Janet Ruth Heller’s poetry book, Folk Concert: Changing Times, was published by Anaphora Literary Press (2012). Folk Concert contains Heller’s best poems written from the 1970s to 2011. Folk Concert concerns the journey of becoming a woman during difficult times. Themes include feminism, love relationships, college teaching, nature, psychotherapy, travel, the anti-Vietnam War movement, family, the life of an artist/entertainer/writer, and music.
Here are some comments about Folk Concert by author Jim Daniels, who teaches creative writing at CarnegieMellonUniversity, and Marge Piercy, who is also an acclaimed poet and novelist.
“Folk Concert: Changing Times, by Janet Ruth Heller, captures small everyday moments with matter-of-fact grace and humor. The powerful understatement of these rich, precise poems swells and reverberates. They sing with political commitment, emotional commitment, and a lifetime of paying attention.”
–Jim Daniels, author of Trigger Man, Having a Little Talk with Capital P Poetry, From Milltown to Malltown, Mr. Pleasant, In Line for the Exterminator, Places/Everyone, Punching Out, M-80, Blessing the House, Night with Drive-by Shooting Stars, Show and Tell: New and Selected Poems
“Janet Ruth Heller’s poems in Folk Concert: Changing Times work hard for clarity. They feel like clear water, but they have the cumulative power of a summer storm. Her family and nature poems are particularly moving.”
–Marge Piercy, author of Gone to Soldiers, Braided Lives, The Longings of Women, Woman on the Edge of Time, Sleeping with Cats, The Hunger Moon: New & Selected Poems, 1980-2010, Circles on the Water: New and Selected Poems 1960-1980, Breaking Camp, Hard Loving, 4-Telling, To Be of Use, Living in the Open, The Twelve Spoked Wheel Flashing, and The Moon is Always Female
Janet Ruth Heller has a Ph.D. in English from the University of Chicago. She has taught literature and writing at Western Michigan University, Albion College, the University of Chicago, Michigan State University, Grand Valley State University, and Northern Illinois University. Heller is a past president of the Society for the Study of Midwestern Literature and is currently the president of the Michigan College English Association. She is also the author of the poetry books Exodus (WordTech Editions, 2014) and Traffic Stop (Finishing Line Press, 2011), the scholarly book Coleridge, Lamb, Hazlitt, and the Reader of Drama (University of Missouri Press, 1990), and the award-winning book for children about bullying, How the Moon Regained Her Shape (Arbordale, 2006). Heller’s website is https://www.janetruthheller.com/
Amazon offers Folk Concert for $15 per copy plus postage. The ISBN-10 is 1-937536-26-2, and the ISBN-13 is 978-1-937536-26-8. You can order Folk Concert at the following link: http://www.amazon.com/Folk-Concert-Janet-Ruth-Heller/dp/1937536262/
Distributors include Ingram, IndieBound, and Campus Books.