I own 13 Bukowski books and will review them all in this blog at some point. For his collected poems the reviews will be quite short - his novels will get a proper review. Stay tuned for more if they are not posted yet. If you're a fan please leave comments.
The idea to read this book came from my girlfriend at the time (Kelly) who after dating me for awhile figured that Bukowski was my kind of guy. Now that I have read well over a dozen of his novels and collected poems, I am unsure how I feel about that. For those of you who know Bukowski like I do, I am sure you can understand why.
Without giving too much away the book is complied of around 120 poems. As with all Bukowski's collect poetry that I will review in this blog, there isn't much I can say that you won't find out on your own. Poetry is particularly hard for me to review, so I will say little except to recommend that you read them. I will also list 10 of my favorites for the sake of sharing, although there were so many more than that in this book specifically.
Here are a few I really enjoyed: 1. a free 25 page booklet. 2. the garbage man. 3. rain. 4. drunk ol' bukowski drunk. 5. slim killers 6. story and poem. 7. the inquisitor. 8. the mockingbird. 9. the rat. 10. hot.
Bukowski has so many moments of brutal honesty, for example in 'drunk ol' bukowski drunk' and 'the inquisitor' the reader can easily see him as he existed in real life as these things unfold. From what I have learned about Charles Bukowski, his poems are like tiny glances into his actual life. Take 'the rat' for example, or 'hot' I don't think there was ever any pretending with Bukowski.
I recommend this book for all those of you who know what I am talking about when I say that you have to enjoy the 'Bukowski-style' in order to dig it. Trust me when I say you would also enjoy Canadian Author; Juan Butler (who I consider to be the Canadian equivalent - also reviewed in this blog.)
This book is 159 pages long and I remember finishing it really quickly, I was an instant fan.
On my sliding scale I give this book a solid 9/10 - It's a great introduction to Bukowski if you were to treat it as such. I am very lucky to have obtained a copy back when Black Sparrow Press was still around (Google it) The Black Sparrow publications always had the greatest paper textures for their covers, and this book is no exception. If you like to collect and own hard copies of what you read (as I do) this simple pleasure can be very appealing.
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