Problematic Press presents a variety of material on a wide range of topics. Below, you can find Problematic Press titles for sale in addition to FREE reading from featured writers.

PROBLEMATIC PRESS TITLES

You’ve heard of The Battery – quiet, peaceful, serene. That is until Girly Muckle wakes up.

Girly knows the folk living in The Battery have plenty of secrets to keep. She has a few of her own. For starters, she’s a selkie.

Now, a selkie isn’t some cutie-pie creature, so you needn’t imagine a princess of the mermaids here. No.

Along with her besties – an adlet and a shapeling – they are the Queer Hands, a band of young punks with big dreams.

But, when a meddling detective threatens to expose their mythical nature to the world, will the Queer Hands even make it out alive?

While this novel takes place in a fantastically imagined Newfoundland, it bears a tale that is sure to please selkies residing anywhere.

So, for those residing anywhere, Girly Muckle and the Queer Hands may now be ordered in print here while the Kindle edition can be ordered here.

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Bernardine Ann Teráz Stapleton is an author, a playwright, a performer, and an absolute treasure with the voice of a tempest.

Born in North West River and raised in Marystown, her connections to the province of Newfoundland and Labrador resonate throughout her works.

Her plays are regularly produced across the province, and her previous books include the award-winning They Let Down Baskets (Killick Press), Rants, Riffs and Roars (Creative Book Publishing), and This is the Cat (Creative Book Publishing). Her creative memoir, Love, Life, is forthcoming from Breakwater Books.

Learn more about her at bernistapleton.com.

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Nicole Leona Smith is an emerging visual artist who divides her time between Newfoundland and her home in Cambridge, Ontario. Her illustrations are simply delightful.

Until now, she has been best known for her writing and her work in theatre.

She is also drafting her first novel with support from the Ontario Arts Council.

Discover more about her at nicoleona.com.

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Nicholas Morine’s Kowloon Walled City, 1984 is now available!

 

 

 

 

The year is 1984. In the heart of Hong Kong, Kowloon Walled City seethes with human passions, both good and evil. Not a single ray of light penetrates this fortress of hope and despair. This is a lost, illicit city filled to bursting with shady businessmen, drug dealers, junk shops, and desperate gamblers seeking an avenue for one last thrill. It is said that the police do not dare to enter. Whether this is true or not remains a mystery.

Fang, a heroin slinger and a brother of the 14K, becomes a marked man beneath the roars of the crowd, fists bloodied. The love of his life stands between him and his glory, a choice that may never be reconciled. The Siu Nin a Fu, an annual martial arts tournament calling the very best warriors from across the globe to the depths of Kowloon Walled City, is about to take place. Buried in liquor, needles, and smoke, Fang’s future is about to take flight. Take a step into the black tapestry of the past, where ghosts walk the dim, decrepit alleys as if neon still fell upon their defeated shoulders.

Kowloon Walled City, 1984. A shredded memory of a living, breathing entity that once was… and is no longer.

Print and Kindle editions are available on Amazon‘s many websites, or they can be purchased from one of the Problematic Press Shops (CAN and US).  If you’re in the St. John’s, NL area, then you might find us pushing books at Sci-Fi on the Rock 10 or at the Farmers’ Market.

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Nicholas Morine’s Cavern: City in the Dark is also available in print and Kindle editions!

Cavern: City in the Dark is a dystopian adventure set on a ruined Earth.

Deep beneath the scarred and scorched surface of the Earth, the last of us remain.

The Cavern is deep, dark, and damp. The city is busy, expansive, industrious. Technology has been salvaged, scavenged from the surface, and repurposed to a new fashion. Survival comes in the form of the shunt, drilled deep into the skull. A device that takes all the pain away, and lays it on the shoulders of one poor soul.

The Sufferer. An old man, dying beneath the tree of tears. And when his heart breaks, it will spell doom for us all.

Nicholas Morine was born and raised in Gaspereau, Nova Scotia. Words are his livelihood. He has written many words on a range of subjects, from tech to fashion. Having returned to Nova Scotia, he continues to write non-fiction and fiction. Montag Press published his debut novel, Punish the Wicked: A Dystopian Horror. Problematic Press is proud to present Cavern: City in the Dark, his second novel.

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The True Story of the Three Billy Goats Gruff: The Troll’s Side of the Story was written by David Reynolds when he was about 9-11 years old. It relates the young author’s reinterpretation of the classic Norwegian fairytale, considering how the troll might have seen things differently.

Subtle and charming, bright and playful, The True Story of the Three Billy Goats Gruff: The Troll’s Side of the Story reimagines the classic tale to reflect on the perspective of the kind troll who falls prey to the prejudice of the eldest goat Gruff. Illustrations by Myles Reichel give this tale life. Plus, this edition also includes Sir George Webbe Dasent‘s translation of the classic folktale. This book is best suited for adults reading to young children, for early readers, and for all of us children-at-heart.

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Narrative, Nature, and the ‘Cock’ and ‘Bull’ Story: The Lockean Tristram Shandy and the Modern Novel, by Amanda Tiller, is now available in print and digital editions in the Problematic Press Shop (CAN and US).

Narrative, Nature, and the ‘Cock’ and ‘Bull’ Story: The Lockean Tristram Shandy and the Modern Novel is based on Tiller’s research as a graduate student at Memorial University of Newfoundland. Her studies focused on Laurence Sterne‘s novel The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman (1760). Sterne’s novel has tremendous comedic appeal, but it is also noteworthy because Shandy narrates the tale as a string of digressions and tangents. This means Sterne’s novel is one of the first English novels to stray from Aristotle‘s classical literary guidelines as presented in his Poetics. In Narrative, Nature, and the ‘Cock’ and ‘Bull’ Story, Tiller applies concepts from John Locke’s Essay Concerning Human Understanding to explore how such deviations lead Tristram, in the series of events stemming from his birth, to a more precise imitation of nature than strict adherence to Aristotle’s guidelines could have procured.

Copies can be purchased from the Problematic Press Shops (CAN and US). The book can also be found on Amazon.ca as well as Amazon.com. Additionally, wholesale purchases of Amanda Tiller’s Narrative, Nature, and the ‘Cock’ and ‘Bull’ Story: The Lockean Tristram Shandy and the Modern Novel can be made through CreateSpace Direct, Ingram, and Baker & Taylor.

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Vester Vade Mecum: A Collection of Short Fiction, edited by David Reynolds, is now available in print and digital editions in the Problematic Press Shop (CAN and US).

Vester Vade Mecum: A Collection of Short Fiction is designed to be a low cost alternative to anthologies produced by much larger publishers. This is a collection that is sure to delight educators and pupils alike. The stories remain as intriguing and as relevant as they ever were. This collection contains a variety of imaginative short works of English literature, featuring authors such as Mary Shelley, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Oscar Wilde, Pauline Hopkins, Stephen Leacock, and others (see the Contents listed below). Edited by David Reynolds, the text contains contextual information about each author and story as well as questions to provoke critical reflection. The presentation is straightforward and minimal, allowing educators to engage the material however they like with little direction from the text.

Copies can also be found on Amazon.ca as well as Amazon.com. Additionally, wholesale purchases of Vester Vade Mecum: A Collection of Short Fiction can be made through CreateSpace Direct, Ingram, and Baker & Taylor.

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Robert Hayman’s Quodlibets, Lately Come Over from New Britaniola, Old Newfoundland is available now in print and digital editions in the Problematic Press Shop (CAN and US). You can also find this title at Amazon.ca and Amazon.com.

Hayman’s Quodlibets is a collection of witty, poetic verses that were penned while he served as governor in colonial Harbour Grace, Newfoundland between 1618 and 1628. His is likely the first English poetry penned in North America. Containing original poetry as well as his translations of pieces by John Owen and Francois Rabelais, Quodlibets reflects on thieves and knaves, good wives and whores, as well as the untamed beauty of Newfoundland. Hayman’s poetry exposes his love for Newfoundland, inviting the adventurous and hopeful to settle this rock. David Reynolds has adapted the language for this edition to ease reading for today’s audience.

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Problematic Press is also pleased to feature these earlier titles by David Reynolds.

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Fawning, Fear and Frustration: A Collection of Teenage Poetry from the 90s is available in print and Kindle ebook formats in the Problematic Press Shop (CAN and US) as well as Amazon.ca and Amazon.com. This title is also available in a variety of ebook formats at Smashwords.com. And, finally, Fawning, Fear and Frustration is now available for Kobo e-readers in the Kobo store!

Fawning, Fear and Frustration collects thirty six poems by a young David Reynolds. It features a range of poetry that considers love, death and confusion in addition to a number of matters that lay somewhere in between.

Superheroes: An Analysis of Popular Culture’s Modern Myths is available in print and Kindle ebook formats in the Problematic Press Shop (CAN and US) as well as Amazon.ca and Amazon.com.

Superheroes is a scholarly interrogation of popular North American superhero narratives, such as those of Superman, Spider-Man, and Batman. It attempts to provide some insight into how media’s messages influence the culture’s ethical values. As an extension of ideas presented by Friedrich Nietzsche, Joseph Campbell, and Umberto Eco, this dissertation argues that superhero tales must be regarded as modern mythology.

PROBLEMATIC PRESS SHORT FICTION – READ FOR FREE

Sabaku, the Deserter Vol. 0: “Showdown at the Cactus’s Prick” by David Reynolds is also available in a variety of ebook formats from Smashwords.com.

“Falk the Vagabond and the Whore Delores” by David Reynolds is also available on his blog, Reynolds’ Thoughts and Fictions.

PROBLEMATIC PRESS ESSAYS – READ FOR FREE

“Aristotle’s syllogism and scientific knowledge” by David Reynolds is also available on his blog.

“Evaluating empiricism in ethics, considering Hume and Levinas” by David Reynolds is also available on his blog.

“Explaining psychologism, considering Husserl” by David Reynolds is also available on his blog.

“Heroic Action in Shakespeare’s Plays” by David Reynolds is also available on his blog.

“Language as a Public Manifestation of Thought” by David Reynolds is also available on his blog.

“Morality in Conrad’s The Secret Agent“ by David Reynolds is also available on his blog.

“The Value of Truth in History and Myth” by David Reynolds is also available on his blog.

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