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rmperezpadilla's review
emotional
reflective
5.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Violence, Racism, and Xenophobia
thndrkat's review
challenging
emotional
informative
reflective
sad
medium-paced
4.5
Content Warnings
Moderate: Gun violence, Racism, Bullying, Suicide, and Violence
thecolourblue's review
challenging
emotional
sad
medium-paced
3.5
This is definitely a collection I would recommend, especially to people who don't typically like to read poetry. Both because of the importance of the issues it discusses and because I think the poems are quite accessible - in that they often read more like prose.
I do though think that the quality of the poems in the book was quite variable, some seemed much more significant to both the author and his message than others. The collection is already pretty short, and having entries that feel like they could have been cut without really changing the impact of the book weakens it somewhat for me.
This one is hard to rate because I think the intention and context of the poems are, for me at least, a lot more emotive and impactful than the poems themselves. The collection is inspired by a photograph of a father and daughter who drowned trying to cross the river from Mexico to the USA, which subsequently went viral in 2019. The photograph itself is heartbreaking, and so it carries with it an instant wash of emotion and (for American readers) a sense of shame and anger to fuel the book. Where it sadly didn't really connect for me was in the writing itself.
I do though think that the quality of the poems in the book was quite variable, some seemed much more significant to both the author and his message than others. The collection is already pretty short, and having entries that feel like they could have been cut without really changing the impact of the book weakens it somewhat for me.
This one is hard to rate because I think the intention and context of the poems are, for me at least, a lot more emotive and impactful than the poems themselves. The collection is inspired by a photograph of a father and daughter who drowned trying to cross the river from Mexico to the USA, which subsequently went viral in 2019. The photograph itself is heartbreaking, and so it carries with it an instant wash of emotion and (for American readers) a sense of shame and anger to fuel the book. Where it sadly didn't really connect for me was in the writing itself.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Child death
Moderate: Racism
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