Category: Reviews & Criticism

  • Portuguese, poetry by Brandon Shimoda, reviewed by Nathan Moore

    Portuguese, poetry by Brandon Shimoda, reviewed by Nathan Moore

    Brandon Shimoda’s Portuguese is the result of a collaborative publishing venture between Octopus Books and Tin House Books. From this information alone, you’d be right to expect something that, at the very least, is interesting. Portuguese is not only interesting, it defines new expectations about poetry. Now I expect more from poetry. There’s the “Oh,…

  • You Good Thing, a new poetry collection by Dara Wier, reviewed by Jordan Sanderson

    You Good Thing, a new poetry collection by Dara Wier, reviewed by Jordan Sanderson

    Reading Dara Wier’s You Good Thing, I felt “physically as if the top of my head were taken off,” not only on the first read, but also on each subsequent read. She begins the book with a sketch and an epigraph—“by the longest route possible”—taken from a photographic biography of Fernando Pessoa. The poems do…

  • One, a text by Blake Butler & Vanessa Place. Assembled by Christopher Higgs. Reviewed by Will Kaufman.

    One, a text by Blake Butler & Vanessa Place. Assembled by Christopher Higgs. Reviewed by Will Kaufman.

    One is perhaps most notable for what it is; a unique collaboration between three writers. Blake Butler and Vanessa Place were assigned the tasks, respectively, of writing the exterior landscape and interior landscape of a single character. They were not allowed to collaborate or communicate at all with each other about their projects. Once they…

  • Review: F IN, erasure poetry by Carol Guess, reviewed by Kelsie Hahn

    Review: F IN, erasure poetry by Carol Guess, reviewed by Kelsie Hahn

    At first, Carol Guess’ F IN draws attention to what’s missing. Its pages are mostly empty, as it is the parts that remain from Guess’ novella Willful Machine after being cut down to a scattering of words and phrases. The original was a mystery, including ghosts and the investigation and pursuit of a crime. This…

  • The Moon’s Jaw, poetry by Rauan Klassnik, reviewed by Jeremy Behreandt

    The Moon’s Jaw, poetry by Rauan Klassnik, reviewed by Jeremy Behreandt

    I’m trying to figure out what they call the synopsis wherein each big event is separated by a dash at the beginning of a novel’s chapters. You know what I’m talking about? Like in Cormac McCarthy’s Blood Meridian: Childhood in Tennessee – Runs away – New Orleans – Fights – Is shot – To Galveston…

  • Dark Matter, poetry by Aase Berg, reviewed by Jeremy Behreandt

    Dark Matter, poetry by Aase Berg, reviewed by Jeremy Behreandt

    One contracts and soon succumbs to Dark Matter more than one begins to read it; no matter how this review begins, a cursory tracing of infection patterns would be more suitable. Recurrent throughout this latest translation of Aase Berg’s poetry is the image of the black shell, which might be a cracking, hatching chaosmic egg,…

  • “Aleksandar Hemon’s The Book of My Lives”: A Reflection by Joseph Riippi

    “Aleksandar Hemon’s The Book of My Lives”: A Reflection by Joseph Riippi

    Some things you should know about me. The day a new Radiohead record comes out, I buy it. The day a new Aaron Sorkin show premieres, I watch it. And the day a new Aleksandar Hemon book is announced, I find a galley and devour it. That’s not to say those things correlate. This is…

  • Review: Louise Henrich on ANIMAL collection, a fantastical zoo trip by Colin Winnette

    Review: Louise Henrich on ANIMAL collection, a fantastical zoo trip by Colin Winnette

    Instead of speaking about the trunk of an elephant or the way an elephant moves, Colin Winnette begins his story by reminding the reader “an elephant never forgets,” but gives the common aphorism a sinister angle: Never owe an ELEPHANT money. It will make a point of humiliating you. It will find you on public…

  • A Review of Andrew Rihn’s The Hunger Dictionary by Lisa M. Litrenta

    A Review of Andrew Rihn’s The Hunger Dictionary by Lisa M. Litrenta

    In The Hunger Dictionary Andrew Rihn defines the numerous types of hunger one can feel when a romantic relationship falls apart. In these poems, Rihn’s narrator is hungry to communicate with a closed-off partner. The Hunger Dictionary serves as the narrator’s first opportunity to identify and evaluate the problems in the relationship. When I think…