We Are All Terminal But This Exit Is Mine

From Unknown Press, this full-length collection of poetry explores the childhood memories and nostalgic daydreams of a grade-school bookworm now grown up to face cancer, debt, solitude, and the fear that all the joys and hopes of a bygone youth are slipping out of reach. Named the "Best Book of 2017" by literary website Drunk Monkeys.

"In 2017, no book moved us, challenged us, and inspired us like James Duncan’s poetry collection We Are All Terminal But This Exit is Mine. It’s a powerful, transformative, and funny work - and our choice for Best Book of 2017." – Drunk Monkeys editorial staff

"A poignantly beautiful and bittersweet cycle of poems—vivid reflections of a grown man coming to terms with the hopes, dreams and experiences of childhood, his present circumstances and possible future outcomes. The poems are evocative meditations on the transitory and ephemeral nature of life and our inevitable mortality. Though often tinged with sadness, they serve as incantations that are, at their core, hopeful, celebratory and life affirming." – Michael Gillan Maxwell, author of The Part Time Shaman Handbook: An Introduction For Beginners

"An unflinching collection that spins a web of reminiscence sweet with heartache and dusted with longing for a youth now passed. With a narrative as eternal as spring, populated by gravel lots and corn fields, Duncan crafts a time and place we all remember, one of boyhood and recklessness, of late night stars and clenched fists, where death and love look so much alike—a bittersweet sunset calling to end a summer we swore had just begun." – Ally Malinenko, author of Ghost Girl