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 Home Chris Mansel's Book Reviews
26 Book Reviews A Review of Selected Writings by Cedar Sigo "I refuse - Cedar Sigo To categorize a book of poetry is to advance upon a step you don't intend to make. You can say in your opinion what you think and what you believe but someone is going to have a completely different perspective. The writing of Cedar Sigo is at first an exploration into the generally accepted poetry from a writer not in the mainstream but then something happens and you find yourself in the poem, My First Sacred Music. In the poem he writes, "She drops but one of its hairs It begins to curl" It's easy to see there is madness on display here and it's a madness found in the driveway of the best of homes. An actor dresses for a performance and begins with the opening line he just improvised before walking on stage. He repeats the line until the crowd heads for the door. Then he begins the play as it was written. That is the feeling you get from reading this book. You'll not get what you were expecting but if you stick around the text will entertain. The cost of this book is: $7.00 You can acquire a copy of this book by contacting: Ugly Duckling Presse Book
A Review of Short Poems, City Poems 1944-1998 by Leo Connellan "Under the definition of patron he had written "a wretch who supports with indolence, and is paid with flattery." - Simon Winchester, The Professor And The Madman Leo Connellan writes us into a room where he has the keys. He writes in the poem, Closed Wake; "My foot smacked rivers, Leo Connellan presents us with a body of work from years of toiling away at his art. Like a prisoner poets are, shoveling all day unmentionable indiscretions and retiring to our homes to conceive and receive the blessing of creativity. Creativity isn't always the way in which we would aspire but it does come. Richard Wilbur writes of Connellan, "Connellan's poems are vivid, harsh, spare, surely cadenced and colloquially eloquent." I wouldn't go that far in my opinion but the poetry is an entertaining read. You could do much worse I suppose; you could forge through the respective shelves of what the mainstream booksellers describe as poetry. The cost of this book is: $10.00 You can acquire a copy of this book by contacting: Hanover Press
"Let's wash our hair together in the snowbed - from the poem, The Blue Planet Recedes Below, And I See Its Curve Within
The above line of poetry inspired me to write, "Like a step down into the mist covering the city to find snowy petals flying about your face, Mortal Everlasting is what was happening while you were living your life." It's the way you move through a book that defines how you read. Do you start at the beginning or flip through the pages till a word or image catches you? Reading the lines at random you could create a poem of your own. The cost of this book is: $12.00, In Canada $13.50 You can acquire a copy of this book by contacting: Pavement Saw Press
A Review of Pants by Shelley Stenhouse The poem, Quit It, is perfect stream of consciousness poetry. Is it really stream of consciousness? It is to me and that's what we are dealing with here, my opinion. You have yours; take it for a walk until you can run. In the poem we find a clarifying release of a lost loved one and a pure of mind focus that enables the mind to focus on one thing and that one thing becomes your memory. The poetry of Ms. Stenhouse, that's a very pretty name by the way, Stenhouse, could be from any age, it has that palpitating feeling that is needed to move through a generation untouched. Perhaps not untouched, but that beautifully worn look that has been incorrectly labeled these days as stressed. The cost of this book is: $6.00 You can acquire a copy of this book by contacting: Pavement Saw Press
A Review of The Root by Mark Taksa In every poem featured in The Root by Mark Taksa, there is a line or two that sparks your interest, but a line or two does not a poem, a complete poem make. I hate to write a bad review but when placed with the evidence before me all I have to do is let the jury do their job. Don't get me wrong there is real effort here and maybe with another look at the material perhaps Mr. Taksa could do better. Or perhaps he'll think I am wrong and dismiss me as an idiot. Either way you can make your own mind up. The cost of this book is: $6.00 You can acquire a copy of this book by contacting: Pavement Saw Press
A Review of Shake Hands by Carl Thayler Dedicated to the memory of Townes van Zandt, Shake Hands by Carl Thayler is an excursion, a fault line of the literary kind. Dale Smith describes it this way, “like Hank Williams or Lefty Frizzell, he follows the unpredictable and at times predacious wanderings of the heart.” The definition of predacious mentions the word, predatory. An interesting characteristic of the heart wouldn´t you say? This is a good book, a book you might enjoy on a few levels but to classify it on the level of Hank Williams, or even in the tradition of Townes Van Zandt is a most vulgar mistake. When you´re a kid you are fascinated by the funhouse mirror but as you grow older you realize the man was just using a funny way of taking your money. You can get the same reaction from a sunbeam on rippling water and you don´t feel compelled to buy the stale popcorn or enjoy the risk of the high wire. A note to any writer is to be careful whose hands you leave your first impression. Mr. Thayler, with friends like these, I´d suggest a solo outing cover to cover and inside to out. The cost of this book is: $10.00 Pavement Saw Press
A Review of Chac Prostibulario by Ivan Arguelles & John M. Bennett As a fiery landmark on the hemisphere of poetic works in this or any other century, Ivan Arguelles has constantly lit the embers buried deep in the watery grave of many minds. His constant outpouring of work startles even the dead. His new collaboration with John M. Bennett is no exception. Written in five different languages Chac Prostibulario, is a grand experiment in the tradition of the first texts discovered from early man and the pivotal balance of word and sound, voice and sight and…I´m at a loss for words. The very thought of writing a book like this is genius enough but to read the text is like listening at the music of Captain Beefheart at the time signatures of rain, dust and the weight of a sunbeam against a gray sky. Once you pull yourself from the cover art of John M. Bennett encounter the text within. Pretty soon you´ll echo the words of Bob Dylan, “Oh my god, am I in here all alone?” The cost of this book is: $10.00 Pavement Saw Press
Jumping into a book with no preconception is an art in itself. After reading through the entirety of The Fish Are Laughing I´ll offer up a toast for Will Nixon, I have a feeling he would appreciate/need/require it. This is a book with the catalog of charms of a walk on a prison yard, a slumping down the stairs toward a riot in a church courtyard. A walk into a room blazed with light and attaching a thin wire to a grenade that bursts with the falling of a tear. Now tell me, honestly, who wouldn´t love a book that included a poem entitled, The Philosophy of Margaritas? The poem, Lucky, is a comic dirge of Samuel Beckett´s thin world air extreme, a beauty in the form of an ugly stepsister waking under the stairs. Will Nixon steps ahead of the crowd and laughs out loud. He knows we´ll follow. The cost of this book is: $6.00 Pavement Saw Press
“Were you in the midnight basement when she found the book and pronounced in secret the dark, wild words? Did you stagger as the song ran dry at dawn and ended? The immense tendrils slither out into an infinite minute; A burst of growth through the walls like an exploding bomb, Windows turning into lace, showering the street with glass slices. A grotesque hatchling emerges from the building´s shell and Looks about.” From the poem, Ancient Knowledge by F.J. Bergmann Normally you open a book of poetry and seek out whatever quirky turn of a phrase you can find and then close it up and look at the back cover and then turn it over to read the name again. You mean you don´t? Most people do I have seen them in bookstores. Open Sauce Robert to its first poem, read the above passage and you´ll not close this book too soon. You might even carry it over to the overstuffed chair nearby and marvel at its intent. If you make it to the last poem, Tea Ceremony, then you´ll be reading it in the checkout line. That is if in your part of the country you can find a store that will sells serious literature instead of the latest novel made into a movie. The latest cat calendar or the kind of coffee your father never drank. The price of this book is: $6.00 Pavement Saw Press
There´s a very calming saneness about Rose M. Smith´s writing. An unchangeable thrust to each stroke of the pen that at once considers the sound of the word and the space of which it rests. In the poem, Amputations, she examines the loss of a limb and finds comfort in its absence, she writes: “When it itches to be touched, I reach down to find you missing, Not even memory clear enough To justify this shadow of sensation” It´s been said that you can get used to anything. It has also been observed that even a loser can win. I say that those that make these observations have usually yet to be tested. In the poems of Ms. Smith we find an angle that moves surely across the room and around the windowsill that angles itself out into the light, the light that has been tested on far greater soil than we stroll upon. The cost of this book is: $6.00 Pavement Saw Press
Notes and Plays is an avid volume of work that will not find its way to rest on your shelves easily. This is a book that will make you pick it up, that will force you to read it avidly, and will never cease in finding in you in the disrepair of which it speaks, i.e. the human condition. The very audacity to continue on with Anton Chekov´s play Uncle Vanya (Uncle Vanya Two) is gutsy and would be absurd and meaningless if it were not very well written. All the writing here is deeply imaginative and should not be surprising that the author is seventy-five years of age. Deeply set into the landscape, a writer of seventy-five years has seen more perhaps than he ever wanted or expected. In a way, after living a life such as this I imagine all of your work would become journalism, a report from the front of your own personal survival. In the play, Superman Has Had His Day, the character Bucharest states, “Fear, above all, stands in the way to advancing toward full participation in communication.” This is a collection fo writing that each individually stand on their own. You can acquire a copy of this book by contacting: Spectacular Diseases imprint c/o Paul Green, 83(b) London Road, Petersborough, Cambs., PE2 9BS, England
Toby Olson seems to create with a wave of his hand a particular image that will sustain you even if you skim over the words of his writing and find yourself planted somewhere amidst the texture. The rough-hewn matter that makes up the story of The Blond Box is simplified with an impassioned against the grain type of setting. Taking place through the research of a graduate student, the sorting through, the story tells of a pianist who has died. What envelops the reader are the starts and stops that seem to have you lunging forward in your chair and turning the page sin a sense of what is to come. Mr. Olson has lived in his own life many lives, a life of writers, of many things actually. You can´t live through several decades of life and not have several turns of life that don´t change you in some way. These roads have culminated in The Blond Box. The price of this book is: $14.95 Fiction Collective Two
This is the kind of book I would never read if it were not for reviewing books for the Muse Apprentice Guild. If I were to want to know some information on Ancient Greece I would read a history book. But by saying that I am not saying that historical novels don´t have their place in the world of letters. This is a novel that was worked on and worked on; the reading details that for you. Although it does seem overexcited by its own creation it is summarily an interesting way to spend an afternoon. You can acquire a copy of this book by contacting: Hilliard and Harris
Now pay attention to what I am about to say. Listen for just a moment. This is how the first poem in this book begins; the poem is entitled, Sol/o; “my love there are no accidents in war-no kisses on the belligerent lips of crocodiles no loves greener than the dancing hearts of children no reveler jollier than the worm in columbus´s head” Now that is the way to begin a book/poem. “The lips of crocodiles?” Brilliant. This book is like a bleeding man wandering into the jury box and exclaiming the truth. A woman testifying of the brutality done to her as she drives her foot into the natural wood floor so hard she drives the nails holding the floor together into the earth below. A particular book will come the MAG´s way once in a while that will throw me back a few steps, this is one of those moments. Mr. Motsapi ends the poem, Mushi this way, “there is hope yet as we remember to roll back the lacerations & heal the bruise that brought us mirrors & darkness” This poetry comes from South Africa, an entire world away from the writing of America. And maybe, just maybe that is something we will have to come to terms with as more poetry from this country comes to the American eye. This is solid writing that could withstand every opinion of every American writer who thinks that their little coffee shop is better than the other coffee shops. An elitist is a pretty common thing especially in America. It´s not like we here in the U.S. have any great tradition beyond the last few hundred years. Remember, there was great writing within these shores long before most of our ancestors arrived. I can write what I wish believe me. I´m just a writer who was unknown a little while ago and who knows may be again. From my home in Alabama I can see quite clearly tell what goes on in the world of poetry. And I suppose you can too. Just because one writer gets another to review a book he wrote and the writer repays the favor doesn´t mean that either of these writers is really getting anywhere in the world. Reviewing Earthstepper in the magazine New Coin, Laura Chrisman writes, “A very far cry from official New South African discourse of reconciliation, this collection brilliantly fuses pan-Africanist militancy, romantic spirituality, and scathing attack on neo-colonialism in its global and local forms. The political urgency is never compromised by empty rhetorical posturing or aesthetic banality: this is a rich, experimental poetry, raining down fresh imagery, complex conceits, carefully patterned to produce a volume of striking originality and stylistic rigour.” I couldn´t agree more and I hope you will buy this book and see for yourself. Support the arts outside of your reach. Remember to always read the poetry and take from it what you can. The writer worked hard writing this text as I am sure you did as well. This book just happens to be better than most. You can acquire a copy of this book by contacting: Deep South
A Review of Viral Manifesto by Joel Van Noord “It will be a virus that infects, a revolution of the mind, a bloodless movement; the old will simply be ignored and shrivel away. The movement will be thought.” - Taken from Viral Manifesto If you read the above passage you will see that according to this manifesto history will die through thought. “But to be human is to escape the time of now. To philosophize about the end and the beginning. And that´s what I want to do.” Well if that is the case then I suppose I can forget every painful memory I have had and call it science or even art. Mr. Noord writes well using language as a branch to save himself from going over the falls but falls short of the rocky bottom close to shore by his lack of ability to write dialogue. This is a common ailment in many writers, particularly novelists. It´s not an insult; it´s just a fact. You can acquire a copy of this book by contacting: 1st Books
A Review of Greatest Living Poet: Strange Gods, Bulk Prophecies by Mark Staber Kobo Mark Staber Kobo touts himself as a “master poet.” In his own words he says, “American poetry has a new master.” Well, I believe we all should carry a bit of confidence about our work but….I just don´t know about this. The writing in Greatest Living Poet is average. Compared to the work of many of the submissions to the MAG he is slightly under average. You must understand that in all of the reviews I have written for the MAG there has been a pretty low percentage that has been totally a waste of time. There are some very good writers writing for the MAG, otherwise August simply wouldn´t publish their work. Mr. Kobo might as well have said that he was better than Whitman or Pound. Greatest Living Poet? I seriously don´t think so. But that is just my opinion. You can acquire a copy of this book by contacting: Xlibris Corporation
Tales from the darkside? Perhaps. A story, any story containing abuse runs right to my heart and has its immediate attention. I think we all have seen more than we would like to admit, personally and as a voyeur. To be an addict is a scar you wear like a halo. Dr. Danusha V. Goska leaves us at the curb and after a while collects us and drives around for a while and she tells us a story. The writing is so damn engrossing and challenging. This book will shake you back out of and into whatever images appear in your mind. If you´re suffering get help. You can acquire a copy of this book by contacting: Xlibris Corporation
A Review of The End of Free Love by Susan Steinberg “The way to steal a car is to first become invisible and the way to become invisible is to have good concentration. It is about seeing under your skin with your inside eyes. When everything gets glittery you will slowly fade.” Susan Steinberg, The End Of Free Love A collection of stories, short stories/writings in length but some are quite mammoth in their scope and quality. Like a Paul Simon lyric from the seventies, the words flawlessly twisting around one another and as the tune rises and falls you become lost in the melody. Reading this volume I yearned to be back in an anonymous motel room in the years past staring out the window and wondering would I sleep that night. This was a moving and transcendental experience felt by a man who needs exactly that. Susan Steinberg is a white lotus bending from the sky to the sunset above. The cost of this book is: $13.95
I open this book by Issac Goldemberg and find a man who writes of something deeper than the normal contents of a collection of poetry; but where to begin when describing this great work? When I opened this book to review I was already listening to the music of Nusrat Fateh Ali Kahn. The music mixed with the work of Issac Goldemberg is astonishing. The poem Portrait II, “Just like that I write of a man Who walked as a lunatic through the streets Giving violent good-mornings To all the words. He was with us Without ever having relinquished his amazement. Nothing was enough for him, Not even his cadaver looking so much like our belongings.” This is yet another book from Cross-Cultural Communications that has moved me with the care in how it was put together and the moving message within. Mr. Goldemberg writes in the poem, Self-Portrait V, Space ripped apart Explosion of shadows Boy who returns from his own funeral. Temple open for wailing. The cost of this book is: $10.00 You can acquire a copy of this book by contacting: Cross-Cultural Communications
A Review of Above The Human Nerve Domain by Will Alexander “body as remolded algae as transacted powder as Greek & umbrageous bondage” The above lines of poetry are from the poem, Life in Post-Socratic Biology. It´s refreshing to read a poet who has obviously stirred his reading toward something other than just other poets. There´s a world to be explored so far below the radar that the material to be excavated could fill a thousand standing tombs. Mr. Alexander explores the body in ways that others will pursue a shoreline and a few sunsets. He writes in the poem, Body As Vertiginous Lumen, “one thinks of a transparent family of wolves” Upon reading Above The Human Nerve Domain you think of many things. That is why it is a very satisfying meal to turn back into seed. Buy this book. The cost of this book is: $12.00 You can acquire a copy of this book by contacting:
A Review of Susan Sarandon: A True Maverick by Betty Jo Tucker Film critic Roger Ebert has a rule, he has several rules but the one that always struck me was the rule that any film that featured Harry Dean Stanton or E. Emmett Walsh was worth watching. Today I suppose you could amend this rule and include Phillip Seymour Hoffman and Steve Buscemi. In a world of film critics that are so many that it is dizzying to contemplate. One of the rare figures that stands out is Betty Jo Tucker. Ms. Tucker writes with an endearing quality of a true fan of the movies that hasn´t allowed her to be cast in the work she re-creates in her reviews. Her new book, Susan Sarandon: A True Maverick, is not, I repeat not just the average book written by a critic to either get closer to a celebrity or to treat the work of the actor like the pinnacle of the craft. A True Maverick guides us through the artistry and the sometimes-turbulent life, private and public, of one of American Cinema´s most talented actresses. As you turn the pages of A True Maverick you realize just how much a maverick Betty Jo Tucker is, it is best stated in the following passage: “As an anti-war protestor during U.S. involvement in Veitnam, I understand Sarandon being upset when people think she doesn´t love this country. “Peaceniks” were suspect back then, too. I remember my job as a college dean being in jeopardy as a result of hiring the famous pacifist poet Daniel Berrigan to teach in the Upward Bound program. Those were troubled times, and calling fellow citizens “traitors” for harboring opinions about military action didn´t help solve anything-nor will it now.” Ms. Tucker focuses a special section of the book to the Myelin Progect, and even has stated that all proceeds she receives from the sale of this book will go to this worthwhile fund. Susan Sarandon became involved with The Myelin Progect while making the film, Lorenzo´s Oil. An excerpt from True Maverick, “When Lorenzo was five years old, he began doing strange things like bumping into objects. Augusto and Michela soon received the horrifying news that their son had a rare, incurable genetic disorder that would cause him to lose all his bodily functions and die before he reached his teens. This disorder, known as adrenoleukodystrophy (ALD) only affects boys, but it is passed on through the mother. The Odones refused to look at this illness as incurable, so they began doing research on their own. After two years of fighting with the medical establishment and parents of other ALD boys, they discovered a blend of plant oils they thought would help their son.” A True Maverick is as far-reaching and as endearing as Betty Jo Tucker herself. From the films of Susan Sarandon (Dead Man Walking and The Cradle Will Rock) to the activism of a American citizen, you can call her a True Maverick, in a time when standing out in the crowd can be the safest place. The cost of this book is: $13.95 Hats Off Books
A Review of Megalopolis by Marie Kazalia
A Review of Voices In Diversity: Poets From Postwar Korea Selected and Translated with a Preface by Ko Won Published from the most adventurous publishers of poetry in this country, Cross-Cultural Communications, the publisher lives up to its name with each release, this is a book that could very well change a single individuals opinion of a country or of a body of work. Isn´t that extraordinary? An anthology that comes from a land under-appreciated by the American reader, Voices In Diversity is best reflected in this line from the poem, The Dream Of An Inferior by Pak No-hae, “The whole body shivering, an inferior as yet, I am scissoring, hammering. With a dream of connecting All the divided things into one” Impassioned writing from a very diverse country, well really what more could you want? I would love to see this type of book from Thailand and many other countries. If you are to find it from anywhere I believe it would be with Cross-Cultural Communications. The cost of this book is: $15.00 Cross-Cultural Communications
A Review of Feet Teeth by Andrew Topel Feet Teeth is billed as “A 6115-word sentence designed as an aural sound-chamber for the reader to immerse themselves in.” Bearing this in mind, this is a very good representation of just that. I read Feet Teeth and imagine myself in a art gallery with this text being read over a sound system and staring at the floor and trying to follow the pace of the text and shut out the clinking of people drinking wine that comes from a box and rattling on about nothing. The line about “Tarter sauce guitars” always gets me. Like Adrian Belew, bend that neck till it sings sweet and tangy. You can acquire a copy of this book by contacting: LUNA BISONTE PRODS
A Review of Drunk and Disorderly: Selected Poems (1978-2000) by Alan Catlin I spent a late night once at the bus depot in downtown Memphis, Tennessee once, the one by the pyramid if you have been there. This book brings back that odd, heated night between whores and cops, junkies, cabbies and vending machines. The poem, Subnormals Dressed for the Halloween Masquerade, it begins, “They are the children of God, not quite forgotten in their late, adult confinement…” That´s pretty accurate. Some writers exchange themselves for the words of others while many more just examine themselves. Alan Catlin exposes what he sees and gives it a name. A worthwhile instant that goes on and on and on. The price of this book is: $14.00 Pavement Saw Press
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