"If you can tinker with the 'no dog poop' sign, that would be worth trying." Actual sentence I just wrote to our Slant Books cover designer. This is why they pay me the big bucks....

"When I can see creation this way, I can stop seeing myself as a grasshopper in the eyes of others. Like them, I, too, am part of creation." Read Richard Chess for today's Close Reading: slantbooks.substack.com/p/am-i-a-gra...

So glad that Graham Greene managed third place in the Association of Catholic Publishers’ book awards. He ought to be encouraged by this.

Suzanne: I asked for a sign from God. Me: Turn around.

“This love sets The Future of Love apart from much of the cheap surrealist verse of our time . . . Poch’s book is a welcome and refreshing work of depth and mystery.” Read Benjamin Myers on John Poch’s new collection for New Verse Review: newversereview.substack.com/p/a-review-o...

If you missed our reading and discussion with Robert Cording on “What’s Possible,”  it is now available as an episode of SlantCast on Spotify! Check it out here: open.spotify.com/episode/0kgz...

"Love is necessary, the Book demands, / even when it is a splinter of glass / lodged in the heart." Now available: read an excerpt from Robert Cording's new book, What's Possible, on our website. slantbooks.org/news/read-an...

"Through Nathan, God declares that the distance David imagines between himself and the rich man has collapsed completely: the evildoer is himself." Read William Cain on the Hebrew Bible for Close Reading: slantbooks.substack.com/p/close-read...

To celebrate the launch of Luigi Giussani's Time and the Temple, translator Sofia Carozza and writer @lukeburgis joined SlantCast for a rich discussion. Tune in for reflections on the communal origins of the translation, the meaning of "vocation," and Luke's new book. www.youtube.com/watch?v=SdrY...

I know it's late on a holiday weekend but I wanted to post this right away. My small contribution to remembering the beloved Warren Farha, whose funeral is tomorrow evening in Wichita: open.substack.com/pub/slantboo...

SAVE THE DATES! Slant's online book launch for Darren Cools' new YA novel, Light in the Canyon, will take place on June 23rd. AND if you're in the Ypsilanti area, come meet Darren at The Corner Brewery on June 25th! Register for Zoom launch here: us02web.zoom.us/meeting/regi...

I am utterly heartbroken that my dear friend and comrade-in-books Warren Farha has passed from this life. To me he was like a brother, a twin. His bear hugs nearly cracked my ribs. I called him Abba Warren. Here he is at the Glen Workshop in 2007 with his Christian humanist traveling road show.

"For me, holding our hearts open is a way of moving past the dichotomies we often think in." Read Brandi Willis Schreiber's stunning interview with Robert Cording about "What's Possible: New and Selected Poems" on Substack: brandiwillisschreiber.substack.com/p/whats-poss...

Slant at Barnes and Noble! Thanks to the reader who snapped this shot of Howard Schaap's new book in Sioux Falls, SD.

"Cording & his wife have come, now, to a kind of closure: they don’t need to ask, 'Where are you?'—because they know now where he is: 'inside us.' & from within them, he shows them how to 'look around.'" Read Peggy Rosenthal on Robert Cording's New & Selected slantbooks.substack.com/p/robert-cor...

I called her my fairy godmother. She helped me get my start in publishing. Yesterday at the memorial service for poet Luci Shaw her life was celebrated. Suzanne and I were able to attend and were moved beyond words. Memory eternal.

In case you missed it: Our reading and conversation with Robert Cording for this week's release, What's Possible, is available now on YouTube and Spotify! youtu.be/x3iJWA96Vck

"What’s Possible: New and Selected Poems makes clear what many have long known: that Robert Cording is among his generation’s finest poets, and that his work has been both deeply consistent and yet constantly evolving." Join us for tomorrow's launch at the Zoom link: us02web.zoom.us/meeting/regi...

"'Ia Orana Maria' still retains a boundary, an edge, but outer reality has become part of the inside reality when the edge, the outside, is part of the inside." Read George Dardess on Paul Gauguin for today's Close Reading: slantbooks.substack.com/p/puzzling-w...

"The most impressive thing is that the play manages to take death seriously and, at the same time, be very funny." Read Brendon Sylvester's review of J.C. Scharl's new play on death and Rabelais for today's Close Reading: open.substack.com/pub/slantboo...

NEXT WEEK! Register now for the launch event for Robert Cording's new and selected poetry collection, What's Possible: [8:44 AM]Register here: us02web.zoom.us/meeting/regi...

"Is there a connection between what we did and why?" Read William Cain on William Shakespeare and Frederick Douglass for today's Close Reading: slantbooks.substack.com/p/more-of-ma...

TFW your front door becomes someone else's home...

“There is evidence everywhere that things don’t decline, they just change.” Tune into today’s episode of SlantCast with@joeljmiller, author of The Idea Machine, for a discussion of the art of the book review, cultivating kindness, and old books vs. new. Watch here: www.youtube.com/watch?v=D9ye...

"One doesn’t necessarily expect youthful, Spanish sensuality or the fragrant musk of Mediterranean climes from a middle-aged Midwesterner. John Poch & his eighth collection of poetry are full of precisely these sweet surprises." New review from Radix: www.radixmagazine.com/2026/04/22/t...

TWO WEEKS AWAY: Join us for the launch event for Robert Cording's What's Possible: New and Selected Poems! Register here: us02web.zoom.us/meeting/regi...

This is the most important thing I've written in many a moon. I hope you will take the time to read it and let me know your thoughts. churchlifejournal.nd.edu/articles/the...

"We wouldn't need art if the only way to tell the truth was literal propositions... We need, at times, to be converted, to be captured, to be shocked, to be taken unawares." Listen to @Gregory_Wolfe on the @FRATERNUS podcast Sword & Spade: www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vgs2...

Philosophical and theological wonder? I treasure these words. Proud to have @bryanbliss.bsky.social, @slantbooks.bsky.social, and @gregorywolfe.bsky.social as my champions. Thank you. #youngadult #fiction #sff #yafiction #scifi #booksky #books #literature #literary #author #writer

"Stupid and good, stupid and beauty, these things are not mutually exclusive." Read Morgan Meis on a "famous but now not really all that famous, let’s say once-famous and now fairly obscure painting" for today's Close Reading: slantbooks.substack.com/p/the-isle-o...

Best freakin' book dedication ever? One of the treats you'll encounter when you read a free excerpt from Tom Howard's "Invisibilia" (Slant). slantbooks.org/news/read-an...

If you are the Calvin Festival of Faith & Writing, please stop by the Slant Books booth and say hello to our managing editor, Emily Starr Kwilinski! Oh, and buy a book or three!

Grateful to the Wall Street Journal for affirming that I am the definitive biographer of Malcolm Muggeridge. 😀https://www.wsj.com/opinion/free-expression/malcolm-muggeridges-journey-to-christian-belief-bce89fbf?reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink

A huge milestone for Morgan, Slant, & me -- our first review in The New York Review of Books. And what a review! "THE MOST EXCITING NEW WRITING ABOUT THE VISUAL ARTS TO APPEAR IN A GENERATION." www.nybooks.com/articles/202...

"What may appear to be the constraints of form in each of these poems may in fact be the very features of the poems that enable the poets to, at last, sing to the Divine." open.substack.com/pub/slantboo...

"When we make the most consequential decisions—those that set off life-defining ripples—often we don’t know what we’ve done." Read William Cain on Ernest Hemingway and Henry James for today's Close Reading. slantbooks.substack.com/p/making-dec...

Giveaway begins today! One lucky reader will be selected at random before launch day (April 14, 2026) to receive a FREE SIGNED copy of Tom Howard's new short story collection, Invisibilia: a mesmerizing ride through a haunting, haunted landscape. Entry link: forms.gle/njcrZQWC3CAi...

The video of my talk is now available -- probably the most important speech I've given in a long time: "The Church of What's Happenin' Now: Art, Beauty, and the Need to 'Make It New.'" www.youtube.com/live/ekNLB3K...

The Benedictines are not only hospitable but also generous, as you can see from this beautiful plaque they gave me after my keynote speech (with Pope St. John Paul II blessing the whole shebang)!

Those Benedictines sure understand hospitality. Feeling very welcomed here at Benedictine College.

7:30 PM TOMORROW, Friday, March 20! Don't miss Slant publisher Gregory Wolfe's keynote address at Benedictine College's Symposium on Transforming Culture—"The Church of What’s Happenin’ Now: Art, Beauty, and the Need to 'Make It New.'"

Don't forget to follow SlantCast on Spotify to listen to all of our live launch events as podcast episodes. If you missed the launch for The Future of Love earlier this month, it is now available here! open.spotify.com/episode/3dq1...

"Scarlet, gold, blue-green, gin-blue, cobalt, parrot-green, beer-brown, orange: these are remarkably color-full lines." Read Peggy Rosenthal on John Poch's new collection from Slant Books for today's Close Reading: slantbooks.substack.com/p/loving-the...

SAVE THE DATE: Join us for the live launch event for Tom Howard's new short story collection, Invisibilia, on April 14. Howard takes the reader on a mesmerizing ride through a haunting, haunted landscape of drifters, soldiers, lovers, and ghosts. Register here: us02web.zoom.us/meeting/regi...

ICYMI, our launch event with John Poch for The Future of Love is now live on YouTube! Check it out: www.youtube.com/watch?v=TzZz...

"For many African Americans, reading has been an epiphany, a form of insurgency and escape. Often undertaken in private, even in secrecy, reading for them was revelatory, a conversion." Read William Cain on "Black Boy" for today's Close Reading: open.substack.com/pub/slantboo...

#AWP Let's gooooo!!!!

Congratulations and happy publication day to John Poch! It's not too late to register for the launch event for The Future of Love—TONIGHT! Register: us02web.zoom.us/meeting/regi...

#AWP Goers! Slant will be in Baltimore this week! Come visit our booth at the Association of Writers & Writing Programs conference!

"The poem—its soul—spoke into and through my partially awakened state." Read Richard Chess on Elizabeth Jacobson for today's Close Reading. slantbooks.substack.com/p/i-am-turni...