Skip to main content

Dub

"Dub: Finding Ceremony takes inspiration from theorist Sylvia Wynter, dub poetry, and ocean life to offer a catalog of possible methods for remembering, healing, listening, and living otherwise." 

Although I have finished reading the final instalment in Alexis Pauline Gumbs' trilogy, I keep referring back to the synopsis for help explaining the experience. At first glance, tackling theory and Black history in one poetry collection sounds like an impossible goal, but Gumbs does so flawlessly and effortlessly.

Dub

The thing I love about Gumbs' work is that only she could have written this book; no one else could have accomplished such storytelling in this format. Reading Dub is truly a journey, as it starts off slow and steady, with the pace and tempo increasing with every turn of the page. The story Gumbs' painted was amazingly vivid, and the history she chose to relate also becomes personal, which added to the beauty of the narrative. 

While reading this book, I cannot deny that I felt a variety of emotions. Most of the time I felt exposed, raw, but the concluding words definitely helped me find healing in an unexpected but welcome way. 

This book was an absolutely flawless page turner, and it should come as no surprise that I see it as a 5 star read...I definitely need to go back and read Spill, the first of the trilogy.

What other poetry should I be reading? To share your thoughts, questions or review requests, please comment below, email me (theopinionatedbookworm@gmail.com) or follow me on Instagram (@theopinionatedbookworm1).

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The House of the Spirits

A good friend of mine once told me, "if a book has a rating of 4 or more stars on Goodreads, it is probably a safe bet that you will like it." This is why I almost always choose my books by their Goodreads rating, a strategy I am currently rethinking after reading The House of the Spirits by Isabel Allende. With an average rating of 4.23/5 on Goodreads, I thought I was going to love this book, and for the first four chapters, I did. However, as the story progressed I started to struggle, which has led me to believe that when choosing books I might need to employ tactics that do not solely rely on Goodreads ratings. The Patriarch Isabel Allende's novel takes place in early to mid twentieth century Chile, and tells the story of landowner Esteban Trueba, a man who went from rags to riches using nothing but his mother's honourable last name. Esteban is a classic example of an upperclass patriarch; he believed that by going back to the land of his mother's fami...
Post a Comment
Read more

The End of the Reading Rut

This reading rut I was in was a painful experience that unexpectedly came to an end when I picked up Seven Days in June  by Tia Williams. I was taken on an unexpected journey, torn open while reading about the love story of Eva and Shane. Now that the story is over, I wish it had never ended. 7 days to fall in love, 15 to forget Fifteen years after Eva and Shane first fell in love, they meet again during a writers panel hosted by a mutual friend. Although they had not spoken to each other since their love ended, they were forever in each other's thoughts when writing their respective novels, a fact that only they were aware of. Even after so many years, their feelings are still electrifying, but one question remains, can they overcome the events of the past? Sometimes, reading a romance novel can seem formulaic, but this story broke every formula I have ever experienced in my literary adventures. Each chapter told me something about Eva and Shane that I genuinely did not expect. On...
Post a Comment
Read more

The Kings and Queens of Old

For as long as I can remember, I have had a deep, nearly obsessive, fascination with the past. The stories I was drawn to were ones of kings and queens, knights and wizards, myths and legends. Regardless of the truth behind these stories, the language and the heroic characters that populated the tales created a romantic attachment that lasts to this day.  Even now, I prefer stories of fantasy and adventure to those of real life, and in admitting this I feel like I have failed in my duty as a bookworm, as I only just finished reading The Lost Queen by Signe Pike, even though it was published in 2018.   The Lost Queen I have to sincerely thank Netgalley and Atria Books for giving me access to this ebook, because it was truly a wonderful adventure. The story begins when Languoreth, daughter of a King who still follows the Old Ways of their ancestors, is a child who just lost her mother and must learn to navigate womanhood in a changing world. As the years pass, Languoreth ex...
Post a Comment
Read more