A set of poems about the failings of the healthcare system rendered in extremely graphic imagery.
A poet traces a harrowing hospital experience in this linked collection.
Author hall writes in the voice of their protagonist, Ashton, who’s plagued with medical anxiety (“i’m constantly thinking of every inch of me”), which may be hypochondria but could be a more serious malady. A bump appears on their neck, and the situation spirals into a visit to the hospital to see Dr. Reynolds, but once Ashton is in the waiting room, their reality and sanity begin to fissure and fracture. The hospital goes into lockdown, with no explanation; other strange things begin to occur, which may be hallucinations: A body on a stretcher begins to boil; a nurse collapses, looking “all crispy black & reeked.” Ashton remains determined to get their checkup, but they soon spiral into a breakdown—a rolling rhythm of peaks and valleys as the collection unfolds. Rather than titles, the poems have timestamps, beginning with Ashton’s night terror at 2:59 a.m. and flowing into other events throughout the day, often just minutes apart; the stamps become confused, even illegible (“?1:44:5? ??” and “0?:?4 ??”), and the poems follow suit. A disembodied voice speaks to Ashton in italics as their mind frays. At times, words scramble on the page, stretched apart by space or frenzied together. Overall, this is a body horror collection that will challenge many readers, as the poet’s use of graphic imagery (“from my skin burst a leg, a tarry black / & bristled appendage, / then another. the searing edge / of a blade peeling flesh”) is simultaneously revolting and intriguing, and continually compels one to ask, “Is this real?” Through the perceptions of Ashton, the poet reveals how a system and its stewards can make even a single hospital visit apocalyptic, as one fights for autonomy at every turn: “To finally work up the courage to seek help,” hall writes, “once more, & to end up trapped, helpless,” reflecting the difficulties that marginalized people can have as they assert themselves.
A set of poems about the failings of the healthcare system rendered in extremely graphic imagery.Pub Date: June 14, 2023
ISBN: 9781957537603
Page Count: 225
Publisher: Brigids Gate Press
Review Posted Online: Oct. 10, 2024
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A virtuoso performance and an ode to an undervalued medium created by two talented artists.
The veteran actor, comedian, and banjo player teams up with the acclaimed illustrator to create a unique book of cartoons that communicates their personalities.
Martin, also a prolific author, has always been intrigued by the cartoons strewn throughout the pages of the New Yorker. So when he was presented with the opportunity to work with Bliss, who has been a staff cartoonist at the magazine since 1997, he seized the moment. “The idea of a one-panel image with or without a caption mystified me,” he writes. “I felt like, yeah, sometimes I’m funny, but there are these other weird freaks who are actually funny.” Once the duo agreed to work together, they established their creative process, which consisted of working forward and backward: “Forwards was me conceiving of several cartoon images and captions, and Harry would select his favorites; backwards was Harry sending me sketched or fully drawn cartoons for dialogue or banners.” Sometimes, he writes, “the perfect joke occurs two seconds before deadline.” There are several cartoons depicting this method, including a humorous multipanel piece highlighting their first meeting called “They Meet,” in which Martin thinks to himself, “He’ll never be able to translate my delicate and finely honed droll notions.” In the next panel, Bliss thinks, “I’m sure he won’t understand that the comic art form is way more subtle than his blunt-force humor.” The team collaborated for a year and created 150 cartoons featuring an array of topics, “from dogs and cats to outer space and art museums.” A witty creation of a bovine family sitting down to a gourmet meal and one of Dumbo getting his comeuppance highlight the duo’s comedic talent. What also makes this project successful is the team’s keen understanding of human behavior as viewed through their unconventional comedic minds.
A virtuoso performance and an ode to an undervalued medium created by two talented artists.Pub Date: Nov. 17, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-26289-9
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Celadon Books
Review Posted Online: Aug. 30, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2020
PERSPECTIVES
An ebullient nature lover’s paean to birds.
A charming bird journey with the bestselling author.
In his introduction to Tan’s “nature journal,” David Allen Sibley, the acclaimed ornithologist, nails the spirit of this book: a “collection of delightfully quirky, thoughtful, and personal observations of birds in sketches and words.” For years, Tan has looked out on her California backyard “paradise”—oaks, periwinkle vines, birch, Japanese maple, fuchsia shrubs—observing more than 60 species of birds, and she fashions her findings into delightful and approachable journal excerpts, accompanied by her gorgeous color sketches. As the entries—“a record of my life”—move along, the author becomes more adept at identifying and capturing them with words and pencils. Her first entry is September 16, 2017: Shortly after putting up hummingbird feeders, one of the tiny, delicate creatures landed on her hand and fed. “We have a relationship,” she writes. “I am in love.” By August 2018, her backyard “has become a menagerie of fledglings…all learning to fly.” Day by day, she has continued to learn more about the birds, their activities, and how she should relate to them; she also admits mistakes when they occur. In December 2018, she was excited to observe a Townsend’s Warbler—“Omigod! It’s looking at me. Displeased expression.” Battling pesky squirrels, Tan deployed Hot Pepper Suet to keep them away, and she deterred crows by hanging a fake one upside down. The author also declared war on outdoor cats when she learned they kill more than 1 billion birds per year. In May 2019, she notes that she spends $250 per month on beetle larvae. In June 2019, she confesses “spending more hours a day staring at birds than writing. How can I not?” Her last entry, on December 15, 2022, celebrates when an eating bird pauses, “looks and acknowledges I am there.”
An ebullient nature lover’s paean to birds.Pub Date: April 23, 2024
ISBN: 9780593536131
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Jan. 19, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2024
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