As an anatomy nerd, this poetry just made me happy, even on the topic of heartbreak.. Would recommend

Honestly, I think with this book, I got exactly what I was hoping for. It contains short but hard-hitting poems that really reminders you of a lot of things you already know and practice. And a gentle nudge to start practising them if you haven't already. Each poem follows a description of a bone in the human body. As someone with an Anatomy degree, it was quite interesting to read the authors take on the strength and importance of these small bones. It relates to the poems that cover love, passion, death, sadness, gender and vulnerability.
Whilst a lot of the concepts presented in this collection is not new. It holds its importance by serving as a reminder to treat yourself and others around you with love.

"i think we write about ourselves so we can become creatures"

Walrath's poetry collection was short but impactful. her choice to group the poems in sections based on different bones in the body felt unique and i especially loved the pages where she introduced these bones; mixing up anatomical descriptions with powerful poetry.

this poetry collection felt insightful, meaningful and unique with a beautiful cover, and it's one i would love to revisit to find even more meaning in.

"hiding our hearts is easy when we have so many bones"

“𝘱𝘢𝘪𝘯 𝘪𝘴 𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘴 𝘩𝘶𝘮𝘢𝘯 𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘩𝘰𝘶𝘵 𝘪𝘵 𝘸𝘦 𝘸𝘰𝘶𝘭𝘥 𝘣𝘦 𝘴𝘬𝘦𝘭𝘦𝘵𝘰𝘯𝘴”

I don’t read much poetry, and most of the poetry I’ve read was for school and written by old white dead dudes. But when it comes to modern day poetry I have discovered that it is not men, but women who have set the bar.

I requested an eARC of 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗦𝗺𝗮𝗹𝗹𝗲𝘀𝘁 𝗼𝗳 𝗕𝗼𝗻𝗲𝘀 because I couldn’t stop thinking about it’s stunning cover. I am happy to say the content within is just as good. Holly Lynn Walrath is definitely going to turn heads in the world of poetry with her artful words.

Poetry is unique in that you can give a room full of people the same piece, and each one of them would extract a different meaning based off their own life experiences and view of the world around them.

Our bones are white, structure, strength… But in between it is darkness, void, vulnerable. Life, death, love, sexuality, identity, ghosts all make themselves present… Holly’s words take the reader into these dark spaces with a haunting and raw exploration of everything we hold inside.

𝙎𝙩𝙪𝙣𝙣𝙞𝙣𝙜. 𝙋𝙤𝙞𝙜𝙣𝙖𝙣𝙩. 𝙊𝙧𝙞𝙜𝙞𝙣𝙖𝙡.

If you’re looking for your first or next work of poetry, The Smallest of Bones is an excellent choice.

I really wanted to like this, as I was absolutely compelled by the synopsis and thought that it was truly refreshingly brilliant. But unfortunately I just did not get it. I do not know if it simply did not translate well (in my brain) or why there was such a disconnect. I do think the cover was beautiful, and I do appreciate the authors just out of the box sort of thinking and imagination and do plan on reading more from them in the future in hopes that I do find something that I feel a bit more connected to. I really appreciate the opportunity to have read this.

Inspired by anatomy books, _The Smallest of Bones_ is a collection of short poems about love, relationships, death, and body acceptance. Each poem intertwines these subjects with the haunting images of blood, flesh, and bones.
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I enjoyed reading these poems. Each one was short, but most if not all were very impactful. I found the breakdown of this book interesting. The excerpts about the different bones were interesting, and I feel like it set up each section nicely.

If you enjoy poetry with a haunting aspect, I would recommend this book to you.


Thank you NetGalley and CLASH Books for the ARC.

I'm sorry, I just didn't "get" it. I really didn't feel intelligent enough for this and I can only apologise to the author for trying to read it when I know poetry isn't my thing. I'm trying to get more into it but I think it's time to accept that my brain isn't very good at understanding metaphors. I did enjoy the sections about the different bones though! I've not left a numbered rating on Goodreads, so as not to skew the review with my confused opinion!

Thank you NetGalley and the publisher for providing me an ARC of this book in exchange for my review. All opinions are my own

I loved the use of anatomy as a diving off point for this poetry collection. I think that’s a fantastic idea that I’d love to see used more.

However I expected this collection to be more macabre. Clearly that was my mistake I. Assuming so. But because of that I feel like my enjoyment was impacted.

I still recommend you give this poetry book a try. Poetry is extremely personal and this collection may resonate more deeply with you then it did with me.

The poems in each section of this book read like one larger piece, while also standing alone as glimpses into someone else's story. It was a refreshing and interesting way to approach a poetry collection, and the poems bled smoothly out of section introductions that described the bones in focus: cranium, mandible, sternum, and so forth. The mix of technical detail and poetry gave the poems that followed each intro greater depth.

I was immediately intrigued by The Smallest of Bones due to the horror genre and the cover (just being honest). This is a poetry collection focused on the skeleton that keeps our human selves together. With each piece starting with an overview of a specific bone, this collection is unlike anything I've read before.

Holly Lyn Walrath takes all of the pieces that make up our bodies and weaves them through dreams, nightmares, trauma, gender, and accepting the skin we're in. Each piece feels precise and intentional, stemming from fact, which was a satisfying experience. This quick read is heavy hitting and allows the reader to savor each line.

The Smallest of Bones is easy to read, meaning it's for both poetry newbies and experts. I think there's something for almost anyone in this deliciously dark set of work.

There are definitely some really good poems in this collection but I found most of them were either over simplistic or completely over my head (disclaimer: I don't read that much poetry so this could be entirely my fault).

I found the middle sections of this book to be the most rewarding but they kind of lost me at the end - even though it's a short read. It felt like the themes were all jumping around without ever really sticking to a clear point of view. Some of my favourite parts were actually the section divider/explanation pages were Walrath focuses on a specific bone of the body. These pages felt the most concise and hard-hitting for me personally.

Overall, I loved the concept and I don't necessarily think there are any bad poems in it, there is just a clear divide between the strong ones and the weak ones. I'm excited to read more of Walrath's poetry in the future!

Thank you Netgalley & Clash for the review copy!

This is a hell of a book. The walking tour through the bones, which starts as a common grass Wikipedia entry and darkens as it progresses into the weight and evidence of physical abuse in a female body is very very harrowing, and I found it an incredibly effective recourse. Those prose poems are some of the best of the book and situated the briefer pieces in a broader context, preparing the reader for the horror, for those of us that write "to become creatures", who would "chose to be violent" if it was possible. I think there's something very impactful about this (1) not being a recovery book ["come back to haunt me/ i don't want to think about/ what i mean without you/ what kind of woman that makes me"] and (2) tracing regardless the workings of abuse, the slow shaping of the bones, the repeated lesions on the same bone, the way will ultimately bends under the hands of other body. It reminds me vaguely in tone of a chapbook by Hannah V Warren, but sets itself apart by its approach, the clinical beginning of the prose poems that unravels with the shorter poems and cements us in a warped consciousness.

That said, while I really enjoyed this book, the amount of blank pages felt thoughtless, which disappointed. Since it's such a small manuscript really, it felt like space was used as a "filler" instead of giving it meaning. It took me out of the reading constantly. However, that doesn't mean I won't be returning to this book. Thank you so much CLASH Books and Netgalley for allowing me to read this ARC!

For such a short book, The Smallest of Bones packed a punch. I loved that each section was broken up with prose poems about different types of bones, and the way the poems of each section almost felt like segments brought together to form a bigger whole.

Genre: Poetry

Release Date: Expected 26th September 2021

Publisher: CLASH Books



The Smallest of Bones is unique collection of small poems with a chilling and somewhat ethereal undertone throughout. Covering topics such a love, relationships, and heartbreak in such a shattering tone, then jumping into the subjects of sexuality, queerness, gender and identity and of course death, ghosts and bones.

"If you strip me down to my bones, am i yours?"

This collection was intimate peek into the thoughts and soul of somebody on a jouney of painful self acceptance and reflection. In a dark, constantly moving style that isn't for everyone - it isn't written in perfect stanzas and is in that beautifully disjointed modern style that feels more like a trailing, confusing thought than a standard poem but so much more visually enchanting. Jumping between hauntingly beautiful and viscerally crude and raw, this was difficult and dark at times - especially if you're sensitive to repetitive references to blood and bones.

While these poems may be shadowy, this honestly powerful collection offers a brief glimmer of light in the darkness for anyone who is trying to learn about who they are down to the smallest of bones.

RATING: ⭐⭐⭐⭐

Thank you to Holly Lyn Walrath, Clash Books and Netgalley for this ARC in return for an honest review.

This book was middle of the road for me. Not great, but worth the read. I liked the cadence of the sections, but the poems felt a bit rudimentary.

Holly Lyn Walrath's 'The Smallest of Bones' is a beautiful collection of poetry. Walrath writes an intimate and honest reflection on love, heartbreak, identity, and more. Holy provides a beautiful and dark homage to the powerful emotions that hide within the crevices of our bones. Each word is written magically and with a ravishing desire to explore each and every experience that the human body stores. A truthful and powerful journey worth reading!!

This poetry collection is, while short, an impactful read. It melds together facts, figures, and oddities of the human skeleton and serves as a shell for a serving of emotional experience. It isn't often that you find a collection that you want to reread, but for The Smallest of Bones, I would want to revisit this experience more than once.

Special shout out to the cover art of this book - Stunning! Very eye catching and beautiful. One of the reasons I initially looked into this collection.

Now for the review,

The Smallest of Bones can only be described as dark, confusing, and very abstract. I won't say i'm an expert on poetry and what is good or not, but this collection was...weird. The themes within the collection was what enticed me at first glance and upon reading I was intrigued by the formatting of the poems and the content. Each section begins with a short explanation of a different bone in the body and it's functions, and then said bones are interweave into the section of poetry to follow. I really enjoyed that set up. The formatting was something that was left to be desired - especially when reading it in a online format. I recommend reading a hard copy version if possible. It was very difficult to decipher what was meant to be in what order due to the way it was formatted.

As for the poems themselves I found most of them to be beautifully written in a strange way, but I just didn't connect with them at all. I was excited because every previous review I saw before I read there was mentions of everything I love in poetry, but ultimately it just didn't hook me. I did mention I am not an expert on poetry so I'm sure others will enjoy this collection and find the connection that I was unable to have.

Overall, The Smallest of Bones is a quick read and a very strange collection of poems that focus on topics like queerness, sexuality, ghosts, and many more very important topics that will either resonate fully with you or leave you with a sense of confusion at what you just read. Read it yourself and find out where you fall.

Special Thanks to Netgalley for sharing this digital reviewer copy with me in exchange my honest opinion.

A collection of tiny horror poems sometimes reminding me of Carmen Maria Machado's prose in Her Body and Other Parties depicting themes of body, love, sexuality, queerness, gender identity, and horror elements like ghosts, demons, dreamscapes, and visceral images. The poet has taken inspiration from certain bones of human body such as sacrum, sternum, skull, spine, etc. and blends biology, horror, and raw emotions in the poems. Poetry review is almost always subjective. It's hard not to feel a certain glee when you discover hidden gems like this. Especially for a reader of horror novels. The poems sometimes digress from the central bone-emotion metaphoric pairs to other imageries and that is a flaw I found in this collection.

It's a common knowledge that the Victorians amplified the art of grief, bereavement, and the macabre. I remember reading about tear catchers and memento mori for a drawing couple of years ago. The birds in the rib cage on the cover page intone that age when mortality was seen, celebrated, and lived with grace and collective reverence. Thanks to Netgalley for this ARC for an early review.

"I think we write about ourselves so we can become creatures"

This was a very unique book of poetry in the way it was shaped and in the way it was presented. I loved loved loved the bones part, and that's what makes this a unique collection. My favourite thing about the book might actually be the introductions to every section, and how there was a general or etymological explanation on the bones and then linking them to deeper topics, generally on women. There was mention of sexuality, violence, gender, trauma, grief, the body... it felt very dark at times. My favourite section was the one titled "Spine"; both the introduction and the poems in that part were the ones that resonated the most with me.

"the very preciousness of you
beside me and sleeping

god I love the things I hate"

There were some parts I thoroughly enjoyed, but also some that didn't make much sense. I get that this is what modern poetry has become, sometimes more about the aesthetic than the actual content at times, and not even the meaning but the structure. Maybe the one problem with this was that the synopsis didn't match the contents that much. The idea was so good! But it ended up being quite an average read in terms of the poems themselves. Nevertheless, it is a very original collection and it's conceived beautifully, and I enjoyed reading it.