I loved the writing and the use of nature to describe certain aspects of life. However I couldn't connect with the poems and found some of them a bit hard to understand.
Conyer Clayton clearly put her heart and soul into these so I still recommend the collection.

*3.5/5
This was an interesting collection to say the least. A lot of it, in my opinion, was kinda forgettable. The shorter poetry wasn't that great but the few long poems were really good and overall I'm just really confused about my feelings after reading this.

*I received an ARC via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. Thanks for the free poetry collection.*

I'm sorry to say that, but I couldn't really connect to the majority of the poems. I don't know if it was me, the language or that I was lacking context, but I felt mostly neutral or slightly puzzled about the poems. Maybe I didn't get them because they were too enigmatic, the metaphors too weird and strange, or the topics unclear. The blurb sounded much more promising.

Here's one poem I found somewhat ok:

"Trace: We leave our skin on rock faces, dance vertically on cliffs, let our sweat drop for miles. I’m back, alone. I existed once in this place, like every place."

2 Stars, sorry. :(

"We Shed Our Skin Like Dynamite" is Conyer Clayton's debut full-size poetry collection, and I really enjoyed this one. Clayton's style is one of word play, where the prose is not straightforward but instead kind of bumps along so the reader is really left with more of an impression of the theme and emotion the poet is trying to convey, rather than a clear image. I found that they way Clayton arranges her words on the page, both in order and form, was really compelling, and invited me to mull over particular stanzas again and again.

My favorite poems put images of nature and images of human invention in stark relief against each other, but Clayton also explores themes of love, youth, death, sex, late nights, and alcohol, just to name a few. You would be hard-pressed to find something about life she doesn't touch on here.

You will never connect with every single poetry collection you read. Unfortunately, this is the case with We Shed Our Skin Like Dynamite and I. While I'm sure there's actually nothing wrong with the collection and others would surely enjoy its contents, it wasn't for me and I just couldn't connect with it.

Love the cover. Some hit and miss poems. Some way too long for my liking. Enjoyed reading them nonetheless.

There is a great deal of feel, more than I had anticipated. And now, now that this book has defied me - I will be dealing with more poetry for days to come. Better words are made out of poetry. But we must survive. Hadi Atallah, author of 'Rosemary Bluebell.'

This was a very sombre and touching read. Conyer Clayton's poetry was full of imagery, and vulnerability, and I could tell that it came from a very personal space. There were several lines within the book that drew my attention further and further in as I read: "There are nights when we shut the curtains to deter the sunrise" was no exception. We cannot stop the sun from rising, but we try to block out each day that creeps towards us. Another gem that caught my attention was "we want top be wind weathered, but soft to touch": was Conyer talking about they way we always return our thoughts and presence through resilience, and through the journeys that life takes us on? We always seem to return the the beginning, even if it is not our beginning, we find our way back, softer but more learned than before. It was a challenge to read because of the strengths of the writing and the strong messages within each section, but I think that was where the beauty was. It was an emotional read because it was full of emotion, and sometimes our hearts are very raw when we wear them on our sleeve.

Conyer Clayton's debut full-length collection of poetry, "We Shed Our Skin Like Dynamite" was a visual journey through the ups and downs of life. Her collection abounded with metaphors and imagery of childhood and the mental pictures that make up a life.

There is a mature depth to her work. It is not straightforward poetry, but requires some "digging" to uncover meaning and understanding. Some will bristle at this style of poetry. I believe with some hard work and an open mind most people appreciative of poetry as an art would enjoy this collection.

Ms. Clayton has previously published six other chapbooks, collaborated with Nathanael Larochette to produce an album, and her poetry has been featured in numerous magazines and literary publications.

I received this as an eBook from Guernica Editions via NetGalley in exchange for an honest and unbiased review of the title. I did not receive any compensation from either company. The opinions expressed herein are completely my own.

Conyer Clayton's "We Shed Our Skin Like Dynamite", is a fabulous book of poetry covering a wide range of emotions and topics.. The topic of life and death is beautifully weaved together.

I was really hoping to love this poetry.
It’s usually quite easy for me to do so, however, these pieces of poetry unfortunately confused me a lot. I can tell that these works are centred around the poet’s life/what she has witnessed where she’s from. But the structure and the story telling didn’t seem to make sense for me and I struggled to find meaning behind a lot of them.
Whilst it might not make sense to me, someone else might love it.

I read this debut collection twice in quick succession. There’s powerful language here, mixed with a strong sense of disconnection that highlights the mystery and the critical examination the poet brings to everyday observations of relationships, addictions, art. A strong debut by a unique, distinctive voice. Highly recommended.

Clayton has a lovely way with language and phrases, even if I didn't always understand what the poems were getting at.

I gave this poetry collection a two out of five stars. I didn't connect to any of the poems and I honestly found them pretty boring.

After a strong, startling beginning full of beautifully lonely imagery, this collection loses steam.

I really enjoyed the themes throughout this book but I did find some of them hard to understand. I couldn’t decipher what some of them meant and they seemed pretty abstract to me. I'm not super well versed in poetry and I only casually read poetry so maybe someone with more knowledge than me would understand them. Other than that, I thought this collection was beautiful and creative and I really enjoyed reading it.

The words to this were thought out and beautifully written but I either couldnt connect with the authors feelings or didnt quiet understand the message the author was trying to convey. Art is subject so perhaps this poetry collection was just not meant for me to be the target audience.

I found this book hard to get through. I wasn’t understanding the writing style therefore I could not relate to anything that was being said. It was a good length of a book otherwise I probably wouldn’t have finished it.

3/5 stars. I will admit that these poems were just a bit confusing. Many of them were hard to understand the meaning behind them, and what they all were trying to say. With that being said though, this collection was quite unique. I’ve never read one like it. If you enjoy deeply analyzing poems then you’ll for sure like this collection!

We Shed Our Skin Like Dynamite is a debut poetry collection by Conyer Clayton. When I read the synopsis, I was really excited to read this book. The themes of art,sex and addiction sounded intriguing to me.
The writing was beautiful,there is no doubt about that. My main problem, however, was trying to understand what that writing tried to say. Everything was so abstract and out there, that I just couldn't tell you what any poem was about. Like for example:"I almost lost you in your skin,pulsing on a fallen tree trunk ". Pretty,but what it actually means I have no idea. So,unfortunately,despite my excitement for it,it ended up going way over my head.
Thank you to Netgalley and Guernica Editions for a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.