A book of poetry is a fickle thing. Some times the words flow and the author so magically is able to speak to your soul. Inside this book I did find a few that I loved, but .... Unfortunately for me this just wasn't my cup of tea.

The Voice of My Mind is a short collection of poetry by T.A. Fish. I liked the initial idea of the collection, however there were several things that put me off of it. The religious poetry didn't bother me, but it seemed very run of the mill in my opinion. The rhyme scheme was also very simplistic and felt like it limited the thoughts of the author. I felt like it would have been more beneficial to free the rhyming scheme and actually put their thoughts into a better word selection. It seemed very gimmicky to me. There was potential here, but it just didn't meet my hopes for it.

I received a copy of this from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

A short collection of poems, including spiritual and philosophy. They are mesmerizing and captivating . I love poetry and this is one of my favourites this year.

Oh, I hate to give this book a negative review because it's obvious the author put a lot of heart into these poems. However, the writing style just seemed overly simplistic to me. The rhymes are expected and there are a lot of commas where there shouldn't be commas. (I did receive an ARC, so this may be changed in the final edition, but that doesn't change the rhymes.)

Here's an example of a poem so you can see what I mean. These verses are pulled from "Toxic."

Whispering in my ear
A woman, whom I fear

Ear and fear are quite simple rhymes, and you don't need the comma between woman and whom. Later in the poem:

A kiss of poison sweets
Piercing, my hearts sheath

"Hearts" needs an apostrophe, and you don't need the comma after "piercing." Plus, this couplet doesn't have any significant meaning in relation to the rest of the poem, in my opinion. Here's one more example from the poem "Friendship."

There was a little boy,
Staring quietly, without coy.

Upon, seeing his friend,
His eyes light up, end to end.

I read this a couple times because I was waiting for it to make sense. But I can't figure out what it's trying to say. Honestly, this collection just isn't my cup of tea. The rhymes come across as trite and unnecessary, leaving me unable to connect with the content. I hate to leave a negative review, I really do. I'm sure there are readers out there who will love this collection, so my recommendation is to read some of the poems and see for yourself.

*Thank you to NetGalley for providing me with a complimentary copy of this book in exchange for a review.*

I love my poems served as raw as the Poet can, and T. A. Fish did just that with this collection.
I'm glad the publisher granted my request via Netgalley to read this book, and I know that readers would relate to and cherish a bunch of poems herein.

I’m no real fan of rhyming poetry, but TA Fish might help change that. I loved the subject matter if these verses and Fish shows a talent for arranging these words. Plenty of poetry to love in this book.

This collection of poems speaks mainly to the theme of death. This made for, at times, quite a down-beat/depressing read. There were a few poems which stood out for me: phantom, failure, whispers, the covered veil, happiness, & cloud 9. But on the whole this poetry collection didn't do it for me. This doesn't mean it's not for you! As I think if you were aware of how much of the book is about death you may pick it up in a different mindset, but I expected broader themes and more diversity of poem topics. As a non-religious person, I also found there were quite a lot of Christian references which didn't really do anything for me except make the poems less relatable. So if you're in the mood for poems about death and are happy with religious references, give this one a go and see what you think!