I’m a huge fan of Nicole Oquendo, & I have loved everything published by Bone & Ink Press. This collection is, like many of Oquendo’s chapbooks, a themed collection of hybrid work (I’ve taken to calling their work “proems” because they live in the liminal space between poetry, prose, & magic spell/invocation).
Reviews & Posts
The Loneliest Show on Earth
This book is really unique — it’s one big fabulist poem, separated into movements, kind of reminiscent of Erin Belieu’s Black Box. The overall conceit is a circus show, the idea of “running away to join the circus” & each movement examines recurring themes, like desire, identity, & loss — specifically, the loss of an insular community — your own band of circus performers.
Many Restless Concerns (A Testimony): The Victims of Countess Bathory Speak in Chorus
Is Many Restless Concerns a conceptual literary work? Collection of threaded persona poems? Historical-fiction-in-verse? Narrative poem? All these definitions are accurate, & none capture completely what Many Restless Concerns “is.”
sensorium
You know that one book that knocks the air out of your lungs? The one that teaches you all sorts of things on a craft level, & makes you grind your jaw in utter admiration & (respectful) envy because you wish you’d written it? The one that makes you determined that the next thing you write is going to be *on their level*? You know that book?
Yeah. This is THAT book.
The Vertigo Tarot
Anything that brings together Rachel Pollack, Neil Gaiman, and Dave McKean can’t go wrong, and this deck showcases that. The forward by Gaiman is everything you’d expect and want to read, affirming the idea that creativity and the occult are symbiotic entities that bring forth new ideas, new narratives, and new perspectives.
The Asylum Oracle
** spoiler alert ** This is easily my favorite oracle deck, and it’s both friendly and accessible to readers at any stage, whether or not you’re already familiar with Emilie Autumn’s music or Asylum world.
Les Vampires Oracle
If you’re a fan of the artwork of Jasmine Becket-Griffith, then you’re probably already aware that this is one of many Blue Angel decks (often paired with a Lucy Cavendish guidebook, though sometimes with other collaborators) that use Becket-Griffith’s artwork to approach different Oracle deck themes.
The Fantod Pack
This is a very small 20 card Edward Gorey oracle deck — ostensibly created by Madame Groeda Weyrd, a Finnish/Egyptian divinator and author of Floating Tambourines and The Future Speaks Through Entrails.
So, basically, *exactly* what you’d expect of an Edward Gorey oracle deck.
Sorrow
No one — and I mean NO ONE — writes a messy love story and human reconciliation quite like Tiffanie De Bartolo. This author has had my heart since the 90’s, when Dream for an Insomniac came out. For every decade of my life, Tiffanie DeBartolo has given me a book to help me get through the euphoric highs and soul-crushing lows of love, friendship, figuring out what you want, and understanding how to forgive those who hurt you, and how to forgive yourself for those you’ve hurt. In her body of work, love is an unavoidable, glorious mess that well-meaning people make, and it’s also the exact thing that becomes their saving grace.
The Buckland Romani Tarot
This is one of my older tarot decks, a deck that was gifted to me by a friend. Since they gave it to me, the original edition (2001) has gone out of print and has become quite rare and expensive, definitely a collector’s edition. It is also one of the most beautiful and interesting decks in my collection, one I enjoy working with for personal readings as well as reading for others.