Leon Stevens's Blog, page 18
April 4, 2025
Free Book Friday: Poetry, Conversations, and Sci-fi…Oh, my!
Haiku is one of the only traditional forms that I purposely write, and even then, it’s not that traditional.
Here are a few new poets for you to check out:
Missing the conversations? Head over to my Indie April Sci-fi page to read 5 new interviews from 5 indie authors!
Book news: I lowered the price of my trilogy by $2.00/paperback from $8.99 to $6.99. Why? To align with the market rate for comparable book lengths.
Euphrates Vanished will be $0.99 for the month of April to celebrate the release of the prequel, A Matter of Sabotage.
-Leon
Check out this week’s book promos below.
Buy Euphrates Vanished (Kindle/KU) $0.99A Matter of Sabotage (Kindle)Don’t feel like buying the book?
Sign up to review Euphrates VanishedSign up for an Advance Review Copy of A Matter of SabotageSci-fi not your thing?
Try my two poetry collections: Lines by Leon and A Wonder of Words
The story behind Free Book Friday: I’ve met many authors and readers during my time marketing, cross-promoting, and blogging. I think writers have a responsibility to inform readers about all the indie authors out there in the very crowded world of book publishing. You can’t do it alone, and why would you when you have a supportive group available?
Readers don’t just read one author – they stick with their favorite genres. Therein lies the power in cross-promotion. If one of my readers buys a book from an author I promote, then chances are there will be a reciprocal effect, or so is the hope. Do I want to boost sales? Of course I do. Do I want to boost other’s sales? Why not. It’s called karma.
Some free book offers require a newsletter sign-up, which is a small non-monetary price to pay to try out a new indie author.
Leon Stevens is a multi-genre author, composer, guitarist, songwriter, and an artist, with a Bachelor of Music and Education. He published his first book of poetry, Lines by Leon: Poems, Prose, and Pictures in January 2020, followed by a book of original classical guitar compositions, Journeys, and a short story collection of science fiction/post-apocalyptic tales called The Knot at the End of the Rope and Other Short Stories. His newest publications are the novella trilogy, The View from Here, which is a continuation of one of his short stories, a new collection of poetry titled, A Wonder of Words, and his latest sci-fi mystery, Euphrates Vanished.
My new book page: http://books.linesbyleon.com/
Free books? Sign up for my bi-weekly newsletter and choose one or more!
books.linesbyleon.com/Newslettersignup
April 3, 2025
National Poetry Month: Day 3
A poem a day I promised you
Something old, perhaps
Maybe something new
It could be slightly humorous
Or filled with emotions so numerous
But you will be guaranteed
The form, the rhyme, the stanzas
Are freed
From conventional verse
And quite often terse
Because…
Well, that’s just how I roll
-Leon Stevens
Want more poetry?
For Canadian poetry fans!
Lines by Leon: Poems, Prose, and Pictures
Signed paperback, art print, and bookmark direct from authorCND Orders (free shipping)
CA$20.00
Click here to purchase. Leave a comment Cancel replyΔdocument.getElementById( "ak_js_1" ).setAttribute( "value", ( new Date() ).getTime() );
Thursday Thoughts: Have you ever heard of the Heard and MacDonald Islands?
Neither had I until Trump levied 10% tariffs onto them. Oh…you can’t see them on the map? That’s because the letter ‘o’ in Macdonald covers them up. Well, that’s not exactly true, the upper arc of the letter ‘o’ in Macdonald covers them up.
Here’s a pretty photo of the Southern Ocean islands:
Where’s all the cities, you ask? Well, there are none. No people either. So why is Trump going after them? Simple. Their whole economic plan was not planned out, despite the assertion that he has the best team working on it.
Think I’m joking? Here is the last page of the tariff chart:
And here is who’s going to be affected:
Poor penguins…
Last thought: Do you want more proof on how disorganized the whole plan is? Here is the first page. Notice anything?
It’s not in alphabetical order, or high to low, or even in the volume of trade into the USA.
Who does that?
Leon
Leon Stevens is a multi-genre author, composer, guitarist, songwriter, and an artist, with a Bachelor of Music and Education. He published his first book of poetry, Lines by Leon: Poems, Prose, and Pictures in January 2020, followed by a book of original classical guitar compositions, Journeys, and a short story collection of science fiction/post-apocalyptic tales called The Knot at the End of the Rope and Other Short Stories. His newest publications are the novella trilogy, The View from Here, which is a continuation of one of his short stories, a new collection of poetry titled, A Wonder of Words, and his latest sci-fi mystery, Euphrates Vanished.
My new book page: http://books.linesbyleon.com/
Free books? Sign up for my bi-weekly newsletter and choose one or more!
books.linesbyleon.com/Newslettersignup
April 2, 2025
Weird Wednesday: Weird Poems
How do you make someone dislike poetry? Well, if you are ee cummings, you write “grasshopper”, then wait 100 years and ask someone on Reddit to tell you WTF it’s supposed to mean. And after you don’t read the following analysis, you say, “I just want my poems to rhyme. Is that too much to ask?!”
ee cummings is infamous for his use of form to create meaning throughout his poems. i recommend reading the poem once through, pausing a moment, then reading it through again to see how, at first blush, it makes you feel. i love cummings but have never encountered this poem before, so ill take you through the steps i took to arrive at my own meaning for this poem. after all, one of the key points of poetry is to get you to look at the world in a new and different way, so let’s see what we’ve got here.
First Glance and gut reactions: what the fuck? i know from my own experience that cummings is an avant gard poet, and that none of his previous poems have been completely devoid of meaning. so there’s something going on, but right now i’m at a loss.
Trying to piece it together: i’ve noticed a clue in the last line: grasshopper. cummings carefully placed this at the end – he wanted to evoke a sense of misunderstanding and confusion for the early parts of the poem, but no one can understand completely incoherent babble. stretching my brain, i remember solving anagrams in my youth. this substance of this poem is seemingly about grasshoppers, and a few of the anagrams can be directly translated into “grasshopper” in lines 1, 5, and 12.
line 2-5: poem has something to do with grasshoppers. line 2-4 seems, to me, to be trying to say “who (the grasshopper) as we (the speaker and company) look up now at the” this personifies the grasshopper, and interestingly, we (so the speaker is not alone in his musings) appear to be looking up at him? instead of down at him. curious, as grasshoppers typically down on the ground, but maybe that’s just how high/impressively the hopper is hopping. note the jarring introduction of line 5 – and in all caps too! you could say that this line behaved almost like a grasshopper, erratically jumping from place to place. and would you look at that, it moved so quickly, it seemed to have cut off the e (and the speaker’s line of thought) from the word “the” in line 4. cheeky little bastard.
line 6-10: this line starts with an “e” – maybe its the missing e from before? and then it says something like “ring into the leaps!” Ring is an interesting way to describe how a grasshopper moves, but much like a bell resonates after it rings, so too does a blade of grass oscillate back and forth after something flicks off from it. I can buy this.
lines 10.5-14: notice the lone “a” at the end of line 10. Then there are some parentheses. cummings used some parentheses earlier and i sort of just ignored them because it was convenience (but then, we really hadn’t been formally introduced to the grasshopper yet – they are pretty easy to ignore if you don’t study them closely.) But now I feel like we should pay attention to it because the poem doesnt make much sense otherwise. Line 14 is hard to parse out – let’s skip the final anagram of grasshopper in line 12. the poem basically reads like this now: a (rrIvInG) to rea(be)rran(com)gi(e)ngly
That first bit looks an awful lot like the word arriving. And you arrive at locations, so that “to” makes sense, too. Those other words in parentheses at the end seem to spell out the word “become.” Let’s rearrange this a bit: “arriving to rearrangingly become” and then, the final word “grasshopper.”
well that was unexpected to say the least. the word “re-arranging-ly” just popped up. and that’s what ive been doing this whole time. rearranging how i’ve been taught to understand and read english to understand this poem.
i have no idea if any of this is the literary canon for this poem, but this is what i, as an independent reader, have gotten from this poem. in my short analysis I feel like ive missed some key things in the middle of the piece, but i feel satisfied for now. maybe later, ill come back and revisit this poem, with new thoughts to glean a new truth.
so what do i think this poem is “about?” i think its about a little insect we often don’t pay any attention to until someone writes a poem about it – all it does is eponymously hop from grass to grass blade, which seems so mundane and insignificant. but after experiencing this poem, ill never look at one the same way. congrats, ee cummings.
ps as cummings just showed, pun]ctuation, proper grammar, good en{g}lish. dont me/an (an!yth-in;,g) aslongasyour(audience)understands what youre trying to convey.
No, I really didn’t expect you to read all that. I didn’t. But you’ll notice that he avoids certain conventions. Well, all conventions.
Some of my poetry can be weird, or odd, because I don’t often think about conventions when I write poetry, I just get an idea and let the flow determine what form the poem will take. Some of my poems rhyme like more conventional forms, but many are more erratic.
So, what does this poem mean? It means I saw a mangled fencepost, sketched it, then thought it would be a good was to use the made up word “bented.”
That’s it.
Really.
-Leon
Leon Stevens is a multi-genre author, composer, guitarist, songwriter, and an artist, with a Bachelor of Music and Education. He published his first book of poetry, Lines by Leon: Poems, Prose, and Pictures in January 2020, followed by a book of original classical guitar compositions, Journeys, and a short story collection of science fiction/post-apocalyptic tales called The Knot at the End of the Rope and Other Short Stories. His newest publications are the novella trilogy, The View from Here, which is a continuation of one of his short stories, a new collection of poetry titled, A Wonder of Words, and his latest sci-fi mystery, Euphrates Vanished.
My new book page: http://books.linesbyleon.com/
Free books? Sign up for my bi-weekly newsletter and choose one or more!
books.linesbyleon.com/Newslettersignup
Join my email list
RECEIVE A FREE EBOOK WHEN YOU SUBCRIBE TO MY WEEKLY NEWSLETTER
Processing… Success! You're on the list. Whoops! There was an error and we couldn't process your subscription. Please reload the page and try again.Leon Stevens is a multi-genre author, composer, guitarist, songwriter, and an artist, with a Bachelor of Music and Education. He published his first book of poetry, Lines by Leon: Poems, Prose, and Pictures in January 2020, followed by a book of original classical guitar compositions, Journeys, and a short story collection of science fiction/post-apocalyptic tales called The Knot at the End of the Rope and Other Short Stories. His newest publications are the novella trilogy, The View from Here, which is a continuation of one of his short stories, a new collection of poetry titled, A Wonder of Words, and his latest sci-fi mystery, Euphrates Vanished.
My new book page: http://books.linesbyleon.com/
Free books? Sign up for my bi-weekly newsletter and choose one or more!
books.linesbyleon.com/Newslettersignup
April 1, 2025
The Origins of April Fools’ Day
[This is a repost from last year (yes, I’m being lazy, but I can’t make up another one…)]
The Origin of April Fools’ Day
The first recorded prank was discovered deep in a cave in the Pyrenees, where a cave painting shows a club being notched and weakened, then lower on the wall a saber tooth tiger is seen eating the arm of a Neanderthal, with a severed lower limb nearby.
Professor Dingall remarked, “Well, Henson. I guess that prank cost him and arm and a leg!”
Farther in, past the famous handprints were several connected half circles, the precursor to sitting on the Xerox machine.
In Greek mythology, Icarus loosened the top of the saltshaker which caused his father to ruin his breakfast. Enraged, he stormed out of the kitchen muttering under his breath, “I’m gonna get that little SOB.” A year later, Icarus’s father convinced him that flying to the sun was achievable. Touche.
The next recorded prank took place in Egypt where a worker, Apphool, was asked to retrieve an adz in the newly constructed anti-chamber upon which the booby trap was triggered and the room was permanently sealed.
When discovered in 1911, hieroglyphics on the wall showed the first record of giving someone the bird, and what for many years was assumed to be a bouquet of flowers. Later experts determined it was in actual fact meant to indicate a bunch of assholes.
In 1367, teenagers snuck into the construction site at Pisa and removed several of the foundation stones, replacing them with replicas made of papier mâché.
Galileo has been credited for the “shoe polish on the telescope eyepiece” prank, which was why he was imprisoned, not for the whole “the Earth goes around the sun” malarkey.
One of the first prank fails occurred when Gustave Eiffel was told there was a contest to see who could build the tallest tower out of a Meccano set, the winner receiving a free pass to the next World Exposition.
And finally, the best prank award goes to the archeologist who tricked a Nazi general into peeking into a golden chest, cementing into history the now classic line:
“Made ya look.”
-Leon
Question: What is a prank or joke that you have played or have had been on the wrong end?
Leon Stevens is a multi-genre author, composer, guitarist, songwriter, and an artist, with a Bachelor of Music and Education. He published his first book of poetry, Lines by Leon: Poems, Prose, and Pictures in January 2020, followed by a book of original classical guitar compositions, Journeys, and a short story collection of science fiction/post-apocalyptic tales called The Knot at the End of the Rope and Other Short Stories. His newest publications are the novella trilogy, The View from Here, which is a continuation of one of his short stories, a new collection of poetry titled, A Wonder of Words, and his latest sci-fi mystery, Euphrates Vanished.
My new book page: http://books.linesbyleon.com/
Free books? Sign up for my bi-weekly newsletter and choose one or more!
books.linesbyleon.com/Newslettersignup
National Poetry Month / Indie April
Indie April is a celebration of indie authors of all genres in all book distribution platforms. Of course, being an indie author myself, I hope that readers seek out my books all year round, but like any promotion, it’s a bit of a blitz to bring attention to the amazing books that authors are writing.
Because book two in my new series, the Orion Arm Alliance, came out yesterday, I lowered the price of book one to $0.99.
“…a great series to get into if you enjoy shorter scifi reads or want to dive into the genre.”
April is also National Poetry Month in Canada and in the United States. What does that mean for you? Well, if you absolutely despise poetry, it probably means you had to sit through English classes in high school and analyze “The Road Not Taken” by Robert Frost or “Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night” by Dylan Thomas until you chewed your pencil though to the graphite.
No poet writes a poem to have it picked apart by a bunch of hormonal teenagers who are just trying to compete for popularity in the cesspool of adolescent angst.
Well, maybe Peter Bayley might have penned a few conundrumable verses, or Catherine Maria Fanshawe for that matter.
No, I didn’t know who they were either…
I suppose the question that should be asked is, “Why should we read poetry?”
Poets, like writers of fiction, have a special skill to put into words what they want to describe, be it a feeling, or an experience. Poets, unlike writers of fiction, do it in a way to keep the people at Roget’s Thesaurus in business.
Poets try to express an experience by painting words onto a paper canvas that—wait for it—can be interpreted in different ways.
I admit, poetry isn’t for everyone, but neither is science fiction, or romance, or ornithological western parody. When I started to write poetry, it was in the form of song lyrics and some of those were transformed into shorter poems.
I can’t sit down and read poem after poem after poem, but I can use a poem as an escape or a way to divert my attention for a short span of time.
I think my poetry is pretty straightforward. There’s not to much under the surface, so if to scratch to much you’ll just wear out the ink on the page. I try to make it entertaining, humourous, or touching, and sometimes I can achieve that in one poem.
So this month I will be posting a poem each day that I hope you will enjoy. Maybe it will pique your interest in the two poetry collections I have available, or maybe you’ll just say, “No, sir. I don’t like it.”
And that’s okay.
In celebration of poetry, I’ll be posting a poem each day. Well, that’s the plan anyway…
For Canadian poetry fans!
Lines by Leon: Poems, Prose, and Pictures
Signed paperback, art print, and bookmark direct from authorCND Orders (free shipping)
CA$20.00
Click here to purchase. Leave a comment Cancel replyΔdocument.getElementById( "ak_js_1" ).setAttribute( "value", ( new Date() ).getTime() );
March 31, 2025
Monday Music: Juno Highlights
If Canadian music isn’t a mirror to what Canada is, I’m not sure what is.
The Junos were a display of diversity. With categories like Francophone Album, Contemporary Indigenous Artist, to South Asian Music Recording, it shows how just how multi-cultural Canada is, but how it is embraced and celebrated.
And where else can a elementary or high school music educator win a national music award? Yes, there is a Juno Award for Music Teacher of the Year.
Most awards were given out on Saturday, keeping last night’s ceremony to just 2 hours and 2 minutes. I will often record award shows so that I can skip the commercials and and boring parts, but I did watch most of this one with the exception of Josh Ross. Sorry dude. Can’t do it.
So what did you miss? Here are the highlights
As expected there was some focus on national prideAll the winners were humble and gratefulOverall the ceremony wasn’t pretentious, although Michael Buble can come across as a bit pretentious.An Indigenous band won Rap Album of the year I don’t know if Punjabi hip-hop is popular anywhere else than Canada and South Asia, but it seems to be thrivingPalestinian-Canadian singer Nemahsis kind of sounds like Feist. She also gave a memorable quote, saying:“I’ve been wearing hijab for 20-plus years and all I ever wanted was to turn on Family channel, YTV and just see somebody that looks like me. I didn’t think it would take this long, and I didn’t think I’d be the one to do it”Someone called Elon Musk a pile of garbage (or a piece of shit, I can’t recall)
And since it was on Canadian television, you would have heard a few f-bombs.
If you want to read and see video highlights: CBC News Junos
But one of the surprising things wasn’t that there were a heck of a lot of drag queens during BBNO$s performance, but that I didn’t know (or remember) Peach Pit was a Canadian band.
-Leon
Book two of the Orion Arm Alliance, A Matter of Sabotage, will be out in spring 2025, so time to get reading book one!
Leon Stevens is a multi-genre author, composer, guitarist, songwriter, and an artist, with a Bachelor of Music and Education. He published his first book of poetry, Lines by Leon: Poems, Prose, and Pictures in January 2020, followed by a book of original classical guitar compositions, Journeys, and a short story collection of science fiction/post-apocalyptic tales called The Knot at the End of the Rope and Other Short Stories. His newest publications are the novella trilogy, The View from Here, which is a continuation of one of his short stories, a new collection of poetry titled, A Wonder of Words, and his latest sci-fi mystery, Euphrates Vanished.
My new book page: http://books.linesbyleon.com/
Free books? Sign up for my bi-weekly newsletter and choose one or more!
books.linesbyleon.com/Newslettersignup
Sign up for my bi-weekly newsletter and receive a free book!
Oh, pick me!
C’mon, space stuff!
March 30, 2025
Songs for a Sunday: Juno what I think?
Canada hands out its Juno awards next Sunday in its annual celebration of Canadian music. Today, I thought I’d give you a few Canadian bands that did not get nominated along with some that did.
Aviva Chiara Mongillo, also known as Carys, is a Canadian pop singer and actress. The acronym stands for: I Know You Are But What Am I
Lauren Isenberg, known professionally as Renforshort is a Canadian singer and songwriter from Toronto.
New West is a Canadian musical group from Toronto, Ontario. I’m cheating a bit since I didn’t remember they were the winners of the Juno Award for Breakthrough Group of the Year at the Juno Awards of 2024. A bit of a Coldplay vibe to this group.
Another acronym, If you Know You Know, adding credence to my theory that the next trend in music is AcroPop.
Khyree Zienty, professionally known as Ekkstacy, is a Canadian singer-songwriter from Vancouver, British Columbia. He is up for Breakthrough Artist of the Year
I know what you are thinking, “What about Canadian progressive metal instrumental bands?” Well, here’s Intervals:
Sum 41 will be inducted into the Canadian Music Hall of of fame. They started in 2000 as a self-proclaimed “crappy punk-rock band from Ajax,” and after 8 albums (plus 3 live albums) they are calling it quits.
I’ll admit I haven’t followed them very closely, in fact, I thought they had broken up years ago. Here’s two songs from the last record:
They will be performing for the last time tonight at the Junos.
-Leon
Book two of the Orion Arm Alliance, A Matter of Sabotage, will be out in spring 2025, so time to get reading book one!
Leon Stevens is a multi-genre author, composer, guitarist, songwriter, and an artist, with a Bachelor of Music and Education. He published his first book of poetry, Lines by Leon: Poems, Prose, and Pictures in January 2020, followed by a book of original classical guitar compositions, Journeys, and a short story collection of science fiction/post-apocalyptic tales called The Knot at the End of the Rope and Other Short Stories. His newest publications are the novella trilogy, The View from Here, which is a continuation of one of his short stories, a new collection of poetry titled, A Wonder of Words, and his latest sci-fi mystery, Euphrates Vanished.
My new book page: http://books.linesbyleon.com/
Free books? Sign up for my bi-weekly newsletter and choose one or more!
books.linesbyleon.com/Newslettersignup
Sign up for my bi-weekly newsletter and receive a free book!
Oh, pick me!
C’mon, space stuff!
March 29, 2025
Weekend Wrap-up March 29: Are you kidding?
Elon Musk is planning to go to Wisconsin to hold a gathering after the vote for a vacant Supreme Court seat. He has publicly endorsed the Republican judge. He is going to give away two million dollars to two attendees, as long as they voted for…
Wait, he didn’t say you had to vote a certain way, so that’s not illegal, right? Pfft… even I know that’s shady…
Update: The Wisconsin Attorney General has filed to block this action.
If you don’t know who Congresswoman MTG is, this is all you have to know about her character:
In case you missed it, the American reported said, “I want to hear your answer to what’s she’s asking.”
She never gave it.
I love this new reality show they got going in the USA.
-Leon
In case you missed my blog:Songs for a Sunday: Juno what I think?Weekend Wrap-up March 29: Are you kidding?Free Book Friday: March 28Thursday Thoughts…Tuesday Top Accidental Texts
Book two of the Orion Arm Alliance series is out in April, so time to read books one! http://books.linesbyleon.com/
Hope you enjoyed the recap! Feel free to share it with others.
Leon Stevens is a multi-genre author, composer, guitarist, songwriter, and an artist, with a Bachelor of Music and Education. He published his first book of poetry, Lines by Leon: Poems, Prose, and Pictures in January 2020, followed by a book of original classical guitar compositions, Journeys, and a short story collection of science fiction/post-apocalyptic tales called The Knot at the End of the Rope and Other Short Stories. His newest publications are the novella trilogy, The View from Here, which is a continuation of one of his short stories, a new collection of poetry titled, A Wonder of Words, and his latest sci-fi mystery, Euphrates Vanished.
My new book page: http://books.linesbyleon.com/
Free books? Sign up for my bi-weekly newsletter and choose one or more!
books.linesbyleon.com/Newslettersignup
March 28, 2025
Free Book Friday: March 28
Book news: I lowered the price of my trilogy by $2.00/paperback from $8.99 to $6.99. Why? To align with the market rate for comparable book lengths.
Euphrates Vanished will be $0.99 for the month of April to celebrate the release of the prequel, A Matter of Sabotage.
-Leon
Check out this week’s book promos below.
Buy Euphrates Vanished (Kindle/KU)Preorder A Matter of Sabotage (Kindle)Don’t feel like buying the book?
Sign up to review Euphrates VanishedSign up for an Advance Review Copy of A Matter of SabotageSci-fi not your thing?
Try my two poetry collections: Lines by Leon and A Wonder of Words
Free book from Bradley James!
Deals and Reads From StoryOriginFree books to review!
Starts Feb. 27The story behind Free Book Friday: I’ve met many authors and readers during my time marketing, cross-promoting, and blogging. I think writers have a responsibility to inform readers about all the indie authors out there in the very crowded world of book publishing. You can’t do it alone, and why would you when you have a supportive group available?
Readers don’t just read one author – they stick with their favorite genres. Therein lies the power in cross-promotion. If one of my readers buys a book from an author I promote, then chances are there will be a reciprocal effect, or so is the hope. Do I want to boost sales? Of course I do. Do I want to boost other’s sales? Why not. It’s called karma.
Some free book offers require a newsletter sign-up, which is a small non-monetary price to pay to try out a new indie author.
Leon Stevens is a multi-genre author, composer, guitarist, songwriter, and an artist, with a Bachelor of Music and Education. He published his first book of poetry, Lines by Leon: Poems, Prose, and Pictures in January 2020, followed by a book of original classical guitar compositions, Journeys, and a short story collection of science fiction/post-apocalyptic tales called The Knot at the End of the Rope and Other Short Stories. His newest publications are the novella trilogy, The View from Here, which is a continuation of one of his short stories, a new collection of poetry titled, A Wonder of Words, and his latest sci-fi mystery, Euphrates Vanished.
My new book page: http://books.linesbyleon.com/
Free books? Sign up for my bi-weekly newsletter and choose one or more!
books.linesbyleon.com/Newslettersignup
