Scan barcode
nuttytwitchy22's review
3.0
This had to be one of the better poetry books I've read. I'm not one to really care for poetry but this one had quite a few I enjoyed. I look forward to the other collections I have from this publisher.
latida94's review
dark
sad
fast-paced
4.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Rape, Sexual assault, Death, Pedophilia, Murder, and Racism
sergeantnicholasangel's review against another edition
challenging
dark
informative
reflective
tense
3.0
I enjoyed some poems more than others, but I liked the collection overall. My favourites were: 'Knife' by Ruth Sharman; 'Pearl Bryan' by Anon; 'Stackalee' by Anon; 'The Chop Shop' by Tony Barnstone; 'The Assassin's Fatal Error' by Lawrence Raab; 'The Murder Suspect, Moments Before He Is Confronted By Police' by David Starkey; 'The Assassin's Morning' by J.J. Steinfeld; 'Black Widow' by Gail White; 'Porphyria's Lover' by Robert Browning; 'With Or Without Milk' by Philip Dacey; 'The Inquest' by W.H. Davies; 'Charlie Howard's Descent' by Mark Doty; and 'Killers In Letters' by Ravi Shankar.
mangopassion555's review
challenging
dark
mysterious
reflective
fast-paced
5.0
Content Warnings
Moderate: Violence, Death, Murder, Sexual content, and Blood
Minor: Rape
vasha's review
3.0
Overall, I can't say that this collection aroused great enthusiasm in me. There were lots of poems based on recent cases -- odd how many of those sounded similar, in spite of the varied forms used; perhaps it was that the way that the poets chose to tell/analyze the cases was similar. And the collection was unbalanced between very new (at least three quarters), late 20th century (most of the rest) and just a sprinkling of older ones. Might have seemed less incongruous if it stuck to just contemporary verse. In that case, though, we would have missed a few good items like "The Murderer" by Stevie Smith, "Crime Club" by Weldon Kees, or "The Inquest" by W. H. Davies; "A Case of Murder" by Vernon Scannell is widely reprinted, but for very good reason, and I'm not sorry to encounter it again.
What were some that left a favorable impression with me? "The Ballad of Charlotte Dymond" by Charles Causey stands out for its startling imagery and driven mood. I must say I have a weakness for the ballad format; "Victor" by W. H. Auden is pretty good too. "American Murderer" by Megan Levad alludes to songs such as blues or "Stackalee". "Actually, However" by Thom Ward is an unusually interesting meta-fictional take on crime stories. "Fart" by Roger McGough manages to be very colloquial and conversational and still sound like a poem, but more important is how the language works to make the story unforgettable. Then there's "The Lover" by Tony Barnstone, "The Murder Writer" by Lynn Emanuel, the excerpt from "Blue Front" by Martha Collins, "Charlie Howard's Descent" by Mark Doty, "The Sound That Wakes Me at Night, Thinking of It" by Charles Harper Webb, and maybe a few others. Rather a scanty harvest.
What were some that left a favorable impression with me? "The Ballad of Charlotte Dymond" by Charles Causey stands out for its startling imagery and driven mood. I must say I have a weakness for the ballad format; "Victor" by W. H. Auden is pretty good too. "American Murderer" by Megan Levad alludes to songs such as blues or "Stackalee". "Actually, However" by Thom Ward is an unusually interesting meta-fictional take on crime stories. "Fart" by Roger McGough manages to be very colloquial and conversational and still sound like a poem, but more important is how the language works to make the story unforgettable. Then there's "The Lover" by Tony Barnstone, "The Murder Writer" by Lynn Emanuel, the excerpt from "Blue Front" by Martha Collins, "Charlie Howard's Descent" by Mark Doty, "The Sound That Wakes Me at Night, Thinking of It" by Charles Harper Webb, and maybe a few others. Rather a scanty harvest.