Strained rhymes and some unoriginal subject matter keep this collection from being a resounding success.
Schultz’s poetry collection offers a meditation on coming of age while tackling themes of race, identity, and self-discovery.
The core theme of this poetry collection is identity; in a poem titled after the first-person singular, “I,” the speaker concludes “I am/ Just…I.” The poems leading to this revelation trace the speaker’s quest to find out who he is, who he is meant to be, and who he is meant to be with. The speaker is biracial, with “the white side/the black side,”and his experience of identity is one in which he tries to reconcile his two lineages and reckon with what it means to be a biracial man in America. As the speaker grows up and tries to understand his identity, he must also contend with raw emotions and with his desire; the speaker’s quest to engage with his identity also forces him to figure out his place in the world and his relationships with the people around him. Schultz’s poetry references Tupac Shakur, and this collection owes a lot—from the formal poetic qualities to the black-and-white illustrations by McGee, Anastasiia, Drummond, and Hu that dot the book—to Shakur’s poetry collection The Rose that Grew from Concrete.Much of the collection reads like a mixtape for rejection and heartbreak, combined with the speaker’s hope to build a family. The poem “Crying” is a shining example of Schultz at his best, as some expected terms (like “friendship” and “separation”) are juxtaposed with surprising ones (like “cats” and “steroids”). Most of the poems, however, trade in typical images of passion, as sentiments like “My love may burn” (“Sugar”) have been overdone since Petrarch. or are too tethered to awkward rhymes like “Is it necessary for love to be so frightful and scary/ Should I be wary” (“Letter to HER”) for them to reach their full potential.
Strained rhymes and some unoriginal subject matter keep this collection from being a resounding success.Pub Date: Nov. 30, 2023
ISBN: 9798218187002
Page Count: 180
Publisher: DreamTitle Publishing
Review Posted Online: Nov. 15, 2023
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A disturbing, absorbing, and valuable addition to the literature of cruelty inflicted upon Indigenous peoples.
Chilton’s historical novel imagines the harrowing tale of three Virginian Patawomeck women who survived the 1666 massacre of the men of their tribe and were sold into slavery.
The small Native American Patawomeck tribe make their home in northern Virginia, near the Chesapeake. In 1666, frustrated with the tribe’s refusal to sell their land or accept the Virginia Governor’s Council’s choice for a new chief, the council chooses to respond with violence. On one summer night of that year, the Virginia militia enter the Patawomeck territory carrying their “thunder sticks” and savagely shoot every adult male in the village. They seize babies and corral the women, who are placed on a ship and sold into slavery in Barbados. Among these women are Ah’SaWei (Golden Fawn), a young mother, and her close friend, NePa’WeXo (Shining Moon). Once in Barbados, Ah’SaWei, her mother, and her daughter are sold to the Mount Faith Manor Plantation, owned by master Russell White, a Quaker. They are luckier than Xo and her daughter, who are purchased by the vicious, sexually avaricious master James Lewis of the Sugar Grove Plantation. In alternating chapters, Ah’SaWei, whose name is changed to Rebecca, and Xo, renamed Leah, narrate their tales of struggle and survival—on the ship, on the plantations, and after their triumphant return to the colonies in 1669. Packed with Indigenous culture and customs and sprinkled with tribal terminology, the narrative is vivid, magnetic, and chilling. The author is herself a Patawomeck descendant, and she’s combined scant available written records with tribal oral history to inform her creation of two emotionally powerful, vibrant female protagonists. Mixed in with the tragedies that befall these women are humorous moments, such as their descriptions of the English men: “They rarely bathe, their breath and teeth repulsive. They are hairy and filthy; they cover themselves with woven layers, fetid with sweat and dirt.” Several sections move languidly, but plenty of action, tears, cheers, and historical detail work to keep the pages turning.
A disturbing, absorbing, and valuable addition to the literature of cruelty inflicted upon Indigenous peoples.Pub Date: April 2, 2024
ISBN: 9781960573957
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Sibylline Press
Review Posted Online: Jan. 4, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2024
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Great fun.
The second installment of childhood recollections (after Opposite the Cross Keys, 1988) by mystery writer S.T. Haymon, who here evokes a sheltered 12-year-old's further encounters with life's earthier side.
Haymon's 1920's, upper-middle-class childhood revolved typically around school, home, loyal servants, and a pair of doting, well-educated parents—until age 12, when her father died and her mother decided to move to London. Refusing to accompany her, the precocious, comically self-confident Sylvia tried to limit this series of upheavals by insisting on remaining in Norfolk in the care of a favorite teacher—except that at the last minute her headmistress (already a sworn enemy) switched houses, arranging for two maiden schoolteachers to put Sylvia up in their house instead. Sylvia knew that the Misses Gosse and Locke were eccentric. What she didn't know was that the skinny, aggressive history teacher and the teary, puppy-like math professor were lesbians. Nor did she notice as Miss Locke's increasingly desperate infatuation with her began to lead the entire household toward destruction. Amusing characters abound—the gardener, Sylvia's only ally, whose faith in the value of a virgin's tips on the horse races led him to pay her for advice; the dour housekeeper who sang opera and downed bottles of gin; the art teacher's model who bewildered Sylvia with talk of "randy old dykes"; and the spiritual channel who informed her that her daddy was watching everything she did from heaven. Haymon's depiction of herself as an unusually clever, frequently petulant, and thoroughly practical young girl obsessed with filling her stomach while all sorts of passionate fireworks exploded around her evokes an era when secrets still existed and scandals were bursting to happen—and makes for slyly humorous, very British entertainment.
Great fun.Pub Date: Dec. 14, 1990
ISBN: 312-04986-2
Page Count: -
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
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