Somewhat Grumpy Press 🇨🇦

Nice write-up of the event, and the small publisher life.

Text as posted, on a colourful decorated background, with the SGP logo, a stylized Pallas' cat.

Summer Sale, August 10 to 15, all paperbacks 1/3 off (which is actually 33% more or less - math is not my strong suit). Order directly from our web site. somewhatgrumpypress.com

A sweet romance in a beautiful location!

Somewhat Grumpy Press Founded in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, 2020

Summer Sale - Coming Soon!

Paperbacks 1/3 off, August 10 to 15.

Place order from our web site (click Buy Books), between August 10 and August 15. Seventeen titles available. Canada only.

somewhatgrumpypress.com

Setting Type Exploring approaches to book cover layout

In this week’s newsletter, we tackle the question of cover layout and type from the illustrator’s perspective:

theartofmichaelwhelan.substack.com/p/setting-type

Ocean’s Lure Falling in love wasn’t part of the plan… “Ocean’s Lure is a treasure of a read.” Michelle Helliwell, author of Not Your Average Beauty. “A sweet contemporary rom…

If you are looking for a beach read, "a perfect beach read" is among the reviews my rural Cape Breton romance has received. eBook or paperback from any retailer, or direct from the publisher (me). somewhatgrumpypress.com/oceans-lure-...

The Mall Walkers Reviews The Mall Walkers R. Brian Howe In the summer of 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic is spreading, and a mall bookstore clerk is found dead in a washroom, a blue facemask stuffed into his mouth. Tha…

"In the summer of 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic is spreading, and a mall bookstore clerk is found dead in a washroom, a blue facemask stuffed into his mouth." The Mall Walkers, from R, Brian Howe. somewhatgrumpypress.com/the-mall-wal...

Welcome to Purple Thistle Posts Writing, creativity, mystery, etc. Why the purple thistle? The thistle is the national flower of Scotland, my ancestral home. And purple is the color of creativity and the mysterious—two topics tha…

Carolyn Nicholson, author of 'Traitors, Cannibals, Highlanders, and Vikings,' has started a blog, discussing her Scottish ancestry, writing, and other topics. #booksky carolynnicholson.ca/2025/07/30/w...

Newly discovered cuties~4 Palla's cat kittens aka manuls were born 2 months ago at La Torbiera in Italy, there was a gender reveal ~all baby girls! Pallas' cats prefer cold environments and grasslands at elevations up to 15,000 feet. They are also solitary animals.🩶🩶🩶🩶
[Cr. romanpaulov on Instagram]

Route on Detour I’ve never read Tom Wolfe’s The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test, but it is the source of the expression “You’re either on the bus or off the bus.” I heard this expression at off…

What if the bus took a wrong turn, and kept going? #flashfiction
covell.ca/route-on-det...

Tales from the Darkside “Schwarzmann’s surrealist alternate realities show us how precarious any reality can be.” Chris Benjamin, Atlantic Books Today. “These stories have the off-kilter quirkiness…

Tales from the Darkside, by Robert John Schwarzmann.

“Schwarzmann’s surrealist alternate realities show us how precarious any reality can be.” Chris Benjamin, Atlantic Books Today. somewhatgrumpypress.com/darkside/ #booksky

Opinion | ‘1984’ Hasn’t Changed, but America Has

“1984” is again being restricted, this time by conservative, Trump-aligned politicians in the United States.
#giftlink
www.nytimes.com/2025/07/27/o...

Photo of the back half of a tall ship replica, at a dock. The ship is relatively small, and painted bright blue above the deck.

Carolyn Nicholson visited the Hector replica in Pictou. In her book 'Traitors, Cannibals, Highlanders, and Vikings,' a time-traveller asks a settler about their voyage on it. "I knew what was coming, but it hurt me to hear it from someone who had lived it." somewhatgrumpypress.com/traitors-can...

Book cover, featuring a folk art style painting of the village - several colourful houses and boats in a small bay.

Rose Blanche is a Newfoundland village, founded in the 1800s. George Rose grew up there in the 1930s and 1940s, and in this memoir he paints a vivid picture of life in the outports at that time. Includes colour photos, paperback or ebook, order online or any bookstore. #boooksky

Beloved Dartmouth bookstore to remain open after surge in community support | CBC News An iconic bookstore in Dartmouth, N.S., that faced eviction over two months of unpaid rent was able to raise the money it needed to get caught up, thanks to an outpouring of support from the community...

Beloved #Dartmouth bookstore to remain open after surge in community support #NovaScotia

John W. Doull, Bookseller faced a Friday deadline to get caught up on unpaid rent

www.cbc.ca/news/canada/...

📌📚🔥 good thread 🧵 on actions to take to push back on censorship/ digital book burning 👇

#booksky

The Lost Giant of American Literature A major black novelist made a remarkable début. How did he disappear?

A book, signed and gifted by Langston Hughes to William Kelley, somehow made its way from Manhattan to a junk shop in rural Maryland, and there begins a tale. www.newyorker.com/magazine/201...

Vanishing into a fog

Photo by Andrew Neel on Pexels.com I've been terrible about writing here after my book launch (Bib & Tucker). I'm sure my publisher despairs of me as my promotional efforts have been so slight...I hope he continues to publish me as I have the third Nurse Ruth book percolating…

No worries, looking forward to the third Nurse Ruth book.

The Spartan Chronicles The Spartan Chronicles Thomas Frood Thomas Frood, while studying physics and mathematics at Queen’s University, worked with Spartan Air Services in the late 1950s, as a weather observer and radio o…

The Spartan Chronicles. Thomas Frood, while studying physics and mathematics at Queen’s University, worked with Spartan Air Services in the late 1950s, as a weather observer and radio operator in Canada’s far north. These are stories of that remarkable time. #booksky somewhatgrumpypress.com/spartan/

Bib & Tucker Bib & Tucker DA Brown It’s 1947, and Ruth Maclean has returned to nursing school at Kingston General Hospital, only to find she is on her own for yet another placement, this time in the f…

Enjoyed one of our books, but it's too much hassle to sign up to leave a review somewhere? You can easily submit reviews on our website, no account required. Reviews are much appreciated, and just a sentence or two is great! somewhatgrumpypress.com/bib-tucker/

Two New Thriller Titles Detective Robert Lui is back, in his fifth adventure from Vancouver author Glenn Burwell, Possession Point. DA Brown has almost completed editing the book, and it will be published this fall. Meanw…

Detective Robert Lui is back, in his 5th adventure from Vancouver author Glenn Burwell, Possession Point. @dabble58.bsky.social is editing the book, and it will be published this fall.

Meanwhile, @covell.ca has started editing 9/11...

somewhatgrumpypress.com/2025/07/16/t...

Customers in Canada can support their local independent bookstore by clicking Shop Local after selecting a book at 49th Shelf. All our titles are in stock at Dartmouth Book Exchange; some titles in stock at other bookstores in NS and NB, including Carrefour Atlantic. 49thshelf.com/content/sear...

Bookshop: Buy books online. Support local bookstores. An online bookstore that financially supports local independent bookstores and gives back to the book community.

Customers in the UK and USA can support their local independent bookstore by purchasing our titles through bookshop.org

China LGBTQ Crackdown: Dozens of 'Boys' Love' Writers Arrested Over Online Novels LGBTQ Censorship: China detains dozens of authors—mostly women—for writing gay erotic fiction online, sparking global outcry over creative freedom.

"Across China, authorities have been interrogating dozens of writers -- many of them young women -- who published gay erotic novels online, in what appears to be the largest police roundup of its kind to date."

Since May of this year, we've been printing some paperbacks in Canada instead of the USA. So far, that's $1500 worth of printing. The books are also cheaper (allowing us to increase author earnings), delivery is faster, and the paper is better quality.

Our eBooks are available on Amazon, but also Kobo, Nook, Apple, Google Play, and some we've never heard of. If you can't find a title at your favourite eBook store, let us know. Most are also available through eBook lending systems at libraries.

Private Eye hits the nail on the head

Somewhat Grumpy Press Founded in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, 2020

We are a Canadian publishing company. All our authors live in Canada, and paperbacks sold directly by us or the authors are printed in Canada (as of May 2025). somewhatgrumpypress.com

July 2025 View Issue as PDF vol. 16, no. 5ISSN 2369-6516 (Print)ISSN 2369-6524 (Online) Scroll down to read all poems, or select the poem title to go directly to that poem. Select the author’s name to …

Some days I write sonnets
with the wrong number of beats per line
and almost no rhyme,
but they still sound okay,
and other days they get published
with other poems
and are in good company.
Read mine, and more.
ohforgery.com/2025/07/04/j...