Review Archives - Page 52 of 85

rev. of Imaginary Ancestors by Madeline DeFrees

From Oedipus to Tom Jones to Luke Skywalker, our culture is full of children who need to discover their true parents. The quest for lineage has been the subject of sagas and fairy tales, and in her fifth full-length collection of poems, Madeline DeFrees adds a woman's sensibility to the heroic search for family, identity,…

Journey to the Land of the Flies by Aldo Buzzi

Mark Strand recommends Journey to the Land of the Flies, essays by Aldo Buzzi: “It is impossible to describe the homey exoticism of this book, its associative richness, its great intelligence manifested so casually, its wit, its imaginative scope, its revelations, its dilemmas, e.g., ‘I was reflecting on the menu, undecided between serpent soup, roast…

rev. of Lives of the Fathers by Steven Schwartz

"I hear him weep," a narrator says of his father in Steven Schwartz's fine second collection, "but rather than sadness I feel a great relief; finally, something I've done has touched him." If Flannery O'Connor's stories are "mother-ridden," Schwartz's are, in a gentler sense, father-ridden. Seven of the ten short stories in Lives of the…

rev. of Devolution of the Nude by Lynne McMahon

Devolution of the Nude Poems by Lynne McMahon. David R. Godine, Publisher, $12.95 paper. Reviewed by David Daniel. The best works in Lynne McMahon’s Devolution of the Nude seem like found poems, unlikely jewels turned up in some nearby but rarely visited garden of the mind. The freshness of her language provides both delight and…

Except by Nature by Sandra Alcosser

Jane Hirshfield recommends Except by Nature, poems by Sandra Alcosser: “Sandra Alcosser’s second collection is filled with pleasures: descriptions that make the reader shiver with delight, vivid moments of the human heart refracted, and passionate inquiry.” (Graywolf)

rev. of Goodnight Gracie by Lloyd Schwartz

Lloyd Schwartz's writing displays a peculiar combination of gifts — observation of personality; loving attention to homely turns of language, neglected as stray cats; a moral generosity that cannot be called "forgiving" because it declines to condemn in the first place; a formal aptitude for triolets and off rhymes; a way of being funny that…

rev. of Disturbing the Peace by Richard Yates

In a way, Disturbing the Peace bears a special relation to Yates's early t.b. ward stories — "Out With The Old," "No Pain Whatsoever," and "Thieves" (published here for the first time) — I guess to the extent the "affliction" of the protagonist can only be questioned in impersonally moral terms: the unafflicted are merely…

rev. of Farewell, My Lovelies by Diann Blakely

Farewell, My Lovelies Poems by Diann Blakely. Story Line Press, $12.95 paper. Reviewed by Denise Duhamel. In her second book, Farewell, My Lovelies, Diann Blakely evokes Raymond Chandler’s yin and writes a decidedly female poetry — tough, stylized, and heart-smart. In the opening poem of the collection, “Last Dance,” the speaker observes a gaggle of…

Graveyard of the Atlantic by Alyson Hagy

George Garrett recommends Graveyard of the Atlantic, stories by Alyson Hagy: “Alyson Hagy’s third collection of stories and her best so far. Praised by Charles Baxter and Jill McCorkle, among others, these seven stories all concern life on the Outer Banks of North Carolina.” (Graywolf)

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