Reviews
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Return Them to Their Sources Uninterpreted
Each conceit, each stanza, each line in Lovely, Raspberry sparkles with such wonderful ambiguity of thought that is, paradoxically, a type of clarity; through Belz’s absurdism, aspects of the human condition are illumined in unique, resonant fashion.
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The Silent Woman
An account of the marriage between Marilyn Monroe and Arthur Miller says a lot about the actress’s hygiene and sexual habits. The relationship, not so much.
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The Tiki King
“Zahlah quit the bed and saw her dark reflection in the full-length mirror. An American woman. That’s what she saw. Liberated and humiliated.”
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As If the Stars Invented Dinner
So what are Mazer’s actual poems like? They are, in their way, haunted.
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Elegant Trash
In his second book, Rob Sheffield uses ‘80s pop to explore adolescent memories, complex emotions, and the woes of being the de facto “gay friend.”
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A Gap in a Two-Way Mirror
As a chapbook, Narcissus Resists works. Across nineteen poems, a conceit such as this can get old, but Hittinger keeps his book compelling and engaging.
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The Canal
On a London bench, two strangers talk about desire and terror: “People wear masks. These masks, they do not even know they are wearing them.”
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Floating in a Most Peculiar Way
In Packing for Mars, Mary Roach matches her curiosity and humor against government secrecy, drunken Russian cosmonauts, and free-floating turds.
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The Boy Who Couldn’t Sleep and Never Had To
D. C. Pierson’s adolescent heroes hope for a future in which “‘existence engineer’ and ‘clone wrangler’ will be viable career paths.”
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Star-Smoked Skies
Kuipers is a “traditional poet” with respect to her unwavering focus on craft; the engine powering her verse is tight word choice that simultaneously conjures up tangible, living objects and powerful emotional resonance.
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The Kingdom Within
In a new collection, Anthony Doerr lovingly explores the topography of the natural world and the shifting interior landscapes of memory.
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The Shaking Woman
Siri Hustvedt’s memoir is a sprawling exploration of memory and the ways trauma manifests in physical illness—less Mary Karr, more Oliver Sacks.