hamsun’s classic novel Hunger, and created and starred in a one-man rendition of Harold Pinter’s The Homecoming. He has recently written and performed his solo work, Lenny Bruce: Dead & Well, and starred in numerous Off-Broadway plays. In addition to his theatrical career, Carlaftes is the author of two other books on Three Rooms Press: A Year on Facebook (humor, see below), and Drunkyard Dog (poetry, see above).
Contact: info@threeroomspress.com
BASEBALL KARMA AND THE CONSTITUTION BLUES
by Ronnie Norpel
A BEHIND-the-SCENES SCORECARD about BASEBALL, LUCK, LOVE and SUPERSTITION—from a young woman’s INSIDER perspective.
In Baseball Karma and The Constitution Blues,native Philadelphian Ronnie Norpel provides a play-by-play, behind-the-scenes account of a young woman’s education in life, luck, love and superstition while working for her hometown major league baseball team.The book stems from Norpel’s days as a front office representative for the Philadelphia Phillies.
Norpel’s ficto-memoir brims with insider insight, detailing the fastballs, curveballs and errors experienced by main character Mary Katharine “Mick” Carmichael when she gets involved with a rookie on the Constitution Blues team. Baseball Karma and The Constitution Blues overflows with heart and humor, without glossing over the despair of karmic growing pains for both Mick and the Blues. Underneath it all, we discover how one woman’s real-life curse changed destiny—until it was finally lifted for good. Norpel’s rookie novel is must-have read for summer.
Ronnie Norpel has always been passionate about baseball, and the Philadelphia Phillies in particular. In this coming of age novel, she writes with religious fervor about an Irish Catholic girl from the suburbs who attempts to make it in a man’s world and discovers life outside the front office can be more diffi cult than expected. She has a wonderful way of combining her feelings about the Catholic church and the church of baseball, chronicling Mary Katherine “Mick” Carmichael’s seduction by the sport, personal fall from grace and eventual road to redemption.
—DICK WEISS, NY DAILY NEWS
Part personal history, part novel . . . a love letter to Phillies fans. Norpel’s debut novel embodies the mixed emotions that drive our national pastime.
—A.D. AMOROSI, PHILADELPHIA CITY PAPER
Ronnie Norpel’s debut fi cto-memoir tells a very brave, rollicking, ordinary yet extraordinary story of a young woman’s coming of age, at a time and place where baseball seemed to have redemptive powers. Just when she thought she was doing everything right, a curveball shatters her identity.
—CELIA INGRID FARBER, THE TRUTH BARRIER
Baseball Karma and The Constitution Blues by Ronnie Norpel, Three Rooms Press
ISBN: 978-0-9840700-5-3, $15.95, 5.25” x 8”, Territory: WE, 210 Pages, April 2010, Trade Paper, Ficto-Memoir/Pop Culture/Baseball
Contact: info@threeroomspress.com
- A Year on Facebook, by Peter Carlaftes
A YEAR ON FACEBOOK
by Peter Carlaftes
Groucho Marx meets Kurt Vonnegut and they become BFFs in this irreverent, hilarious new book.
A Year on Facebook is a comical trajectory through modern American life via daily updates from the insightful and irreverent pontiff of pun—Peter Carlaftes.
In this day of the tell-all journal, Carlaftes’s book, exposing the foibles of our seemingly civilized sensibility, tells both how — and like — it is. Iconic from conception, A Year on Facebook is a one of a kind literary experience that raises the bar for the idealist in us all.
Through the hysterical daily Facebook status updates of the author— who became a viral Jonathan Swift through his irreverent social, political and just plain “out-there” observations—A Year on Facebook provides an hilarious book to thumb through at random or read page-by-ROTFL-page. It’s packed with side-splitting illustrations, and “interactive” pages that provide a multimedia experience for the reader in combination with the book’s namesake website.
The thousands of comments that have flooded Carlaftes’ online mailbox—many of which are included in this book—prove again and again: A Year on Facebook will leave readers howling with laughter. As one commentator summed up, “I wonder if you know, Peter, how many times you make me laugh out loud with your status updates. Guess it doesn’t matter. Just keep me laughing, please. 
”
A Year on Facebook by Peter Carlaftes, Three Rooms Press
ISBN: 978-0-9840700-3-9, $13.95, 6” x 9”, Territory: WE, 184 Pages, January 2010, Trade Paper, Humor/Pop Culture/Social Networking
Contact: info@threeroomspress.com
RECREATIONAL VEHICLES ON FIRE
New & Selected Poems by Jane Ormerod
A fresh, fearless, new poetic voice that challenges and transfixes. An extraordinary first full-length collection.
Recreational Vehicles on Fire by Jane Ormerod is an extraordinary first full-length collection of poetry by a completely original modern voice. Daring and innovative, yet remarkably accessible, Ormerod explores the psyche and reduced position of humanity in a world increasingly overtaken by corporate greed and faceless machines. She invites the reader to examine with her how—of if—basic human emotions such as grief, joy and love fit into the present, and ponders their place in relation to past and future. Each poem is a stunning example of language and thought, delivered in a variety of unique forms. Ormerod is indeed a force to be reckoned with.
Poet and literary critic Sarah Sarai notes: “I’ve seen her perform . . . and find her speech—not elite, not Cockney—like her poetry, arresting and uncommon. . . A little punk, a little reserved, a lot artist, [her work] swoops in to challenge and transfix. Her confident lines embody a surety that their existence is all the sense we need.”
Recreational Vehicles on Fire; New & Selected Poems, by Jane Ormerod, Three Rooms Press
ISBN: 978-0-9840700-1-5, $15.00, 6” x 9”, Territory: WE, 112 Pages, October 2009, Trade Paper, Poetry
Contact: info@threeroomspress.com
- Poppin’ Johnny, New American Poems by George Wallace
POPPIN’ JOHNNY
New American Poems by George Wallace
A post-modern poetic “On the Road” that feels like music and offers a surreal trip into what’s left of the American heartland.
Poppin’ Johnny: New American Poems by George Wallace is a stunning collection by a poet whose work recalls the conversational diction of the Beatniks, but with an absolutely contemporary flavor. Known worldwide due to his broad-based internet following (for years, Wallace has posted his poems online almost daily), Wallace has selected more than 70 poems for this collection, presenting a panorama of modern-day Americana. As original Beatnik musician David Amram notes, “Jack Kerouac would have loved him.”
This new book has already received widespread critical praise throughout the online literary community. Zvi A. Sesling (dougholder.blogspot.com) notes, “Nitty-gritty, down in hole, Wallace rips life as if it were a piece of paper, leaving the edges jagged and the paper crumpled like so many lives he observes.” Jack Foley believes, “A George Wallace poem is a burst of articulation that carries us into the country of Talk. These poems—brilliant, funny, dangerous, cantankerous—announce the pure pleasure of speaking.” And Robert Peake sums up, “These are poems as rough and vulnerable as manhood, as full of hope and heartbreak as the new world. If you want to know what America feels like in your mouth, read George Wallace out loud.”
“George Wallace has written the quintessential American book of poetry. The poems in his new book Poppin’ Johnny New American Poems lift off the pages like so many warm-colored hot air balloons in the middle of an Iowa cornfield. And while they glide over the American checkerboard of fields and farms, these poems also hover over the urban streets of American cities where they take in the smells of restaurants brimming with working people as the sun rises, the rough textures of alleys at night and the blue-denimed boys who ride subways, and others who fling fish guts for a living.” by Lenny DellaRocca. Read the full review of Poppin’ Johnny at Greenwich Village Gazette.
Poppin Johnny; New American Poems, by George Wallace, Three Rooms Press
ISBN: 978-0-9840700-2-2, $15.00, 6” x 9”, Territory: WE, 116 Pages, September 2009, Trade Paper, Poetry
Contact: info@threeroomspress.com
- Yo Quiero Mas Sangre, poems by Ryan Buynak
YO QUIERO MAS SANGRE
Random Acts of Poetry, by Ryan Buynak
A gripping collection of poetry
written by and aimed at members
of the Twitter generation.
Ryan Buynak takes a new look at the underbelly of modern American life, traveling from coast to coast and hooking up with an eclectic collection of characters, all the while searching for freedom, heart and soul in a world ruled by technology. His gripping first full-length collection of poetry is written for “people who don’t know shit about poetry” by a man who clearly does.
Yo Quiero Mas Sangre has met with widespread and heartfelt praise from members of the online poetry community. Mona Pierpaoli regards it as “A beautiful first book of poetry which has as curt and concise a voice as it has vivacious and interesting subjects and scenes. The elements of this book, while seemingly quite disparate, come together to make an effective and enduring movement. Great read.” Justin E. Foyil adds, “With tongues and twists from an imagination and experience one could only wish to speak about. This was an indescribable work/message, I couldn’t put down until its resolution. This was the most “real” indirect advice from a friend/stranger, I’ve ever read.”
Yo Quiero Mas Sangre; Poems, by Ryan Buynak, Three Rooms Press
ISBN: 978-0-9840700-0-8, $15.00, 5.06″ x 7.81”, Territory: WE, 84 Pages, June 2009, Trade Paper, Poetry/Pop Culture
Contact: info@threeroomspress.com
native Philadelphian Ronnie Norpel provides a play-by-play, behind-the-scenes account of a young woman’s education in life, luck, love and superstition while working for her hometown major league baseball team. The book stems from Norpel’s days as a front office representative for the Philadelphia Phillies.
Norpel’s ficto-memoir brims with insider insight, detailing the fastballs, curveballs and errors experienced by main character Mary Katharine “Mick” Carmichael when she gets involved with a rookie on the Constitution Blues team. Baseball Karma and The Constitution Blues overflows with heart and humor, without glossing over the despair of karmic growing pains for both Mick and the Blues. Underneath it all, we discover how one woman’s real-life curse changed destiny—until it was finally lifted for good. Norpel’s rookie novel is must-have read for summer.
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