{"id":6253,"date":"2012-12-21T08:00:42","date_gmt":"2012-12-21T13:00:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lanternreview.com\/blog\/?p=6253"},"modified":"2012-12-21T16:26:50","modified_gmt":"2012-12-21T21:26:50","slug":"staff-picks-favorite-reads-from-2012-and-other-recommendations-for-the-new-year","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lanternreview.com\/blog\/2012\/12\/21\/staff-picks-favorite-reads-from-2012-and-other-recommendations-for-the-new-year\/","title":{"rendered":"Staff Picks: Favorite Reads from 2012 (and Other Recommendations for the New Year)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Every year around the holidays, we post a roundup of books recommended by our staff writers to the LR <\/em>Blog. The end of the current year is now fast approaching, and so in continuation of our tradition, here is a list of titles we enjoyed reading in 2012 and wanted to share with you:<\/p>\n

* * *<\/p>\n

\"Rules<\/a>
RULES OF THE HOUSE<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Rules of the House<\/em><\/a><\/strong>
\nby Tsering Wangmo Dhompa<\/strong>
\nApogee Press, 2002<\/strong>
\nRecommended by Mia:<\/strong> “I recently started teaching full-time, so I haven\u2019t had much time to read poetry\u2026 but I\u2019m slowly working through Tsering Wangmo Dhompa\u2019s Rules of the House<\/em>. I\u2019ve been savoring every poem because Dhompa has this way of leveling the reader with the slightest detail, all the while developing complex arcs that echo and extend throughout the book.”<\/p>\n

* * *
\n<\/em><\/p>\n

\"The<\/a>
THE PILLOW BOOK<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The Pillow Book<\/a><\/em><\/strong>
\nby Jee Leong Koh<\/strong>
\nMath Paper Press, 2012<\/strong>
\nRecommended by Wendy:<\/strong> “Inspired by the example of eleventh-century Japanese author and court lady Sei Sh\u014dnagon, Jee Leong Koh collects his miscellaneous jottings in his own pillow book. Written in the genre called zuihitsu<\/em>, which compromises both prose and poetry, these observations, lists and anecdotes on life in Singapore and New York are, in turn, humorous, reflective, satirical, nostalgic and outrageous.”<\/p>\n

* * *<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
GARDENING SECRETS OF THE DEAD<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Gardening Secrets of the Dead<\/a><\/em><\/strong>
\nby Lee Herrick<\/strong>
\nWord Tech Editions, 2012<\/strong>
\nRecommended by Wendy:<\/strong> “[In Brian Turner’s words]: ‘Lee Herrick’s Gardening Secrets of the Dead<\/em> is a lyric exploration of the fractured and fragmented landscape of the self, where the body is a song composed of many selves. Whitman revised, the poems ‘celebrate and assemble\/ from around the world’ with a voice that is politically engaged and rooted in compassion.'”<\/p>\n

* * *<\/p>\n

\"Ascension\"<\/a>
ASCENSION<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Ascension<\/em><\/a><\/strong>
\nby giovanni singleton<\/strong>
\nCounterpath Press 2012<\/strong>
\n Winner of the 81st Annual California Book Award for Poetry<\/em><\/strong>
\n Recommended by Jai:<\/strong> “Comprised mostly of a daybook written during musician and spiritual leader Alice Coltrane’s 49-day transition between death and rebirth, giovanni singleton’s Ascension<\/em> rings with unexpected cadences. As a soul ascends, what settles and rattles at our feet? From day to day, where are the stillnesses? These are the questions this book leads me to ask, as singleton takes us ‘way back to \/\/ where every sound \/ was a story and \/\/ every silence \/ epic.'”<\/p>\n

* * *<\/p>\n

\""Almost<\/a>
“Almost Heaven” (MANOA 23.2)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

“Almost Heaven: On the Human and Divine<\/a>“<\/strong>
\n[Volume 23.2 of Manoa<\/em>]<\/strong>
\nRecommended by Henry:<\/strong> “This is volume 23.2 of Manoa<\/em>, the volume that came out in 2011 just prior to ‘Sky Lanterns,’ with beautiful glass-plate negatives of Hawaii, and featuring writers on a variety of illusory paradises not limited to the Pacific. The essays especially are worth checking out!”<\/p>\n

* * *<\/p>\n

\"Yours,\"<\/a>
YOURS,<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Yours,<\/a><\/em>
\n<\/strong>by Kristen Eliason
\nDancing Girl Press, 2012
\nRecommended by Iris<\/strong>: “I’ve been reading a lot of chaps this year (they’re perfect for short amounts of time, so I can read one on my lunch break), and this one is an absolute gift. Living overseas in the wake of a momentous tragedy, Eliason’s speaker grapples with her alienation and grief in a series of heartbreakingly spare missives\u2014quiet snapshots in whose white spaces the rawness of loss seeps through. Eliason has a talent for lyric invocation, but the real power of this chap, for me, really lies in the spaces of absence that pit and fragment her text\u2014the things she allows her speaker to leave unsaid.”<\/p>\n

* * *<\/p>\n

\"Self-Portrait<\/a>
SELF-PORTRAIT AS RUMOR AND BLOOD<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Self-Portrait as Rumor and Blood<\/a>
\n<\/strong><\/em>by Rachelle Cruz<\/strong>
\nDancing Girl Press, 2012
\nRecommended by Iris:<\/strong>\u00a0“Another fabulous Dancing Girl title. Notable for the courageous viscerality of its voice, Cruz’s chap is tonally very different from Eliason’s, but also intensely powerful. Cruz’s speaker is a shape-shifter, slipping easily in and out of voices and narratives from across time and space in order to weave together a portrait that glistens as much with sinew as it does with the force of its story.”<\/em><\/p>\n

* * *<\/p>\n

Staff Publications:\u00a0<\/strong>The LR<\/em> Blog staff has also had a particularly busy year in terms of our\u00a0own individual writing lives, and since this post is the one time a year that we get to feature the staff, we thought that this would be a perfect opportunity to share some of their recent and forthcoming publications with you. If you follow the blog regularly and are curious about our bloggers’ own poetic work, we hope you’ll consider adding a few of these titles to your future reading lists, as well!<\/p>\n