But Our Princess Is in Another Castle

by B.J. Best

Overview

The color, noise, and often cryptic images of classic video games set the prose poems in B.J. Best’s But Our Princess Is in Another Castle in motion, but the poems soar far beyond their nostalgic springboards. And while Mario, Pac-Man, and pioneer families forsaken on The Oregon Trail populate these pixelated landscapes, this book translates the games and plays them in the real world, so an Asteroid becomes just one more star shot with lost love, Space Invaders might have communist sympathies, and God is just as bad at Tetris as the rest of us. Written for gamers and non-gamers alike, the book’s levels explore how our past virtual lives can inform our present actual ones. A coming-of-age narrative turned love story turned philo­sophical journey, But Our Princess Is in Another Castle deftly combines two mediums into vivid poems as lyrical as they are imaginative.

Product Details

BN ID:	2940016206486
Publisher:	Rose Metal Press, Inc.
Publication date:	03/03/2013
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	104
File size:	670 KB

About the Author

B.J. Best is the author of two previous books of poetry: Birds of Wisconsin (New Rivers Press) and State Sonnets (sunnyoutside). He is also the author of three chapbooks from Centennial Press, most recently the prose poem collection Drag: Twenty Short Poems about Smoking. He teaches at Carroll University and lives in the Wisconsin countryside with one wife, one son, three cats, and nine video game systems. He asserts he is the only person in the history of the world to have beaten Super Mario Bros.—with an actual Nintendo and television—on a pontoon boat.

Editorial Reviews

“In But Our Princess Is in Another Castle, B.J. Best retools the Bildungsroman for the new century. This mesmerizing book is part poetry, part virtual reality, and part search for grace. Withe images more human than pixelated, and in cunning, perfect language, Best texture maps a beautiful coming of age in our ordinary electric kingdom."

Amy Newman

“Remember that tingle when you first heard the sword flash in The Legend of Zelda? The giddy ecstasy of those rising tones when you first found a piece of the Triforce? Feel it again within these pages. In his latest collection, B.J. Best honors the traditions of prose poetry and of gaming with nuance and depth while instilling a sense of unmitigated discovery you will recognize from those years when you were open to pleasure in any form."

Phong Nguyen

“In But Our Princess, B.J. Best pushes into our ribs and digs through our childhoods—the hands we held, the red of our first kiss, the skin we’ve shed and calloused from every game controller—until we can taste the dust we inhaled while blowing on a Nintendo cartridge that wouldn’t work. Best has written an engrossing, personal, and highly addictive collection of poetry. He has reminded us why it’s such a good time to be reading contemporary poetry."

Gregory Sherl