I love the concept and the heart that has gone into this collection. They didn't all hit it out of the park but the idea and intent were there. I think this would be a nice read for those who enjoy poetry.

So much fun! Loved the diversity and representation in this book. It made me take a step back and get a new perspective through the different authors’ opinions

This is a gorgeous book, the artwork blows me away. The poetry though, I just don't know if I'm not the person to read it or what, but none of the poems did much for me.

I loved the diversity of the art and authors, the various styles of poetry from the poets, and that there was a typed version of the poems at the end of each section. There are a lot of poems here and I loved that, and I love the discussion questions at the end, but I couldn't get into the poems.

Thank you Netgalley for this review copy.This is honestly beautiful. It's gorgeous, beautiful and each story is unique and just hits different parts of my heart strings so much. This is a piece of art and when it was released I actually bought myself a physical copy. Thank you to the contributers for pouring their hearts into this!

I'm a big fan of anthologies. It gives the reader a chance to explore various authors, and in this case artists. I've never read an anthology with poetry before, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. There were some I enjoyed more than others, as well as some artistic styles I liked more than others, but overall it was a good, quick read, and I think the underlying messages from the various poems were well done and important.

I really wanted to like this book. I read the concept, saw the creators...but it was a struggle for me to try to read it. The art is lovely, but it felt too artsy to follow. Did not finish.

This book was sent me to as an ARC on NetGalley. However all opinions are of my own.
Unfortunately, this title was removed from NetGalley before I could read and give a review.

Absolutely love how intersectional this is and the art style is pretty but I think the formatting was a little disjointed, something didn't click for me.

This is SUCH a good book! The illustrations are ""chef's-kiss" good and the way it is laid out speaks to my soul! I think the poetry collection was accessible and powerful. This collection was such a unique way to present poetry in a different light, but also a unique way to present feminism in a different way. With a host of authors from varying gender identities, I felt this book was inclusive and exciting, something that the poetry collection can use!

The first thing that caught my attention was the cover, it's absolutely gorgeous. The graphic elements/illustrations were also really pretty, I absolutely loved the artwork in this novel and I think it's quite unique how they combined the poetry with the comics elements. However, at the same time the poetry and the comics together was a little overwhelming sometimes, but that may be just a me problem. The poems were nice, but I wasn't necessarily able to relate to all of them, which is okay, I still think it's a unique and beautiful little book.

I am not a poetry reader so this was wonderful introduction in my opinion. I really appreciated the study guide the comic part was what attracted me and really enjoyed it. Overall it was a good collection of poems. In my opinion if you are just starting out with poetry this a good way to do while begging able to explore feminism, queer and gender without it being overly comlipacated.

As with any anthology, there will be bits you love, bits you like, and bits you don't care for, but overall, I felt this was a good collection. I'm not that good at figuring out poetry sometimes, I admit, but the inclusion of a study guide at the end was really nice, it brought up points I wouldn't have gotten to on my own, and I honestly wouldn't mind if more books included study guides. There are quite a few subjects covered, and while not all of them were relevant to me personally, I'm glad they were there; it made me think past my own experiences, and that's always a good thing. The art was good throughout- some poems were illustrated in a more literal way than others, but that didn't detract anything from the poetry for me- I could still form my own vision of the poetry if what I was seeing didn't match what I was feeling, especially since the poems were printed in text only after each comic. This is the second volume of poetry in a graphic novel format I've read, and I do hope to see more in the future!

#Embodied #NetGalley

I really really wanted to enjoy this collection, since I love the message, I love comics, and I love the idea of getting more poetry out in the world and appreciated. But most of these poetry/comic fusions just didn't connect with me. The comics were usually pretty straightforward interpretations of the poems and didn't take many chances around inventive imagery and metaphoric interpretation. And I also had the odd experience where having the poetic lines broken up across comic panels made the poems feel disjointed and made it harder to read them flowingly and fluently and to think of them in totality. I liked the poems when I read them without the art, I liked the art, but they didn't work well together. Comics really are the fusion of art and words presented sequentially, and so a good comic needs to be more than just a illustrated lyrics; the words and visuals and their sequential arrangement all need to blend and complement each other. It just didn't feel like that happened here.

This graphic novel is a deeply creative collection of art and poetry. Since the words are part of the art, the poems are reprinted in the back of the book as text only; as sometimes it is admittedly difficult to read some of the fonts. It even includes a study guide.

I did find the whole experience reading this moving but I'm not a poetry expert. I love the idea behind this collection and all the different perspectives; even if I didn't quite 'get' all of it. 3.7 out of 5.

Very beautiful book . I devoured it in one read , every word was beautifully sculpted . Super happy that i picked it up .

Anthologies are always a mixed bag, and this one is more so than most. There are some excellent poems here and there is some striking artwork, but rarely do the poems and art truly mesh. It's worth reading, but it doesn't quite hit its mark.

Received via NetGalley.

Thanks to Diamond Book Distributors and A Wave Blue World for an advance NetGalley of this title, which was published on May 18, 2021. I'm writing this review voluntarily.

Embodied is a diverse and innovative comics anthology that pairs feminist poetry with artwork and highlights cis female, trans, and non-binary creators. The collection features a wide variety of poetic forms and visual art styles, and while the works do consistently link back to the physical body, the subject matter of individual pieces runs the gambit from issues of reproductive rights, to fighting to exist in a BIPOC body, to feeling accepted as a member of the LGBTQIA community, etc. When the combo of words and images really clicks, Embodied is able to successfully describe and evoke feelings around physicality in ways that other mediums cannot.

Unfortunately, not all of the pieces here cohere fluidly. There were times when I felt like a poem, particularly in terms of spacing and presentation, was less effective with the imagery than on its own. While poetry certainly does evoke images, some of the comics took the poet's words in a direction that felt too tangibly literal. It's difficult to do collaborative pieces like this, especially when trying to make sure that an image comes off as less of an illustration and more as an equal part of a whole artwork. Despite the fact that this collection is inconsistent, it's clear that the anthology was created with a lot of heart and care, and I really appreciated the ambitious reach of the book.

This is a collection of various poems with artists transforming them into the style of a graphic novel after the fact. Most of the poems were well written and impactful. A majority of the art was well done. However, the pairings clashed more often than they didn’t. In these cases both the poem and the art would be stronger on their own instead of being forced into these awkward combinations.

Embodied is an ambitious book trying to bring graphic art and poetry together with a focus on feminist work, I love the idea of the book, but the execution was lacking. At times the art felt it did not match the poem it was paired with and the poem was kind of lost in the images, but I did like they put the full poem on its own and in its intended style separately. The book is worth reading for the sake of experimental reading and looking at it as a starting place for bringing graphic art and poetry together..

I absolutely love the idea of mixing poetry and graphic novels. The art was fantastic, I was really pulled in by the stunning artwork. I really liked that the poems were printed on their own after with their art, it allowed me to take in the poems on their own as well.
This was a great concept that I'd love to see more of.