This was an incredibly heartfelt book of poetry. Lozada-Olivia touches on standards of beauty, being an immigrant, feminism, and acceptance of self. Beautifully written.

I have listened to her slam poetry before and I love Button Poetry. This was a whole new experience-- I absolutely loved it and would love to hear it all performed too.

Memoir in poetry form. Issues ranging form racism to gender. While Lozada-Olivia's themes are common, her direction is different than the rest. I enjoyed her perspective and media connections. Two of the poems will stay with me for a long time. One about Jessica Jones that I even shared with my wife because it was SO incredibly on point, and another about a "would you rather" game involving a tail that truly put me in my place as a light-haired white woman (the last line of the poem is still stuck to me). Definitely worth your time.

A wonderfully written book of poems! The poems capture the confusion, understanding, misunderstanding, expecting, explaining and the essence of becoming. Each poem has something to say that you've probably not heard like this before. It's real, it's raw. It's a spectacular book of poetry. The poet doesn't go into simplistic prose and expects you to rise to the poetry itself.
Wonderful poems.

Thanks to NetGalley for letting me have a digital copy of this beautiful little book in exchange of an honest review. This will be the first of many.

I got to read this book by chance. I was browsing my newsfeed on Facebook one day some months ago, and this friend shared a video of a girl reciting poetry. It was powerful. The poem that the girl read was titled 'My Spanish' according to the video's title, but now I know that it is actually called 'You Know How to Say Arroz con Pollo But Not What You Are.' For some reason that video, that girl and that poem stuck with me.

Some time later, I logged into NetGalley after many months and started browsing the poetry section in particular and voila, there was Peluda by Melissa Lozada-Oliva in the Read Now tab (this is actually my first read from NetGalley and I haven't had any request approved so far, so having it in the Read Now tab felt like a blessing). I automatically knew that this was the book of the same girl of the video. I don't remember if it was mentioned somewhere in the video, but I just knew.

I read it in just an hour, and that's because I purposely read it slowly so that I could take it all in. I have to admit that I was impressed by how many feelings I felt while reading these poems. I didn't expect to like them so much. Many of them are about body hair, hence the title Peluda ('hairy' in Spanish), and how women go through life waxing their hairs to please society, but particularly how it affected the author, obvioulsy, since she says to be quite hairy and, on top of that, she belongs to a family of beauticians that always told her that beauty is pain and she should just put up with it. She's also latina, and she makes sure to show that part of her in her poetry.

I truly believe her poems are outstanding, and it makes me think of all the people obsessed with Rupi Kaur's books when here we have much deeper and meaningful art. I do like Rupi Kaur, but her style is very simplistic and sometimes less is not more, sometimes we need to ink all our thoughts on paper and just let it all out. I felt passion in these poems. And that's the best kind of poetry that I can think of.

I really loved this book, and after reading it I plan on seeking out more of Melissa's work. New school poetry that is evocative and beautiful.

This book explores the relationship between Latina identity, femininity, body hair, body image, and family. I didn't enjoy every poem in this book, but I did enjoy most of them. It's filled with powerful poetry with a dash of humor. Nice mix of poems that are read very personal to light enjoyable reads. Even though I didn't like every poem, I did like Melissa's writing style and I will be read more poems by Melissa Lozada-Oliva.

I don't know how to express how I felt about my reading experience of this collection. Intimate would be the word. It was like reading the author's memoir in verse. Fierce, honest and so very personal - all things which made me absolutely love every single poem in this collection, making it a struggle not to connect with every word.

There were so many intricately woven themes explored in this collection from woman and their relationship with body hair, being an immigrant and the struggle of belonging, to the complexity of a mother-daughter relationship, racism, sexism and patriarchy as well as body stereotypes. The amount of diversity of themes in a mere 50 pages is definitely a feat for the author, not only because it is hard to do that but also because it is difficult for the reader to connect with all of them – something I didn’t experience while reading. I laughed, cried and experienced a plethora of other secondhand emotions wholly.

Moreover, I felt that because a theme like women's relationship with body hair was explored in relation to the author's history, it made the reading experience of it much easier to relate to and just more focused. Admittedly, some poems did felt like prose shaped like poetry by the space between the verses which for a reader like me did affect my opinion. Nevertheless, I loved this collection from a poet who had a distinct voice and delivered such strong, fierce and intimate poetry along with a tad bit of much appreciated humour.

...................................................

This is a excellent, vibrant, sparkling introduction to an important new voice in American poetry. Lozada-Oliva’s poems are smart, brave, and funny. She makes us work for it, but her rewards are generous. I can’t wait to see what she does next.

Peluda by Melissa Lozada-Oliva was quite an interesting read. I wasn’t quite sure what to expect, as I had to google the meaning of the word “peluda” before I started reading. However, the book’s description and cover piqued my interest and I had to read it. As a woman, I could appreciate many of the poems, as they uncovered those coming-of-age stories many of us keep hidden in diaries. I also learned a lot about the author through reading these poems. I saw how society’s standards of beauty have such a profound effect on women at an early age. I sympathized with her as she confessed she’d prefer growing a tail over having hair on her body. I will admit that some of the poems messages were lost on me, as I had a hard time relating or understanding what the author meant. But certain poems, like “Mami Says Have You Been Crying” reeled me in and painted vivid pictures of Melissa Lozada-Oliva’s life for me. Her poems are honest, raw, and unfiltered and I commend her for sharing these thoughts with the world. I am glad that I was able to read an ARC of Peluda through Netgalley and I recommend lovers of modern poetry to check this out. I’m glad I kept an open mind and did so, as it was cool to see the perils of growing up from the lens of another woman different from myself.

⭐⭐⭐🌟

I had never heard of this poet before, but reading this anthology made me search for videos of her performances online. This helped me appreciate this collection more as I was able to read these poems in her voice. The poems are very relatable to me as a Latina, even if they are not my usual cup of tea.

I started reading this book. with a hope to read something that was really relatable. It claims be writings of a hairy Latina girl. I hoped to find something deep, something meaningful...but I found the poems to be complex, without much reason...it did not have what it takes to had me turning pages to read more....

I received a copy of this novel from the publisher via Netgalley, in exchange for an honest review. 

I cannot fully express how grateful I am that Button Poetry allowed me to read the ARC for this book, this kindness does not in any way influence the way I feel and will talk about Peluda and the visceral experience I had while reading it.

To understand how I felt about reading this book you need to think about it as stumbling upon someone's journal, and as you read along you identify in this stranger's words feelings and thoughts so achingly familiar you wonder how you were never able to put it into words. I did not live Melissa Lozada-Oliva's life. I don't know her, and most of the things she talks about have never happened to me, or do not affect me as a Chilean woman, but that doesn't mean I haven't felt the way she has felt. It doesn't mean that the words in "Ode to Brown Girls with Bangs" don't push me into tears thinking 'yes, yes. This is exactly it'.

There is a certain touch of intimacy coming from every single one of her words. She is not sharing a universal story, a "one size fits all" (which is always a lie), but her personal flare makes her words feel even more "cercanas", familiar and something, I believe, many people will relate to.

In Peluda, Lozano-Oliva talks about gender role, stereotypes, bodies, abuse, assault, and identity sin tapujos. She tells things just the way they are, no embellishments, no apologies. In "Mami Says Have You Been Crying" Lozano-Oliva writes "remember your body / the body-- a land of feelings we've been told to cut down / we rip the things we hate / about ourselves out & hope / they grow back weaker / but hair is the only thing that grows / the way things grow in the homeland / which is why we get goosebumps when we hear Spanish at the supermarket or when a dead friend's sweater hugs us in a dream or when a kiss is planted on the back of the neck. the hair follicles click back to life." which sounds like the condensation of every word and poem and feeling in this beautiful, familiar book because we are peludas. Our hair is thick and dark, and the more and more you shave it, wax it, curse it into submission the more it comes back like a memory, like a sign. You can never fully change who you are and where you are from, and this experience might not be the same for you, it might not be the same for me, but we are united by this common thread that runs from my mother to your grandmother, and each one of our fathers, we are memories becoming history.

I 100% recommend this book to anyone who loves intimate tales, and poetry. Button Poetry writers never disappoint. They always have very distinctive voices and styles that manage to set them apart from a sea of voices, oftentimes chanting a similar story. I don't know how much will change from the ARC to the final copy of this book, but from what I've seen, it can only get better.

melissa lozada-oliva, a poet and spoken word performer whose recent work i’ve been lucky enough to read --thank you netgalley for sending it to me to read!-- is one more poet i’ll need to add to my favorites and follow.

after reading a few of her poems in peluda, which just released on september 26th, 2017, i knew i needed to research her background bc i felt her work, her narrative, her voice was so important. this meant watching some of her spoken word performances on button poetry, and WOW. how have i not heard of her or her pieces before!? (was especially enamored by her poem based after ocean vuong, who i adore!) this book of poetry is a keeper, reflecting lozada-oliva’s unapologetic thoughts and feelings when it comes to her experiences as a young latina woman with immigrant parents.

here’s one of her spoken word pieces called ‘my spanish’, and titled ‘you know how to say arroz con pollo but not what you are’ in peluda: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fE-c4Bj_RT0

Wow. I am stunned. This is one of the books I want to carry with me everywhere I go. It is both a comfort and a little irritation that reminds you of your worth and your struggles. I loved every poem in this. They are eloquent, funny, painful, just perfect. It is my honest opinion that this is one of the books that can make a better person ou of you, braver and fiercer. I feel like challenging the world after reading this.

Beautiful poetry from Melissa Lozada-Olivia all about the intersection of her Hispanic heritage and how she fits in America. She tells about her life and her parents' sacrifices and experiences. Absolutely wonderful.

I did not have any previous experience with Oliva-Lozada's work, but I found that she is a very talented poet. She has a very unique take on being a Latina woman and it makes her poems all the more rich.

This book of poetry focuses on themes such as identity, belonging and self esteem. The poems are both personal and political, and above all very feminist. They would probably be much better live, but they are still good to read.

poems that bristle and bite

mami does not understand why you like holes
in your shoes, in your tights, in your gloves.
what did you want to seep through, brown girl
with bangs? a song not written about you?
really, you were being a seamstress
just like your abuela in the living room making
skirts out of curtains, just making adjustments,
just making holes in places your new skin
was supposed to be.
(“Ode to Brown Girls With Bangs”)

i don’t know if i feel in love
feel beautiful
or just feel
maybe we all need some rest
(“Self-Portrait With Historical Moments”)

I was so excited about this book that I did something I rarely do – namely, brave Adobe Digital Editions to read an ARC. (It is forever crashing my machine, okay.) Lately I’ve been digging poetry more and more and, between the book’s stunning cover and the rave early reviews, I just knew I’d love peluda. And I did! I mean, I do!

Growing up, I always felt weird and awkward and hairy – hairier than most of the other girls around me, anyway, the popular ones in particular. Okay, so maybe I’m one of the white girls Lozada-Oliva writes about in “Yosra Strings Off My Mustache Two Days After the Election in a Harvard Square Bathroom” –

the ones who don’t shave
for political reasons, the ones who took
an entire election cycle to grow
out a tuft of armpit hair

– which is to say my Italian-German self is only “hairy” when held up to modern beauty standards, e.g., not terribly hairy at all. Maybe I can’t really relate. Even so. I adored all of the twenty-one poems that make up peluda just the same.

Over on her Facebook page, Lozada-Oliva describes peluda as “my yellow chapbook about my hairy latina feels,” which seems as apt a description as any. Lozada-Oliva tackles such weighty topics as beauty, assimilation, racist microaggressions, sex, shame, depression/metal health stigma, alienation, George Zimmerman, and, yes, body hair: clumps and heads and volumes and rivers of hair. Melissa’s Guatemalan immigrant mother Josefina was/is a beautician, so her schooling started early. Her words radiate with ferocity and hunger and wit that doesn’t cut so much as claw and devour.

There’s so much to love here, but one piece really stands out: “Wolf Girl Suite,” which is really a story told in five acts. With all the elements of a feminist horror flick, I am aching to see this one adapted for the screen. Coming to a theater near you, Halloween 2021?

“Ode to Brown Girls With Bangs,” “You Use Your Hands So Much When You Talk,” “You Know How to Say Arroz con Polla but Not What You Are,” “What If My Last Name Got a Bikini Wax, Too,” and “We Play Would You Rather at the Galentine’s Day Party” are other favorites too. But they’re all pretty great.

fyi, there are a number of videos of Melissa Lozada-Oliva’s spoken word poetry up on YouTube, and it’s even more powerful in person. Lozada-Oliva’s delivery is sometimes surprisingly funny, with a dark sense of humor that isn’t always – plainly? – evident in written form (at least not to me, anyhow). Search for “Like Totally Whatever” and “How To Survive The Zombie Apocalypse As An 82 year old Guatemalan Grandma” for a real treat.

https://youtu.be/me4_QwmaNoQ

https://youtu.be/x-Y9zgOSUnk


TABLE OF CONTENTS
Origin Regimen
Maybe She’s Born With It, Maybe She Got Up Early
Ode to Brown Girls With Bangs
Lip / Stain / Must / Ache
I’m Sorry, I Thought You Were Your Mother
You Use Your Hands So Much When You Talk
AKA What Would Jessica Jones Do?
You Know How to Say Arroz con Polla but Not What You Are
My Hair Stays on Your Pillow Like a Question Mark
What If My Last Name Got a Bikini Wax, Too
The Women in My Family Are B****es
I Shave My Sister’s Back Before Prom
We Play Would You Rather at the Galentine’s Day Party
Wolf Girl Suite
It’s Funny the Things That Stick With You
Mami Says Have You Been Crying
Self-Portrait With Historical Moments
Light Brown Noise
I’m So Ready
House Call
Yosra Strings Off My Mustache Two Days After the Election in a Harvard Square Bathroom