Toxicon and Arachne, the recent poetry collection by Joyelle McSweeney, depicts the short human lifespan with an unconventional consistent darkness. Uniquely refreshing in its morbidity, this work is scattered with the bitterness of losing a child, and McSweeney portrays her grief “the way a crane / dances for its mate / the awkward body / […]
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The third collection from Leslie Contreras Schwartz, Who Speaks for Us Here, is both a question and answer for silenced women. These poems are both a warning and a guide about how to hush the haunting of trauma, how to master the art of carrying multiple selves inside of us. The women in these lyrical […]
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Mónica de la Torre’s marvelous work of art and language, Repetition Nineteen, weaves its way into the world this month to make our lives a little brighter. A vivid and thoughtful bilingual book, this work inspires readers to consider the misunderstandings and reliability of translating and code-switching, and gives us permission to fill in the […]
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Meena Alexander has a conversation with literary ghosts in her posthumous poetry collection, In Praise of Fragments. The writings and drawings in this book depict nonlinear, speculative bits about what it means to be alive, present, and home. She invites us on her exploration of the soul in her last few years of life. Many […]
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Speech, a reflective and well-timed new work by Jill Magi, is quite possibly the delicate walkthrough of life that so many of us secretly wish we had. The speaker serves as a flawlessly observant guide on a linguistic journey, giving us both foresight and hindsight as we wander along a path that is at once […]
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Slingshot by Cyrée Jarelle Johnson is a turbulent debut collection that should be on every fall reading list. His poems demonstrate skillful navigation of what it is like to see the world through queer black eyes, opening all other eyes to the alternate visibility and invisibility of this existence, the dangers of being seen by […]
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Hannah Cohen’s poetry collection Bad Anatomy shows us how our world looks when we hold it in vine-wrapped hands, at once a fragile ball and a strong snare. Read this book to be inspired to look at the world through new eyes, with a fresh stop-to-smell-the-roses vision. Cohen’s very first poem is about everything she […]
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Marlena Chertock stunned us once before with her poems in “On that one-way trip to Mars,” and now she returns with another astronomical collection, “crumb-sized.” Familiar topics return with new flair and detail, teaching us more about blackbodies and exoplanets, and imparting more awareness on personal issues like dysplasia and queer life. One of her […]
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You may stumble upon Alain Ginsberg if you’re trying to find Allen Ginsberg, but there’s no need to be disappointed by this poet mix-up. Alain’s writing is a melancholy autobiography of what it means to not only survive, but also to live, and how hard it can be for queer individuals to do the bare […]
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There’s nothing like finding a book that is so open and honest, you feel as if you’ve found a window into the author’s psyche. That’s how it feels to read Marianne Apostolide’s latest, Deep Salt Water (BookThug), a powerful memoir about abortion and the experience of loss as it evolves over time. It’s a beautifully […]
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JR Mahung’s literary creation, “Like Waters,” is both a tidal force and a gentle flow. It is teaching someone how to dance and not caring if they step on your feet, just wanting to twirl in some comfortable space with them. It is a lesson that if you keep searching for perfection, you’ll miss all […]
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I remember being mesmerized the first time I saw Nirvana’s MTV Unplugged session, as I’m sure countless other teens have. From the first notes of “About A Girl,” I was hooked, feet up on the couch, listening and wondering about the mystical blue-eyed man growling into the microphone in that famous oatmeal cardigan. It’s a […]
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Taylor Steele is a rare triple-Taurus. She’s a triple threat too—poet, screenwriter, and essayist—and it seems there’s very little that isn’t in her wheelhouse. You’ll find this is true almost instantly upon cracking Dirty. Mouth. Kiss. open. This is a collection of poems that roots for protection of the self, that’s wrought with newfound […]
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Inspired by a consuming crush, Shy Watson follows her first book (“Away Status,” previously reviewed!) with the equally stunning “My Parents Were Going to Give Me Your Name If I Was Born a Boy.” This short collection of poems, written in a single season, depict what it is like to want and not be wanted, […]
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From her balcony on the 21st floor of a Miami high-rise apartment, a woman, identified as “J,” muses over the comings and goings of neighbors and strangers, all the while contemplating her own solitude. It feels a little voyeuristic, reading the intimate thoughts of a woman being a voyeur herself, and at times even like […]
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The End, By Anna is Adam Zachary’s stunning fiction debut. Vibrant and experimental, it is a true success in fiction writing by a self-proclaimed poet, whose work addresses the fundamental question: What does it mean to make good art? The End, By Anna, published in November 2016 by Montreal’s Metatron press, is a pocket-sized booklet, […]
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There’s nothing like poetry that makes you stop and reread. Poetry you can savour – that clings to the back of your throat, insists on being taken in not just in one sitting. This is the poetry you fall back on, and that, perhaps, you have resting beside you on your bedside table, waiting. It’s […]
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Aziza Barnes’ first full-length poetry collection feels like a study of interiors. The insides of insects, human mouths, burroughs, apartments, the center of a sweaty dance floor, the depths of intestinal lining, and of course, the self. These poems reveal what we do when the exteriors have gotten the best of us. Or what we […]
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You should be longing to read Erin Taylor’s book “oooo,” because these poems are the human definition of longing. They are confessions of actually wanting people to touch you on the metro, feeling cold and distant and needing comfort. Taylor admits, “I mainly bite my nails and sometimes have a person I admire paint them […]
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I remember my first encounter with the term “feminist killjoy.” It was in my gender and media studies class, and we were assigned feminist scholar and writer Sara Ahmed’s Killing Joy: Feminism and the History of Happiness as one of our readings. The term, I’ll admit, had me worried at first – I’d had enough […]
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“Ajebota” refers to the class difference between those who are wealthy and privileged versus “ajepako,” those who are not. It is a privilege to be able to follow the path you love, which, for Precious Okoyomon, is writing. She appropriates different texts and draws inspiration from various sources, including print and Internet. Her poetry compilation, […]
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Marlena Chertock’s debut poetry collection, “On that one-way trip to Mars,” is both warm and chilling, covering not only the expanse of the solar system but also of human emotions and experiences. It is a complete balance of history, science, medicine, and the nature of humanity. All of these areas of life affect each other. […]
Read moreShe’s a self-proclaimed bruja, possibly a real actual pirate, a bookseller, and a nationally recognized spoken word poet who’s part of the 2015 National Poetry Slam championship winning team. Melissa Lozada-Oliva embodies all of these titles and can be found juggling them masterfully in Boston. She’s previously been published in Electric Cereal, Sidelines, Microchondria, and […]
Read moreIt’s tricky to pin down what, exactly, The Irresponsible Magician is, but that’s the fun of it – it defies genre. A work that weaves between essay and fiction, Rebekah Rutkoff’s collection from Semiotext(e) is exploratory and pushes beyond what we have often come to expect from our books – that extra readability that comes […]
Read more“One day, I was not famous, the next day, I was almost famous and the temptation to go wide with that and reject my past was too great.” (8) This is the story Natasha Stagg tells in Surveys with astounding exactness and understanding of that esoteric corner of the internet of which we all, at […]
Read moreDo you remember the way your mother would see you off to school in the morning? Did she sit with you for breakfast, or was she busy in her room, getting ready for the workday? Maybe her own mother used to sit with her for breakfast in the morning, and that’s what’s become routine, along […]
Read more“Away Status” by Shy Watson is a poetry collection that will lead you away from your comfort zone and straight into something so alarmingly honest, you will want to both close the book and keep turning pages. It is hard and easy to read the words of someone who tells the dark secrets that no […]
Read moreThe moment I learned of Elizabeth Tsung’s book, I reached out to her, practically begging to read it. As a girl who spent a good chunk of time and a number of points not feeling pretty, the title called to me immediately. But the book itself, beyond the title, continues to call to me even […]
Read moreBorn in Edmonton, but based in #the6, Vivek Shraya is a an artist whose works span across the mediums of music, film, and writing. She’s put out ten albums, four short films, and three books. An accolade queen, Vivek is a three-time Lambda Literary Award finalist for her books God Loves Hair, She of the […]
Read moreRecently, Carrie Brownstein—actor, comedian, author, and one-third of Riot grrrl band, Sleater-Kinney—posted a snap to Instagram showcasing her copy of I’m very into you laying atop a red background sans any commentary. It’s no wonder that Brownstein didn’t include any words with her picture because this intimate book has a way of rendering the reader […]
Read moreThis isn’t the domestic sphere you know, the one you’re told about. This is a deconstruction, a dismantling, a tearing apart. This is a doing away with expectations – a refusal of the woman’s “role.” In The Filaments of Heather, author Heather Goodrich’s chapbook from Sad Spell Press, we find a woman ridding herself of […]
Read moreAlexandra Wuest’s chapbook “The Female Gaze is Cool” advocates for the elimination of tunnel vision, for a new perspective that shouldn’t be so new. The female gaze is so often an internalized male gaze, a reflection of how other men (and women) see women. But the female gaze should be its own gaze, and these […]
Read moreIf you are searching for the perfect book to read while eating alone at Chipotle, I would recommend Carmen E. Brady’s “Eating Alone at Chipotle.” One person even tweeted at Brady @therealcbrad to admit to the tragicomedy of reading it while eating alone and spilling food all over the pages. You can cry from spices […]
Read moreSara Sutterlin’s I WANTED TO BE THE KNIFE is an escape from pretentious, bullshit dude poems. If anything, it is the answer to these poems. It gives us a look at cum from the other perspective. What does it mean to be spewed upon instead of doing the spewing? This sounds legit disgusting, and I […]
Read moreJamie Oliveira is a traveling visual artist and writer. She is also an activist for women’s healing, which is beautifully apparent in her work. Her latest project, (more than) dust. is a powerful photo book that serves as a platform for sufferers of emotional abuse. The book came into fruition thanks to funding from a […]
Read moreJust reading the author note that precedes Danielle Perry’s Phases (Sad Spell Press), her first chapbook, is enough to spark your enthusiasm over what’s to come. She’s a tarot reader who is “generally amping up her witchiness,” and who couldn’t use more of that in the world? Of course, we wouldn’t expect anything less of […]
Read moreIf you have ever felt split in half – hesitant but in control, understanding but not understandable – Amanda Dissinger’s This Is How I Will Tell You I Love You may resonate with you. This is a book packed full of duality, guarded warnings and heartfelt admissions, about the complexity of love. Whether the subject […]
Read moreIn this collaborative effort, Elizabeth J. Colen (author of poetry and flash fiction collections, finalist for the Lambda Literary Award in 2011), Carol Guess (author of 15 books of poetry/prose, awarded the Philolexian Award for Distinguished Literary Achievement by Columbia University), and Kelly Magee (author of chapbooks and short story collections, winner of the Katherine […]
Read moreTrigger warning: bipolar, theme of suicide “Hypothesis: I will not go crazy because I am not truly insane. Just a spectacular fuck up,” is the bitterly hopeful premise of Naadeyah Haseeb’s Manic Depressive Dream Girl. This unconventional chapbook, in which the boy and girl are alternately comfortable and wild, explores the depth a relationship can […]
Read more“How much can you tell me about love?” asks the bird in Darshana Suresh’s opening poem, “Birds on a Power Line,” from Howling at the Moon (Platypus Press). “Enough to fill my breakfast bowl,” answers the other. In her debut poetry collection, 19-year-old Suresh has more than enough to share about love, loss and survival […]
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