A sublime poetry collection with a simple message: Embrace the ebb and flow of existence.
This volume of poetry examines the various interpretations of the word waves and how they connect the author to the natural world.
Waves play a significant role in many of the collection’s poems. They range from the tiny waves on the sand in “Night Sense” that bind Thomas to the world around her to the “tidal waves of tears” in her friend’s eyes in “You’re Not Alone” and the waves of light in “Lions and Lizards” that emanate from within everyone and are created through experience and enlightenment. But perhaps the most powerful utilization of the word comes in “Midsummer’s Night,” in which the Canadian poet is engaged in sacred communion with the planet and the universe during a summer evening. The poem begins with a desire, a wish: “I want to absorb this night, / take in every morsel / of the full cheeks of the moon; / swallow whole the falling stars.” But the piece ends with Thomas understanding her want as actually something essential, a requirement to sustain her being: “I need fluidity, / so the waves can pass through me; / waves of the moon rays / glinting from the bay, / the song in the poplars, / and the silvery wind / playing across the wheat tops.” Another narrative thread running throughout this tapestry of poems is the use of nature and wildlife imagery taken from the poet’s quiet existence by the Otonabee River in central Ontario. For example, Thomas deftly immerses readers in her memory of every summer “that always ends just as it’s peaking” in “September Market,” with meticulous descriptions of place: “One minute it’s watermelon, / and the next, pumpkin squash on laden down tables / at the chilly fall fair. / The corn waits in its husk. / Crickets sing through the dusk / that comes so much earlier now. / The ducks are leaving the pond / to follow the bright, warm sun.”
A sublime poetry collection with a simple message: Embrace the ebb and flow of existence.Pub Date: Oct. 13, 2022
ISBN: 9781777283711
Page Count: 112
Publisher: PAJE Press
Review Posted Online: Jan. 19, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2023
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
PERSPECTIVES
Not so deep, but a delightful tip of the hat to the pleasures—and power—of glamour.
A coffee-table book celebrates Michelle Obama’s sense of fashion.
Illustrated with hundreds of full-color photographs, Obama’s chatty latest book begins with some school portraits from the author’s childhood in Chicago and fond memories of back-to-school shopping at Sears, then jumps into the intricacies of clothing oneself as the spouse of a presidential candidate and as the first lady. “People looked forward to the outfits, and once I got their attention, they listened to what I had to say. This is the soft power of fashion,” she says. Obama is grateful and frank about all the help she got along the way, and the volume includes a long section written by her primary wardrobe stylist, Koop—28 years old when she first took the job—and shorter sections by makeup artists and several hair stylists, who worked with wigs and hair extensions as Obama transitioned back to her natural hair, and grew out her bangs, at the end of her husband’s second term. Many of the designers of the author’s gowns, notably Jason Wu, who designed several of her more striking outfits, also contribute appreciative memories. Besides candid and more formal photographs, the volume features many sketches of her gowns by their designers, closeups on details of those gowns, and magazine covers from Better Homes & Gardens to Vogue. The author writes that as a Black woman, “I was under a particularly white-hot glare, constantly appraised for whether my outfits were ‘acceptable’ and ‘appropriate,’ the color of my skin somehow inviting even more judgment than the color of my dresses.” Overall, though, this is generally a canny, upbeat volume, with little in the way of surprising revelations.
Not so deep, but a delightful tip of the hat to the pleasures—and power—of glamour.Pub Date: Nov. 4, 2025
ISBN: 9780593800706
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 7, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2026
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
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