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Barn Burned, Then , by Michelle Taransky,
reviewed by Andrew Wessel, posted at A Compulsive Reader
Here is the beginning of the review:
A while back I read the first full-collection publication from Michelle Taransky::Barn Burned, Then, and have been planning on responding in some way ever since. The particular aspect of the book that arrested me was the use of line breaks. The only way I can think of discussing this at all is by giving an example:…
for the full review, click here.
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The Plot Genie, by Gillian Conoley,
reviewed by Gillian O. Hamel, posted at MARY Magazine.
Here is the beginning of the review:
Gillian Conoley’s latest collection, The Plot Genie, takes its title and setting from a system devised in the 1930s by silent film writer Wycliffe A. Hill, which provided writers with a list of characters and plot elements to be selected at random by spinning a cardboard wheel. However, Conoley chooses not to use the original Plot Genie device to determine the characters and plot of her book. Instead, she uses the concept of the Plot Genie to examine the space and limitation of fictional universes, placing the characters in a space of tension between the content-creating powers of a figure based on the original Plot Genie device and their growing awareness of their existence as text on a page. By focusing on these characters as they are trapped in this liminal, not-quite-created space, Conoley opens up a poetic space where her subjects become aware of the text as their reality, rather than the space described by the text. Conoley’s creation of a layered, book-space-within-a-book-space structure serves as an examination of the poetics of fiction and of books as physical objects, exploring the effects and consequences of existing in a world where interaction and experience has been programmed in text as a physical place.
The plot genie itself emerges as a character…
The plot genie itself emerges as a character…
For the full review, click here.
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