This was a great poetry book. It was interesting read and I would like to read more in the near future. I highly recommend it.

Poetry can be a very personal thing, or it can be a thing of great beauty transcending a generation or a county and becoming part of your very being. Alternatively, poetry can be throw away, a collection of sounds meant to inspire thought or simply to entertain, but in my experience, this latter form is often difficult to capture on the page and even harder to recreate in the minds and hearts of a reader. I would love the hear these poems performed, read out, expressed and felt, perhaps then their inner rhythm would show itself and make sense. Sadly, as these poems are written I am robbed of that experience, and as such find little to draw me back to their tale. If you like written performance style poetry this will be for you, I hope I get the chance to hear them one day.

Poetry is very personal but this is not my style at all.

I really didn't get this book. The writing felt distracted and amateurish and was hard to follow, even when the poem title made the subject matter clear. The use of footnotes was annoying, and the excess of exclamation points made me feel like I was reading text messages written by a twelve year old.

If you like poetry that engages you intellectually Shaffer provides this. Its not always pleasant musings as there are more than enough things for Americans to be serious about these days, but it is a relief to find a safe haven for both the lovers of both brain and the beautify. Click off your social media and ignore all the witterings of CNN and Fox news Washington pundits and just remember in this verse that the American literary world can be inspiring, amusing and unabashedly clever.