3.5 Stars (I received an e-arc from Net Galley in exchange for an honest review)

The format of this collection intrigued me almost as much as the writing. First we start off with a small section (almost an introduction with the sentences having a slash in place of a period. Then switches to a standard format with images at the end of every few poems, as well some of the text being in a lighter grey colour at times. Poems about dealing with the everyday struggles of womanhood and being a housewife with a sci-fi/fantasy tone applied to the writing. As well the author included some information about the unique cover and the entomologist who assisted with it.

Poetry is always so hard to judge. One man's art is another man's treasure. So I'll leave it at that.

A fantastical account of womanhood, Glimmerglass Girl contains 24 poems that each have their individual merits. The themes of womanhood emerge in reducing ourselves ‘she memorises little spaces she could hide in,’ Performance ‘of his palm like a world / revolving slowly in it / she is held / he watches her turn / music softly tinkling / and her head tilted just so – he can hold her hands up like / ballerinas dance /’ and being alone ‘loneliness can fester, wounded, and eat up your heart, leaving only a dark grotto, etched with predators,’
Poem The Art of Loneliness was by far my favourite. I also liked this line, and the poem it is in towards the end of the book, which took my breath away, ‘if I dream it enough, it frays thin, dies a ghost death easier than his, the boy I played with on a wet fall day.’ Memories, White Matter.
The precision of Walrath’s writing, and its meaning leaves a lingering impression. The illustrations, some superimposed into the background of the poems, gave the book a vintage feel. I closed Glimmerglass Girl wanting to read more of Walrath’s writing.

This collection of poetry is so beautiful and delicate while being difficult to describe. This collection deals with a lot of ideas, including primarily feminity, the female self, and womanhood through the subjects and topics of love, abuse, marriage, self-harm, and alcoholism. The representation of females and women through this poetry, and how they adapt and deal with life is so touching and special that this collection of poetry belongs on every female and woman's bookshelf!

I got to be honest. In the past, I have read poetry and love reading it but i have never reviewed a piece or a poetry book, for that matter. This is actually my first time reviewing poetry with this book so here goes.

Glimmerglass Girl is a short collection of poems that talks about experiences of Holly Lyn Walrath through beautiful and exquisite poetry. It tackles topics such as life, love, marriage, abuse, self-harm, the body, death, and alcoholism, which people, and not just females, can relate to.

There were a few poems I liked and these poems include: In Rejoice of Kindred Grief; She Learns How to Disappear, Morning Song; Two Hundred Fifty-Seven; The Art of Loneliness; and White Matter. The book had a couple of art which I appreciated.

Although some poems seemed cryptic and confusing, they also held a pang of wonder and mystery to me which I liked. The author’s excellent use of representation and metaphors was what got me. In my opinion, using metaphors is good, especially in poetry. I just love it when writers use them because they make words (or poems, for this instance) seem more special. This book had a decent amount of metaphors inside it so that's great.

Truth be told, I just read Glimmerglass Girl because I wanted a short and quick read and that's what I got. In the end, I wanted to read more, to get more. The book is something that made me feel more half-full than half-empty. Nevertheless, i enjoyed it as a whole and am happy with the decision that I read it because I seriously missed reading poetry and this exactly did the trick.

Thank you to NetGalley for providing me a copy and to Holly Lyn Walrath for writing such powerful words and inspiring me as a person and young lady. I also reviewed this on my BookLikes page (http://nerdiiieee.booklikes.com).

This book of poetry is a very quick read. Easy to finish in one sitting, and while some of it was ok. I didn't really feel that compelled by this collection of poetry.
For me there was just something lacking and I found it ok, but wouldn't pick it up again.

Overall, I didn't hate this poem collection however, while I enjoyed some of these poems none of them really jumped out at me.

This was a nice little book of poetry dealing with women and what it means to be a woman. Well worth a read, although not the kind of poetry I tend to enjoy.

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Thank you to Netgalley for providing me with a copy for an honest review.

I really loved Holly Walrath writing in Glimmerglass Glass. Her writing is so beautiful and I love how descriptive she writes as well. There was artwork within and it worked very well. This wasn’t as long as most poetry book I read but I liked that. It’s about womenhood and the authors own experiences. I gave this 3.5 out of five stars.

Some of my favorites lines are:
“I will fuck my way through the realm of fae until I’ve got nothing left to learn.”
“I will learn to fight even when there’s nothing left to fight for.”

Very short poetry collection. Short but still deep enough to make the reader feel what the writer wanted to say. Relfexions on feminity, love, abuse. Powerful words.

"Inside here with me,
The afreet's ghost
and the memory of feeling thin"

Accessible, modern, powerful; this poetry collection is both dreamy and painfully sincere.

"We live in a world / of unfulfilled fairytales."

I am new to poetry, new as a reader/reviewer, but my love for poetry is nothing new. I have been reading several new poets and I am blown away by this talented poet. I find myself reading certain poems over and over and each time I take away something different, that is a sure trademark of a great poet. Inspiring and very personal, exactly what I look for in a great book! I have a new favorite author, Holly Lyn Walrath. I have purchased the actual book and it is a favorite, I only buy hard copies of my favorite books! NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review Glimmerglass Girl by Holly Lyn Walrath.

Thank you to Finishing Line Press, Netgalley, and Holly Lyn Walrath for the digital ARC in exchange for an honest review.

"We live in a world of unfulfilled fairytales. You were promised... I was promised..."
"She memorizes little spaces she could hide in..."
-WOW! Just WOW!

There were a few poems that grabbed a hold of me immediately and left shivers down my spine. There were other poems that I couldn't quite grasp - as it can be with many poetry collections. When I finished this short collection and closed the book, I was, at first, dissatisfied. It was at best mediocre to me. After about 10 minutes that passed, I was surprised at the pull to pick the book up to read again.

This is definitely a collection that deserves time and thought when reading. Not one to be rushed, but to linger as to feel the appreciation of the words and imagery on the pages.

Glimmerglass Girl, by Holly Lyn Walrath, is a poetry collection that brings together the ethereal and the corporal, the extraordinary and the mundane. It is deeply, viscerally feminine in its experience yet also seems to break down the very notion of what a woman is.

In short lines of prose and halting poetic verses, sometimes with a structure reminiscent of Dickinson using dashes for line breaks - but with a darker edge to the feeling of her words, like Poe. Yet the style of this collection is far from any classic poet. Creative and contemporary, Glimmerglass Girl's vision is in the varying shapes to its poems, and the images that accompany them also lend another medium for readers to contemplate them through. But the collection's greatest power comes in the verses themselves; Walrath doesn't shy away from bringing emotional truth to her readers, with sensual descriptions that evoke images of both violence and beauty.

There is a feminist, subversive message in the poems that will (and should) cause readers to stop and contemplate, and perhaps question, their own lives, experiences - and hearts. As a woman who is also a poet & writer, and strives to understand the world through sense and experience - Glimmerglass Girl shot directly into my heart with its painful truth and fragility. The image ultimately left in my mind is the butterfly wing on its cover, and how we must look into the glass and recognize ourselves, and our own strength - in order to fly.

This thin chapbook of poems seems at once light and dark, brilliant yet incomprehensible. I read through each offering twice and came away no wiser, despite preparing myself to find meaning in the words. A poem that begins “I am night and a thousand stars hurtle through/my skin, punching through the ether” sets the reader up for a powerful experience. It’s over a few short paragraphs later, a story not tied up neatly, only words and a mental picture that creates an unsatisfactory feeling. Not unsatisfactory in a bad way – just a longing for something more to grasp, a clearer picture of sorts.

The author does have a way with words, stringing them together like a delicate necklace that has its own beauty, yet doesn’t match with anything in the closet. That is not to say it is a wasted purchase -understand that these poems may not meet with your expectations. They are an acquired taste, revealing more each time they are read. Two particular poems became my favorites: I Swallowed the Moon and Blue Cadillac. I feel that Cadillac is the most mainstream work, easily understood, with fondness for the title character (?) shining through easily. I too, remember the classic cars with wistful nostalgia, as the poem notes:

And somehow in this memory of you/your massive lines like some primordial behemoth/long since dead and buried/in ice, the very blueness of you, I may have/remembered myself, another classic beauty.

It was so easy to conjure up big fins in the Texas heat as I absorbed this poem. Images formed freely in my head, unlike some of the author’s other writings in this book. Sometimes the final lines give off a hint of sarcasm, of impropriety or dismissal; other times the end is so far away from the beginning you don’t know what to think. There is a strong undercurrent of feminism and heartbreak in the words, and at times I wondered what experiences the author had, to describe in such a way.

All and all, not the worst way to spend time reading. Poetry is more resonant with people; either you love it or hate it. This little book was pleasant to read, despite the fact that I came away from most of it confused. Read it and let me know what you think.

Glimmerglass Girl is a relatable collection with a lovely use of language. The verses are accessible and can take on a surreal quality, tinged with darkness many times throughout the collection. In particular, I am Going to Find the Unicorns was full of vivid, imagery that lingered long after the poem ended.

I also enjoyed the inclusion of the illustrations accompanying the poems, which generally can go either way for me, but was effective here and gave the verses another layer.

Will be checking out the poet’s other works on the back of this.

This was an ARC in exchange for an honest review, with thanks to Netgalley and Finishing Line Press.

Glimmerglass Girl is a collection of poems focused purely on women.
There are several themes treated like love, abuse, loneliness and even alcoholism but in all this the thing that touches most are the memories of the author herself to peep in every poem.
The poems are short but contain within them all the drama and the feeling that the author tries to express.
The format of the small volume is very nice and they alternate with the poems of the illustrations.
It is a short and fast but rather deep reading. There are poems that struck me for their intensity but others I found more superficial.
However, it remains a good collection that everyone should read.
My favourite poems:
Espejitos
Two Young Wives
She Learns How To Disappear
Wind-Up Girl
Premise of The Heart

With a mix of the personal and the fantastic, Holly Lyn Walwrath’s beautiful collection of poetry Glimmerglass Girl explores womanhood from multiple angles, revealing the ways we break apart and pull ourselves back together again. An interview with Holly will be appearing on <a href=”http://www.andreablythe.com/2018/09/11/poet-spotlight-holly-lyn-walrath-on-hybrid-writing-and-the-idea-of-femininity/”>my blog</a> next week.

“We live in a world of unfulfilled fairytales.”

I appreciate the prose and poetry of what miss Holly was trying to bring to the table in Glimmerglass girl. I didn't connect with everything but I liked the book well enough.

"When the unicorns find me, I will learn to fight even when there’s nothing left to fight for.".

100% my favorite quote from the book!!

3 and a half stars for me.