It's no small feat in the age of multinationals, big houses doing good numbers with e-book sales and celebrity memoirs to self-publish a book that garners the respect of one's peers and general and lasting buzz interest. It's also no small feat to have this same book a 2011 Lambda Literary Award finalist. Recently re-released, Vivek Shraya's God Loves Hair is a DIY masterpiece in the age of Wal-Mart top 10 book clubs.

The politics of space and place are never neutral. Though many would like us to believe otherwise, the authors who have contributed to The Art of Trespassing know that geographies are always contested. They take the ancient art of trespassing to new levels by questioning and transgressing not only personal boundaries, but society's as well.

What happens when a woman with "dykey clothes" confronts a man with a bushy beard about the lesbian book he's reading? Is life easier for a butch or a lipstick lesbian? Is it better to be queer in Whitehorse, where you're subjected to direct questions, or in Vancouver, where PC politeness masks embarrassed confusion? Missed Her, a collection by Vancouver writer and performer Ivan E. Coyote of her Xtra! West columns, conveys these lifestyle collisions with thoughtful humour.

A drug dealer with a conscience, straight boys who jog naked at night in a group, and a hit-man who finds himself in a life changing ceremony; yes, there's everything under the sun (and moon) in Richard Van Camp's new collection of short fiction The Moon of Letting Go.

A member of the Dogrib Nation of North West Territories, Van Camp is one of Turtle Island's (Canada's) premier writers. Published in The Walrus, Descant and Up Here Magazine, Van Camp brings stories from the North to the rest of Turtle Island.