Vision
It is our vision with Rabbit House Press to create a publishing company with uncompromising integrity. Setting the highest standards in both content and aesthetics, the objective is to share unique works that promise enduring appeal. We will forever remain passionate about evocative stories which are uniquely American, celebrating the glorious quilt of disparate characters that make up the fabric of our country. It is our pleasure to connect writers with their readers.
Erin Chandler
Editor in Chief
Editor in
Chief
Erin Chandler entered the publishing arena with twenty years-experience producing theatre and independent film. Struck by the wealth of unproduced and anonymous talent with which she found herself, Erin decided early on it was imperative to rally the troops. She found venues, cast the most extraordinary actors, directors, musicians, set designers and lighting technicians in order to put them on stage or in front of a camera. What came from these labors of love were many creatively successful endeavors including producing the Dramalogue Award-winning run of David Rabe’s In the Boom Boom Room at the Ventura Court Theatre in Studio City, California, critically acclaimed rock opera, Orpheus: A Season in Hell by Daniel Gilboy at 21 Square Feet Theatre in Los Angeles, John Patrick Shanley’s Savage in Limbo at Theatre, Theatre, Leslie Caveny’s Love of a Pig and Beth Henley’s Crimes of the Heart at the Complex Theatre in Hollywood.
Chandler produced Leslie Jordan's Lost in the Pershing Point Hotel, an independent film chosen for a premiere at the Seattle Film Festival. With famed Producer’s Rep, Jeff Dowd ‘The Dude’ at the helm, the film won a slew of awards including Best Script at the Los Angeles Independent Film Festival and Best Independent Film, New York International Film Festival. Just before leaving Los Angeles her original play, June Bug Versus Hurricane was produced at the Lost Studio in West Hollywood. Moving back to her old Kentucky home, her personal creativity shifted from theatre and film to literature. Upon arrival, she returned to Graduate School, obtaining a Masters in Theatre in 2012 from the University of Kentucky and an MFA in Creative Writing from Spalding University in 2017. Her memoir, June Bug Versus Hurricane was published through Rabbit House Press in 2018 to popular and critical acclaim. As fate would have it, Erin again found herself surrounded with extraordinary talents, now in the literary field. As organic as any natural progression she is now moved with a passion to share literary works and with this in mind, she created Rabbit House Press.
Our Books
All Products
Released November 2021: Don’t Die: Poems 2013-2021 by Michael Blumenthal
A poet, essayist and novelist. Blumenthal spent a decade as the Briggs-Copeland lecturer in poetry and the director of the Creative Writing program at Harvard University. He is a Guggenheim Fellow and recipient of the Water Mark Poets of North America First Book Prize, Juniper Prize, Isabella Steward Gardner Prize, and the Ribalow Prize for Best Work of Jewish Fiction. Pulitzer Prize- winning poet, critic and translator, C.K. Williams said of Michael Blumenthal, "The intellect of a scholar, the sensitivity of a poet, the objectivity of a professor of law: it hardly seems possible that so many virtues can be embodied in one." Blumenthal's latest collection, Don't Die: Poems 2013-2021 may be his most insightful, raw and important work to date.
Released June 2021 Joshua Fragmented by Bruce Lewis
A virtuoso jazz guitarist whose prose follows the tradition of Thomas Wolfe and Henry Miller. In lyrical outbursts, Joshua Celeste remembers and is remembered, from the fields of his boyhood home at Water Maple Farm in Kentucky, with a cattle rancher father and misplaced, glamorous mother to the streets of Budapest, Hungary as a traveling guitarist, a melancholic ex-pat. Bruce Lewis moved to Budapest 1993 and stayed until 2012. He played with some of the best European musicians in the world, traveling with his guitar to twelve different countries. His insight into the culture and people of the ancient city make Joshua Fragmented part travelogue and history lesson along with a beautiful, philosophical lesson on the sacrifices of art and the pull of home.
Released in August 2020: Stream by Kay Long Roberts
This slim volume is an ode to twenty-eight years of daily walks through forested ground to Stream, a beloved waterway. In brief, deeply observed passages, Kay Long Roberts invites us to accompany her on a journey through the woods, past fields and groves, among grazing deer and talkative birds. Inflected with surprise, melancholy, humor, hints of danger, and filled with animals, trees, and wildflowers, Stream fills the reader’s senses with the peace of the natural world. “Nature will nourish you, Kay” the author’s grandfather told her - and clearly it has, as this book will nourish all who read it. A rich and rare treasure.
Released in June 2020: Arranging Deck Chairs on the Titanic by Mike Wilson
“Would that the Roman people had but one neck,” said the mad emperor Caligula, “that I might chop it through.” In Arranging Deck Chairs on the Titanic, Mike Wilson takes on our own mad would-be emperor, a man “sharpening the hatchet / for our collective suicide.” Wilson, a poet of keen intelligence, guides us through this upside-down world where “Antarctica is hotter than L.A.” and “all the answers on Jeopardy are lies.” Here is the MAGA-hatted, assault-rifle toting cult that drinks, not the Kool-Aid but the Clorox. Here is God the barfly “ordering a round for everyone / but without instructions for an Ark.” A government as terrifyingly absurd as Trump’s might seem to defy the poet, but Wilson distills our anger with skill and wit. Arranging deck chairs on the Titanic might be the futile gesture of those who refuse to see impending disaster, but it might also be an assertion of human dignity in the face of madness. ~Sherry Chandler
Released in February 2020: After the Race by Pamela Dae
Alexandra was raised to be the next Jackie Kennedy. Just as her mother intended, Alexandra's summer internship on Capitol Hill results in the perfect fiancé, a future job, and D.C. political savvy. But when Alex returns to college for her final year and falls in love with a handsome, blue-jeaned bike champion, she must choose between the two men and the lives they represent, and decide whether she can defy her mother's designs to fulfill her own dreams. Ultimately, Alexandra must find within herself the power to confront the one unplanned event that could derail everything.
Released in December 2019: Transcendental Voyages from Kentucky to Kathmandu by Nancy Royden
Nancy Royden traveled the world wild with curiosity in search of an authentic spiritual path. After being admonished for her open-mindedness of heart and spirit, she extracted herself from naysayers and went on a journey that catapulted her across oceans to discover the many different ways to experience divine truth. Among many life lessons from her voyages, came this beautiful book of poetry.
Released in November 2019: Bad Sex in Kentucky by Kevin Lane Dearinger
American culture runs on sex. Sex sells music, movies, cars, careers, and celebrity, but the subject of sex, the actual intimate act, can quickly reduce a conversation to a dirty joke. Growing up gay and Catholic in the state of Kentucky in the mid-twentieth century, author Kevin Lane Dearinger was puzzled by what he heard about sex: the sneers, lies, misrepresentations, distortions, guilt, and secrecy. Some of his experiences were traumatic, but most just contributed to a life-saving sense of the absurd. The natural was made unnatural by gossip and judgment, fear and cruelty, and sex was “bad” in Kentucky, but language, humor, and time have provided protection and perspective. Bad Sex in Kentucky is about seeking grace under pressure, even at the risk of a pratfall. It is about place, family, and heritage. It is about survival at a price and a kind of ferocious forgiveness. It is about the search for the tangled intersection of sex and love.
Our Books
Our Authors
Michael Blumenthal is a celebrated poet, essayist and novelist who spent a decade as the Briggs-Copland lecturer in poetry at Harvard University before becoming the director of their Creative Writing program. A Guggenheim Fellow and recipient of the Water Mark Poets of North America First Book Prize, Juniper Prize and Isabella Steward Gardner Prize, he lived in Budapest Hungary from 1992-1996 as senior Fulbright lecturer. Blumenthal’s novel, Weinstock Among the Dying won the Ribalow Prize for Best Work of Jewish Fiction.
“Bruce Lewis is a masterful jazz/blues/folk guitarist whose pursuit of his muse took him from the central Kentucky tobacco farm of his boyhood all the way to Budapest, a vibrant center of art, music, fashion, and entertainment, where he remained for almost two decades, and launched a legendary career, playing clubs, music halls, and festivals all over Europe. Now back in Kentucky, he has distilled that experience in fictional form in a fine, wide-ranging novel, Joshua Fragmented, which chronicles the adventures of itinerant performer and luckless citizen of the world, Joshua Celeste. To read it is to join him on that poignant odyssey, and thereby to treat oneself to a terrific ride.”
Ed McClanahan- Novelist
Kay Long Roberts grew up on a farm in Union County, KY and is a registered nurse and nurse educator. At the age of thirteen she announced that when she was a grownup she would write and publish a book. She went on to publish a doctoral dissertation with fifty peer reviewed health research articles and has written many grant applications for health research. She received her MFA from Spalding University and has written several profiles of older women from an underserved neighborhood in Louisville, Kentucky. However, she still did not feel as if she was a writer. One day she listened to her soul, picked up a pen and wrote Stream. Stream is an ode to the rhythm of nature and speaks to the core of the human soul. Kay helps us discover, or remember, our spiritual connection to nature and nourish the core of who we are as humans living on this good earth. It is her hope that Stream will inspire us to join her in seeking sustenance from nature and doing our part to protect nature for those who will come after us.
Mike Wilson’s work has appeared in magazines including Cagibi Literary Journal, Stoneboat, The Aurorean, The Ocotillo Review, London Reader, and in anthologies including for a better world 2020 and Anthology of Appalachian Writers Vol. X. He received Kentucky State Poetry Society’s Chaffin/Kash Prize in 2019. He resides in Lexington, Kentucky, but summers in Ecstasy and winters in Despair.
Born and raised in Lexington, Kentucky, Pamela Dae received degrees in English Literature and Journalism from Indiana University. She graduated with a J.D. from the University of Kentucky College of Law and has worked as a federal criminal defense practitioner for nearly two decades. Pamela has been published in AvantAppalachia and Nowhere Magazine. After the Race is her first novel.
With more than twenty years of full-time newspaper and substantial online media experience, Nancy Royden earned her bachelor’s degree in communication arts from Georgetown College in Kentucky. Her writing has been published by The Associated Press, Texas Highway Patrol Magazine, JET magazine, South Florida (Fort Lauderdale) Times, Nu Magazine of Austin and the San Francisco Chronicle. Her photo credits include The Baltimore Sun, The Huffington Post, NBC4 (Washington, D.C.) and Kentucky Living. Her volunteer photography encompasses Latinitas Austin, The American Cancer Society’s Relay for Life and the Ward Hall Foundation. A native of Ashland, Kentucky, Nancy has traveled extensively, living in Germany for five years and residing in Texas, Alabama, Maryland, Tennessee, and North Carolina. Nancy lives and works in Frankfort, Kentucky with her husband and cats, regularly posting nature and architectural photos on social media. She is the proud mother of Ian Riddle, a college student in Maryland.
Kevin Lane Dearinger enjoyed a professional acting career that took him to Broadway, on national and international tours, and to many regional stages. He retired from performance and from his second career as an educator, returning to live and write in Kentucky. He is the author of The Bard in the Bluegrass, Marie Prescott, a “Star of Some Distinction,” Clyde Fitch and the American Theatre, and several plays, including Regarding Mrs. Carter and Naked on Request. He is currently working on a new play, two theatrical biographies, and a volume of poetry.
Erin Chandler is an author, teacher and publisher from Versailles, Kentucky. With twenty years’ experience as a playwright, actress and producer in Los Angeles she returned home to further her literary interests, getting a Master’s degree at the University of Kentucky with a focus on playwriting and an MFA in Creative Writing from Spalding University. She teaches memoir for the Carnegie Center and is a Mentor for their Author Academy. Her publishing company Rabbit House Press releases new works from writers all over the country celebrating the diverse fabric of our American experience. Her memoir June Bug Versus Hurricane and collection of essays, Cinderella Sweeping Upgarnered critical acclaim from Kentucky luminary, Silas House and celebrated author, Leslie Jordan among others.
An army brat who moved around her entire life experiencing different states and countries and cultures, Sara Don Shaver bartended in casual and fine dining establishments in downtown Savannah, Georgia among others. Dogs a constant during her travels, she became a certified dog trainer and when these two passions came together, she came together with Rabbit House Press to create this fun gift bag/bar and coffee table book Unleashed Libations: Canines and Cocktails. Mix up, train up and drink responsibly!
Find her book at unleashedlibations.com
Staff & Board
Corbyn Keys is a working print designer at Rabbit House Press and other local businesses in the Central Kentucky area. Keys graduated from the Santa Fe University of Art and Design in New Mexico with a BFA in graphic design. She has many other artistic endeavors including her pursuits as a documentarian, fashion designer, and screenwriter.
Judy Mathews (Editor, Resource Development) has an MFA in Creative Writing from Spalding University in Louisville and a BA in English from Lourdes University. Her work has been published in The Round Table Literary Journal, Avalon Literary Review, The Badlands Literary Journal, and The Tau. Judy is passionate about animals and her American Indian heritage, raising funds for Cherished Cocker Rescue and the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota. Judy Mathews is dedicated and tenacious, skilled at grant proposal writing and fundraising. With a strong desire to create awareness of the First Nation cultures through art, literature and oral tradition, she possesses a gift for empowering others and building positive relationships between individuals from diverse socioeconomic and cultural backgrounds. Jlmathews1972@hotmail.com
Mark Thomas was born and raised in Lexington, Kentucky. In his early twenties he moved to Washington DC where he stayed for twenty-five years, working at the Smithsonian Institute's National Portrait Gallery as a researcher before turning his attention to the culinary arts, opening up restaurants in the Dupont Circle neighborhood with such celebrated chefs as Jose Andreas. Returning to Kentucky in 2015 he is happy to have joined the Rabbit House Press family.
Board:
Brooke Lee - Designer, Author, Musician, Teacher, Berea, Kentucky
Whitney Chandler - Editor of the Woodford Sun newspaper, Versailles, Kentucky
Mark Thomas - Developer of Educational Programs, Smithsonian Institute
Lynne Chandler Brown - Writer, Psychotherapist, Southern Pines, North Carolina
Denise Lutz - Author of Thumbs and Lipschitz House, Glenlake Farm, Kentucky
Media
Gallery, video, and audio.
Author Spotlight November 1, 2020 with Erin Chandler, Mike Wilson, Kevin Lane Dearinger, Bruce Lewis, Pamela Dae and Kay Long Roberts
Rabbit House Press Interviews Bad Sex in Kentucky Author Kevin Lane Dearinger
Rabbit House Press Interviews After the Race Author Pamela Dae
Rabbit House Press Interviews Arranging Deck Chairs on the Titanic Author Mike Wilson
