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matchamelon's review against another edition
4.0
A wonderful short read. It made me feel and think deeply about how intricate people can be and how fascinating life is, but at the same time it brought me some deeply buried sadness.
lauren_endnotes's review against another edition
5.0
Evoking strong emotions from the get-go, Journey opens the essay collection with her own call to a suicide hotline, followed by various stories relating to an infidelity that cost her several relationships. Brutal and raw, but also with moments of humor, An Arrangement of Skin is a work of art from the poet/essayist Anna Journey.
Highlights of the collection:
Birds 101 - Journey's taxidermy of a starling class
The Goliath Jazz - when a childhood acquaintance commits murder, she looks back for clues into his past... in a children's church musical of David and Goliath.
The Guineveres - her mother's story of folk music, and growing up
Modifying the Badger - Taxidermy pt 2, this time with small mammals
Bluebeard's Closet - Bluebeard legend and all sorts of other disparate tidbits that worked so well together.
I am looking forward to her poetry. This collection was stellar.
Highlights of the collection:
Birds 101 - Journey's taxidermy of a starling class
The Goliath Jazz - when a childhood acquaintance commits murder, she looks back for clues into his past... in a children's church musical of David and Goliath.
The Guineveres - her mother's story of folk music, and growing up
Modifying the Badger - Taxidermy pt 2, this time with small mammals
Bluebeard's Closet - Bluebeard legend and all sorts of other disparate tidbits that worked so well together.
I am looking forward to her poetry. This collection was stellar.
vg2's review
2.0
I really adore and respect Anna Journey’s poetry, and had high hopes for this collection of autobiographical essays. Unfortunately, it did not work for me at all. Mostly, it just felt very disjointed and messy whilst also heavily curated, a combination that jarred. I’m not sure if individually, some of the contributions were first published elsewhere, but if not, there was a lot of repetition and informing the reader of the same facts and background information that had appeared in the last essay (and often the one before that, too) - at the very least, some editing would have solved that problem and improved the flow. Also, and I recognise that this is an awful thing to say of someone’s personal essays, but a number of the inclusions felt unnecessary and over-indulgent. I am actually a fan of autobiographical reflections written by authors/poets that I admire, and enjoy how they consider their experiences in wider contexts and how it has informed their views and stance on the world. I didn’t get that sense here. It was more a catharsis and justification of decisions she had made in her life, which, as readers, we should neither need or be entitled to, so who was the book intended for? Whilst there were glimpses of wider thoughts, I couldn’t help thinking that they were vehicles for the stories, rather than the other way around.
I will continue to read any poetry that Anna Journey releases; I resonate with her style and feel that as a conduit for her past and emotions, poems are the ideal medium. I just didn’t get that same sense here.
I will continue to read any poetry that Anna Journey releases; I resonate with her style and feel that as a conduit for her past and emotions, poems are the ideal medium. I just didn’t get that same sense here.
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