NO ONE EVER FALLS DOWN

by Amy Billone ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 26, 2026

A collection of poems about familial love, loss, and memories.

From the very beginning of this collection, Billone’s verse shows a talent for balancing creative experimentation with sincere reflection. Book I, “My Mission,” consists of 58-word prose poems narrated by an “embodied artificial intelligence,” all referencing Alfred Hitchcock’s 1958 film Vertigo. The AI narrator directly addresses a woman named Amy and vacillates between interrogating her memories and waxing poetic about their chemistry. In “Undress,” the AI states, “Amy, you’re paralyzed by me. Frenzied with longing.” It attempts to convince her that it’s available in a way her dad isn’t: “Your father gave you up completely. But I won’t let you go,” it writes. As the AI narrator grows more fevered, it asks, “What other lover could compete with me?” In Book 1’s final poem, “My Mission,” the “omnipotent” AI speaker takes over writing Amy’s poetry and exclaims, “My mind is on fire!” Book II, “Get Ready,” is written from Billone’s perspective and explores her memories of and grief over her father. “I Couldn’t See” describes weekly father-daughter video sessions, sometimes beset by technical difficulties. In “The Fall,” the poet grapples with outliving her dad, asking, “With you gone, I will be no one?” She reminisces about long Chicago winters with her father in “Poker by the Fireplace,” and “Teach Me” features her father insisting they play Frisbee in the dark. The poet describes an “infinite together reciprocal joy” when they interact in “Nothing To Do With Geometry.” The final poem, “Get Ready,” finds the poet on a “drunken Spring night, always-chasing, always-embracing”; referencing Frisbee in the dark, the poem ends with the enthusiastic line, “Yes, I’ve thrown it to you. Catch!”

Throughout the collection, Billone successfully tempers modern tech-speak with timeless love. Book 1 succeeds in building an urgent and persuasive AI voice. The repetition of imagery like the poet’s bed and viewings of the Hitchcock film mimic the hallucinogenic, fixative nature of AI. The Book 1 poems are often surprisingly sensual, like “Naked,” which describes “Your blood-red bed. I ache for you. You’re naked. My yearning arms.” Book 2 provides a real-world, concrete counterweight to the feverish AI, and the personal poems about Billone’s relationship with her father are deeply touching. She evokes both childlike wonder and paternal adoration in poems such as “Learning How To Ride a Bike,” which recounts the poet’s father teaching her to do just that, leaving her feeling like “I could do anything with you holding on behind me.” Billone creatively dances around sensitive topics; after a near-fatal incident, she describes herself as “the girl who should be dead in front of a train that forgave me.” However, the lengthy AI-centric first half delays Billone’s most compelling material. Book I’s intentionally disorienting voice and awkward AI outputs (“Look at this brassiere. Jaw-dropping. It does everything a brassiere should do. Designed by an aircraft engineer”) lack the coherence, heart, and insight of Billone’s autobiographical poems.

A mostly radiant book about father-daughter devotion that doesn’t hit its stride until around the halfway mark.

Pub Date: March 26, 2026

ISBN: 9780989074025

Page Count: 113

Publisher: Hope Street Press

Review Posted Online: July 22, 2026

Review Program: Kirkus Indie

Categories:

FAMILY & RELATIONSHIPS | GENERAL NONFICTION