First, let me say that Kristin is a writing buddy of mine. This isn’t unusual, though–if you’re writing poetry and read hers, you’re probably her type of person. Start a conversation and you’re likely to end up as her writing buddy, too.

I recommend reading this chapbook if the review that follows sounds appealing to you. (As a personal choice, I’m almost never not going to recommend a book I review here, though some will have caveats.)

Pink Plastic House is a chapbook of sonnets, organized thematically into different “rooms”. When I ordered a copy, Kristin personally annotated it and sent some stickers along with the book. Many of these are early sonnets for her and brim with the rawness of that. There’s no confusing early with unskillful, though.

I particularly admire the use of the formal mechanisms of poetry. Myself, I rarely write formal poetry, though I’ve been known to try to maintain some kind of meter. Kristin’s poems are full of mid-line rhymes, half rhymes, enjambment, and other poetic techniques to avoid the sing-song feeling that the iambic meter can sometimes impose.

In terms of the content, some of the poems are “easy”, but others are darker and more difficult. A few have sexual innuendo. If this last part is what you’re looking for, and you can only afford one of Kristin’s chapbooks, get Good Girl Games instead.

If you want a book to devour in an afternoon and be done with it, you might find Pink Plastic House to be too short. Sonnets are short, after all. If, instead, you want to savor a book, looking carefully at each poem in the house she’s constructed, you’re likely to enjoy this immensely. Plastic houses and childhood things are a metaphor throughout, and some of the poems are playful like a dollhouse and others are glimpses at the melted ruin of a plastic house subjected to the magnifying glass of a sadist.

Visit her website at https://www.kristingarth.com/ to order this or one of her other books (you can read many of her poems for free to get a taste of her style). Of particular note, her latest book, Puritan U, is available for pre-order from the fabulous Rhythm & Bones Press. (The careful observer will notice that they have published some pieces by me, which you can read on their site. Find links on my list of published works.)