RaveLos Angeles Review of BooksA haunting reminder of what steps could have been taken — and which have been, and continue to be, repeatedly refused ... [To] the Last [Be] Human tracks not only Graham’s attitude toward the nature of climate change but also the evolution of our cultural discourse. What once seemed a bleak but distant possibility now appears inevitable.
Jericho Brown
RaveThe Colorado Review... advances the promise of Jericho Brown’s luminous first two collections...not only by probing the violence inflicted casually and institutionally on black bodies, but by considering what the literary theorist Stephen Best describes as \'black abstraction\' ... In impeccably controlled lines, which accumulate meaning as they unfold along the page, the speaker stakes a claim to valuation: of the body, yes, but also of aesthetic worth ... Intellectually challenging and lyrically thrilling, The Tradition is a welcome addition to Brown’s already accomplished oeuvre. Its trenchant investigation of police brutality, combined with its exploration of erasure, characterizes its celebration of vulnerability in the midst of extinction. What’s more, Brown’s development of the \'duplex\'—a sonnet-like repetitive form, whose name recalls apartment-style housing—showcases an adept talent for eloquent lyricism. Perhaps what sets it apart, however, is Brown’s penchant for optimism, rooted in an appraisal of physicality and the beauty of particulars. In this, it is especially apropos ... For times such as ours, devastating as they may be—racially, politically, ecologically—faith in the good is all too rare, though perhaps, in the end, it’s what sustains us.
