Conjuring the literature of the desert, such as If There Were Anywhere But Desert by Edmond Jabès, Desert Solitaire by Edward Abbey, andLand of Little Rain by Mary Austin, Jami Macarty’s The Minuses beckons attention to ecological and feminist issues and the co-incidence of eating disorders, sexual harassment, family and intimate partner violence, homelessness, suicide, environmental destruction, and other forms of endangerment. Seeking escape from relationship, belief, and self, multi-perspective survivors claim voice as contemplators of natural splendors, and as seekers of incarnate desires. These voices amplify the precariousness that predicates women's lives and the natural world, laying bare the struggle and faith required to endure with integrity and spirit intact.

Jami Macarty's profile page

Jami Macarty teaches poetry and poetics at Simon Fraser University. Cofounder and editor of The Maynard, former executive director of Tucson Poetry Festival, and a member of the Community of Writers at Squaw Valley, she is the author of three chapbooks of poetry: Instinctive Acts (Nomados Literary Publishers, 2018), Landscape of The Wait (Finishing Line Press, 2017), and Mind of Spring (Vallum Chapbook Series, 2017), winner of the 2017 Vallum Chapbook Award. She is a recipient of grants from Arizona Commission on the Arts and BC Arts Council, and her poems appear in Arc Poetry Journal, Beloit Poetry Journal, The Capilano Review, Interim, The Rumpus, Volt, and more. For more information, visit www.jamimacarty.com.

"This book is humming with desert silence, and forcefully compelling in its echoic impact."
—Vallum

"Macarty’s lines shine—lanterns in darkness. Set against a landscape backdrop, this gorgeous and moving collection feels both specific and timeless in its explorations. These poems speak to the human condition in fresh and stirring ways."
—Entropy

"The poems in The Minuses are composed as accumulations of declarations and description, that concurrently linearly build, and collage as lyric patchworks."
—Rob Mclennan's Blog