Review: Strange Nests by Jessica McHugh

 Strange Nests, the follow-up offering by Bram Stoker nominated author Jessica McHugh, is a new blackout poetry collection based on the book The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Barnett. The book uses selections from The Secret Garden to create a beautiful meditation on love, loss, pain, memory, and the grieving process. This project came to McHugh shortly after the loss of her brother, which I’m sure is the inspiration for Strange Nests. The results are both heartbreaking and beautiful in equal measure.

This is my first experience reading any of McHugh’s work and my first experience reading blackout poetry. While it takes a bit of getting used to, I really enjoyed the book once my eyes got adjusted to piecing together the words and phrases. I plan to buy physical copies of both Strange Nests and A Complex Accident of Life, in which McHugh used the text of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein as inspiration and medium.

I loved reading this book. The artwork by Lynne Hansen fits the theme and feel of the book perfectly. I am already looking forward to reading this again when I get my physical copy.

 

 

5/5 Stars

Many thanks to Beverly Bambury Publicity for proving me with an eArc of this book to read and review. All thoughts and opinions on this work are my own.