Digging Up My Bones
In 2019, my book Digging Up My Bones was first published. It sold out its first print run, and my publisher felt like he had a real hit on his hands...progressive, feminist, anti-Trump, anti-Republican, pro-LGBT+ poetry. He felt it was the right book, at the right time. To get it a wider audience, he decided to submit it to Kirkus for a review. Kirkus, in their infinite wisdom, gave my book to... ...a conservative, right wing, Christian male reviewer. With predictable results. My publisher freaked out, and pulled my book from print. After five years, I finally regained the rights to my book, and it is now available as an ebook in my Kofi store! Why should you buy my book, you might ask? Well, conservative Christians hate it! Here's the Kirkus review in its entirety, for you reading pleasure.
TITLE INFORMATION
DIGGING UP MY BONES Gwyndyn Alexander B Cubed Press (155 pp.) $12.99 paperback, $7.99 e-book ISBN: 978-1-949476-03-3; March 6, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
A New Orleans poet incorporates themes of Greek mythology, politics, power, and violence against women in dozens of free verse poems.
This collection begins with the titular piece, addressed to Alexander’s (Once Upon a Childhood, 2015, etc.) adoptive mother, in which the poet declares: “I was never your real daughter. / I was less / than the family pet.”
Alexander quickly pivots from the personal to the political with “A Song For The Sirens,” a rant about the weariness feminists feel explaining things to men.
“Cassandra” speaks to how men have appropriated women’s words and ideas.
In “In And Out Of Time,” the poet asserts that she would tell her younger self: “Fists are not kisses, / and rape is not sex.”
“Why Can’t You Take A Compliment?” explores the phenomenon of male strangers telling women to smile.
A trio of poems mourns the fates and legacies of Helen of Troy, Medea, and Medusa while references to more modern stories, like Disney’s The Little Mermaid and tales by the Brothers Grimm, appear later.
“Black Lives Matter” examines the way “the police have become / the thieves” while “White Wash” blasts Caucasian women for voting for Donald Trump.
Alexander is a gifted writer.
“Seasons of You,” a poem for her husband in the dedication section of the book, sensually describes how “you stretch like a sated cat” and “even the wind / wants to caress you.”
Unfortunately, her talent has been channeled into a litany of complaints that will be all too familiar to female readers.
In addition, the author’s religious pieces demonstrate a strange understanding of God with claims that he “jilted me” and a description of Christian children as “cannibals.”
And poems like “Vulva Vivamus!” verge on the crude: “I sing the power of pussy, / of the vagina in all her glory.”
A well-intentioned, fiery collection of feminist poetry. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Buy it here! Tell all your friends!
This book was nominated for multiple awards, and sold out its first print run. First published at the height of the first Trump presidency
