Hope you all had wonderful Christmas days!
We stayed home this year, so it was pretty uneventful, except my head cold turned into bronchitis, and…
Someone left a lump of coal in my stocking!
Casually checking my book on Amazon, I noticed someone had left me a nasty bad review of my Becoming the Villainess book…on Christmas Eve! It was just so hurtful. I know we poets ought to have thick skins, but you know, you pour your heart and soul into something…anyway, it was a bitter Christmas pill and just plain discouraging. And I was already feeling a little discouraged about the whole poetry thing. I did re-arrange and re-edit the Japanese fox-wife/folk tale MS, so it’ll be ready to send out again, but I haven’t really been writing or sending out work lately. Hmmph. What’s the use of writing poems if people are just gonna hate on them anyway?
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Jeannine Hall Gailey
Jeannine Hall Gailey served as the second Poet Laureate of Redmond, Washington and the author of Becoming the Villainess, She Returns to the Floating World, Unexplained Fevers, The Robot Scientist’s Daughter, and winner of the Moon City Press Book Prize and SFPA’s Elgin Award, Field Guide to the End of the World. Her latest, Flare, Corona from BOA Editions, was a finalist for the Washington State Book Award. She’s also the author of PR for Poets, a Guidebook to Publicity and Marketing. Her work has been featured on NPR’s The Writer’s Almanac, Verse Daily and The Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror. Her poems have appeared in The American Poetry Review, Poetry, and JAMA.
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Karen J. Weyant
Hi Jeannine, I read through her review and to be honest, I really had no idea what she was talking about…of course, I am sort of a novice when it comes to poetry, but I have to say I don’t know what she means by deep wisdom — who says that poetry, or any work of art, has to have this deep profound meaning that should make the reader lose sleep over its message? Can’t a poem just be fun and eductional (okay, that was the teacher coming out in me) and simply introduce readers to a subject which may be totally new to them?
I know it’s hard, but sometimes you just have to be thick skinned. (I should take that advice the next time I get a rejection letter)
And I’m looking forward to your next book in print. I know it will happen. 🙂
David V
I thought it was common practice to dismiss any reviews beginning with “It’s been while since I read a book of poems”…
jeannine
Thanks! You guys have made me feel better already.
Peter
Got your broadside today. Thank you!
That reviewer was way off base. I call them out!
Moskervenice
I had a long response prepared, but it wasn’t funny or poignant or nasty enough, so it’s just as well that the browser ate it. My instinct is to play with her head, fax her every rejection letter we ever get so she feels justified, but not quite…and that will gnaw at her.
…nah that assumes the presence of a conscience or the capacity for all but surface thought.
Collin
What the hell is she talking about? Obviously, metaphor is not her strong suite. “Ouchy, it’s too hard…I don’t get every single word. I may have to look something up.” Boo-fucking-hoo.
What do you expect from a person who reads second-rate fantasy fiction and uses mint shampoo?
jeannine
Yay Peter! Merry-after-Christmas!
Collin and David V and David M – ha! You guys made me laugh out loud. Thanks for your reminders not to take this stuff too seriously…
Karen J. Weyant
I couldn’t resist — I read through all the comments and at first, I didn’t understand what Collin was talking about until I looked back at the reviewer’s (I had another word in here, but I decided to play nice) profile only to discover she reviewed shampoo. Who in the hell reviews shampoo!?!! On Amazon? 🙂
Nick
Who rates a de-luxe Rosemary Mint, shampoo that is unavailable anyway?
——————–
The Critic spits on what is done,—
Gives it a wipe,—and all is gone.
————— Thomas Hood
Felicity
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