I’ve just finished writing a review of three poetry collections for Envoi poetry journal. I’ve always been a big fan of Kenneth Steven’s work, especially those poems which are inspired by the natural world, so it was a great pleasure to review Wildscape, which brings together poems from his previous six collections. The other two volumes were pamphlets – Waiting for H5N1 by Jane Routh and Wishbone by Elspeth Smith. I really enjoy reviewing and never fail to learn something new about the craft of poetry writing by doing a close reading of the texts.
Reviewing
4 responses to “Reviewing”
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.
This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.
It is indeed great to receive free books through the post!
And I agree with you too, Mistlethrush – reviewing IS hard work. I always seem to spend much longer than I intended on trying to get it ‘right’. It’s such a coincidence that you’ve also just reviewed ‘Waiting for H5N1’ – I enjoyed it too but used up most of my allotted words on the Kenneth Steven collection so am not sure I really did it justice.
I’ve recently reviewed Waiting for H5N1 too. I look forward to reading your review. I try to avoid reading other reviewers’ comments before I send mine off so I don’t get influenced. I enjoyed it (being a wildlife lover I would…) but I found it impossible to find a quote to sell the collection. I thought it worked brilliantly as a collection.
Interesting that you all enjoy reviewing. I find it hard work! I agree with Russell that it’s a pleasure to get free books through the letter box but I’m always concerned about being fair. I find the most difficult books for me are the humorous ones – I don’t have a great sense of humour I’m told…!
Reviews are enjoyable to compile, but the other pleasure is to receive a publication one is normally to mean buy
I really enjoy reviewing too, though I don’t do so much of it since Gerald England shut down NHI review. I like Kenneth Steven’s work too.