Compulsive Reader

Compulsive Reader News
maggieball@compulsivereader.com
http://www.compulsivereader.com
Volume 27, Issue 9, 1 Sept 2025

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IN THIS ISSUE

New Reviews at Compulsive Reader
Literary News
Competition News
Sponsored By
Coming soon

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Hello readers. Here is the latest batch of reviews and interviews:

The Witnessing Poet: a review of Water & Wave by Eugene Datta

In the end, Water & Wave succeeds by telling the story of the poet’s own evolution as a witness to experience. From the poems early in the book that treat memory and the writer’s capacity to evoke it with few caveats, to the final title poem in which the distinctions between mind and body, thought and experience, are stark and unable to be overcome, Datta brings us to the present moment. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2025/08/27/the-witnessing-poet-a-review-of-water-wave-by-eugene-datta/

A review of Mermaids and Musicians by Diane Frank

A cellist for over eighteen years with the Golden Gate Symphony, Diane Frank writes about music with profound authority. Her deep understanding, knowledge and love of music in all its forms is evident throughout, whether it’s dissecting the Beethoven Quartets or describing the subtle performance of vibrato on a cello or delighting in banjo and fiddle tunes at a dance where people are waltzing, clogging, dancing contras. Her lyrical style is as elusive and rousing as the music in which she luxuriates. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2025/08/25/a-review-of-mermaids-and-musicians-by-diane-frank/

The Tragedy of Righteousness: On Claire Daverley’s Talking at Night

“I know it seems like I didn’t choose you, ever, Rosie says, when all I wanted was to choose you.” Will and Rosie’s commitment is honest, low-key, and earned. The frustrations of two fallible people trying to do it right make Talking At Night a worthwhile read, A fragile, fierce meditation on love, restraint, and what it means to be chosen, seen, and loved selflessly. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2025/08/24/the-tragedy-of-righteousness-on-claire-daverleys-talking-at-night/

An interview with Adedayo Agarau

The author of The Years of Blood talks about his new collection and its impetus, the Poetic Justice Book Prize, influences, structures, ‘Faith’ and the visceral, Yoruba culture, the catastrophe already here, the use of grammar, especially the em dash, in poetry, the impact of music on his writing, Nigeria’s vast literary tradition and upcoming books to look out for, and much more. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2025/08/21/an-interview-with-adedayo-agarau/

A review of The Years of Blood by Adedayo Agarau

Everyday African life, as depicted in Agarau’s debut poetry collection The Years of Blood, is a concrete space where “God is somewhere withering in his envelope of silence” – but how to overcome both God’s silence and the West’s speculative consideration? Infliction. In a style diagonal to Ocean Vuong’s arcane confessionalism and Charles Reznikoff’s documentarian ache, Agarau aims to inflict the griefs and hopes of life in Ibadan, during “the years of blood.” Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2025/08/21/a-review-of-the-years-of-blood-by-adedayo-agarau/

A review of Open House: Conversations With Writers About Community edited by Kristina Marie Darling

This essay collection is of particular use to educators, with many of the essays operating from the perspective of professors in classroom settings, and thus including their strategies for engaging students in community. But there are also prescient reflections outside of the classroom or workshop, such that any reader with a passion for writing and poetry might find new perspectives and useful tools. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2025/08/19/a-review-of-open-house-conversations-with-writers-about-community-edited-by-kristina-marie-darling/

A review of Room on the Sea: Three Novellas by André Aciman

These overwrought overthinking characters, some dubious, some convinced at the get-go by the gentleman’s parlor tricks, are epic romantics. You might even say emotional vampires. Back and forth between alternate lives on the Amalfi coast, and in New York City (where London Terrace apartments and the High Line figure mightily), these folks dive deep into their projections and unslaked thirst for completion. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2025/08/17/a-review-of-room-on-the-sea-three-novellas-by-andre-aciman/

A review of A Yellowed Notebook by Beth SKMorris

While mainly a tribute to her father’s memory, Beth SKMorris’ A Yellowed Notebook also fondly (and sometimes not so fondly) recalls the rest of her family as well. Bookended by two haiku set seventy years apart, the poet lovingly reviews her father’s life and the lives he affected. The overweening picture of David Kaplan, her father, is of a confident and caring man deeply engaged in life. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2025/08/16/a-review-of-a-yellowed-notebook-by-beth-skmorris/

A review of The Making of a Poem by Rosanna McGlone

The Making of a Poem has consistently excellent poems, worthy of emulation and worth buying for the selections alone. Being able to follow the transition from rough draft to finished poem provides fascinating insight. It’s isn’t some ineffable genius that creates such works, but hard yakka combined with a crucial sense of what does and doesn’t work which only comes with extensive reading and years of practice: the long apprenticeship that the poets featured here have clearly had. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2025/08/15/a-review-of-the-making-of-a-poem-by-rosanna-mcglone/

An interview with Connie Willis

Connie Willis has won more major science fiction writing awards than any other science fiction author. More than the Big Three—Asimov, Clarke, Bradbury—more than her “hero” Heinlein, more than George R.R. Martin, more than the irascible Harlan Ellison. When I chat with her on a beautiful sunny afternoon in Greeley, Colorado, she’s matter-of-fact about her writing accomplishments, and not all that impressed with herself. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2025/08/13/an-interview-with-connie-willis/

A review of Roads to Stroud by Noel Jeffs

As with previous poems I have read by Jeffs, there is a sense of quickened pace created by the lack of formal scene-setting and there is a direct apprehension of feelings and objects. The poet’s persona is established sympathetically so that the reader wishes him well and hopes that his difficulties, whether physical or metaphysical, are resolved. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2025/08/12/a-review-of-roads-to-stroud-by-noel-jeffs/

A review of Amanda Chimera by Mary B. Moore

As Joseph Brodsky put it, “to the poet phonetics and semantics are, with few exceptions, identical.” And one can see this in Moore’s poems that are so marvellously, deliciously musical, locating their meanings like an orchestration rather than a thesis, a wondrous symphonic search to understand the dimensions of a dual self. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2025/08/10/a-review-of-amanda-chimera-by-mary-b-moore/

A review of The Blue House by Sky Gilbert

Consider giving The Blue House a read if you’re interested in a detailed portrait of a manic depressive artist, following the lows and lows, with stunted highs, of a life lived on odd terms with art and bad terms with society and the people who inhabit it. If you have an interest in the mid to late century gay cruising subculture, you’ll also find fodder for thought here. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2025/08/09/a-review-of-the-blue-house-by-sky-gilbert/

A review of Vulture Capitalism by Grace Blakeley

Blakeley, a thirty-two year old Oxford-educated economist/journalist, says that liberal democracies under capitalism are not true democracies. As things stand now, government and capital work together to help the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. True democracy is economic democracy, in which citizens not only vote but also have real control over their lives. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2025/08/08/a-review-of-vulture-capitalism-by-grace-blakeley/

A review of My City is a Murder of Crows by Nikita Parik

Language is given the incisive treatment as Parik describes consonants and vowels in the speaker’s mouth, finally describing how the consonants are bound together like bread in a sandwich. However, the deeper principle is that although dark moments are inbound to our existence, we will overcome difficulties such as Covid collectively. This volume records the poet’s experience of Covid through poetry. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2025/08/06/a-review-of-my-city-is-a-murder-of-crows-by-nikita-parik/

A review of Girl on Girl by Sophie Gilbert

Sophie Gilbert does some major uncovering in this book, digging deep into the culture’s recent past to unearth the filthy White underbelly that lies beneath. Part archeologist, part pallbearer, she exhumes the back story and brings it kicking and screaming into the light of day. Gilbert writes, “In 1995, a self-help tsunami of a book titled, innocently, The Rules, advised women who wanted to get married to look to 1950s feminine mores for guidance.” Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2025/08/05/a-review-of-girl-on-girl-by-sophie-gilbert/

A review of Bodock by Robert Busby

The threads creating the tapestry are often thin, though. Rarely, if ever, will the same characters appear across multiple stories. There’s a joy to be found in wondering whether you’ve just met an unnamed character from a previous story, or if the same dinghy bar or stretch of road is being used as the setting. Despite the lack of crossovers, Busby still manages to make Bodock feel like a fleshed-out, lived-in town, with a community of believably-flawed people. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2025/08/04/a-review-of-bodock-by-robert-busby/

A review of Big Feelings by Amy Lovat

In an endearing way to try and control the more uncontrollable aspects of her life, Sadie has a habit of reducing things to lists. These often take the form of Desert Island Top 5s. This extends to relationships, films, books, places to visit (and even to Lovat’s acknowledgements). But not everything is reducible to a list and not all of the lists are static. However, the lists do make good structuring devices, and add to the ease and charm of Big Feelings, a book full of big feelings but also ease and charm. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2025/08/03/a-review-of-big-feelings-by-amy-lovat/

A review of The Haunting by Cate Peebles

When working on a collection that relies so heavily on intertextuality, less is often more. The Haunting draws upon over twenty different pieces of media, ranging from nineteenth century novels to contemporary horror films. While many of these allusions feel at home, the sheer volume an at times feel overwhelming. Peebles’ ambition to capture the full spectrum of what it means to be haunted is admirable, but sometimes, attempting to encompass every possible reference dilutes the potency of the haunting itself. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2025/08/02/a-review-of-the-haunting-by-cate-peebles/

All of the reviews and interviews listed above are available at The Compulsive Reader on the front page. Older reviews and interviews are kept indefinitely in our extensive categorised archives (currently at 3,583) which can be browsed or searched from the front page of the site.

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LITERARY NEWS

In the news this month, Karl Schlögel, a German historian and essayist who has specialised in Eastern Europe, has won the 2025 Peace Prize of the German Book Trade. He will speak and be presented with the €25,000 prize on October 19 in the Paulskirche in Frankfurt during the Frankfurt Book Fair.

The Society of Children’s Book Writers & Illustrators announced winners and honour books for the C2025 Crystal Kite Awards, which are peer-voted and recognise “outstanding books created by SCBWI members across 15 international regions.” For the full list visit: https://www.scbwi.org/announces-winners-of-the-2025-crystal-kite-awards

Abbas El-Zein’s memoir Bullet, Paper, Rock: A Memoir of Words and Wars (Upswell Publishing) has won the 2025 National Biography Award. Since 1996, the National Biography Award has celebrated excellence in biography, autobiography and memoir writing. With a prize pool of $A42,000, it is the nation’s richest prize for Australian biographical writing and memoir: $25,000 for the winner and $2,000 for each of the six shortlisted authors. To see more about the winner and the shortlisted authors visit: https://www.sl.nsw.gov.au/awards/national-biography-award-0

Finalists for the 2025 Lambda Literary Awards in 26 categories have been announced (it’s a big list!) and can be seen here: https://lambdaliterary.org/2025/07/announcing-the-finalists-for-the-37th-annual-lambda-literary-awards/?mc_cid=cd68106369&mc_eid=42412f7ef5. Finalists and winners will be celebrated in New York City on October 4 as part of Lammys Day, which includes readings and panels.

Shortlists in six categories have been released for the 2025 James Cropper Wainwright Prize for UK. Nature Writing, which celebrate “nature and our environment, nurturing respect for our planet, and informing readers of the threats that the earth currently faces.” The two overall winners of the Wainwright Prize Book of the Year and Wainwright Children’s Prize Book of the Year will be named on September 10, with each receiving £2,500. Category winners will each receive £500. Check out the shortlisted titles here: https://wainwrightprize.com/shortlist-2025/

Finalists have been named for the Forward Prizes for Poetry, which include the £10,000 Forward Prize for Best Collection, the £5,000 Felix Dennis Prize for Best First Collection, the £1,000 Forward Prize for Best Single Poem, and the £1,000 Forward Prize for Best Single Poem–Performed. Winners of the annual awards, which celebrate new poetry in the U.K. and Ireland, will be named October 26 in London. This year’s book finalists are: Best collection: I Sugar the Bones by Juana Adcock, Southernmost by Leo Boix, The Island in the Sound by Niall Campbell, Avidya by Vidyan Ravinthiran, and Wellwater by Karen Solie. For First collection, Theophanies by Sarah Ghazal Ali, Chaotic Good by Isabelle Baafi. Heirloom by Catherine-Esther Cowie, Altar by Desree, and Goonie by Michael Mullen.

The Australian Crime Writers Association has released a shortlist for the Ned Kelly Award for Best Debut Crime Fiction, which “showcases our newest Australian writers and the diversity of style and stories they bring to the crime fiction genre.” This year’s shortlisted titles are: Down the Rabbit Hole by Shaeden Berry, A Town Called Treachery by Mitch Jennings, The Chilling by Riley James, All You Took From Me by Lisa Kenway, Everywhere We Look by Martine Kropkowski, and Those Opulent Days by Jacquie Pham. The other Ned Kelly Awards category shortlists (true crime, international, crime fiction) have not been announced yet. Overall winners will be named in September.

Winners have been named for this year’s Jericho Prizes, which honour new Black-British writers of children’s picture books. Sebrina O’Connor’s Dou Dou’s Brave took the award for Best Picture Book Script (ages 3-7), while Best Baby & Toddler Script (ages 1-3) went to Ronke Owoeye’s This One? That One!. Each winner receives £1,250 from partners Hachette Children’s Group and a 12-month membership to the Society of Authors.

Arrowsmith Press has released the shortlist for this year’s Walcott Prize, honouring the work of St. Lucian Nobel Prize-winning poet Derek Walcott and recognising a book of poetry by a non-U.S. citizen published anywhere in the world. The winner, who will be named in October, receives a $2,000 honorarium. The 2025 Walcott Prize shortlisted titles are: Blue Exodus by Hussain Ahmed, Orpheus and Euridyce in New York by Olena Boryshpolets, In the Capital City of Autumn by Tim Bowling, The Silence by Gillian Clarke, Collected Poems by Wendy Cope, No One Will Know You Tomorrow by Najwan Darwish, Selected Poems by Lavinia Greenlaw, What of the Earth Was Saved by Leeladhar Jagoori, The Light That Burns Us by Jazra Khaleed, Ceremony for the Nameless by Theresa Lola, The Shark Nursery by Mary O’Malley, mahogany eve by Alan Payne, 2000 Blacks by Ajibola Tolase, The Naming of Names by Shash Trevett, and Coco Island by Christine Roseeta Walker.

Winners were announced for the 2025 Aurora Awards, which recognise excellence by Canadians in the fields of science fiction, fantasy, and horror. This year’s Aurora Awards, voted on by members of the Canadian Science Fiction & Fantasy Association, were presented in a livestreamed ceremony. See the complete list of category winners here: https://www.csffa.ca/2025/08/2025-aurora-award-winners/

The Sunburst Award Society released shortlists for the C$3,000 Sunburst Award for Excellence in Canadian Literature of the Fantastic, which will be presented this fall again after a four-year hiatus. This year’s shortlisted titles are: Mood Swings by Frankie Barnet, Bird Suit by Sydney Hegele, Blackheart Man by Nalo Hopkinson, Code Noir by Canisia Lubrin, and A Seal of Salvage by Clayton B. Smith.

A shortlist has been selected for the 2025 Royal Society Trivedi Science Book Prize, which celebrates the best popular science writing from around the world. The winner will be revealed October 1 and receives £25,000. The other shortlisted titles receive £2,500 each.The shortlist includes: Ends of the Earth: Journeys to the Polar Regions in Search of Life, the Cosmos, and our Future by Neil Shubin, Music as Medicine: How We Can Harness Its Therapeutic Power by Daniel Levitin, Our Brains, Our Selves: What a Neurologist’s Patients Taught Him About the Brain by Masud Husain, The Forbidden Garden of Leningrad: A True Story of Science and Sacrifice in a City under Siege by Simon Parkin, Vanished: An Unnatural History of Extinction by Sadiah Qureshi, and Your Life Is Manufactured: How We Make Things, Why It Matters and How We Can Do It Better by Tim Minshall.

The winners of the 2025 Hugo Awards, voted on by members of the World Science Fiction Convention, have been announced. For best novel, The Tainted Cup by Robert Jackson Bennet (Del Rey). For the rest of the long list, visit: https://seattlein2025.org/wsfs/hugo-awards/winners-and-stats/

Shortlists for the 2025 Ned Kelly Awards have been released and can be found here: https://www.austcrimewriters.com/2025-shortlists. Sponsored by the Australian Crime Writers Association, the awards honour works in the categories of best crime fiction, true crime, and international crime fiction, as well as debut crime fiction, which was previously announced. Winners will be named in September.

Moira Buffini won the £2,000 YA Book Prize, which celebrates fiction for teenagers and young adults from the U.K. and Ireland, for her dystopian debut novel, Songlight, the first volume in the Torch Trilogy, the Bookseller reported. The winner was named at the Edinburgh International Book Festival in a ceremony hosted by writer and activist Laura Bates.

Geraldine Brooks will receive the 2025 Library of Congress Prize for American Fiction, which honours “an American literary writer whose body of work is distinguished by not only its mastery of the art, but also its originality of thought and imagination…. The award seeks to recognize strong, unique, enduring voices that, throughout long and consistently accomplished careers, have told us something about the American experience.” The award will be presented to Brooks at the National Book Festival on September 6, where the author will discuss her latest book, Memorial Days: A Memoir (Viking).

Eighteen finalists have been selected for the 2025 Kirkus Prize in fiction, nonfiction, and young readers’ literature. Winners in each category receive $50,000, and will be announced October 8. See the finalists here: https://www.kirkusreviews.com/news-and-features/articles/finalists-for-the-2025-kirkus-prize-revealed/

Finally, the longlist has been selected for the €25,000 German Book Prize. The shortlist will be announced September 16 and the winner on October 13, on the opening evening of the Frankfurt Book Fair. See the nominated titles here: https://www.deutscher-buchpreis.de/en/nominated/

Have a great month.

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COMPETITION NEWS

Congratulations to Karen Wadkin who won a copy of Alighting in Time by Lynne Wycherley.

Our new giveaway is for a copy of Ultimart by Carl Wilhoyte. To win, send me an email at maggieball@compulsivereader.com with the subject line “Ultimart” and your postal address in the body of the mail.

Good luck!

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