Complicated landscapes of beauty, threat, and unease
Sandra Marchetti’s third full-length collection, Diorama (Stephen F. Austin University Press, 2025) depicts a woman in complicated uneasy relationships with the world, nature, and herself. Marchetti presents a dazzling array of poems that demonstrate the sure hand with language of a veteran poet who is also an accomplished writer of prose.
A meticulously researched glimpse into the Depression-era South
In her second work of historical fiction, Liza Nash Taylor brings us to early 1930s Virginia, New England, and many locales in between. In All Good Faith is richly detailed—from the glass jars of pickles and beet-pink eggs in the Keswick Market, to the “golden-hued marble lobby” of the Boston Public Library, to a bedraggled campsite beside the Anacostia River.
Interrogating and modernizing the myth of Psyche
In Psyche (Anxiety Press, 2024) Casey Catherine Moore interrogates, queers, and modernizes the myth of Psyche, the goddess of the soul in Greek and Roman mythology who was loved by Eros and tormented by Aphrodite. Rich in explanatory notes and annotations, the book reflects Moore’s extensive scholarship and her strong poetic skills.
Drawing on tales to explore roles—and whiteness
Holly Karapetkova seems to me a poet who understands the power of spells, of arranging words so that they get to a more primal level of meaning beyond whatever ordinary situation her words describe. The first poem in Dear Empire (Gunpowder Press, 2025) could almost be a blessing or spell for motherhood. The words hang in such a way that something slightly unreal—gift or curse—seems about to break through.
Waves and Threads
Michele Evans, a fifth-generation Washingtonian, is a writer, teacher, and adviser for Unbound, an award-winning Northern Virginia high school literary magazine (no relation to Washington Unbound). This first book shows the benefits a poet derives from many years of teaching and working with student writers.
The satirical, the earnest, and the politics of activism
Z. Hanna’s debut book, We’re Gonna Get Through This Together (Modern Artist Press, March 2025), is a smart, lyrical, and incisively witty short story collection about the murky waters we find ourselves in when we try to fight against injustice and search for a place to belong. At once satirical and earnest, this collection explores race, class, gender, sexuality, and the politics of activism.