The poems in Alice Burdick's debut poetry collection, Simple Master, explore what is required of us to remain human in a strange new world. Burdick focuses on a "silent centre" surrounded by the noise of the city or landscape. The poems investigate language, using colloquial words uncommonly, as the poet hears them. Coherent, ironic, often humorous narratives emerge from the poems' multilayered lines.

Alice Burdick lives in Mahone Bay, Nova Scotia. She is co-owner of Lexicon Books in Lunenburg, and serves on the board of the Writers Federation of Nova Scotia. In the early 1990s, she was co-editor of The Eternal Network, and assistant coordinator of the Toronto Small Press Fair. She is the author of many chapbooks and three full-length poetry collections: Simple Master (Pedlar Press, 2002); Flutter (Mans?eld Press, 2008); and Holler (Mansfield Press, 2012). Her work has appeared in many magazines, online and in print, and was shortlisted for the First Lemonhound Poetry Prize. Her poetry has been included in several anthologies, including Surreal Estate: 13 Canadian Poets Under the In?uence (The Mercury Press), Shift & Switch: New Canadian Poetry (The Mercury Press), Pissing Ice: An Anthology of New Canadian Poets (BookThug), To Find Us: words and images of Halifax (HRMP), and the forthcoming The Child Alone Anthology (Frog Hollow Press).

Alice Burdick's profile page