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This
book is available at your local bookstore or from on-line vendors such
as Amazon or
Barnes & Noble, or directly from the publisher. |
Like a Pop artist, Tom Hunley creates with bright colors and sharp lines. In the face of disaster, he responds with the kind of insouciance praised by Whitman and practiced by a Buster Keaton or Harold Lloyd. "Meet me at the Cafe Nihilism," Hunley writes, and in poem after poem we're there, where the abyss and comedy mix, the poems are both edgy and tender, and Mayakovsky's bad-boy persona gets an American makeover. Some bonuses: Hunley wears his considerable learning on his sleeve lightly; as a formalist, he's the best
kind--unsolemn and jazzy. When he asks from his students "mango-like writing" that's "tropical, sun-kissed," he's describing his own aesthetic. As you read this book, enjoy the juice spilling down your chin. -- Philip Dacey Though nothing is what it seems in this playful debut by a promising young poet, there is no calculated obscurity here, only a gregarious embracing of the endless possibilities of language and life. Tom Hunley entertains, moves, and surprises us. Caveat lector! -- Joe Survant What I like most about Tom Hunley's work is that he writes about the Other America: not the vitamin-enriched, fluoride-coated country where everybody drives an SUV or hopes to, but the weird, surprising country that's more interesting and more fun. The middle section of this book is called "The Hard Sciences," but aren't all sciences hard? When a reporter in one of these marvelous poems asks First Daughter Amy Carter if she has a message for American girls and boys and she says no, isn't that what most of us would say? The tongue will tell you all the lies you want to hear. But it will also tell you everything you need to know, and that's Tom Hunley's specialty. -- David Kirby | |
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