Category: Book Reviews

Book Reviews

A review of Passages by Jenni Nixon

These are certainly not poems overflowing with sentimentality. Nixon has total control of her words, and is measured and diligent in creating and intelligent and elegant narrative in poetry form, whether she writes about helping a neighbour, the compulsory acquisition of hundreds of homes for the construction of tunnels or other environmental concerns.

A review of Text Messages from the Universe by Richard James Allen

This is philosophy at its best, to exist or not, or as Shakespeare put it “to be or not to be”. Allan makes you think, consider, and reflect, and he does it in a very clever way utilising poetic devices and intelligent lines. The poet’s voice is very convincing, whether he uses sophisticated language or everyday language, his unique style draws the reader into the narration.

A review of Beauty in the Beast by Emily-Jane Hills Orford

In the original folktale, when the young woman learns to love the beast, she is surprised by his transformation.  In Orford’s novel,  Priya is manipulated by a male being for whom she felt an attraction, so her happy ending is not the conventional one. Instead, it arises naturally from Orford’s novel and is suitable for the 21st century.

A review of Isle of Dogs by Jon Frankel

Isle of Dogs is full of densely plotted, exciting political intrigue and violence. But Frankel is at best when writing about the intimacies of daily life which persevere in this new world–a meal made with food grown at a garden, a woman’s relief at putting a baby to a full breast, a man picking up his child before going to work.

A Review of A Career in Books by Kate Gavino

Gavino’s characters are lived in, relatable, and funny. Their bosses are archetypal, knowable people we have all worked worth (or been). The New York they occupy is similarly vivid, and will likely be familiar to readers who have spent any amount of time in Brooklyn, commuting into the city, or hunting for lunches that cost less than $16. Duck buns anyone? 

A review of Lilies on the Deathbed of Étaín and other poems by Oisin Breen

But it’s serious, deadly serious. Written with care, and with love for language. At first sight, there seems to be something infernally unruly about Oisín Breen’s poetry, until you spot the fact that the structure is there, recognisable but bloody oneiric, lulling you into a false sense of security and then ripping itself up and changing.

A review of Sea Skins by Sophia Wilson

Wilson works every word with the precision of a linguist, drawing out the sounds of words, “The tick-tock knock of one hundred clocks” or “three shells cantering takka tak takka tak”. Alliteration, rhythm, rhyme, parataxis – the poems employ a range of techniques that make them aurally beautiful