It was an 'okay' read for me. Some of the poems were lovely, some were too simple but got to me anyway, and some of them were forgettable. However, I genuinely appreciate the overall message of this collection and I'm glad I stumbled upon it.

Also, I have to say, I absolutely love the design and the cover of the book.

Not quite my type of poetry. I'm sure there is an audience out there for it though.

This was an okay collection of poetry, but it regularly fell into a trap that I find problematic as a reader-- it told me what to do.
That may seem like a strange thing to react negatively to-- isn't a lot of the point of poetry to try to inspire change?-- so I'll explain what I'm getting at. Many of the poems provided a snapshot of life, an observation, presented a problem, and then it told me how to feel about it or what I should do or change. It did this directly, sucking any subtlety out of the writer/reader exchange. I don't like that because it kind of goes against how poetry is supposed to work. Poetry is supposed to be subtle, to explore the beauty of language in addition to the themes it explores, so when a poem just tells me what to think or do, it's really falling into the classic trap of telling instead of showing. I wanted Taplin to present an idea or problem or scene and show me what is right or wrong, and then give me the opportunity to feel and react and want to respond accordingly. This is poetry, not a persuasive essay with a thesis statement.
There were some gems throughout the collection-- it's not like he fell into this trap on every poem-- but many of the less-problematic poems still were fairly run-of-the-mill, failing to take the chance to explore their themes with beautiful language and organization on the page or the like. The best poems showed me that Taplin certainly has the potential to be a very good poet, he just hasn't gotten there yet. Hopefully being a "social-media sensation" doesn't hold him back from realizing where his writing can improve and taking the steps to get there.

I love poetry and have really come to appreciate the saddening truths they hold within them. Brutally honest, these poems and prose are some of the most moving I have read. Primarily inspired by the death of Beau's grandmother, we can see common used themes of love and death/loss throughout. We also get the feel of changes in relationships in some of the poems with the reoccurrence of loneliness, trust, friendships, forgiveness and longing.



I loved how inspired by the cover, roses were used throughout the book from petals on the cover to inside on pages for a background against popping white text.



A powerful use of language in every piece, I was gripped, relating to so many situations discussed throughout and so glad I chose to review this book as I will be looking out for more of Beau's amazing work.



Many thanks to the publishers for allowing me to review this book for them!