The Firecracker Alternative Book Awards herald the best in wildly independent writing and publishing — the people who sharpen the cutting edge, the First-Amendment radicals with a bad attitude.
Fiction
This
Too Can Be Yours
by
Beth Lisick Publisher Comments
In this wholly unpredictable collection of tongue-in-chic short stories, Beth Lisick casts a cool eye on the lost and living dead of offices, nightclubs, shopping malls, and rent-controlled apartments. Pretentious web designers, reality show... (read more)
Nonfiction
Fast
Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal
by
Eric Schlosser Powells.com Staff Pick
"What we eat has changed more in the last forty years than in the last forty thousand," Eric Schlosser writes, yet most Americans know very little about how that food is made, where, by whom, and at what cost. Fast Food Nation traces the industry... (read more)
Poetry
Cunt-Ups
by
Dodie Bellamy Review:
"Cunt-Ups is an explosion of textual sexuality that resists principles of formal ordering, is polyvalent in its voice and range, and as perverse in its sentence construction as its content. Its "setting" is the mediated exchange itself, the fractured articulation of "a female body who has sex writing about sex." While the title might imply a gendered site of production, it also suggests..." David Buuck (read more)
Politics
9-11
by
Noam Chomsky Publisher Comments
A New York Times, Book Sense, Los Angeles Times, San Francisco Chronicle, Boston Globe, Village Voice, and Powells.com bestseller. Published worldwide in 20 countries. In 9-11 Noam Chomsky dissects the root causes of the September... (read more)
Sex
Hardcore
From the Heart: The Pleasures, Profits, and Politics of Creative Sexual
Expression
by
Annie Sprinkle Publisher Comments
Pornography, on or off the stage, is an inflammatory issue, and one which is deeply linked to theatrical representation throughout history. But what happens to the notions of the pornographic when a female performer subverts the conventional models... (read more)
Drugs
Junkie
Love
by
Phil Shoenfelt Publisher Comments
Junkie Love, set in Camden Town, London, during the late 1980s, is a study of addiction and loss, a nihilistic love story for the blank generation. Focusing on the psycho-pathology of addiction, it takes a look at what happens when hope disappears... (read more)
Music
We
Owe You Nothing: Punk Planet - The Collected Interviews
by
Dan Sinker Powells.com Staff Pick
Punk Planet has long been a magazine just as concerned with politics and philosophy as it is with the music it covers. Their pure passion for the art and meaning of their favorite musicians has allowed them to pull off some of the most insightful... (read more)
Art/Photography
The
Devil's Advocate: The Art of Coop
by
Chris Cooper Publisher Comments:
Yes, that's right, this fancy hardcover book reproduces tons of Coop's posters and stickers and thangs, all in color. Step right up... (read more)
Graphic Novel
Palestine
by
Joe Sacco Synopsis
Originally published in two volumes, Joe Sacco's non-fiction graphic novel won an American Book Award in 1996. A journalist who works in the comics medium, Sacco here reports on his trip to the Occupied Territories and his experiences among Palestinians... (read more)
Kids
Little
Lit: Folklore & Fairy Tale Funnies, with Gameboard
by
Art Spiegelman Publisher Comments
A treasure and a treasury! Innovative cartoonist and renowned children's book artists from around the world have gathered to bring you the magic of fairy tales through the wonder of comics. The stories range from old favorites to new discoveries... (read more)
Special Recognition
(Most Frantic and Deserved Campaign for a Spoken Word Award)
Why Things Burn
by Daphne Gottlieb Synopsis
Eileen Myles introduces this second volume of confrontational poems by the San Francisco-based performance-poet. Gottlieb toured with SlamAmerica. (read more)
