Booknotes 4.6

The Tower, by W. B. Yeats, published 1928, poetry. Randomly came across this in the library stacks and figured I’d finally give Yeats a try. Mixed feelings. I think “Nineteen Hundred and Nineteen” was my favorite of the lot, with “we thought / That the worst rogues and rascals had died out” ringing true to me as something I too once thought but no more. Also liked the “natural declension of the soul” line in “My Descendants.”

Grief Is the Thing with Feathers, by Max Porter, published 2015, fiction. Whew. It’s weird and sweary and earthy but does interesting things with form and language, and I cried at the end, as I often do with deadly deathly deathy I don’t know what the right adjective is stories.

Winter Trees, by Sylvia Plath, published 1971 (posthumously), poetry. Evocative language. Quite liked it, especially the Three Women play at the end. Planning to read more of her work, and Red Comet, her biography. Her struggles with depression and suicide remind me of my father, by the way.

Tuyo, by Rachel Neumeier, published 2020, fantasy. I’d seen rave reviews but wasn’t sure what I’d think. Got hooked by the end of the first chapter and ended up loving it. Great writing. I really liked Aras (one of the main characters) and the dynamic between him and Ryo, too. I think people who like Victoria Goddard or Katherine Addison would probably like this. (They feel kind of similar on the brain, at least to me.) Looking forward to reading the rest of the series.