Last Stop, Lonesome Town

In this quirky and beautiful vaudevillian debut, Tara Azzopardi employs sharp social observation and a pop-culture universe from the past and present to explore the struggles we face in constructing our own identities, both public and private. Whether she’s dating Caspar the Friendly Ghost, observing Agatha Christie in Giza, fleeing Albania in 1925, or walking the corridors of Alcatraz in 1962, Azzopardi consistently has an eye for the offbeat, the macabre, and the slapstick. Be prepared to leave all expectations behind when you enter the carnivalesque world of Last Stop, Lonesome Town.

“Tara Azzopardi’s beautifully crafted poems are funny, dark, and surprising. Their surreal spookiness disturbs and delights, like falling off the Titanic and landing in a bingo hall in the Yukon.” —Mark Connery

“Joni Mitchell’s Grade 7 teacher said to her, ‘If you could paint with a brush, you could paint with the words.’ The book of poems that you are holding in your hands—right this very moment—is just such a testament.”
—Sonja Ahlers

“Azzopardi is ‘Queen of the Swamp,’ and this is her coronation. She writes weirdo, side-splitting, muck-covered poems that give form to the love she shares with and for ‘everybody/at the edge’ of history: from lonely teen goths to Albanian immigrants, to sex-club patrons, Alcatraz prisoners, lost civilizations, and even the Yeti. And yes, Azzopardi’s poems may come from the swamp, but they reach for—and occasionally touch—the great ‘mystery,’ as she calls it: the ‘hows and whys’ of being human yesterday, today, and tomorrow. Forever.” —Alessandro Porco