sarah evans, the mastermind behind zines like "root" & "salt & slush," teamed up with her sister, julia, to create this small split zine about making fresh & healthy food for your dog &/or your baby (obviously, there are different recommendations for each). sarah has a nine-year-old american staffordshire, which is a big-ish-sized dog, & rather than eating super-processed & boring dog food, she eats all kinds of different stuff, mostly created with the leftovers from what sarah & her partner make for themselves. julia started making her own baby food for her daughter, anna, as soon as anna was old enough to be interested in food, up until the age of two years. most of her ideas consist of preparing whatever the adult is making for herself in a manner that is easier for babies to eat. the emphasis in this zine is making sure that the dogs & babies under your care are getting all the nutrients they need, experiencing exciting & varied diets, eating in a way that is safe, & keeping the labor & costs low for the food preparers. the zine is organized alphabetically by ingredident, with tips on preparation & an explanation of the nutritional benefits (or counter-benefits, in the case of some forbidden ingredidents mentioned) each food item offers. sarah & julia are on a quest to show that preparing good food for babies & dogs doesn't have to be this tremendously complicated hippie thing that takes up your entire day. if ever you have considered the possibility of creating a diet like this for your dog or your baby but wanted some simple, easy-to-understand information on how to make it happen, this is the zine for you!
quarter-standard * 32pp. * $2.35 (u.s.)/$2.75 (int'l)

this incredible resource collects all kinds of various abortion stories from women from all walks of life, illustrating the necessity of self-agency in the realm of reproductive health as well as the work that needs to be done around improving access to abortion around the world. this zine may be a heavy read for people who have experienced abortions or are considering it as an option. i had to take breaks while reading it the first time, before i ever had my abortion, because the emotion that pours off these pages as women tell their stories is so incredibly intense, it's almost tangible. i want to re-read it again now that i've had an abortion, but i'm a little nervous! some people had clinical abortions & detail their experiences--both good & bad. some tried herbal abortions. some worked & some didn't. some had multiple abortions, a different experience every time. some women write their articles from the standpoint of defending their choices, addressing the politics behind their decisions, some offer just the clinical facts, & still others delve into the emotions surrounding their choices. one woman writes about an experience a friend had with menstrual extraction, & another writes about being an advocate at a clinic. it's damn near impossible to stay neutral on the issue of abortion after reading this collection of stories, & i don't think anything can beat a primary source for telling exactly what it is people have to go through to retain control of their own bodies. this should be required reading. only 1 copy left!
half-legal * 60pp. * $3.35 (u.s.)/$4.95 (int'l)

my friend angela wrote this zine. we became friends when we were working together at the papercut zine library in cambridge. at the time, angela worked for a school doing work for inner-city kids who needed a lot of help. even though she felt that was important work to be doing, she felt really stifled by the pressure of living a professional lifestyle with dress shoes & mandatory femininity. so she quit her job, gave away almost everything show owned (i am typing this up at the end table she gave me, which i use as a desk), & went to vermont to work with the bread & puppet theatre, & spent the fall traveling around north carolina, florida, west virginia, etc, visiting friends, working on the campaign to stop mountaintop removal, living in unheated cabins, etc. this is the zine she wrote about her last few months in boston, why she decided to relinquish her claim on the traditional 9-5 pay-off-your-student-loan-&-live-in-an-apartment-building life, & sate her curiosity about living the punk rock, politically-engaged, traveling kid life. it's all little stories about her double life in boston, sitting in an office by day, riding bikes & dumpstering after dark, performing with the puppet theatre, helping de-feather chickens, visiting boston & feeling different. interspersed throughout are very adorable illustrations pertaining to the stories, including animals & ladies playing accordions. it's very engaging & inspiring. it's always pretty incredible to see someone you care about doing something they have always wanted to do & watching it unfold in positive & complex ways. so i'm glad she she created this little document. plus, i make a guest appearance! see if you can spot me.
half-standard * 36pp. * $3.05 (u.s.)/$4.25 (int'l)

this is jenny's forst zine in quite some time, & long-time readers of her stuff might recognize that a lot of growth has taken place in the past year or so, leading to this extremely personal, confessional zine in which jenny writes about a lot of challenging issues. sub-titled, "i'll tell you mine if you tell me yours," she opens with some stories about her family & its lengthy history of abusive tendencies, admitting that she inherited this tendency & has done some things she is not proud of. interwoven with these family stories (the text is typewriter-style, but with the clean, easy-to-read layout of computer font, big blocks of text comprising each disparate tale in the zine, broken up with titles) are "big fat thoughts" about jenny's relationship with her body & her fat identity, seeking to complicate traditional notions of what fat really is & also how jnny relates to this identity & other fat-positive activists. she includes some tips on how non-fat folks can support their fat friends, & some ideas on fat fashion, & closes the zine with a recommended book list & a few zine reviews, giving the whole thing a pleasant patina of an old-school riot grrrl-style zine, with incredibly intimate, sometime gut-wrenching stories, but a connection to a sustainable zine communty of like-minded activists. pretty powerful stuff.
quarter-standard * 76pp. * $2.70 (u.s.)/$3.50 (int'l)

julian has returned with a new, even heftier issue of his punk rock personal zine. i moved the other day, & in the process, i had to pack up my personal zine collection, which included some old issues of "one way ticket," & i was reminded of how much i really love julian's layout techniques. this issue is a little cleaner, with big pages of text interspersed with photographs (vintage & new), & off-kilter, mismatched fonts for the headlines. this issue opens with a biography of the mathematician alexander grothendieck, born to russian anarchists, who became a political & academic renegade in the mathematical community before disappearing in 1991, allegedly to finish life as a hermit. this ties in with what seems at first to be another hitchhiking story, until julian explains that he got a ride from czech mathematician who told him all about grothendieck's strange story. a large chunk of this zine is about traveling--hitching or hopping trains, rides from people who want to take julian to reno & turn him on to high-stakes gambling. he writes about taking a friend to the hospital & the uncertain agonies of waiting while doctors determine the health of a loved one. he writes a love letter to jeanette winterson, thanking her for her books & explaining how they informed his perceptions of love in real life (i would have written almost the exact same letter in 1999, before jeanette got all crimethinc on us--written on the body is still amazing). he writes a show review of the canadian sXe band go it alone (whose singer i once met on a greyhound bus across the dakotas), which is actually code for reminiscing about first getting into punk rock & wondering why the fascination still holds years down the line. this is a little brick of a zine, perfect for reading on a cross-country bus or train, waiting out a layover or for the drunks behind you to finish their vodka & fall asleep. warning: will probably give you travel lust!
quarter-standard * 68pp. * $1.70 (u.s.)/$2.50 (int'l)

erick lyle, editor of "scam" zine, has released his first book on soft skull press. it's a non-fiction historical account of his experiences living & organizing in san francisco. erick moved there in the midst of the boom dot-com years, living in occupancy hotels & working with homeless outreach organizations in order to receive welfare. he watched silicon valley creep up on the mission district until the bubble burst & suddenly san francisco was littered with gutted buildings, their residents evicted, half-remodeled into lofts. then 9/11 happened & anti-war activists successfully shut down the city to protest the impending war in iraq (see "life during wartime" #7 for another account of those events). the war happened anyway, as did a lot of city politics: mayoral campaigns that pitted wealthy dot-commers against the homeless population, the rise of gay shame as a radical response to the coporate takeover of gay pride, d.i.y. needle exchange programs, & more. & through all of this homeless coalition work, anti-war activism, & electoral politics, erick maintained his punk identity & connections, starting an art squat at 949 market st., holding punk generator shows on BART platforms, writing zines, altering billboards & doing graffiti. this book is an exhaustive chronicle of over a decade of radical anti-gentrification activism in san francisco, & deftly illustrates the necessity of multi-issue organizing & playing to one's strengths as an organizer. crucial reading for residents of the bay area, but also anyone in any geographical area struggling to hold on to their political & (sub)cultural ideals in a bush/post-bush era.
half-standard * 270pp. * $18.00 (u.s.)/$22.00 (int'l)

this zine is new to the distro, but it is by no means a new zine. jeff wrote "otaku" before he changed the name to "ghost pine," & issue #5 was the last under the former name, released in the fall of 1999. he re-printed a bunch of back issues & gave me a pile to see if anyone would be interested in these "ghost pine"-related artifacts. this zine is so completely worth picking up if you miss those olde-tyme style punk rock storytelling zines. i can't remember where i originally got the zine--maybe from the now-defunct words as weapons distro, or maybe at reading frenzy or something, when i first moved to portland. i liked the layout, which is all handwritten with rub-on letter headers over the stories & a scrappy hand-drawn cover depicting the big cross on the hill in montreal over a set of crossbones. i liked that the cover promised stories of maps, ghosts, street art, bikes, hitchhiking, coffee, saints, midnights, mail, history, secrets, love, luck, & calamity, & totally delivered on every count! this zine is packed to the gills with the kind of fresh, unironic, immediate punk rock stories that are so hard to come by these days. i remember a couple of years after this zine came out, jeff & i were both at the boston zine fair, & he was tabling the first "ghost pine" (#6) & old "otaku"s & i stopped dead in my tracks & traded for the new "ghost pine" based on the strength of this zine. i never show that much excitement to zinesters i don't really know (that was the first time we ever met). re-live the late 90s! get your mitts on this subcultural artifact before it's gone forever!only 5 copies left!
quarter-standard * 52pp. * $2.70 (u.s.)/$3.50 (int'l)

stacey-marie & alexander are a young anarchist punk couple who made this zine together as a document of their unexpected pregnancy & choice to give the baby up in an open adoption. in a very text-heavy typewritten account, they take turns explaining the whole process from the beginning: how they met, how they got pregnant, the options they ran through when they found out, how their relationship struggled during the pregnancy, settling on a birth plan, finding the couple that wound up taking the baby, the birth, the adoptive parents taking the baby home, & their eventual move to chicago. i decided to carry this zine because i have found that adoption as an option for coping with an unexpected pregnancy is not really discussed that much, but it can be just as wrenching or empowering as any other choice. essentially, i found the story unique & wanted to provide a forum for it. this is not an anti-abortion zine, although i do feel compelled to warn readers that there are a few passages that veer dangerously into anti-abortion seniment while stacey-marie describes the decision-making process that inspired her to opt for adoption. although she takes great pains to assure the reader that she is not anti-abortion in the least, i still found my skin crawling a little bit. but if you take that part with a grain of salt & enjoy the story for what it is, it's really worth reading, especially for those folks with a particular interest in reproductive health, childbirth, alternative parenting, & the like. as a former midwifery student, there were definitely a few times when i had to put the zine down & take a few deep breaths. it's hard to listen to stories of seven-month pregnant ladies realizing they have absolutely no birth plan whatsoever & newborn infants being fed soy formula. but hey, shit happens. consider it part-yarn, part-cautionary tale, if you wish. all the writing is quite engaging; stacey-marie's & alexander's personalities really shine through on to the page. (ps--the copies i have in the distro now are the second edition, with a few edits & updates partially inspired by critiques i made here.)
half-standard * 92pp. * $4.35 (u.s.)/$5.95 (int'l)

stacey-marie seems a little more in her element in this second issue of her most recent foray into personal zines, which is subtitled "i'm ready to grow young again" & features a cover drawing of a tree swing. text-heavy & told in one long narrative block that is broken up into chronological & thematic chunks, this zine finds stacey back in athens, where she gave birth to her daughter. the first issue of this zine contains details on that & her decision to give the baby up in an open adoption. stacey & her partner have since moved back to athens from chicago to be closer to their child & some writing here is about the aftermath of the adoption decision, including some hard questions about potentially regretting the choice. but there are also stories here about the anarchist & punk scenes stacey has immersed herself in now that she is in georgia, interspersed with childhood recollections on topics like growing up catholic, body image & shame, & being a voracious reader. these reminiscences are used as guide posts as stacey struggles to figure out her politics & come to terms with her chosen sub-cultural identities. this is a pretty sweet & engaging perzine in the style of a person doing some pretty challenging self-reflection & trying to have fun along the way.
quarter-standard * 36pp. * $1.35 (u.s.)/$1.75 (int'l)

each of stacey-marie's zines are really different from each other, but they're all really good. i love it when a zinester can make such unique zines on each outing, focusing on the things that interest them most at the moment. that's the kind of approach that keeps zine-making interesting & exciting. stacey-marie has decided to use her most recent issue as a forum for her photography. she re-prints a bunch of her photographs here, big enough to take up a page each by themslves so you can see a lot of detail even in black & white photocopies, & wrote a story (all true, all in great personal zine style) to go with each one. she writes about her relationship with her boyfriend (not in a boring emo way; in a slice of life charming way), the new punk house she helped start & the rhythms she developed with her roommates so everyone can take care of each other, stories about her friends, stories about going out drinking, squatting in new orleans, a friend's wedding ceremony in pittsburgh, living with children & how it changes the dynamic of a punk house, & a lot more. the stories here could stand on their own--they're really evocative & well-written. but contextualized with the photographs--something about the images just makes you care more. i was very impressed by the maturity of this zine. stacey-marie writes about her interest in documentation, & that really comes through with this project.
half-legal * 28pp. * $3.70 (u.s.)/$4.50 (int'l)

molly is the artist/writer behind a zine i used to carry in the distro, "24/on cities". some folks may also remember the zine series she did in the mid/late 90s, "tyger voyage". those familiar with her previous projects will already be aware of molly's ethereal, precise, hand-crafted aesthetic. this one is sewn into a folder of black specialty paper, almost imperceptibly letterpressed with the title. the long ends of the sewn binding wrap around the zine to keep it closed. a mini-zine entitled "three rooms" is stitched into the main zine & covered with the same fibrous black paper used on the cover. the text of the zine is typewritten (using an old-fashioned typewriter with cursive font options) on to high-contrast photocopied vintage photos, which help create an antique, old-fashioned atmosphere. the moody imagery complements the introspective, evocative writing, which feels like something someone may have written in the 1940s, not this past winter. example: "our summer recklessness. the way we sit endlessly in parks & half-lit rooms. the way it is always easy. how i walk home alone with dirty clothes & unwashed hair..." when reading molly's zines, it's easy to forget that the modern world exists. the extra expense here is because this is really an art zine, with the intricate binding & letterpressing. it's worth the extra dollar or two though, because this zine will be read & re-read & shown to friends. only 1 copy left!
quarter-standard * 28pp. & 12pp. mini * $4.35 (u.s.)/$4.75 (int'l)

suze wrote in her intro, "this zine is only one tiny tale in an epic story & history...that is being lived & written right now in burma. i spent four months living & working with women in burma's pro-democrazy movement in 2004...my intentions are to put a face (or faces) to the suffering of the burmese people that we hear so little about, & to share the joy i shared with so many folks there, & to fulfill my promise to my burmese friends & students to put out information about the situation in burma when i got back to the states." suze also wrote the zine "sojourner," which included some snippets of her experiences in burma, but this zine is all about the time she spent living in a refugee camp, teaching women to read & write. she tells the story through journal entries, letters home, pretty comprehensive factual information about the burmese crisis that is inspiring so many people to flee, the condition of the refugee camps, & stories written by the students she taught--about working in sweatshops before they left their homes, learning how to read & write, being exposed to feminism, & worrying about their families. the zine closes with some history of political upheavals in burma & the current state of pro-democracy politician, aung san suu kyi. suze also includes a resource list for people wanting to learn more about the burmese situation & how to help refugees. the whole thing is cut & pasted together with lots of photographs of suze's students & the area around the camps. for all the zines out there waxing philosophical about making radical changes in the world, there aren't that many documenting people's experiences actually uprooting themselves from the comfortable lives & going out into the world to try to make some kind of small, tangible difference. this is one.
half-standard * 36pp. * $1.70 (u.s.)/$2.50 (int'l)

i am really excited to be carrying this zine. i had been looking for it for a while, & when i finally tracked greg down, i picked up the zine for distro right away. greg has been writing "rice harvester" for a long time (almost a decade, or longer), but this is the first issue that he has ever done any distribution with in terms of the kind of thing i do. mainly he just took it one tour & gave it away to people while traveling. the covers were designed & screenprinted by icky, who writes "nosedive". inside, the writing is primarily handwritten & pasted over xerox art backgrounds in a style recalling a zine like "scam". in fact, erick from "scam" has a piece in here about seeing the 50 million reunion show on a BART platform in san francisco & the thoughts it inspired in him regarding the gentrification of the city & the aging of punk rock. much of this zine seems to have a theme of growing up & coming to terms with one's mortality--sometimes in big ways. a large portion of the writing is dedicated to greg's experience of being mugged & shot in new orleans a few years ago. he recounts the entire experience, augmented by portraits a friend sketched of him while he was recovering in the hospital. he also writes about a tour gone awry (the band had to hitchhike to shows), his obsession with pinball as filtered through the continuing tradition of his family's obsessive nature, learning to adapt to new technologies, & wanting friends to stop shooting heroin. this zine is heavy at times, but so fucking good.
half-legal * 40pp. * $2.70 (u.s.)/$3.50 (int'l)

it's nice to read a zine about sex work written by a person actually doing the work, not just pontificating on it from an ivory tower somewhere. it's even nicer to read a zine about sex work by someone who is sharp as a tack. janet first tackles the age-old question: why do women strip? & she doesn't pull any punches in her answers, managing to be funny, incredibly honest, & a big unapologetic feminist to top it all off. she addresses the anti-porn/anti-sex work debate from a smart anti-capitalist vantage point, & delineates the psychologies of the various types of men patronizing strip clubs. she offers up useful advice to girls starting out in the business & essentially presents a side of sex work few outsiders ever see--the insider who has thought this stuff through time & time again, & is ready to offer up her perspectives without apology. the layout, which is comprised of happy homemaker clip art, pseudo-religious iconography, & an image i remember coming across in a book when i was seven years old of some renaissance women exposing their breasts to an appraising gent in a top hat, adds to the overall effect of the zine by disavowing the ironic cheesecake effect too many people associate with feminist sex work writing in zines these days.
half-legal * 52pp. * $3.05 (u.s.)/$4.25 (int'l)

this issue provides even more fascinating information on stripping & sex work, beginning with a history of sex work in new orleans (sure to be a seedy story). this issue is mostly about stripping in new orleans & features more on-the-job stories, including a peek into the controversial VIP room, & a frequently asked questions. she writes about sometimes hating her job & addresses the issue that so many sex workers have to address: the supposed glam factor. what really blows me away about this zine is the effortless manner with which janet weaves her knowledge of stripping history, religious debate, & feminist academia, never skipping a beat in readability. also included with this issue is her incomplete guide to clubs in new orleans, detailing what kind of pay dancers can expect, general rules & regulations regarding appearance & how cozy a dancer & her patron can get, etc. i like the way the nuts & the bolts of the industry are addressed right alongside the political & moral motivations. this is smart stuff!
half-legal * 64pp. & insert * $3.35 (u.s.)/$4.95 (int'l)

this is sarah's story of working on an organic farm for the summer, & the feelings it brought up pertaining to living spaces, feeling the connection to seasons & weather, & the way agriculture has developed as the world has become more capitalist-oriented & dependent on machines. it's one long thought-provoking essay laid out on brightly-patterned scraps of fabric & interspersed with beautiful photographs, & let's not forget the recipe for rhubarb pie! it makes a person want to garden, or play in the snow, depending on season & locale, & barring everything else, maybe make a big dinner with organic vegetables for all their friends.
eighth-legal * 48pp. * $2.70 (u.s.)/$3.50 (int'l)

sarah manages to write some of my favorite zines, & she pulls this off despite my natural predilection for text-heavy behemoths. this slim offering is a quick read, mostly about sarah's recent graduation from college, her status as a biologist, & her attempts to foster a local zine community in halifax, but the writing is sweet & sincere & the layout is, as always, beautiful. typewriters & her own very distinctive handwriting, beautiful photographs, fabric scraps, clip art of vegetables, birds, & antique advertisements all blend together in a stunning glimpse into sarah's world. the covers are printed are light brown paper.
quarter-standard * 20pp. * $2.35 (u.s.)/$2.75 (int'l)

more evocative zine beauty from sarah. this issue is all about a five-month long road trip she took with a friend, driving around the u.s. & canada. along the way they found a stray calico & took her for walks on a leash. they camped in the woods & in communities of people living in their vehicles. checking e-mail in cybercafes, whiling away the hours in small town libraries, it all made sarah think about where she was coming from & where she was going & why she was on the road. she picks her words carefully & decorates them with beautiful photographs from her travels (many in full-color) & clever clip art. she perfectly captures that feeling of being on the road but itching to be back home where you can start applying everything that you've learned to a stable community. amazing.
eighth-legal * 40pp. * $3.35 (u.s.)/$3.75 (int'l)

folks who read tha last "root"/"stab" split zine (issues #4& #6, respectively) will recall that it took the form of a free-ranging conversation between sonia ("stab") & sarah ("root") about their various d.i.y./community sustainability/art projects & their burgeoning plans to establish a home base & community center in which to make things happen. the result was halifax's anchor archive, on roberts street, a small house where sarah & sonia lived, & which housed the anchor archive, a zine library staffed by members of their community, which also offered various workshops in the anchor archive space & at different locales all around halifax. over time, the different groups interested in using the space grew & changed, & sarah moved out to make room for the ink storm screeprinting collective. the shed in the backyard was renovated to create space for the artist residency program (in which i participated in june 2007). eventually sonia moved out & the upstairs was turned into the crow's next, a social center & space for community meetings. a weekly skillshare program was developed. this zine (which features a really beautiful double-color silkscreen cover) continues the conversation between sarah & sonia as the anchor archive transforms into the roberts street social center & takes on new projects, new volunteers, new funding options, new organizational models. this zine is a potentially useful resource for people involved in all kinds of different collectives--especially as collectives are always evolving. having been to halifax & seen some of these projects in action, i can attest that these folks really seem to know what they're doing & are invested in the long-term health of their organizations. this zine is really inspiring.
half-standard * 20pp. * $2.35 (u.s.)/$2.75 (int'l)