ellejayz's review against another edition
4.0
There is no doubt that O'Hanlon is a talented writer and his imagination is definitely admirable but I find his poetry to be lacking. Whether it's his lack of rhythm, or another fantastical element, this book reads more like a collection of well crafted sentences put together and only a few of his poems are truly poetic. This makes the collection a rather dull read and while it is short, I lacked any real will power to finish it quickly or to ever re-read it. Disappointing.
ellejaoy's review against another edition
3.0
There is no doubt that O'Hanlon is a talented writer and his imagination is definitely admirable but I find his poetry to be lacking. Whether it's his lack of rhythm, or another fantastical element, this book reads more like a collection of well crafted sentences put together and only a few of his poems are truly poetic. This makes the collection a rather dull read and while it is short, I lacked any real will power to finish it quickly or to ever re-read it. Disappointing.
abandonlakes's review
1.0
"The sun and moon
can be switched off, and clocks keep anything
but time, and what we witness in the mirror
is anything but ourselves; what we see in photos
less."
I'm not someone who thinks it is necessary to understand poetry in order to enjoy it; a meaning does not always have to be present to complete a poem.
That said, David O'Hanlon's first collection went entirely over my head, and not in an enjoyable way. The majority of the poems were short and curt with little susbstance. The reworked Ovid fragments had very little depth, I've read better myth based poetry on tumblr.
The only poems I really liked were "Reality" (quoted above) and maybe "Orpheus"; the rest were boring or cryptic. His attempts to convince me he could write poetry equally well about the mundane and the mythological failed; this collection as a whole, failed.
More...