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forgereads17's review
emotional
informative
inspiring
lighthearted
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
3.75
claireescott's review
5.0
My favorite poetry possesses sharpness, and this collection is sharp. Shapero cuts, she's precise in her evocation, she's jarring with description, and she turns smartly. Her poetry does all of this while still possessing a casualness and sense of humor; it's stunning. "I was wishing for a canny escape not only/ from what is around us, but also from what/ is pitiless and ambulant and tacky and can lodge/ one layer beneath the surface layer of our very/ skin."
casparb's review
i'm BACK again & no doubt about it. this was a NECESSARy reread as i feel I've got around the way with Hard Child to see it as a collection but I hadn't that with Popular Longing UNTIL NOW. y is death in everything lately. I think this is very delicate with it, whereas HC is about to whack u with the child/non-child from the get-go. PL is animated by the deaths of friends, their suicides, though you'd never know it from the skimmest of surfaces, which reads , as she does, almost jolly. She effervesces. & this collection is dominated by a long sonnet-y sequence running on the art-vandalism (not like the jso people, more so the people with guns and hammers). But it mutates, it appears at first to struggle with staying on topic. &&& I think me saying to myself NO think about this pushed it all over the edge into a breakthrough O I GET IT ,,, it all bleeds together. mwah
july:
i'm all here, there's no doubt to me that natalie is the most important poet to me! personally that I've read this year. she's the best she's a vocabulary to herself. (I stand by layli's best collection, these are different grounds) . .. I'm v excited for her new outspoken venture. a brain that needs studying
july:
i'm all here, there's no doubt to me that natalie is the most important poet to me! personally that I've read this year. she's the best she's a vocabulary to herself. (I stand by layli's best collection, these are different grounds) . .. I'm v excited for her new outspoken venture. a brain that needs studying
sara_shocks's review
4.0
Favorites: "Lying is Getting," "California," "Magpie," "Green," "The Greatest Two minutes in Sports," "Don't Spend It All In One Place," and "Ohio on TV"
an_admiring_bog's review
dark
funny
medium-paced
3.75
Upon first read I wrote this: Very dark and often not a generative type of poetry — however very skilful and sometimes deeply strangely darkly humorous.
However after the second and third re-read, I am so much more deeply appreciating the immense humour of the book, and the darkness of it — ironically it became a great read in times of darkness. Shapero is incredibly skilled in turning the line in the wittiest ways.
However after the second and third re-read, I am so much more deeply appreciating the immense humour of the book, and the darkness of it — ironically it became a great read in times of darkness. Shapero is incredibly skilled in turning the line in the wittiest ways.
over60's review
4.0
I felt this poetry was "in your face," and didn't allow for nuance or depth. Not my favorite.
lmshearer's review
challenging
emotional
reflective
sad
slow-paced
3.0
Compared to other poetry collections I've read, this one didn't resonate as much. I found the pace slow for such a short collection and perhaps too cerebral for me at this time.
cstefko's review
4.0
4.5 stars
Shapero is the kind of poet that manages to make really expertly crafted poems feel effortless. She's so good. The same edge of dark humor from her previous collection is still in effect here, though I think I may have appreciated that book ever so slightly more on the basis of a few really standout poems. It's not that these poems aren't as accomplished, they are, they're just a bit quieter if that makes sense. There's a matureness (sometimes world-weariness) to these poems. The same slow-simmering rage as before, but more controlled. Shapero is one of my favorite poets when it comes to writing about depression and suicide ideation (content warning for that, obviously).
I tell you what, Copper Canyon Press just does not miss.
Shapero is the kind of poet that manages to make really expertly crafted poems feel effortless. She's so good. The same edge of dark humor from her previous collection is still in effect here, though I think I may have appreciated that book ever so slightly more on the basis of a few really standout poems. It's not that these poems aren't as accomplished, they are, they're just a bit quieter if that makes sense. There's a matureness (sometimes world-weariness) to these poems. The same slow-simmering rage as before, but more controlled. Shapero is one of my favorite poets when it comes to writing about depression and suicide ideation (content warning for that, obviously).
I tell you what, Copper Canyon Press just does not miss.