After Judge Barbara Crooker read through our 6 finalists, she wrote us to say she couldn’t decide between her top two choices. Both were so good, and so different, she said. We agreed, and so decided to commit to publishing both.

About our first winner, The Garlic Peelers by Lucia Galloway, Barbara says:

One of the things I look for in a chapbook is unity of theme, keeping in mind Frost’s dictum that if 26 separate poems make up a book, then the 27th poem is the book itself. The Garlic Peelers exemplifies this. I love the stunning title poem, and the way the other poems unfolded, like cloves of garlic from its core. I also admired the variety of forms and voices used, and the central metaphor: women’s lives as many-layered and essential as garlic. I like the way Lucia Galloway plays with multiple levels of meaning (chase/chaste/chastened; skins/scraps/leavings/chaff), the quotes that are salted between sections, and the way each section is introduced by lines that are excerpted and reworked from the title poem. No good recipe is complete without garlic, and no poetry shelf will be complete without this fine book.

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