Don't Stay for The After Party

The After Party by Jana Prikryl is a book of poems that takes us through continents and eras.  In the first half of the book, we are brought to each of these places, seeing them through Prikryl's eyes.  The second half is consisted of forty poems that are related and told in the many voices of Prikryl with her style.  Again, we are taken on a journey with her through the poems.

This book gets 0 out of 5 stars from me because there is nothing, not even one factor that I found redeeming in this book.  As a poet, I really looked forward to this book, hoping it would bring me inspiration for poems that I'm writing.  The only thing it taught me was how not to write any poems.

I should've known from the first poem how it was going to go.  Ontario Gothic was the title, the poem...nothing to do with what I was expecting.  And the stanzas were nowhere near connected with each other.  I sat there sitting, wondering what it was all about.  And it didn't stop there.  As I continued to read, the poems got worse and made no sense.  Not one poem was remotely related to the title she gave the poem.  

There were parts of poems where people were mentioned out of nowhere.  Example: Benedict Cumberbatch.  What did he have to do with the poem?  Nothing from what I read.

The second half of the book, I didn't know what she was trying to bring to the reader.  None of the poems were titled.  I know they were supposed to be connecting, but was it supposed to be different poems or one long epic poem?  Ask me now, and I can't tell you one thing I remember from this book.

The summary seemed promising to me, but not once did I find it as going through different eras or continents.  The book was a mess to me.  

I wouldn't recommend this book to anyone, especially poets.  I'm sure there are other poets out there who's poems would be much better to read.

I was given this book by Blogging for Books in return for an honest review.