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Two Brown Dots
Selected by Aimee Nezhukumatathil as the winner of the A. Poulin, Jr. Poetry Prize, Danni Quintos carves a space for brown girls and weird girls in her debut collection of poems.
Two Brown Dots explores what it means to be a racially ambiguous, multiethnic, Asian American woman growing up in Kentucky. In stark, honest poems, Quintos recounts the messiness and confusion of being a typical ‘90s kid—watching Dirty Dancing at sleepovers, borrowing eye shadow out of a friend’s caboodle, crushing on a boy wearing khaki shorts to Sunday mass—while navigating the microagressions of the neighbor kids, the awkwardness of puberty, and the casual cruelties of fellow teenagers. The mixed-race daughter of a dark skinned Filipino immigrant, Quintos retells family stories and Phillipine folklore to try and make sense of an identity with roots on opposite sides of the globe.
With clear-eyed candor and a wry sense of humor, Quintos teases the line between tokenism and representation, between assimilation and belonging, offering a potent antidote to the assumption that “American” means “white.” Encompassing a whole journey from girlhood to motherhood, Two Brown Dots subverts stereotypes to reclaim agency and pride in the realness and rawness and unprettyness of a brown girl’s body, boldly declaring: We exist, we belong, we are from here, and we will continue to be.
Two Brown Dots explores what it means to be a racially ambiguous, multiethnic, Asian American woman growing up in Kentucky. In stark, honest poems, Quintos recounts the messiness and confusion of being a typical ‘90s kid—watching Dirty Dancing at sleepovers, borrowing eye shadow out of a friend’s caboodle, crushing on a boy wearing khaki shorts to Sunday mass—while navigating the microagressions of the neighbor kids, the awkwardness of puberty, and the casual cruelties of fellow teenagers. The mixed-race daughter of a dark skinned Filipino immigrant, Quintos retells family stories and Phillipine folklore to try and make sense of an identity with roots on opposite sides of the globe.
With clear-eyed candor and a wry sense of humor, Quintos teases the line between tokenism and representation, between assimilation and belonging, offering a potent antidote to the assumption that “American” means “white.” Encompassing a whole journey from girlhood to motherhood, Two Brown Dots subverts stereotypes to reclaim agency and pride in the realness and rawness and unprettyness of a brown girl’s body, boldly declaring: We exist, we belong, we are from here, and we will continue to be.
112 pages, Paperback
First published April 12, 2022
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Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews
May 3, 2022
Disclaimer: I won a copy of the book via Librarything
Poetry scares people it seems. It’s not usually the same way that fiction or general non-fiction scares people. Look at the ALA list of banned and challenged books for the past year and the top ten does not include a book of poetry – and usually does not. Even people who read critically and widely tend to avoid poetry – saying either they don’t like it or it is too hard to understand. Let’s be clear some poets are – for instance why do some writers have to make an alternate difference for the word yellow that only they use. But I believe that there is at least one poet for everyone (Okay, I think there is more than one poet but let’s not overwhelm people, okay?).
Danni Quintos might be the poet for you. She’s definitely of the poets I like after reading her collection. Quintos’ collection is divided into three sections: Girlhood, Motherhood, and Folklore. And when you think about it that makes far more since than Maiden, Mother, Crone.
The Girlhood section focuses on her experiences growing up as an outside in Kentucky. She is a multi-ethnic Asian girl with brown skin. The poems can be painful – such as the ones about how she is treated by her classmates – also joyful in “When Clothes Make You Cousins” or even truthfully horror filled, such as “The Worst Part of Riding the Bus”. The poems about her childhood crush are heartbreaking. But there is also great joy in this section and that should be celebrated. There is the wonder and the questioning of children as well.
There is light as well in the Motherhood section but also dark. The section is about the struggle to get pregnant as well as the birth of her son and the changes that her body underwent, the health issues that followed as well as raising the child. It also ends with the poem “Letter to Imelda Marcos”, who as the wife of a president could be called a mother.
The Folklore section is a bit different, focusing on both folklore in the traditional sense but also as it applies to family history as well as national history. The section deals with questions we have about families about why some things do that occur in our family histories. The same is true when she examines how national stories are told and what information is left out.
It is a very powerful collection.
Poetry scares people it seems. It’s not usually the same way that fiction or general non-fiction scares people. Look at the ALA list of banned and challenged books for the past year and the top ten does not include a book of poetry – and usually does not. Even people who read critically and widely tend to avoid poetry – saying either they don’t like it or it is too hard to understand. Let’s be clear some poets are – for instance why do some writers have to make an alternate difference for the word yellow that only they use. But I believe that there is at least one poet for everyone (Okay, I think there is more than one poet but let’s not overwhelm people, okay?).
Danni Quintos might be the poet for you. She’s definitely of the poets I like after reading her collection. Quintos’ collection is divided into three sections: Girlhood, Motherhood, and Folklore. And when you think about it that makes far more since than Maiden, Mother, Crone.
The Girlhood section focuses on her experiences growing up as an outside in Kentucky. She is a multi-ethnic Asian girl with brown skin. The poems can be painful – such as the ones about how she is treated by her classmates – also joyful in “When Clothes Make You Cousins” or even truthfully horror filled, such as “The Worst Part of Riding the Bus”. The poems about her childhood crush are heartbreaking. But there is also great joy in this section and that should be celebrated. There is the wonder and the questioning of children as well.
There is light as well in the Motherhood section but also dark. The section is about the struggle to get pregnant as well as the birth of her son and the changes that her body underwent, the health issues that followed as well as raising the child. It also ends with the poem “Letter to Imelda Marcos”, who as the wife of a president could be called a mother.
The Folklore section is a bit different, focusing on both folklore in the traditional sense but also as it applies to family history as well as national history. The section deals with questions we have about families about why some things do that occur in our family histories. The same is true when she examines how national stories are told and what information is left out.
It is a very powerful collection.
June 27, 2024
This book, and I do not say this lightly, changed my life. As I am also a half-Filipina girl in the American South, reading Danni Quintos's exploration of the joys and hardships of that identity was like finding out I have a long-lost sister. I do not often cry reading books, but Quintos made me cry a couple of times--in the best way--from realizing I was not reading about Quintos after all, but really about myself. I am so grateful that this book exists and will be buying myself a copy forthwith.
March 22, 2022
One of the best poetry collections I have ever read. Everyone should read this book.
Danni Quintos has a way of capturing the small moments and giving them a new kind of beauty and grit, allowing you to share in a moment that is so perfectly articulated you don’t just picture it, you feel it. She lets you into her reality of her childhood, those awkward and sometimes awful coming of age years, motherhood, and being a multiracial Asian American woman.
I loved it, and I hugged it to my chest when I received my physical copy.
Danni Quintos has a way of capturing the small moments and giving them a new kind of beauty and grit, allowing you to share in a moment that is so perfectly articulated you don’t just picture it, you feel it. She lets you into her reality of her childhood, those awkward and sometimes awful coming of age years, motherhood, and being a multiracial Asian American woman.
I loved it, and I hugged it to my chest when I received my physical copy.
September 19, 2025
There’s so much to unpack in such a small collection. Danni Quintos' descriptive-driven writing unfolds her life timeline. In addition to other poems crafted around family stories and traditions passed down from her Filipino family. Quintos’ style is extremely straightforward and blunt, which adds authenticity that kept me engaged throughout the book.
It’s separated into three chapters: childhood, motherhood, and folklore. Childhood was my favorite of the trio, as the author unwinds moments from her girlhood with the perspective that ignorance was bliss in her life until it wasn’t. Quintos thematically used subliminal racism, separated parents, loss of innocence, and religious reflection in a tasteful way in that chapter. Motherhood was my least favorite of the three simply due to the fact that I’m a man without children, so the relatability wasn’t there for me. Lastly, folklore was interesting because it branches outside of the first-person perspective. However, I didn’t feel like it was entirely necessary to have its own chapter because most of the poems were written about her childhood spent with family, but there were some great poems in that portion of the book.
Overall, I really liked the collection despite my detachment from the motherhood chapter because Quintos carries plenty of weight in her poems. The serious themes weren’t overwhelming either. I would’ve liked to see more experimentation on poetic forms. Sometimes formats confused me because they didn’t seem to carry any visual or readable purpose. A solid collection, nonetheless. This could be for female readers interested in trying the poetry genre.
It’s separated into three chapters: childhood, motherhood, and folklore. Childhood was my favorite of the trio, as the author unwinds moments from her girlhood with the perspective that ignorance was bliss in her life until it wasn’t. Quintos thematically used subliminal racism, separated parents, loss of innocence, and religious reflection in a tasteful way in that chapter. Motherhood was my least favorite of the three simply due to the fact that I’m a man without children, so the relatability wasn’t there for me. Lastly, folklore was interesting because it branches outside of the first-person perspective. However, I didn’t feel like it was entirely necessary to have its own chapter because most of the poems were written about her childhood spent with family, but there were some great poems in that portion of the book.
Overall, I really liked the collection despite my detachment from the motherhood chapter because Quintos carries plenty of weight in her poems. The serious themes weren’t overwhelming either. I would’ve liked to see more experimentation on poetic forms. Sometimes formats confused me because they didn’t seem to carry any visual or readable purpose. A solid collection, nonetheless. This could be for female readers interested in trying the poetry genre.
September 4, 2022
Quintos writes about childhood and adolescence with a clarity and vividness that both reawakens memories and makes sense of them. I particularly enjoyed part 1 of the book for that reason - familiar feelings and scenes that Quintos contextualizes from a grown perspective. It’s nostalgic and funny and healing. Those same qualities take you through parts 2 and 3- themes of motherhood and ancestry respectively. The writing is economical and luxurious, starting in a place I’ve known and then taking me to new, old, and imagined places. This is a great book of poetry that I will treasure and recommend forever.
February 22, 2023
A beautiful debut collection of poetry! Quintos’ writing feels personal and necessary. She does an incredible job at transporting us to growing up in the 90s and getting a glimpse into her adolescent experience. There were moments shared that I could relate to as a 90s baby. I loved the social commentary sprinkled throughout the collection as well.
Some of my favorite poems from the collection are “Age Eleven”, “Sixth-Grade Invisibility Studies”, “Who I Wanted to be Instead”, and “Luteal Phase Ends”.
Some of my favorite poems from the collection are “Age Eleven”, “Sixth-Grade Invisibility Studies”, “Who I Wanted to be Instead”, and “Luteal Phase Ends”.
February 3, 2023
I read this book of poetry as part of the Read Harder challenge to read a book of poetry by a BIPOC or queer author. I wasn't expecting to like it too much, since I don't typically read poetry. This book pleasantly surprised me, which I suppose is part of the point of the Read Harder challenge.
The poems were divided into three sections. I loved the introductory poems about the middle school and high school years, replete with TLC references and a great rock playlist that I promptly recreated in Spotify. The motherhood section was less appealing, but fortunately I also liked the folklore section at the end, so it made it easier to get through the part that was the least interesting to me.
If you're not a poetry reader but looking for something different, this is a good choice.
The poems were divided into three sections. I loved the introductory poems about the middle school and high school years, replete with TLC references and a great rock playlist that I promptly recreated in Spotify. The motherhood section was less appealing, but fortunately I also liked the folklore section at the end, so it made it easier to get through the part that was the least interesting to me.
If you're not a poetry reader but looking for something different, this is a good choice.
April 20, 2023
The poetry is storytelling (actually more truthtelling), in three distinct sections/times. The words describe the events and feelings, fairly directly. Ends of lines and stanzas provide multiple meanings, depending on whether you pause there or keep reading the next. I must be getting old: the Notes at the end are references that I did not need the information to know since I lived through then!
June 8, 2022
so sosososo good. made my childhood feel real. the way she weaves american cultural references from the 90s/2000s with folklore, personal memory, family and history is so seamless. the way childhood is mirrored back in motherhood, and vice versa. so so so good
February 6, 2024
I would not consider myself a poetry person, but Danni Quintos is fantastic. Her poems make you reflect, are entirely relatable, and dig into uncomfortable spots that draw your attention without letting go.
October 3, 2024
So i read this for class and that made it less enjoyable, but you can really tell how good of a poet Danni is. Some of these have so much empathy that even a person who hasn’t experienced the same sort of aggression as Danni can really connect and feel for her.
January 2, 2023
Disclaimer: Danni and I were in grad school together.
<3 <3 <3 Great way to start the year!
<3 <3 <3 Great way to start the year!
January 24, 2023
Every displaced Filipino woman should read this. So deeply touched and seen by this book
September 27, 2024
Loved this one in my Asian-American literature class. We were able to Zoom with the audience , and that was such a rewarding process.
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October 13, 2024i think danni quintos is the only poet who's ever written enough about boobs actually
December 8, 2024
Enjoyed this poetry collection focused on Quintos' experiences growing up mixed race in Kentucky, motherhood, and family.
January 6, 2023
Kicked off my new year of reading with this wonderful book of poems. This is accessible poetry, and the collection reads as a coming-of-age story. These poems cover a lot of ground with themes of family and heritage, body image, spirituality, relationships, and motherhood. As a fellow child of the ‘90s, I love the pop culture references sprinkled throughout as well. Highly recommend Two Brown Dots by Danni Quintos!
Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews