The Beacon Best of 1999: Creative Writing by Women and Men of All Colors Book

The Beacon Best of 1999 is what I would like to remember as the year 2000 approaches, sketches of what we hold sacred and keep for those to come. . . . These stories, poems, and essays pay homage to what's become of us, to what we bring to the next millennium-the sweet rememberings of the imagined." -Ntozake Shange, from the Introduction

Continuing a commitment to presenting experiences drawn from lives lived outside the lines, Beacon Press presents The Beacon Best of 1999, a dazzling collection that includes the work of Dorothy Allison, Junot Díaz, Rita Dove, Louise Erdrich, Martín Espada, Ruth Prawer Jhabvala, Ha Jin, Jamaica Kincaid, Barbara Kingsolver, Yusef Komunyakaa, Hanif Kureishi, Marjorie Sandor, and John Edgar Wideman, as well as rising stars like Touré and Reetika Vazirani. Acclaimed playwright, poet, and novelist Ntozake Shange has chosen a treasury of poetry, short fiction, and creative nonfiction published over the past year. In The Beacon Best of 1999, women and men writing with fine grace ask us to look at the whole picture, from the street to the second story-to see, perhaps for the first time, the life of boxer Jack Johnson, or the fierceness of a love transformed into rage for a child killed by gang violence, or the complexities of a love affair in New Delhi, as lenses through which to consider questions of courage, brotherhood, and beauty. The alternative literary annual, The Beacon Best of 1999 will introduce you to a world where tradition and convention are overturned and the unexpected is a welcome guest.

Publishers Weekly

Ushering the work of women and men of color from the literary underground into the company of more established writers, this welcome anthology, edited by noted poet and playwright Shange, showcases standout short fiction, poetry and nonfiction from the past year. The range of nonfiction is impressive in both content and execution: Barbara Kingsolver dissects the spontaneous creation of poetry from image, emotion and miracles in "How Poems Happen," while Dorothy Allison takes a revealing look back at her childhood and John Edgar Wideman examines the meaning of brotherhood--racial, familial and otherwise--in "What's a Brother?" Although the quality of the poetry varies, there is much to enjoy, including Rita Dove's finely distilled portrait of Rosa Parks, Denise Levertov's gentle tribute to "A New Flower," Yusef Komunyakaa's soulful ode to the "Venus of Willendorf" and Danielle Legros Georges's humorous celebration "How to Kiss." The fiction selections consistently offer surprises. Among the best of them are Nadine Kijner's tender yet grotesque "Water," Toure's raucous "The Sad Story of Sugar Lips Shinehot and the Portable Promised Land," Brenda Miller's meditation on loneliness in "The Date" and Hanif Kureishi's wise examination of a restless husband with gypsy feet in "Intimacy." As editor, Shange has been careful not to surrender to ideology or dogma in her selection of material for this expansive collection, which deserves pride of place on the crowded shelf of literary anthologies. (Oct.) Copyright 1999 Cahners Business Information.