Review by Lisa C. Taylor With breathtaking originality, Those Absences Now Closest propelled this reader into the visceral world of war and the generational trauma that no one whose ancestry has been victimized can escape. Poet and translator, Dzvinia…
Browsing: Reviews
Review by Connie Jordan Green Linda Parsons, native Tennessean, is an editor and a prolific writer of poetry, essays, and plays. To come upon a volume of Parsons’ work is to know one is in for a pleasant, but…
Review by Linda McCauley Freeman There is an almost indescribable moment when you first nudge your way into a hoarder’s house. An assault not only of your senses, but also of the very foundation of reality, stability and yes,…
MER Bookshelf – February 2025 Curated by Melissa Joplin Higley Julia C. Alter, Some Dark Familiar, Green Writers Press, April 2024, poetry Julia C. Alter’s Some Dark Familiar begins as an excavation of the shadow sides of motherhood– often…
MER Bookshelf – January 2025 Curated by Melissa Joplin Higley Dzvinia Orlowsky, Those Absences Now Closest, Carnegie Mellon University Press, October 2024, poetry. In her newest collection, Ukrainian American poet Dzvinia Orlowsky is a witness, never a bystander, ready…
Review by Joellen Craft Too Much to Ask: Bridget Bell and the Toxic Positivity of American Motherhood In the midst of a great era for “mommy poetry,” Bell’s debut, All That We Ask of You Is to Always…
Review by Rebecca Jane With Praying to the God of Small Things, Wisconsin-based poet, Catherine Jagoe pays homage to Earth’s aliveness, within its microcosmic realms—here, insects reveal their ingenuity, and laced wings beguile the witness. These poems urge us…
Review by Laurie Kuntz “Put back together by poetry…” is a poignant line from the About the Author paragraph, which is on the last page of Susan’s Vespoli’s book: One of Them Was Mine. This powerful book is a…
MER Bookshelf – December 2024 Curated by Melissa Joplin Higley Megan Merchant & Luke Johnson, A Slow Indwelling, Harbor Editions, November 2024, poetry. This unique collaborative work explores parenthood, illness, and the beauty found in life’s fragile moments through…
Review by Sharon Tracey From the Latin ministerium comes the word ministry: the service and work of providing assistance and care. And in her engaging new collection, Wonderwork, poet and Unitarian Universalist minister Sandra Fees invites us to bear…