a new formulative non-descriptive

978-0-9778526-8-0
Each fragment of Brijbasi's reality has the pregnant lack of connection that we find in dreams.  He is able to assemble the dream states in evocative and poetic ways that give a wry twist to the human condition.

Publication date: 4/2007.  Now available for order at our store:  here.

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sean brijbasi                                        one note symphonies
978-0-9778526-9-7
The collected poems of James Browning Kepple and Kim Göransson together in one of the most unique books of poetry ever published.  

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 couplet                 kim göransson, james browning kepple  
These poems-witty, irreverent, and spiced with allusions drawn from many sources-will appeal to the perceptive reader who will find much in this collection to make their experience abundantly joyous.  Vide's poems are free in form, receptive to rhyme and meter as the occasion serves and efficient at combining poetry and prose within the same poem. But words fascinate him and he expresses this with great variety and notable ingenuity. 




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0974726184
blem vide                                               babble on to babylon
This story collection is one of London's and Dublin's worst kept literary secrets.  It took a publisher with the beerguts of pretend genius to date to publish it, unexpurgated.  They're all here, the charmers, the snakes, the innocent, the complaisant, the guilt-ridden and the guilty, the Brothers, the whores, the poor and the young, the invulnerable, the jailed and the dead, the green and the truant, the music box and the p.a, the skaters, the crooners, and the pink neon sign that blinks all night, saying keys, keys, keys...



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0974726141

the london silence                                          stephen moran
0974726192
kenneth dawson                                         dancing the maze
The Muse and the Mechanism is an intense eye into the modern American small town. In it, we watch Charlie Fell and his band of renegade characters careen through a seemingly endless chain of relationships, addictions, uncertainty, and cigarettes.  Davis writes with all the confidence of a seasoned veteran. His characters team with life and depth, each racing around the idiosyncrasies of their age  with an all-too-familiar realism. 



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0974726176

the muse and the mechanism                              josh davis
0974726133
From brute and violent and obscene to gentle and romantic, even delicate, Blue paints word pictures of raw human emotions and actions with about as true and direct a brush as possible. Some things whisper and beckon ghosts. Others caress and penetrate. Others wield sledgehammers and start fires. But nothing is ever dull or ordinary. 



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j. tyler blue                                              the baltimore years
The immensity of the United States prompts perpetual restlessness and the ubiquity of motorized vehicles exists to satisfy insatiable if often pointless curiosity.  Strom takes us on the road but it is no road that you would ever find or easily imagine, for it is often less a physical road than an imagined highway through the quirkier recesses of the mind and spirit.  

Strom's style matches all this waywardness and careens from gnomic to comically literary.



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0974726117

nothing will save you                                            dean strom
sean brijbasi                                                still life in motion
978-0974726168
last night's dream corrected                      multiple authors
978-0977852611
multiple authors                                            fish drink like us
978-0-9778526-2-8
willesden herald - new short stories 1      multiple authors     
titles:
nothing will save you                                            dean strom
j. tyler blue                                              the baltimore years
the muse and the mechanism                              josh davis
willesden herald - new short stories 1      multiple authors     
multiple authors                                            fish drink like us
last night's dream corrected                      multiple authors
sean brijbasi                                                still life in motion
kenneth dawson                                         dancing the maze
the london silence                                          stephen moran
blem vide                                               babble on to babylon
 couplet                 kim göransson, james browning kepple  
Entire Contents Copyright © 2007 and forever
pretendgenius.com, pretend genius [press]
All Rights Reserved





Dancing the Maze is the first collection of the author's writings and an odd mix of verse, prose and travel journalism.  The author considers his writing a continuing work in progress as he explores his life, the nation's recent history, and the state of the world as he finds it.

Happier writers, if they are any good and not fools, will know that there is much to fear and much to dislike but they seldom bring us reports from the abyss. Dawson does and the honesty of his report wrings admiration. This is what a book should be as a transfiguring instrument.




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Reading this book will enable you to sit still for extended periods of time while your fruit paints you. It is recommended you wear your least favorite hat while reading this. Even if you don't read this yourself (for men) lending this book to women is an almost guaranteed way to make them fall in love with you. (for women) If you're not already in love with yourself, find out why. 



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It's not easy to put yourself into the tattered loafers of a contemporary poet.  He isn't much read - not on this continent at least.  He doesn't represent any kind of iconic allusion.  He isn't quoted by politicians except on inauguration day or when they're reaching for what they hope is sublime, most likely in a speech they instinctively know will be too long.  I can imagine Senator Throb screaming at his speech writers later to not give him the kind of material that causes the voters' eyes to glaze over.  "It's the last goddam time we're quoting any goddam poetry."



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In  the beginning were four drunken editors and their girlfriend/wives in a midtown Manhattan bar.  Four drunken editors et al whose recollections would equal at least eight or sixty four different genesises or is that genisi?  They might have argued the proper plural if given the cue but their lines were cast for bigger fish.  They shared a philosophy that was species neutral.  An empty hook will catch a snag eventually.  read a story from the book here in the Guardian:  secure

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The best of the international Willesden short story prize with writing from Britain, India, Ireland, Japan, New Zealand and the US. A feast of new short stories from these award-winning and brilliant writers: Willie Davis, Steve Finbow, James Lawless, Lee Joans, Nicholas Hogg, Wes Lee, Vanessa Gebbie, Jonathan Attrill, Laura Solomon, Shakti Bhatt, Laura Heggie, Olesya Mishechkina, Arthur Allan (in order of appearance). Underground classics: read these on the tube/subway/metro and look cool while missing your stop.  Publication date: 4/2007.  Now available for order at our store:  here .  Visit the prize website: here .  read a story from the book here in the Guardian:  kid in a well

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978-0-9778526-7-3
A sense of magic, a grasp of the music in  language, and a perception that is multiform and sensitive.

Some poets use the comfy chair approach but to read Barrett you need to sit up very straight and watch the show.  


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Quavaloche                                                        adam barrett
978-0-9778526-3-5 
willesden herald - new short stories 1      multiple authors     
multiple authors     willesden herald - new short stories 3          
The best of the international Willesden short story prize with writing from all over the world. A feast of new short stories from more award-winning and brilliant writers: Jenny Barden, Claudia Boers, Ben Cheetham, Carys Davies, Carol Farrelly, Nick Holdstock, Jo Lloyd, Margot Taylor, Jill Widner, Morowa Yejidé

Publication date: 3/2009.  Now available at our store: here .  Visit the prize website: here .  


now available at amazon.com and at bookstores throughout the known and unknown universe
978-0-9778526-0-4
new collection of short stories.  

"Brijbasi is the poet of irrecoverables. The shadowy figures of his skeletal world have no faces and they would not accept epiphanies. They do accept absurdities and they revel in contradictions. Brijbasi carries this to a degree that naturalizes absurdities and contradictions. The result is less fiction than a display of the mechanics of fiction that focuses on the bare minimum of expected content. This austerity, however witty it often is, brings the reader to considerations of what reality might be like if we look at it closely and if it is, in fact, real."
Publication date: 3/2009.  

Now available at our store:  here or on-line at amazon.com.

sean brijbasi                                        the unknowed things
pretend genius
978-0977852659  
willesden herald - new short stories 1      multiple authors     
multiple authors     willesden herald - new short stories 4          
Fourteen of the best short stories of the year 2010 from brilliant new and award-winning authors, seven by men and seven by women. The stories are set in Australia, Ireland, Russia, Singapore, South Africa, UK, US and more. Contributors: Wena Poon, Toby Litt, Julia Goubert, Willie Davis, Nuala Ní Chonchúir, Kevin Spaide, Carys Davies, Jonathan Attrill, Peggy Riley, Tom Vowler, Paul McGuire, Jo Cannon, Jarred McGinnis, Henrietta Rose-Innes.

Now available at our store: here .  Visit the prize website: here .  

now available at amazon.com and at bookstores throughout the known and unknown universe
978-0974726151  
willesden herald - new short stories 1      multiple authors     
multiple authors     willesden herald - new short stories 5   
The best of the Willesden Herald international short story prize 2011. Twelve new stories set as far afield as China and New Zealand, Sweden and the US as well as several from Britain and Ireland. 'Every human type and taste is here - sad, funny, fresh, sharp, gripping, sour and sweet - delicious small mysteries that suddenly reveal their secret hearts.' (Maggie Gee)

Now available at our store: here .  Visit the prize website: here .  

now available at amazon.com and at bookstores throughout the known and unknown universe
Charlie Fell sells baseball cards with seemingly hallucinogenic properties out of his bedroom, takes road trips to places he loves (New York City) and loathes (Southern California), and trips over a series of romantic entanglements. When the young writer releases his first novel, his life begins to unravel as the fallout from his published inner-monologues drive him back inside his already frail mind.


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978-0985213305 

nothing will save you                                            dean strom
vanishing is the last art                                         josh davis
978-0977852642 
Poems of the style that made Pretend Genius Press what it was before they were famous.



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mean confession                                                  dean strom
9780974726120 
Poetry, once only the domain of the upper class and educated caste, is now a way for everyday people to see the world, to interpret the mundane into something deeper, perhaps even a universal identification of the human experience. The poet Elias Miller has the ability to compress meaning, create word play, soundscapes and generate insights in a small space. Belt Loops & Bird Food establishes a context of common experience that anchors meaning and builds an identification with the reader in ways that are moving and often stunning.
  

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elias miller                                            belt loops & bird food