Reviews tagging 'Blood'

Things You May Find Hidden in My Ear: Poems from Gaza by Mosab Abu Toha

13 reviews

allisonkhenson's review

emotional informative reflective

5.0

really recommend 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Medical content, Murder, Death, Gore, Child death, Genocide, Injury/Injury detail, Grief, Blood, and War

blakeandbooks's review against another edition

dark emotional reflective sad tense fast-paced

5.0

This was my first read for the #Pages4Palestine Readathon, and what an incredibly powerful first read it was. There is something so beautiful and heartbreaking when a poet is able to create such an immense atmosphere of exactly what they want to convey, and Toha did just that. Not even 3 pages into this collection of poetry, and I already understood why it is an award-winning collection of poetry. 

I highly recommend, and it is definitely such an important collection to read. Every poem stuck out to me, but a few that feel very vital to point out are:
🇵🇸 Palestine A-Z
🇵🇸 The Wounds
🇵🇸 My Grandfather Was a Terrorist
🇵🇸 Sobbing Without Sound
🇵🇸 My City After What Happened Some Time Ago
🇵🇸 A Litany for “One Land”
🇵🇸 Displaced 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Genocide, War, Violence, Colonisation, Blood, Grief, and Child death

robinks's review

challenging dark emotional hopeful informative reflective sad slow-paced

5.0

This is such a powerful collection of poetry. So many of the images and sentences illuminated the brutality of daily life for Abu Toha. The interview at the end of the collection also helped provide historical/political context for the works, which is helpful for those who may not know about Gaza and Palestine. I found this collection through following Abu Toha on Instagram.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Child death, Colonisation, Genocide, Grief, Gun violence, Injury/Injury detail, Murder, and Police brutality

Moderate: Body horror, Confinement, Medical content, Medical trauma, Torture, and Vomit

Minor: Pandemic/Epidemic

lifeinsherds's review against another edition

challenging emotional sad medium-paced

5.0

Absolutely essential reading. Palestinian poet Mosab Abu Toha has such emotionally devastating poetry while having such a love and adoration for his country and his people. It is not a poetry collection that can be read easily all of the time. It is emotional and covers the poet's personal experience in war and the people he's seen murdered. Abu Toha is not the first Palestinian poet I've read, and yet this has become one of my favorite poetry books. I would also recommend reading (if you haven't yet) anything by Mahmoud Darwish or "Birthright" by George Abraham.

The interview at the end is also not to be skipped. He has some amazing insights to his views of poetry and what the poetic form means to language and memory.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Medical content, War, Violence, Death, Injury/Injury detail, Child death, Murder, Blood, Gun violence, Grief, Genocide, and Fire/Fire injury

Moderate: Colonisation

sarabrogan's review against another edition

dark emotional reflective sad tense fast-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Genocide, Gore, War, Blood, Xenophobia, Injury/Injury detail, Mass/school shootings, Medical content, Death, Child death, Fire/Fire injury, Gun violence, Medical trauma, Murder, Violence, and Body horror

Moderate: Grief and Pandemic/Epidemic

crybabybea's review against another edition

challenging dark sad fast-paced

4.5

Beautiful, heartbreaking. I cried pretty much the entire time I read this.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Genocide, Hate crime, Medical content, Grief, Medical trauma, War, Gore, Child death, Colonisation, Death, Islamophobia, Injury/Injury detail, and Violence

lizzy_elaineee's review against another edition

challenging emotional inspiring reflective fast-paced

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Body horror, Genocide, and Colonisation

Moderate: Genocide, Islamophobia, War, Colonisation, Medical trauma, and Death

zennyreads's review

challenging emotional hopeful informative inspiring reflective sad fast-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Death of parent, Blood, Violence, Gun violence, Injury/Injury detail, and Genocide

readingwithkaitlyn's review against another edition

informative sad medium-paced

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Colonisation, Medical trauma, Medical content, Child death, Confinement, Islamophobia, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Genocide, Death, Violence, Dementia, Murder, War, Hate crime, Gun violence, Blood, Death of parent, and Religious bigotry

bashsbooks's review against another edition

challenging emotional medium-paced

5.0

Things You May Find Hidden in My Ear is evocative from the title, and it absolutely does not stop throughout the book. Abu Toha takes his readers into the intimate and heart-wrenching moments of a culture, a land, a people under generations of siege. He shows the humanity of the Palestinians of Gaza, a humanity that is often ignored, erased, or disputed in much of mainstream media today. These are not empty numbers or mindless villains dying in the streets of Gaza - they are children, siblings, parents, grandparents, friends, lovers, each their own complex bundle of human spirit. Abu Toha keeps that fact at the forefront of his poems.

I also enjoyed the photographic interlude and the interview with Abu Toha at the end of the book; both provided insight and context to some of the specific details enumerated in his poems. The photos additionally emphasized how real the lives of Palestinians are. 

As I always try to do when I review poetry books, here is a list of my favorite poems from this collection: "Palestine A-Z", "My Grandfather Was A Terrorist",  "Death Before Birth (DBB)", "Displaced", "To My Visa Interviewer", the titular "Things You May Find Hidden in My Ear", and "A Rose Shoulders Up". 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Genocide, Violence, Colonisation, Gun violence, Murder, Xenophobia, Blood, War, Child death, Death, Grief, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Medical content and Medical trauma