Jack Foley has published fifteen books of poetry, five books of criticism, and VISIONS AND AFFILIATIONS (Pantograph Press, 2011), a "chronoencyclopedia" of California poetry from 1940 to 2005. His most recent books include WHEN SLEEP COMES: SHILLELAGH SONGS (Sagging Meniscus press, 2020), RIVERRUN ( Poetry Hotel Press, 2017), GRIEF SONGS (Sagging Meniscus Press, 2017), THE TIGER AND OTHER TALES (Sagging Meniscus press, 2016), EYES (Poetry Hotel Press, 2013), and THE "FALLEN WESTERN STAR" WARS (Scarlet Tanager Books, 2001). He became well known through his "multivoiced" performances with his late wife, Adelle, who was also a poet; many of these can be seen on YouTube. His radio show, "Cover to Cover," airs every Wednesday on KPFA- FM in California. In 2010, Foley received the Lifetime Achievement Award by the Berkeley Poetry Festival.

"Jack Foley continues to grow and surprise. Add to his accomplishments in poetry, criticism, literary scholarship, and radio promotion of poetry and poets, this small, brilliant collection of tales, short plays and occasional prose pieces. Foley’s unique combination of insight, originality, erudition, and humanity, combined with a hitherto unsuspected flair for story-telling, are in full display here -- from a bittersweet faux Irish fable to a tongue-only-partly-in-cheek apologia for the Australian literary hoax ‘Ern Malley’ (the intellectual’s J T Leroy), from a purgatorial comedy of family manners to a Shavian satire full of pith ‘and vinegar,’ set in Hell and starring the Devil and G B Shaw himself, to the collection’s eponymous masterpiece, an arabesque from a 21st century Scheherazade. The book is a bracing pleasure.” -- Christopher Bernard, author of "Voyage to a Phantom City", "A Spy in the Ruins", "Dangerous Stories for Boys", "In the American Night" & "The Rose Shipwreck".