Book Review: Between Eden and the Open Road

Title: Between Eden and the Open Road

Author: Philip Gaber

Genre: poems and short stories

Review:

This book me a little bit longer to read--not because I didn't like it, but because it's composed of many poems and short stories. Personally, I think poems are like fine cheese or expensive wine; they should be consumed in small amounts in multiple sittings. I find that I enjoy reading a few poems at a time (5-10 in one sitting) rather than spending 30+ minutes on poems alone. Poems should be savored.

As I mentioned before, Between Eden and the Open Road is a book of poems and "short stories." I put quotes around "short stories" because to me, they seem more like describing a moment rather than telling a complete story (I'll talk more about this later.) The poems covered a huge range of topics, but 90% of them, in one way or another, deals with love. The mood of many of the poems was kind of somber (though a few were rather fiery/passion filled.) The poems were definitely my favorite part of the book.

My favorite poem from the book was Quicksilver Goddess. For some reason, the woman described as the Quicksilver Goddess in the poem reminded me of Mona Lisa...shy, smiling, nice and a tad mysterious.

I think the words that describe the "short stories" in this book is: a passage that captures a moment or feeling.  Most of the short stories featured are 2-3 book pages long. I feel like Gaber captures a certain feeling one experiences in his words; kind of like experiencing deja vu a bit.  I felt like each passage shows small snippets into a character's life. Personally, I didn't really get to connect with any of the characters since as a reader, I didn't get to spend much time with them before moving on.

Here's one of my favorite quotes from the a short story:

"As she walked away,

she seduced the wind

with her hair and

colored herself a blue funk."

I loved how the words roll of my tongue in that particular quote and it brings to my mind a vivid imagery of a girl walking outside in the crisp, breezy October air.

Overall, I would say I enjoyed the book; I didn't love it but I didn't dislike it either. I probably really liked 20% of the contents, was fine with 70% of the writing and didn't like 10% of the book. I would've liked to see the author cover a little bit of a wider range of topics other than somewhat dysfunctional love and mind talking (when the narrator or some other character is going slightly crazy from a conscience or "inner mind".)

Rating: