Blogger-poet James Collins has just posted a very favorable review of Breakdown: Banjo Poems at his site Love During Wartime. What’s great about the review for me, however, isn’t so much that Collins liked the book (though that was nice), but that he appears to have read it slowly and deeply. It surely helped that he’s Biblically literate as well as conversant with American history and roots music. It was useful to see my own book through the eyes of such a good reader.

I don’t understand authors who claim they never read their reviews. It’s such a great chance to learn what one’s book was really about — because so often, the author is the last to know. Anyway, check it out.