Poetry. Fiction. Native American Studies. In this first full collection in nine years, Sherman Alexie's poems and prose show his celebrated passion and wit while also exploring new directions. Novelist, storyteller and performer, he won the National Book Award for his YA novel, The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian. His work has been praised throughout the world, but the bedrock remains what The New York Times Book Review said of his very first book: "Mr. Alexie's is one of the major lyric voices of our time." Face is filled with the humor, cleverness, and Alexie-vulgarisms that one comes to expect from this Spokane. His fans won't be disappointed.

"Sherman Alexie is one of the funniest writers you've probably never heard of. That's too bad, because he's like a Native American Richard Pryor, his stripped down lines ringing with truth and dripping with punchlines. (It's no surprise that in addition to paying tribute to Emily Dickinson, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and Ralph Waldo Emerson, he also rejoices in the comedy king of the 70s and 80s.) And there's the pain, too. Plenty of pain. Not to mention anger at the inherent unfairness of life, human or otherwise. We mourn for our dead fathers and fear for our young sons. We fall victim to addiction, and our spouses fall victim to us. We crush bugs, call them pests . . . separate families of birds by moving their nests. Are we really better than them because we're bigger? Are we all really all different, or more or less the same? All the while, Alexie balances pain and anger with humor -- some might say of a sophomoric nature. Sometimes, though, as Alexie's work contends, the best response to death and despair is a good old fashioned dick joke. Let's step back for a moment. I can't claim to be an Alexie expert (though I wouldn't mind becoming one), but I have read Flight (a novel from 2007), a couple short stories from The Toughest Indian in the World (2000), and now Face, his latest book of poems published in April. His work, if I can generalize, tends to revolve around issues of sex, maturity, masculinity (or lack of all of these), and what it means to be Native American." - J T Brandt