Review by Booklist Review
Harrison's poetry is earthy in the fullest sense of the word: it is of the earth, stoked by the senses, in sync with the beat of life, and salty in its forthrightness. Harrison gleans lessons from rivers, the moon, birds, and dogs, and puzzles over the elusive nature of time, tagging clocks as the machinery of dread. He writes sharply of war, the loathsome government, the distortions of religion, and humankind's will toward greed and self-destruction. A veteran fiction writer, Hollywood darling, hard-living and deep-thinking poet, Harrison brings tough love to the puzzles of existence and a meditative perspective to life's mysteries as he evokes the wilds of Montana and cherished small towns. He remembers the dead, savors life's bittersweetness, its push and pull, its swish and swash, and knows in his very cells that salvation isn't coming. It's always been here. Harrison may be under doctor's orders to count his drinks and measure the sugar in his blood, but this is his most robust, sure-footed, and spirit-raising poetry collection to date. --Donna Seaman Copyright 2006 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Mountains and forests from the American West, oneiric apparitions and a hard-won, slightly bitter wisdom pervade this 10th book of poems from the prolific Harrison (Shape of the Journey), whose many prose works include Legends of the Fall. Harrison's passionate, sometimes uncontrolled poems portray his upbringing in northern Michigan and his long residence in the wilds of Montana, where "The moose/ down the road wears the black cloak of a god," and any small "community can drown in itself,/ then come to life again." His tough-guy tone and terse descriptions, along with his unpretentious free-verse line, might recall Gerald Stern or even Richard Hugo. Yet his leaps from topic to topic, his declamations and spontaneous, mystical utterances, suggest instead a Latin American influence-several poems appear both in English and in Spanish in facing-page translations, and several more pay tribute to the wild intuitions of Pablo Neruda. (Apr.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Library Journal Review
He's better known as a novelist, but Harrison writes tough, meditative poetry that appeals to a wide audience, capturing hard-won wisdom in language often evoking the scary beauty of this country's Northwest. His tenth collection is blessed with both wildness and grace. (LJ 2/15/06) (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
