Thomas Moore (19)

Thomas Moore's Skeleton Costumes is a collection of three line poems fixated on articulations of queer desire that are steeped in deviance, depression, and digital detachment. Each poem is a snapshot that lunges out to bite you but allows its fangs to linger. Macabre images of webcam broadcast snuffy suicides and dismemberment, maladjusted violent love notes, and ominously cryptic terse confessions make for a powerful book. Even though some of these short poems rely on hackneyed phrases, the show more images that border and precede and succeed these either overshadow them or distort them in interesting ways. An unsettling but beautiful collection of poems. show less

A good exploration of the disconnection felt by suburban teens in the 21st century, and the ways that social media has furthered rather than lessened that distance. It finally takes an Acid-fueled explosion of emotion and sensory overload to connect the Narrator to the world. Even when that happens, the narrator is so alienated even from himself that the reader is never quite sure if sex is or isn 't happening--if the narrator is imagining himself to be the other people in his life or not as show more the sex is happening (if it is). A very clever book. Recommended. show less

A deceptively poetic if sparse novel about the darkest expressions of teenage apathy and confusion in the 21st century. The prose is cautious, gray, and unaffected. As such, it reflects it content. I like what the narrative here is doing, however, I felt like I didn't get to know the characters, or at least the narrator's impressions of the other characters, as well as I might have. I wanted the lack of a resolution to be messier, I wanted to Emma to linger more in the ways that Luke show more lingered. Maybe I don't get those things on purpose? show less