In Season's Dream---Reviewed by The Columbia Review

I just read a beautiful review of my poetry book, In Season's Dream.

                                   "A rich collection of poems with a powerful theme, deep insight, and rich
                                    imagery. Excellent!" The Columbia Review. 

I encourage everyone to read the entire review. It is fairly written, and touches upon some interesting areas of my writing. Hope you get a chance to get a copy and flip through it. It will be at the Book Expo America show in New York at the end of May, with the Foreword booth.
But follow this link and read the review http://www.thecolumbiareview.com/seasons-dream-r-tirrell-leonard-jr-2015/

Ploughshares Spring edition is out

If you subscribe to Ploughshares or buy it from your bookstore or borrow it from a library, the spring 2015 edition is out and in the back with the advertisements, is an ad for "In The Murmuring Trees."

   This ad was designed by Alexandra Artiano, and seeing the beautiful job she'd done with it was the main reason I'd hired her for "In Season's Dream," when I ran into a problem with the publisher over the proposed cover. I can not recommend her enough, she does beautiful work.

On Edgar

Here is a review by R.: http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1243550335

Over a few hours from five at night till half past one in the morning,  I read Edgar Allan Poe,  the fever called living. It chronicles his chaotic life and good fortune.  His deep love of his wife Virginia clemm to his falling apart at her demise. A heartrending journey, a climb out of his boozy destruction to sobriety and engagement.  And the weird circumstances of his bizarre death. As well the odd events that occurred after his death, and reunion of the family post mortem. All in all any Poe fan should read this book.

Thirty second spot

In Season's Dream: https://youtu.be/wYkHlU5r0Vo   I created a cool video trailer for my new book with a free app.

Morning Cuppa

Enjoying a morning cup of coffee before I run out the door to race to my job. I am always getting lost in thought and then realize too late that I am going to be late.
But the sun  is up, and I must run. I'll chat a bit more in the evening. Eventually I will get the hang of all of this, I just must keep at it.

Launched and away

My new collection of poetry
, "In Season's Dream " is available online http://bookstore.xlibris.com/Products/SKU-001011568/In-Seasons-Dream.aspx

It is also available at amazon, easy to find by searching for R Tirrell Leonard Jr. 

It will soon be available to order at your favorite bookstore, or online book seller. If you are on good reads please rate the book.

Thank you.

In Season's Dream, reviewing the journey

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25148583-in-season-s-dreamIn Season's Dream

https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/6648498.R_Tirrell_Leonard_Jr_R. Tirrell Leonard Jr.

   I am very happy with how this book came out, After I had all the pages together I hired an editor to help me work this into a highly polished book. I heeded advice I got for In The Murmuring Trees, and added breaks in the book for contemplation. I broke the book into four seasons, and each section is Spring, Summer, Autumn and Winter.

     The poems of each season all relate to the season, and Tanya Gold did a wonderful job helping me to realize deeper threads of each piece, and reach in and give the reader something to chew on.

     My favorite poems are the longer Narrative ones, the best of which is "Fragment" which is the poem that closes the book.   Each poem quietly builds on feeling, some with humor some with quiet bits of realism, all with intense imagery.

   When I did finish this book finally, I was very happy with it. All in all, I am proud of how Season's came out. The settings of the poetry are Woburn, Ma. Salem, Ma and some of the coastlines and woods of New England.

  Next I hired Xlibris to publish this collection as a paperback, and I also hired Alexandra Artiano, to create the cover design for In Season's Dream. It has been a long journey, three years in the making, The rough draft was almost 100 pages, and I the final product is 80. It took a full year to write, a full year to edit and a few months to bring it out and publish.

https://www.goodreads.com/review/list/33422621-r-jr  all my reviews

A quick note

In Season's Dream, my new poetry collection is off to the printer's. It should be ready by April. It will be available at all the usual online retailers, and at the book rack in the lobby of The Hawthorne Hotel in Salem Ma.
   
       It will be a paperback release this time through and be priced at $15.99 for the paperback, and $3.99 for the kindle, nook and e-book versions. I will post again when it goes live. I am planning to enter it in a few contests this year as well, and will keep you posted on how it did in each contest.

But just wanted to let you know that soon you will be able to procure a copy for yourself. stay tuned for the book launch.

Galleries are in

I spent the morning drinking coffee and pouring through the galleries for In Season's Dream.

     Thankfully there are no errors. Just a couple of omissions that I emailed my publisher to add in.

With any luck this project will be launching within the week. Very satisfying experience this time through.

Onward...

I received an email this morning, "In Season's Dream" is nearing the production phase of publication. The galley's will be sent to me in the coming five days or so. As soon as I approve the galley proofs it will be cleared for release and publication will begin.

          In this stretch, I will be seeing the cover design and approving it.
  
          and seeing the interior galleys and approving them.

I will be carefully reviewing these items looking for typos, if I miss one the error will be mine.
As soon as this is done, the fun will begin.

As well in this space of time my new semester of college will begin, I am in my first year at Southern New Hampshire University, and taking creative writing.  Although I am taking it with a fiction bent, not a poetry bent. I am self taught in poetry and I think I am decent. I'd like to figure out how to craft a short story and novel. Increasing my writer's tool box. At this time I am in the essay area. I am doing well so far.

            Wish me luck, wedding season will begin to heat up at my job. I have quite a bit on my plate.
this will be fun. Stay tuned for the upcoming release of my second volume of poetry, "In Season's Dream," I am aiming for an April release. But that depends on how the galleys turn out.

          Also look for "In The Murmuring Trees," to be advertised in the upcoming edition of Ploughshares Magazine.

Haircut

I just walked into Mahoney's in woburn center. This is one of those places where you feel you stepped back in time. The ceramic looking tile floor is browned by age, cracked in places missing segments in others. The entire place seems like early nineteen hundreds, or even as young as nineteen forties. I suspect a nineteenth century lineage though. There is always a line because Charlie the owner does good work.  Nit far from where I'm sitting hangs a nice large photo of president John f Kennedy.
The brick facade out side, and large wooden pane windows, and the finish of a haircut with a straight edge razor are partly why I love this place.
  Maybe some day people will visit woburn, like they visit boston, salem and concord.

Cover design

This was a picture I took on Derby Warf in Salem, Ma. and I had wanted to use for the cover of my poetry collection. But, the publisher does not like the fact there are unknown people walking through. It is an artistic shot, and photography as art sometimes has unknown people in it.  So I have hired a local artist to design me a cover for my next book.
#booklaunch  

       Well no one said it would be easy any ways. As soon as I get the cover the project will move forward. Too bad, this photo would have made a swell cover.

A Creative Take On A Sonnet

A sonnet is a traditional poetic form of fourteen lines, set in iambic-pentameter. There are many variations of this Italian form. The first sonnets had an octave and a setset. The poem's subject would turn or give a different perspective at in the setset. And also had a rhyming variation. abababab cdecde is one of these.
  
    The Shakesperian version or English model had three quatrains followed by a couplet, and the Spenserian had four tercets followed by a couplet. And the Austrailian version has an enveloping rhyme pattern to it.
Italian Sonnet

     My version of the sonnet (an American model), is quite different and has a unique feel to it. It starts with a couplet followed by a tercet, followed by a quatrain, adding the turn with a following tercet and then reversing the order of the repeated couplet as a sort of refrain. This can create an introspective feel to the whole. I will give a few examples, and you can try this sonnet and post yours below.

In Elder Wood

He watches snow fall through the night and sighs
The cave will hide him from the storm's full-size.

He gathers wood and builds a smoky fire
And dreams inside the flames and green wet wood,
A feeling steals him, prodding crackling choir.

His shelter warms, and holds away the storm
And dreams return of her, a girl in snow
She dances near the winsome elm aglow,
And beckons him out near her tree and form.

He casts a glance to warm his soul's desire
And wanders out, on through the dark and stood
Beside a lithe-pale ginger girl so dire.

The cave will hide him from the storm's full-size
He watches snow fall through the night and sighs.

The Summer of 1985 (In The Murmuring Trees, Xlibris 2012)

In wisps of fog, remember castle grounds
I walked among the ruins on walls and sounds.

Two weeks we camped outside, in pouring rain
Irish boys played in mud, we ran and slid
In Portumna I wish I could remain.

Tallaght, we stayed a couple days and nights
A dance to haunt my life, my heart undid
I left a girl, my love behind, a kid
To dream of dancing with her then, delights.

A song to take away the dreams and pain
She came to me, I pushed away amid
I feel the loss, my faults in broken chain.

I walked among the ruins on walls and sounds
In wisps of fog, remember castle grounds.

Notice the rhyming patterns and how they differ between my two examples.
Now try your hand at my sonnet version and post it below for the enjoyment of all.
Please check out this link for more info on sonnet's Poetic Asides Blog 
In The Murmuring Trees

Why Hello...

           Hi, My pen name is R. Tirrell Leonard Jr. My first collection of poetry was titled, "In The Murmuring Trees." It is available at rtleonard.com, where you can also read the reviews on it, it's also available at Amazon.com, and you can buy a signed copy from the book rack in the loby of the Hawthorne Hotel.

        I just went back to school to procure my degree in creative writing. I am attending Southern New Hampshire University, and working my regular full time job as a banquet waiter for the Hawthorne Hotel in Salem, Ma. and some how still finding time to write with a hectic schedule.

       I am also about to release a new book, which will be called, "In Season's Dream." I worked with an editor on this one, Tanya Gold.

       I will post some poetry here, and detail the journey from here to book launch and beyond. I may also post other ramblings and perhaps an essay or two..maybe though...
     
       But in all I may just post before coffee here or there if I remember to, I am going to make a better effort than my last blog, I think the last time I posted to it was five years ago. It's been nice chatting with you, so very glad to have met, and just maybe you'll check out my website, http://rtleonard.com. And yes as the Title of this blog goes, R is for Robert.

            Sincerely, Robert Tirrell Leonard Jr.