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Saturday, December 11, 2010

Surprise Review of What Feeds Us

I didn't expect to get any more reviews of my second book, What Feeds Us, so it was just delightful to learn that Sheila Bender had reviewed the book in her magazine, Writing It Real. This is a subscription only online publication, but occasionally there's an issue that includes non-subscribers. The review appears in one of those issues.

Sheila gives a generous overview of the collection, then zeroes in on three poems: "Love Test: A Ghazal," "Blueberry," and "Idiosyncrasies of the Body." Since Writing It Real is a newsletter that goes to writers, the review is followed by three prompts, one based on each of the three poems. There's also a blog where people can leave comments. 

Here's a bit from the Introduction:
"A 2006 Quentin R. Howard Poetry Prize winner, the volume is as witty as it is heartbreaking. Diane's poems draw her readers in as they transform visits to the hair dresser, eating pickles as a child, wanting more out of a marriage as a husband brings in cold pizza on a snowy night, being stung by a bee and tended to lovingly, looking at blueberries in her kitchen, noticing an announcement about a coming test, or having an MRI and dreading the results into moments of revelation and introspection. Diane's gift for melding observations of food she prepares, activities in her life, and notions of her own and others with her deepest longings and fears reaches fully into the heart." 

You can read the entire review here. I love this review! 

You might be interested in subscribing to Writing It Real. It costs $30 per year. Sheila is an experienced poet, prose writer, editor, and teacher.
Here are some of the Subscriber Benefits:
  • Links to each new article emailed every Thursday
  • Access over five years of weekly articles in our archives
  • Read any article online or download the print version
  • Receive updated publishing and writing resource information each week 
  • Customize your email preferences to receive newsletters and special notices
  • $20 discount on all Writing It Real online workshops
Read some Free sample articles. 

Consider treating some writer you know to a subscription. Consider treating yourself to a subscription.

2 comments:

  1. Thanks for this! I first started writing poems after reading Sheila Bender's Writing Personal Poetry. And what a fabulous review!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thanks, Violet! I am very happy with the review. I like the addition of the writing prompts.

    ReplyDelete

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