Mini Review: Poisoned Apples: Poems For You, My Pretty by Christine Hepperman

Poisoned Apples: Poems For You, My Pretty by Christine Heppermann

Release Date: September 23rd 2014
Publisher: Greenwillow Books
Format: e-galley
Genre: Young Adult – Poetry, Fairy Tales
Source: Edelweiss
Author: Website | Twitter | Facebook | Goodreads
Buy it: Amazon | The Book Depository
Add it: Goodreads

Every little girl goes through her princess phase, whether she wants to be Snow White or Cinderella, Belle or Ariel. But then we grow up. And life is not a fairy tale.

Christine Heppermann's collection of fifty poems puts the ideals of fairy tales right beside the life of the modern teenage girl. With piercing truths reminiscent of Laurie Halse Anderson and Ellen Hopkins, this is a powerful and provocative book for every young woman. E. Lockhart, author of We Were Liars, calls it "a bloody poetic attack on the beauty myth that's caustic, funny, and heartbreaking."

Cruelties come not just from wicked stepmothers, but also from ourselves. There are expectations, pressures, judgment, and criticism. Self-doubt and self-confidence. But there are also friends, and sisters, and a whole hell of a lot of power there for the taking. In fifty poems, Christine Heppermann confronts society head on. Using fairy tale characters and tropes, Poisoned Apples explores how girls are taught to think about themselves, their bodies, and their friends. The poems range from contemporary retellings to first-person accounts set within the original tales, and from deadly funny to deadly serious. Complemented throughout with black-and-white photographs from up-and-coming artists, this is a stunning and sophisticated book to be treasured, shared, and paged through again and again.

*This book was provided by Edelweiss and the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

Okay, a few things I have to say right off the bat. I swear on my life I have already written this review, even my master list of books says that I have but I can’t seem to find it anywhere. It’s not showing up on my blog when I search and it’s not in my computer so I must be crazy. If I am not crazy though and this is the second time you are seeing this then I apologize. Another thing is that I did not take notes on this book and I read it back in May so this is going to be going off of my memory so I’m going to go ahead and make this a mini review (which it probably would have been anyway), but again my apologies. Alright, enough of that… on to the review!

Poisoned Apples is a book of poetry that is fairy tale based. It is also very feminist. I am very picky when it comes to poetry that I like and I wasn’t really crazy about this book. There were a couple good ones thrown in but nothing really screamed at me. There are 50 poems that are all about the same things. Really they were kind of repetitive. They were about the pressures that are put on girls. On how they should look, act, eat, etc, according to society.

The writing was fine and I did like how each poem had a tie in to a fairy tale but that was pretty much it for me. Overall, it was the cover and the title that pulled me in to read the book. The synopsis compares her writing to Laurie Halse Anderson and Ellen Hopkins but I think that is stretching it a bit. I can see how some people would really like this book and some people could be like me and just not be into it. If you are someone that is really into poetry or really into feminism then by all means pick this book up, you will probably one of the ones that loves it! If you’re not into those things then I would say pass on this one.