Golden by Wilder Poetry is a collection of poetry and prose focused on hope, love, peace, healing, moving on, and a lot more. It's filled with images of the sun, nature, and the universe, and the writing is accompanied by illustrations.

This collection deals with some painful themes of loss, but it focuses more on the brighter emotions of life, like hope, moving on, and healing, which I always love to see when I read poetry. The writing is simple and straightforward, but there are many lovely metaphors that make it resonate even stronger. It's touching, meaningful, and beautifully written, and I think anyone can find something to connect to in it.

The illustrations are drawn in quite a simple style, but they are really well integrated into the pages and connected to the poems, which I love. I really enjoy illustrations that take over whole pages, and they only enhanced the reading experience and impact of the words in the book.

I think the reason why I personally wouldn't rate it higher is that something about it was missing for me. I related to many of the poems, and it was an overall pleasant reading experience, but I was never quite filled with awe and intense emotions when reading it, which is what makes a poetry collection stand out to me. I've read so much poetry at this point that I need it to be something a little unique and really powerful to really fall in love with it, which unfortunately didn't happen here.

That being said, I think if you're someone who doesn't read poetry that often, and you'd like to read something hopeful and filled with sunshine, definitely pick this book up! The writing is great and the illustrations are too, and I think it's a really good collection.

Why do you love the sun? It always touches me back.

It’s refreshing to read a poetry collection that is not filled with grief and loss, This book is a celebration of life. Its lighthearted and optimistic.
The pages are filled with pretty illustrations by Henri Rousseau and beautiful words but for me it was a little mediocre.
I couldn’t relate to a lot of the stories told but I’m sure someone who does would love it.

Thanks to NetGalley and publishers for letting me read this book in exchange for an honest review!

Golden was filled with words on love at first sight, falling out of love and learning to love yourself the most. I enjoyed these poems immensely and would recommend this book of Wilder Poetry to all fans of poetry. I will definitely look to see if they have more works of art in the world to enjoy!

“You’ve Always Known How to Grow Towards the Light.”

“Honest Things Don’t Need a Name”

Another beautiful collection of words and poetry from Wilder, perfect for those of you who love Atticus and the like, and the short and sweet poems of instapoetry that read like song lyrics. This one – true to its title – is like pouring a jar of liquid sunshine and warmth over your head, a treat of warmth, love, home, and more, that will have you feeling as if you’re running through fields of wildflowers beneath the August Sun.

Read this collection on a day when I was under the weather and it warmed my soul. I didn’t know I needed this.

"Golden" is a beautiful poetry book about self love, love but also heart break. I found the majority of the poems very touching and could relate to a lot of them. Some seemed a bit of, but that happens to me a lot when reading poetry books. That is why I can only give it three stars though. I personally wasn’t a big fan of the illustrations, but I still liked that some were included.

This was a really beautiful collection of poetry even if it felt a little disjointed in some places. It made really good use of the art from Henri Rousseau.

Thank you NetGalley and Andrews McMeel Publishing for the chance to read and review this book.

Wilder Poetry sounded familiar and so I went ahead and checked my goodreads to find that I had read Nocturnal in 2020 via scribd.

I'm very sure that Golden has an audience and fans of Wilder Poetry will love it. The illustrations were all very well done. As a whole, I'm not a huge fan, but there is definitely a good audience for this that will.

Golden is everything that I admire about poetry. The words flow effortlessly, carry meaning, and leave you feeling lighter and inspired. Golden dives into the beauty of life, art, and nature. Each piece is laced with descriptions of the Sun, accompanied with beautiful imagery to set the tone. If you’re looking for a light read, one that will leave you cheerful, you have to pick up Golden. Thank you to NetGalley and Andrews McMeel Publishing for this eARC in exchange for my honest review.

Thanks to Net Gallery for letting me review this book in advance!
"Golden" is a book filled to the brim with poetry slams about self love, self discovery, love and also heart break.With a pretty nice choice of words Wilder takes us through her poetry, though the writing style is more straightforward with actions being directly described than more metaphorically which is not completely up to my taste, but then again, just my own taste. I do have to add that there were multiple occasions where "Anyway" and "Thats the thing" were added which often threw you out of this "poetry feeling". The illustrations on the pages were beyond GORGEOUS. It made reading it feel like a warm little hug. It was overall pretty good, your modern poetry book, but sadly nothing out of the ordinary.

"and if the dream
starts to come undone
there is another story
waiting to be written"
After reading and absolutely loving Nocturnal a few years ago, I was delighted to see that Wilder Poetry was about to release a new poetry collection. While Golden is a hope-filled and sunnier companion to the darker Nocturnal, I really appreciate how the author acknowledges the complexity of all emotions and doesn’t focus solely on the positive aspect of growth and healing.
Emotional pain wasn’t set aside to make room for more positive emotions, it was instead made clear that feelings are a balance and that both light and dark and can co-exist.
I enjoyed these poems a lot, and while some resonated with me more than others, all carried a great deal of emotions and were both touching and lyrical. The prose was beautiful, and I absolutely adored the unique illustrations accompanying this collection.
I look forward to reading more from Wilder Poetry and I recommend this book to poetry lovers.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me an eARC in exchange for an honest review