I had read Factory of Tears by this poet and was interested to read a collection that she wrote without a potential barrier of translation in my reading of it. While there were moments of beauty and several striking images in this collection-- particularly of music and history-- I almost wish it was a memoir instead. ("does everything have to be like a poem?") My favorite poems here tended to be the most narrative.

As another reviewer mentioned, sometimes the Western images seemed jarring, and I didn't always find the repetition effective either. That being said, the whole collection does have a haunted, melodic feel to it in the best possible way. I will continue to seek out what Valzhyna Mort writes.

Many thanks to NetGalley and Farrar, Straus and Giroux for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Haunting, beautiful, and vivid, I loved Valzhyna Mort’s latest collection. As a native of Belarus, the poet’s Eastern European sensibility is on display as she grapples with the prevalence of death and its legacy to create a work of true beauty.