Boom!

by Carolyn Jess-Cooke

The title poem of this new collection of poems by Carolyn Jess-Cooke: Boom! enacts the moment when the new baby arrives in the family 'like a hand grenade'. 'Becoming a mother changed me in every single way,' says the author, 'my first child—born in October 2006—just about knocked me sideways. There were many reasons for this, but here's the biggest one: I could not believe how public and political the (hugely personal) experience of motherhood was.' A noted academic, author of a book about film and Shakespeare, and a best-selling popular novelist The Guardian Angel's Journal and The Boy Who Could See Demons, Jess-Cooke found, as many parents do, that the juggling act required to raise young children and continue a professional and creative life, is both exhausting and fulfilling. The poems chronicle the rapturous moments, such as 'Wakening' where the baby is observed: 'the seedling eyes stirred by sunlight'. There are also the tragi-comic 'Nights' full of 'small elbows in the face' and 'assailed by colds and colic'. Jess-Cooke doesn't flinch from the darker fears and depressions that can afflict parents. There are also pieces of pointed satirical intent and socio-political comment such as 'Poem made from bits of Newspaper Headlines ' and 'The Only Dad in Playgroup'. Viewing motherhood from a multiplicity of artful angles, the author says, 'Coupled with all this was the love I had for my children. It completely and utterly blew me away, how much I could love another human being.'

Genres: Poetry

64 pages, Paperback

First published April 15, 2014

About the author

C.J. (Carolyn) Cooke is an acclaimed, award-winning poet, novelist and academic with numerous publications as Carolyn Jess-Cooke and Caro Carver. Her work has been published in twenty-three languages to date. Born in Belfast, C.J. has a PhD in Literature from Queen’s University, Belfast, and is currently Reader in Creative Writing at the University of Glasgow, where she also researches the impact of motherhood on women’s writing and creative writing interventions for mental health. Her books have been reviewed in The New York Times, The Guardian, Good Housekeeping, and the Daily Mail. She has been nominated for an Edgar Award and an ITW Thriller Award, selected as Waterstones’ Paperback Book of the Year and a BBC 2 Pick, and has had two Book of the Month Club selections in the last year. She lives in Scotland with her husband and four children.

Reviews

[Julia · Rating 5 out of 5]

Stunning collection that describes so perfectly a what it is like to be a mother - all the depth and complexity of emotion is in here - both the good and the bad. This is not just a book for parents though - although parents might get something extra from it. I think if you ever want to fully understand what an emotionally messy and gloriously infuriating ride parenthood can be then this is the book to read.