A good read filled with poems tackling topics of racism, assimilation, queerness vs religion, capitalism, police brutality and environmental concerns. However, despite resonating with the message of most (if not all) of the poems in this collection, I didn’t really feel that most of these topics were tackled in innovative or new ways. The poems were good, sure, but most of them didn’t feel impactful enough to stick with me past opening and closing the book. 

Still, I intend to pick up more of Franny Choi’s work because I’d love to see what more she does with the poetic form in the future. My favourite poems out of the collection are: 

• The World Keeps Ending, and the World Goes On
• It Is What It Is 
• Upon Learning That Some Korean War Refugees Used Partially Detonated Napalm Canisters as Cooking Fuel #1 
• Waste