Author: Heavy Feather
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Playlist for the Apocalypse, a new book of poems by Rita Dove, reviewed by Carolyn Oliver
Playlist for the Apocalypse is Rita Dove’s first book of new poems since 2009’s virtuoso Sonata Mulattica (her Collected Poems: 1974–2004, also from W. W. Norton & Company, appeared in 2016), and well worth the twelve-year wait. Expansive in theme, tone, and subject matter across its six sections, Playlist for the Apocalypse defies generalization and…
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“To What End?”: Lorenzo Bartolucci on A Room in Dodge City, Vol. 2: The Blut Branson Era, a novel-in-vignettes by David Leo Rice
Why do you want to be a writer? It came up casually, over dinner, but I’ll never forget the way David Leo Rice paused (rather uncharacteristically) to consider a question he didn’t seem to have bothered with overmuch on his own—which may be the simplest definition of a vocation, after all. And I’ll never forget…
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The Pastor, a novel by Hanne Ørstavik, reviewed by Titus Chalk
For Liv, the titular pastor in Hanne Ørstavik’s 2004 novel—translated from the Norwegian for the first time by Martin Aitken—language is the original sin. Indeed, God spoke the world into being, perhaps why Liv’s faith is wafer-thin, and why she so is deeply troubled by the violence inherent in language, the binaries it creates, the…
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“Taking Liberties”: Four Views of Maggie Nelson’s On Freedom, a review by Ben Lewellyn-Taylor
1. What It Is In her 2011 book The Art of Cruelty, Maggie Nelson argued that “true moral complexity is rarely found in simple reversals. More often it is found by wading into the swamp, getting intimate with discomfort, and developing an appetite for nuance.” Her latest, On Freedom: Four Songs of Care and Constraint,…
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And the Winners Are… 2021 Friends in Letters Results
Hello Feathers! Ryan here. I’m very happy to announce that Brian Oliu and Tasha Coryell have announced their picks for the winners of the second-annual Zachary Doss Friends in Letters Fellowship. In a year that has been more isolating than, perhaps, we might have anticipated, it has been a true source of joy to read…
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“Inventory of Doubt”: A Reflection on Form and Complex Language in Landon Godfrey’s Inventory of Doubts
Landon Godfrey is it treat to the poet who likes to read the comical and the complex. But for this reviewer, the real star of The Poetry within Inventory of Doubts is the poet’s dedication and loyalty to the consistency of form. On each page for the most part with a few exceptions, Godfrey lays…
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The Three Veils of Ibn Oraybi, a novella by Vincent Czyz, reviewed by Jeffrey Kahrs
The Three Veils of Ibn Oraybi is packed with literary juice: It’s mythical like magical realism, yet historical in that we detect Ottoman and Caucasian outlines enclosing the edges of the tale. The novella is as plotted as a detective story, surprising us with its twists and turns, and it is a morality tale. The…
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Haunted Passages Poem: “Tangerine Dream” by Michael Sikkema
Michael Sikkema is a poet. He has a book forthcoming from Trembling Pillow Press, a book forthcoming from Alien Buddha Press, and a chapbook of sound poems and collages fresh out from Low Frequency Press. He enjoys correspondence about owl communication, sound studies, and raising pleasantly feral children at Michael.Sikkema@gmail.com. Image: healthclubnu.nl
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Corrupted Vessels, a swallow::tale press novella by Briar Ripley Page, reviewed by June Martin
Briar Ripley Page’s novella, Corrupted Vessels, from swallow::tale press, is unconcerned with the truth. Not in the unreliable narrator sense, where we have reason to doubt the story which is relayed to us—indeed, none of the four narrators are afforded the chance to mislead us any more than they, themselves, are misled or misinformed about…
Heavy Feather Review 