This was a great poetry book. I always absolutely enjoy her work and I can't wait to read more in the near future. I highly recommend it.

This was a beautiful collection of poetry. I would not say it was the best I have read but it definitely was not the worst. I would be interested in reading more by this author.

This collection is incredible. I own the author’s other collections and couldn’t wait to get this new one. It did not disappoint. Mature, unique, beautiful writing that touched my soul.

The poems are short and long (both versions)

Her work is very similar to that found on her Instagram account

I related so much to this collection of poems.
Thank you so much for the copy!
I bought a copy for my best friend!

The reason I picked this book because I read the other Malee’s book “The Day is Ready For You” and enjoyed it. Her writing is beautiful as always. But again with poetry, some poetry is relatable for me, some doesn’t. However the whole book itself is beautiful.

I enjoy reading Alison Malee’s poetry and felt the urge to check this one out after flying through The Day is Ready for You. Luckily, I was not disappointed.

I liked the idea of rebuilding one's life through poems. I loved the part about adolescence, I saw myself between the lines, I found interesting and moving parts. Unfortunately I have not experienced as many changes and things as the author, so on many things I have not had direct experience, but I can say anyway that I was happy to have read about certain topics and situations. I recommend this book to everyone, especially to people who has to face great changes in life.

I enjoyed this read tremendously. Beautiful words, excellent images played along my head while reading. Some sad, some happy, and all beautifully written,

I feel like this was just not the right time to read this book. The poems are okay, many of them even reminded me of my own style of writing, but I couldn't catch anything that made my heart flutter or my mind expand.
I felt like poems were either too "complex" as in, full of images that didn't necessarily have a clear connection; or they were too simple, like narration that overexplains.
Also, one thing that I found destabilising is that there seem to be different layouts for poems, and to me, that didn't contribute to the cohesion necessary for a poem collection.

I'm sorry, I wasn't moved. It didn't string any chord within me.

I really liked this collection! It resonated a lot with me when Malee speaks of her family and her experiences meeting biological family. I did think there could have been more of a rhythm or sections of the book as I felt like it went back and forth between self love, family, romantic love, and back and forth. But overall I loved the poems and this collection.

Alison Malee never disappoints honestly. Her poetry is so raw and relatable. I really enjoyed how this collection was broken up into different themed sections.

What a gift. This crisp, lucid collection features the kind of poetry I want to read again and again. Malee took me back to my first brush with e. e. cummings ("nobody, not even the rain, has such small hands"). I look forward to many more hours in this book, relearning and enjoying anew the pleasures that words have to offer us.

“a poem starts with someone sifting / through the remains of / what makes them human” – Alison Melee

This is the Journey was a great poetry collection filled with various imagery and emotions. I loved how care-free the poems were while still having important themes. Attention was given to making each poem read smoothly and with a variety of words that embraced each other on the page. There’s so much heart and thought placed into this collection.

Melee has a way of using even the most mundane words and making them spark in her poetry. Even her one sentence phrases made me stop and soak in all the feelings. She is definitely one of the modern poets who knows how to make poetry work without over-complicating it.

“nothing haunts me like the lives I could have led”

It’s the perfect collection for poetry lovers who like being immersed into a world of emotions and new concepts. I think even people who only vaguely like poetry will also be able to appreciate what Melee brings to the page.

* Thank you NetGalley for providing me with this arc in exchange for an honest review.

I was really looking forward to reading this book, but I am a little disappointed. The poems got a little repetitive after a few times. I like self empowering poems as much as the next person, but reading over a hundred pages of nothing but "you're beautiful, you're amazing" becomes nauseating. There were some poems that were truly amazing, but most of it deeply disappointed me.

Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher I was able to read this book in exchange for an honest review.
***
Beautiful collection of poetry.
Alison Malee’s powerful words recount family, love, heartbreak and living the day to day to day in wonderful prose. Some are longer than others but even the shortest of her poems are powerful and moving. This is my first time reading her but I look forward to finding her earlier work and reading it all.

This is a fine and nice collection of poems which, unfortunately, in my case did not meet its ideal reader.
I don't say I didn't like these poems. I appreciate the topics it touches, the strong presence of the poetess, the struggles throughout her life, the way the collection is structured, the journey she herself took and the journey she took the readers to with her. I don't know if it's the style of the poems, the way she expresses herself (these are very subjective things, and many times I find myself not really liking someone's style, even though I can't really out M finger on why exactly I feel that way. I might even appreciate it on a rational level - like in this case.), or that I couldn't really relate (maybe because my experience of life is different), but I felt a bit detached.
This in no way indicates that it's not a great book, that these are not great poems. They are. They're just not for me.

It's a wonderful poetry collection, touching upon multiple topics. As usual, it was some poems I enjoyed more than others, but that's more of a personal preference rather than about quality.

This Is the Journey is my first Alison Malee compilation that I've read and I'm glad that I picked this one up. Alison Malee's writing is so beautifully endearing. Her collection titled, This Is the Journey, really takes you on a journey of all kinds of emotion a person would feel. Her writing not only lets you get an insight into her own world, but it also lets you reflect on your own. Having read her work gave me a new sense of direction & understanding of life's complexities.

Putting your own thoughts & sentiments onto poetry and prose is difficult but Alison Malee executed it splendidly. I will definitely be on the lookout for her future work, and in celebration of World Poetry Day, I really recommend this collection.

This is the Journey is a lovely collection of poetry. I love Alison Malee's vulnerability in her writing. There were many lines that I just had to sit with for a while, because they spoke so deeply to me.

This is the Journey van Alison Malee is the first book I review on my new blog.

In my opinion this book perfectly fits reading during Lent. It contains beautiful poems and sentences. With those Alison Malee tells over the process of stopping to look at the past, present and future with wonder, curiosity and resignation.

learning to catch fireflies with honey instead of hands. this is the journey.

She invites you to look at your own life and journey in this way. Dare to stop in your tracks during the journey you make in your life. Dare to see where it has brought you so far.