This book was absolutely beautiful and it’s so hard to put my thoughts and feelings into words. First, let’s talk about the formatting though, because that confused me a bit at first and looking at some Goodreads review, I wasn’t the only one.

This book, as I understood it, consists of three poems. Not multiple short ones, but three long poems. You can distinguish them because they’re numbered and by their names: On Love, On The World and On Becoming, but I can see why some people on Goodreads are confused and thought there are multiple short poems, because I did at first too.

Another important thing to know going in this book, is that Andrea Gibson is at the forefront of the spoken word movement. Before I knew that, I thought the poems read like spoken word poetry. Knowing that Gibson is a spoken word poet, I think this was deliberate. Some reviewers on Goodreads criticised the use of all caps, but I read that as Gibson raising their voice, like they do in spoken word poetry.

Now that we got that out of the way, let’s talk about the book in more detail. I absolutely love spoken word poetry. I’m not an expert on poetry, but it’s probably my favourite form. Thus, Take Me With You was right up my alley, especially since it’s LGBTQ+ poetry.

I found Take Me With You absolutely beautiful, heartbreaking, powerful… I’m starting to feel like Lady Gaga here

But seriously, I am in awe and in love with this book. I have no words. Once I finished it, I immediately reread it again and cried my eyes out a little bit more. I’ve marked pretty much the entire book on my kindle and I need a physical copy to hold close and take with me* asap.

* Ha see what I did there

There were so many powerful quotes, but I also loved how easily Gibson switched between serious or beautiful and funny

''I find great comfort in believing anyone who has ever broken up with me has probably never gotten over my dog.''

I cannot for the life of my choose one favourite quote, as there are so many. I laughed, smiled and cried (hard) at this amazing book. Some of the sentences in her poems are pure and wholesome, and like I said funny, others? Broke my heart completely and left me a mess.

''When the first responders entered the Pulse nightclub after te massacre in Orlando,
they walked through the horrible scene of bodies and called out, ”If you’re alive, raise your hand.” I was sleeping in a hotel in de midwest at the time but I imagine in that exact moment my hand twitched in my sleep – some unconscious part of me aware that I had a pulse,
that I was alive''

Again, I have no words to describe how I feel about this book, what it meant reading it and how much I love it. I highly recommend picking this one up.

Another fabulous and heartwrenching collection from Andrea Gibson that strikes to the heart of what it means to be human, but also to be human and different.

Slightly mixed feelings about this. I really enjoyed the poems to start with, and found many to have a raw quality that I love. But towards the end I became bored and felt it was unoriginal and a little bland.

For a quick poetry read it was pleasant enough.

Andrea Gibson is a popular poet for many reasons, and this volume is just going to add to those. Gibson's brief lines are packed with information and wisdom; simple, lovely drawings; and unexpected turns of phrase that remind readers just what the English language can do in the right hands. My only complaint is its length: too short. Read it!

I had high expectations for this book, but unfortunately it fell short for me. I liked the presentation of the poems, and I loved the inclusion of illustrations appearing at odd times. The poems however, didn't resonate, and didn't have enough depth for my liking.

Take Me With You is a collection of LGBTQIA poems. There are lovely illustrations throughout this book of poetry. The poems deal with topics that range from relationships, coming out, anxiety, etc. I liked this book of poems, except it was a tad bit hard to follow with how the book ended up formatted. If you enjoy poetry you may like this book. I received this ARC for free from NetGalley in exchange for my review.

I received a galley of this collection of poems from PENGUIN GROUP Blue Rider Press & Plume through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. This collection is set for publication on January 23, 2018.

I will start by saying that if you are even a casual “I saw this piece in a Button Poetry youtube video” fan of Andrea Gibson and their work. You should get your hands on this collection ASAP. Andrea Gibson is an award-winning poet and activist from Calais, Maine. Their poetry focuses on gender norms, politics, social reform, and LGBTQ issues. The galley description states: “For readers of Rupi Kaur (Milk and Honey) and Atticus (Love Her Wild), a book small enough to carry with you, with messages big enough to stay with you from one of the most quotable and influential poets of our time.” And that feels like an apt description. This collection is divided into three sections and is full of one-liners, couplets, and long-form poems and each of them what made me fall in love all over again with Gibson’s work.

This review might be overshadowed by the fact that while reading this galley in the breakroom at work, I almost started crying because Gibson’s poetry knows how to cut at my baby-queer heart.
My favorite thing about any of the collections of their poetry that I have read is that you can hear them read these poems in your head while reading. The inflections that their voice would take during a reading are all there in the text, but even if I didn’t have Andrea’s voice there to guide me through their work I think these words—no, I know that these words would have had a similar effect on my tear ducts. This collection is part love letter, part call to action, part reminder that there are still reasons to live even when everything feels like a screaming cyclone of terribleness. I’m certain that Gibson’s words have saved lives. They remind us that there are reasons to keep moving forward.

I know Gibson’s work is quoted all over the place, I’m certain that I’ve seen their lines, unattributed of course, on mid-to-early-teens internet artwork somewhere in the vast reaches of Tumblr. I don’t want to distill these poems or the power that Gibson has in their language down to a few lines, but if I quoted everything that I wanted to quote I would end up typing out the whole collection. So following are a few teasers that I hope will encourage you to go get this book, read this book, love this book.

“I find great comfort in believing anyone who has ever broken up with me has probably never gotten over my dog.”

“Once
I found a butterFLy’s wing on the sidewalk.
I wanted to keep it but I didn’t. I knew there
were things I should never Find beautiful.
Like Death.
And girls.”
 
Recommendation: As much as I loved this collection, and felt like it’s words hit the core of my heart, I would not use this as an introduction to Andrea and their work. I think that their words have the most power through spoken word performances, and I loved the collection, Pansy. That being said, if you’re already a fan of Gibson’s work, or feel like carrying their words around with you would be helpful for maintaining a level of even-headedness while the world is decidedly collapsing around us.

I was halfway through this book before I realized that I was familiar with the writer from their spoken word pieces, available on Youtube.

“Any feminist who has ever taken the high road will you the high road gets backed up and sometimes we need to take a detour straight through the belly of uncensored rage.”

I read that line, yelled “YES!” because it’s perfection, and realized who the writer was. Gibson dances in out of a multitude of thems – love, politics, LGBTQ+, gender, feminism, and the human condition. I ultimately would rate this about 3.5 stars out of 5. Some are fantastic (see snippets of greatness below) and others weren’t that good. Or at the very least, they didn’t speak to me, which is fine as I’m a cishet white woman so I’m not the target audience for a lot of it. When Gibson gets it right though, it’s so good.

”Patriarchy taught me how to take a punch better than I could take a compliment.”
I mean. Amazing.

“America wakes me in the middle of the night, tells me she had a bad dream, one where the bootstraps hung from trees, one where the morgue pinned flowers on prom suits, one where the casket was a full stomach, growling for more. In the dream, American finally elected a president who the truth, who didn’t bother wearing a sheet, who knew his shoes would be recognized on Wall Street. In the dream, the scaled of justice were busy discussing Miss America’s weight. And all they of hate is that it couldn’t beat the love out of me…”

Some snippets hit home.

“The hardest people in the world to forgive are the people we once were. The people we are trying desperately not to stir into the recipe of who we are now.”


Overall, it’s a solid collection that has its ups and downs but the hits make the misses worth it.


Take Me With You will be available for purchase February 13, 2018.

I received a free advanced digital copy of this book from the publisher via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. This has no effect on my opinion, rating, or review.

The words in this book relates to the people who feels like they are alone to love someone. I really like the language and the style of writing. It doesn't make me bored reading this poem.

Some parts of this book were absolutely golden. I highlighted a lot of quotes that I'm sure I will go back to again and again. Unfortunately, my major issue was with the formatting of this book.  Strange formatting in arc ebooks doesn't tend to bother me that much, however in a book of poetry and poetic writing, the run-on lines and lack of differentiating between different topics made the book almost impossible to read. The whole book read as one long run-on text. It was very confusing and made me unsure what lines were meant to be together and what weren't. I'm sure this book would read much better as a physical book, where white space is more obvious and the drawings don't come in the middle of sentences, but for this reason I was unable to really enjoy it and can only give two stars.

I am a huge fan of poetry, I love reading poetry, I wish I had enought time to read all the poetry books in the world. I got this book in exchange for my honest opinion on NetGalley. I requested this book because the cover looks gorgeous and book description sounded awesome. This poetry book is a collection of LGBTQ which made me even more excited to read it since it was my first LGBTQ inspired read. But I was disappointed as soon as I started reading it, the formatting of this book is horrible, I have no idea if this is because it's an e-book but it was really annoying me when reading the book, even the font was distracted and weird. It was also really hard to knew when one poem finished and another began. There were few poems that I enjoyed but overall I really did not like this book and I hate writing bad reviews.

My favourite poem from this book is:

"She makes me feel like I could win the lottery with a parking ticket."

Goodreads rating of the book: 3.19/5

My rating of the book: 2/5

My rating of the book cover: 5/5

I received an ARC via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Since I adore Rupi Kaur's poems, I'm intrgued to give Take Me With You a try. It's a LGBTQ poem collection which explores various topics. The topics that highlighted this book were political and family related poems. Raising their voices as they struggled on being accepted by the society and their love ones. It's written with such rawness and I like it. However, some poems aren't my cup of tea particularly about love. I thought they're bland and unoriginal.

I unfortunately could not understand this book very well. It was extremely hard to follow for me, and I wish it was executed better. However, there are many incredible topics covered in this book that I'm sure many can relate to. I, however, found it a bit confusing and hard to get through.

Take Me With You by Andrea Gibson is a wonderfully written poetry. It is also a collection of LGBTQ. This is this first for me, I've never read LGBTQ inspired poetry book before. With lines like" You keep worrying you're taking up too much space I wish you'd let yourself be the Milkyway" and "I told myself I was built like a song..." are powerful lines woven into these pages. There's a balance of upbeat poems to deeper more meaningful words. This book shows today's world in these lines of poems that reflect in a truthful way that explores significant themes to today's' world from love to politics to gender, family, and feelings. Take Me With You also has drawings, I also enjoyed the font and layout of the book. This is a must-read for anyone who enjoys poetry.

Packed with so many moments that resonated with me, or that I could pass on to friends who I knew needed to hear those words. Confronting, beautiful, and a comforting reminder that one is not alone.

Weird. As a fan of Gibson's spoken word, I expected something deep and personal but still universal and emotional. This book is, instead, a bunch of random one-liners that are sometimes hokey, sometimes cringe-worthy, and very infrequently affecting. It's also hard to follow, as I started off expecting long pieces but instead got unconnected snippets of what felt like bigger poems that never gelled. This is a strange reading experience that I don't think I'd recommend, especially for those unfamiliar with Gibson's work; there are much better ways to introduce yourself to their poetry than through this meme-ready silliness.

I wouldn’t say that I’m the biggest poetry fan, but I am always willing to read anything by queer authors, so I knew I had to give this a shot. 

For the most part, I really enjoyed it. There were some lines that just really struck me as so original and truthful. Others were less inspired and seemed a little cheesy or tired in places. I also think that the font/formatting of the book impacted my reading experience. It was difficult to tell when one poem ended and another began and the font seemed out of touch to the emotions being expressed in the words. 

Overall, I did enjoy this, but it just didn’t feel finished to me.

Wow, so much of this was relatable, and even those small parts that were meant to be somewhat dark made me laugh because it was relatable for me. I've seen other reviews saying that it wasn't that great. Keep in mind, you are most likely reading this from an uncorrected format proof - a digital galley. There are of course, formatting issues, but the main thing is this was such a great read. I really can't wait to see the finalized small copy that I can take with me everywhere, because make no mistake, I absolutely *will* be keeping this in my purse for whenever I need it!

I think the formatting of this book, really let it down. I don't know what was the actual formatting of the poems, and what was formatting messed up due to it being an e-book. As it stood, many of the poems appeared without line breaks. More like paragraphs, or disjointed sentences. Which... I'm not sure if that was how the poet intended it to be read? 

I also just didn't know where the poems ended and where they began. Subjects would change at the flip of a page, or from one sentence to the next but nothing indicated this was a new poem, or that there had been a shift at all. Which made reading this... kind of, weird? I don't know. I think with poetry it's good to have the definites. Reading a poem with the definite beginning and end gives it that punch. You know what feeling you're supposed to get from the poem by the time you're there at the end. I didn't get a lot of feelings reading this. Or when I felt something, it diminished so quickly because I was like huh? why are we onto something else now?? 

Maybe it was because of the formatting issues, or maybe it was because of something else (or maybe both), but I just couldn't connect to this poetry collection. There were some poems that I did really like, but most of them just didn't work for me. There were some lovely illustrations though that I really liked!

I wouldn't discourage anyone from picking up this book because I think poetry is so so subjective and what works for one person won't work for another. And again, all of the issues with formatting did really hinder my ability to properly read or enjoy this. If you do decide to read it, I would suggest a print copy though. That should have the proper formatting, and will probably be a lot better for the illustrations as well!

This was a great little book with a strong message of resilience.