Anthologies are always a mixed bag, and this one is more so than most. There are some excellent poems here and there is some striking artwork, but rarely do the poems and art truly mesh. It's worth reading, but it doesn't quite hit its mark.

Received via NetGalley. ( )

This book is unlike anything I have ever read, and is so unique I will likely not find anything like it again.

A collection of feminist poetry, authored by a diverse community of LGBTQ, indigenous, black and people of color, which has been rendered in beautiful comic-style graphical format. Each poem and each rendering is unique in both style and content - some are quite challenging and others are immediately just mind-blowingly beautiful.

When they work, as many of them did for me, the sum of the parts (Artwork and Poetry) is elevated to a level that’s hard to describe unless you’re seeing it. (I think its the same kind of transformation that an emotive movie score adds to your appreciation of the plot-line of the movie).

Dominant themes include pregnancy, sexism, loss, grief, pregnancy/birth and miscarriage, climate change, beauty and aging, parenting, love, and marginalization.

The first poem confused me, and there were a number that I found I could not grasp. Overall though, the work is simply stunning and I am so glad to have discovered and read this book.

An awesome study guide is provided at the end - once I stumbled upon it and read it, so many ideas were triggered that I had to thumb back to re-read my favorites.

Poetry and art are both such intimate and subjective joys - there were clearly some entries that resonated more deeply and immediately with me. I had a lot of favorites, but the two that stand out the most are:

Good Bones - An achingly lovely parental reflection on the ( futility or hopefulness ?) it takes to believe one can still raise a child to love and cherish the best in our world. The artwork on this one is heartbreaking.

Units and Increments - Aging sucks, particularly for women in our gendered society, and this poem, and it’s gorgeous rendering, nails it.

A great big thank you to NetGalley, the publisher and the authors for an advance review copy of this exquisite book. All thoughts presented are my own. ( )