This is underwhelming. It took approximately 20 minutes to read, and I was expecting more…terror? It wasn’t horror-poetry as I was expecting, and instead only left me missing my cat.

There are a few poems I liked. The Joy of Traveling, Goldilocks and the Three Bears, and Cats in Space were all good. And I really enjoyed all the poems in the Childhood Tales section.

As a whole, I did enjoy the book, but I wouldn’t buy a finished copy.

A really enjoyable collection of poetry that was so surreal and had such a magical feel to them, it is definitely a collection that I will read many times. I look forward to reading more by the author

I got an ARC of this book.

I don't get it. At all. It took all of 10-15 minutes to read, but I have no idea what I just read. Sometimes that is exciting, but this time, I just won't remember this book. The cover is amazingly cool, but inside is a mystery to me.

This was a fairly quick read with punchy little poems that felt more in line with fairy tales then chilling horror. I'm not a huge fan of poetry, but the collection was still an enjoyable afternoon read featuring classic monsters, fairytales and a bit of feminism.

ARC received from NetGalley

This collection delights in the misunderstood, putting a new spin on werewolves, basilisks, sirens, ghosts, aliens, pandemics, fairy tales and myths. Sng gives new voice to classic heroines and the result is terrifying, magical, and fantastic. Don't miss it!

Christina Sng warns you from her dedication about how brief she'll be - this writing style took me a couple poems to get into, but once I got it, I got it. It seems like a fun game to her to figure out how concise she can be and still get a point across, and she plays the game well. I often found myself stunned at how moved I was from so few words. I experienced so many emotions while reading this: melancholy from the poems on death and change and mourning, joy from the nods to childhood tales, and speculative (of course) from the pieces on life after aliens or life after sun-death (I say 'of course' because Interstellar Flight Press specializes in speculative literature). If you like space, cats, fairy tales, and creepy dead things, this is the book for you! I'd definitely recommend it to anyone who's new to and/or intimidated by poetry as well. I can't wait to pick up a physical copy when this comes out in a month!

Thank you NetGalley, Christina Sng, and Interstellar Flight Press for the free advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

I think this poetry collection would appeal to fans of amanda lovelace or sci fi fans who want to try poetry. My favorite poems were “Escape” and a “A Better World.”

The repeated separated pacing of the poems and the fairy tale references turned a little stale and gimmicky after a while. Both the formats and the fairy tale references worked well as literary devices in the beginning, but the repetition of them to this extent made them lose punch and meaning slightly.

Although some of the poems struggled to stick the landing for me, they make up a really interesting collection of poems that tell the stories of humanity's grief and hubris, from the beginning of life to the end of humanity somewhere out in the universe making it well worth a read.

I'll be the first to admit that I'm no fan of poetry, in fact I more or less hate it.

I'm happy to report that I enjoyed reading this, a collection of short, sharp, dark and humorous poems.
That's not to say I liked every single poem but as a whole it's a great collection and different to boot.
Each chapter contains similarly themed poems, which is a nice touch. I also enjoyed that they included takes on famous writings and movies.
The only issue was that it was such a quick read.
A surprisingly entertaining collection of short, dark poetry.

This book was difficult for me because I think the author wanted to use brevity to be poignant but rather it just said nothing. The concept was interesting and important, but if really felt like Instagram poetry. I noticed that many of the poems in the collection have won awards, so I probably am not the best source for an opinion. I think where this collection suffered for me is because I recently read a collection of Edna St. Vincent Millay's poetry that deals a lot with grief and it was just done better.

Rating: 3,5/5
The Gravity of Existence by Christina Sng is a poetry collection centred around the supernatural and scary.
This was such a quick read, I literally flew through it in less than twenty minutes. I kind of wish that some of the poems had been longer, because I loved the ideas in them, but there just wasn’t enough of most of them to really make them stick in my opinion. This collection most definitely is unlike most other poetry collections I’ve read, but I found myself always wanting a little bit more than I was given by these poems. (I am aware that that was probably the intention, but it made the whole book feel a little unsatisfactory to me.) I do want to highlight my favourite part of this collection, which was the chapter ‘The Enlightenment of Science’.
I’d recommend this collection if you’re interested both in poetry and fantasy/sci-fi, because it’s such a quick read and still has some really interesting bits in it.

This was a quick and easy read. I was really curious to see how the themes of horror/supernatural would merge with poetry, but I didn’t enjoy it as much as I thought I would. The poems were not for me: I felt like most of them were way too short and felt flat because of their length, as they were often too concise to be meaningful. I am mainly drawn to the lyrical aspect of poetry, which I couldn’t really find in this collection. Overall, while I enjoyed some poems, this collection was not for me.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me an eARC in exchange for an honest review

3.5*

This is my first Christina Sng, and I’m very excited to get to more of her work. However, I wasn’t a fan of the first half/third of this collection. The science fiction poetry at the end was glorious, and honestly, I’d love a full collection like that. I feel the poetry in the middle (the princess poems) didn’t show enough of the beauty of her words.

I still recommend this book, and I will be picking up more of Sng’s poetry collections!

Thanks to NetGalley and Interstellar Flight Press for this advanced review copy!

I was offered this collection of poems as an ARC via NetGalley and read them all in one sitting. These tiny poems were intriguing and for the most part incredibly dark. Many are thought provoking and in very few words leave vivid imagery behind such as her "Mass Murders". This little collection could be dipped into whenever you want to spend a few minutes to give yourself a shiver as Sng creates whole eerie worlds in a few lines. I applaud the ability to create such nuance with such brevity!

This book is an incredible collection of poetry. One section retells fairy tales in haiku, and several lean on elements of horror. All around, this was extremely special and well-done.

I'll be putting a review for this up this coming Friday.

I am not a big poetry reader, but I was intrigued by the Sci-fi genre which is my favoured read. I loved this collection. I was amazed at how with so few words these poems allow meds whole Sci-fi stories to unfold in my imagination. They are all so thoughtfully put together, entertaining and thought provoking and many made me smile with their quiet humour. Thank you to Intersteller Press and NetGalley for the ARC. The views expressed are all mine, freely given.

This collection of poetry, while stunning in its imagery, is too brief to completely engage the reader. This is, however, mostly a personal preference. I enjoy longer form poetry, especially when the author is presenting so many intriguing ideas. Haiku is a difficult poetry form to write in and in my opinion a difficult form to read, despite how easy and fast it is to read. I have no doubt, however, that these poems will be thoroughly appreciated by the right audience, it’s just unfortunate that that audience doesn’t include me.

Thank you to the author and NetGalley for providing me with this e-ARC in exchange for an honest review.

My thanks to NetGalley, who provided me with a free copy of this collection in exchange for an honest review.

This collection of minimalist speculative poems -- haiku, tanka and other brief forms -- joyfully tests the limits of what can be done with few words. Opening with a dark SF haibun, Christina Sng quickly shifts focus to horror (three sections), followed by mostly dark SF (two sections) and a very dark SF section for "The End."

In most cases, the haiku and tanka are presented in titled groups, forming a loosely-constructed longer poem from items previously published elsewhere. This works remarkably well, although the haiku especially become more like stars in a constellation than stanzas in a narrative work. The reader may visit them in any order, picking up resonances between them. Other haiku and tanka appear separately titled, with the titles intrinsic to their meanings. These didn't work quite as well for me, possibly because I'm not used to haiku with titles.

As one would expect from a haiku / scifaiku poet, Sng's vision is precise and frequently bleak. Some of the longer poems have distinct "punch lines," though these are never clichés. This is a generously-sized collection, but I found myself reading most of it in a single sitting. Well-crafted scifaiku, it seems, are a bit like potato chips.

Recommended for readers of both mainstream haiku and speculative poetry, or poetry-shy SF / H fans looking to broaden their horizons.

The Gravity of Existence is collection of poems by Christina Sng.

I’m not a regular poetry reader but I enjoyed these. It’s a great collection as there’s some very thoughtful and intense poetry, which is mixed in with more confusing poems. I especially loved the poems that were more fantastical and magical, as they were more engaging.

Overall, a wonderful collection of poems that I enjoyed reading.

A hauntingly beautiful exploration of emotions and space.
Christina Sng has crafted this book masterfully, with each piece more striking than the last. She truly is the queen of SFF haiku.
If you love poetry and want to dip your toe in the speculative genre, this book is 100% for you.