Here are 100 books that The Universe of Us fans have personally recommended if you like
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I never thought I’d be a poetry lover. I got my Bachelor’s Degree in English Literature. During that time, I took quite a few poetry classes, even though I didn’t consider myself a huge poetry fan. Over the course of those classes, I learned that poetry isn’t all about abstract, obscure themes, and academic language. It’s also a way for humans to communicate the feelings and experiences in one heart to another. Once I learned that poetry doesn’t have to be difficult and confusing, I found that I really enjoyed it, and I’d like to help other people discover that poetry can be more accessible and satisfying than what they may have studied in school.
This is unlike any poetry collection I’ve read before. The language is accessible, the material is creative, rich, and a little on the dark side. There’s so much unique imagery and beautiful phrasing that it just delighted me to read it. It’s the kind of poetry book that doesn’t try to be verbose and obtuse just for the sake of poetry. Although it explores some gritty themes, it’s a lot of fun.
That’s the sound of the clocks getting ready to fall back. The nights stretch longer as the days shrink shorter. Creatures of the night come out to play; to fill autumn’s twilights and winter’s chills.
And at the edge of this mist infused scene, Derek R King stands and drinks in this dream. Muse by his side (or is she within), her whispered breath caresses his ears, as she drapes him in words: “Let the poetry begin.”
It is April 1st, 2038. Day 60 of China's blockade of the rebel island of Taiwan.
The US government has agreed to provide Taiwan with a weapons system so advanced that it can disrupt the balance of power in the region. But what pilot would be crazy enough to run…
I never thought I’d be a poetry lover. I got my Bachelor’s Degree in English Literature. During that time, I took quite a few poetry classes, even though I didn’t consider myself a huge poetry fan. Over the course of those classes, I learned that poetry isn’t all about abstract, obscure themes, and academic language. It’s also a way for humans to communicate the feelings and experiences in one heart to another. Once I learned that poetry doesn’t have to be difficult and confusing, I found that I really enjoyed it, and I’d like to help other people discover that poetry can be more accessible and satisfying than what they may have studied in school.
I love this book because it’s like a collection of very short stories, in poem form. It reads like slices of real life, captured in verbal snapshots.
Again, one of my favorite things is poetry which uses everyday language and captures the beauty, sorrow, struggle, and joy of normal life. This book is excellent to dip in and out of for a quick little glimpse of life to enjoy and inspire. There’s something in this book for everyone.
I have published a great many novels and stories and been translated into more than 20 languages, but long before I began to publish fiction I wrote poems, a number of which were published in poetry magazines, newspapers and suchlike – until the day I decided that, while continuing to write poems, I no longer wanted to see them in print. NUDES & VICTIMS contains a hundred of the poems written from 1967 to 2001, plus 30 song lyrics written between 1975 and 2012.
I never thought I’d be a poetry lover. I got my Bachelor’s Degree in English Literature. During that time, I took quite a few poetry classes, even though I didn’t consider myself a huge poetry fan. Over the course of those classes, I learned that poetry isn’t all about abstract, obscure themes, and academic language. It’s also a way for humans to communicate the feelings and experiences in one heart to another. Once I learned that poetry doesn’t have to be difficult and confusing, I found that I really enjoyed it, and I’d like to help other people discover that poetry can be more accessible and satisfying than what they may have studied in school.
I met this author at a local author fair and picked up a copy of his book because he (as well as me!) is a Beatles fan. He said it included poems about the Beatles so I hoped I’d enjoy the book as much as I enjoyed chatting with Ryan. Turned out, I did. Ryan approaches poetry with a powerful mix of wordplay and rhythm. Every poem has a driving beat and becomes a sort of immersive experience. Although this also deals with themes of mental illness, it’s a book that just made me smile to read because it’s so unique. The illustrations make it visually stunning as well.
Open your heart to a compilation of musical poetry and surreal expression drawn from madness and mania.
Artfully weaving a rhythmic tapestry of touching poetry that flows like music, this deeply personal memoir invites readers on a fascinating deep dive into the author’s raw and heartfelt world of living rhythms and authentic feelings. As a deft amalgamation of spoken word, truth to power, clever wordplay, and thoughtful reflections, Euphoric Wonderland illuminates a mad spark of creativity as it draws uplifting inspiration from even the darkest of times.
Stimulate your imagination and open your mind to a psychedelic and enigmatic assemblage…
A Duke with rigid opinions, a Lady whose beliefs conflict with his, a long disputed parcel of land, a conniving neighbour, a desperate collaboration, a failure of trust, a love found despite it all.
Alexander Cavendish, Duke of Ravensworth, returned from war to find that his father and brother had…
I never thought I’d be a poetry lover. I got my Bachelor’s Degree in English Literature. During that time, I took quite a few poetry classes, even though I didn’t consider myself a huge poetry fan. Over the course of those classes, I learned that poetry isn’t all about abstract, obscure themes, and academic language. It’s also a way for humans to communicate the feelings and experiences in one heart to another. Once I learned that poetry doesn’t have to be difficult and confusing, I found that I really enjoyed it, and I’d like to help other people discover that poetry can be more accessible and satisfying than what they may have studied in school.
Yes, it’s a book for kids, but this book has remained with me my whole life. I received this book as a gift when I was a child and I didn’t think I’d like it because I wasn’t into poetry. However, I can’t tell you how many hours I spent perusing the pages of this book. There are so many different poems, by different authors, covering a wide range of topics and themes.
I still own this book and look through it from time to time. It’s a treasured book that can be appreciated by adults as well as children.
Amazon.com Review: The Random House Book of Poetry for Children was recognized upon its publication in 1983 as an invaluable collection--a modern classic--and it has not since been surpassed. Five hundred poems, selected by poet and anthologist Jack Prelutsky, are divided into broad subject areas such as nature, seasons, living things, children, and home. The poems of Emily Dickinson, Robert Louis Stevenson, Robert Frost, Langston Hughes, Nikki Giovanni, and Gwendolyn Brooks populate the book's pages, while Lewis Carroll, Edward Lear, Ogden Nash, and Shel Silverstein ensure that the collection delights even the most reluctant readers of rhyme. Playground chants, anonymous…
I have created art from an early age. Years later, my studies in civil engineering allowed me to combine my love for the arts with my belief in an orderly world. Meanwhile, reading and writing have always been my favorite pursuits. While collaborating as an editor with other authors, assisting them in their writing endeavors, in 2014, I wrote and published my first book. Sharing my writing on Instagram gave birth to the idea of my first poetry book, something like, published in 2018. Since then, two more poetry collections have been published: A TriAngle in 2019 and something like in reverse in 2020.
Pillow Thoughts is a collection of poetry and prose about heartbreak, love, and raw emotions. It is divided into sections to read when you feel you need them most.
I'm the author of Penelope’s Purple Passions. I've been in love with writing poetry since I was a little girl. I would go under the bunk bed at night with my flashlight and write all these poems about love, not that I knew anything about love, but what I did know was how writing poetry made me feel. I believe love is truly the most valuable gift we can give to another soul in our lifetime. I want my poetry to empower people and be that beacon of light in people’s lives. Poetry is the avenue where I can spread love and hope globally to anyone who picks up my books.
This book was chosen because of the deep, profound love that is displayed throughout the book. It speaks to how vulnerable a person makes themselves when they love deeply and how scary that can be. It also speaks to how you can feel so totally lost in loving another person that you forget to love yourself. I could identify with loving so intensely also and having my heart broken. I also identified with the journey of coming to loving oneself again and with that being open to finding someone better.
In the spirit of her bestselling series, Pillow Thoughts, Courtney Peppernell returns with a new, empowering collection of poetry and prose. From heartbreak to dreaming of and finding a new love to healing the heart to ultimately finding peace, the themes in this book are universal but also uniquely individual to readers.
Just as moving and endearing as Peppernell's previous books, I Hope You Stay is a reminder of the resilience and hope needed after heartache and pain. The book is divided into five sections, with poems ranging from free verse to short form. These words are a light in…
The Duke's Christmas Redemption
by
Arietta Richmond,
A Duke who has rejected love, a Lady who dreams of a love match, an arranged marriage, a house full of secrets, a most unneighborly neighbor, a plot to destroy reputations, an unexpected love that redeems it all.
Lady Charlotte Wyndham, given in an arranged marriage to a man she…
I love words! As a child, I learned the power of stories from my father, a master storyteller and creator of 480 original Brer Rabbit stories. I began writing myself at the age of seven, majored in journalism, and enjoyed a career that included everything from technical writing to several of the best-selling Chicken Soup for the Soul books. But only through poetry did I discover the beauty of getting to the essence of experience. I love how poetry takes both the writer and the reader to a deeper place, creating intimacy, giving us “ah-ha” moments, and touching heart and spirit.
There’s a reason Billy Collins served two terms as the Poet Laureate of the United States. His work is known to be both serious and playful, and he is able to take everyday moments and turn them into lessons for living. I always love what he calls “the turn” in his poem—the surprise direction a poem suddenly takes, seemingly departing from its original subject and taking your breath away or leaving you in complete surprise. Aimless Love is a beautiful compilation of fifty new poems and some of the best of four previous books.
“America’s favorite poet.”—The Wall Street Journal
From the two-term Poet Laureate of the United States Billy Collins comes his first volume of new and selected poems in twelve years. Aimless Love combines fifty new poems with generous selections from his four most recent books—Nine Horses, The Trouble with Poetry, Ballistics, and Horoscopes for the Dead. Collins’s unmistakable voice, which brings together plain speech with imaginative surprise, is clearly heard on every page, reminding us how he has managed to enrich the tapestry of contemporary poetry and greatly expand its audience. His work is featured in top…
As a child I did not enjoy reading of any kind, detested English class, and loathed poetry in particular. I simply couldn’t comprehend what relevance poems had to my life. Then, while living overseas, in my mid-twenties in a country in which I didn’t speak the language well and had no friends, I took refuge in an English-language bookstore. There, I would find the slimmest books I could find, which happened to be poetry collections, and I’d pull one down hoping for commiseration. At some point, I realized that I could make certain friends with certain poems. Twenty-five years of growing friendships later, now I read and write poetry for a living.
“Pillow talk of the highest order” ends one review this book. Out of context that would seem to indicate this is a book about romance. There is romance, I suppose, but it is for the English language itself. Open the book at any point and you are likely to be knocked over by the sheer sounds and textures of words bumping into each other—literally and metaphorically. The greatest trick Mullen performs—and there are innumerable tricks here, including anagrams, puns, parodies, borrowed forms—is that she makes poems that are fun to read aloud but also serious in their fun.
Harryette Mullen's fifth poetry collection, "Sleeping with the Dictionary", is the abecedarian offspring of her collaboration with two of the poet's most seductive writing partners, "Roget's Thesaurus" and "The American Heritage Dictionary". In her menage a trois with these faithful companions, the poet is aware that while Roget seems obsessed with categories and hierarchies, the American Heritage, whatever its faults, was compiled with the assistance of a democratic usage panel that included black poets Langston Hughes and Arna Bontemps, as well as feminist author and editor Gloria Steinem. With its arbitrary yet determinant alphabetical arrangement, its gleeful pursuit of the…
Ever since I was a child and my father first pointed me to a few of his favorite poets (Wordsworth, Keats, Shelley), I have been passionate about poetry, particularly poems that speak plainly of the world in a very relatable way. I’ve found that I can learn something about myself and my humanity by reading my favorite poets who often teach me something new about the world. They are my guides and companions.
I love the simplicity of the language and how close the poet feels to the natural world. In her plainspoken language, Oliver’s poems transport us through nature and, by the way, teach us what it is to be human. Herons, sparrows, owls, and kingfishers flit across the pages in meditations on love, artistry, and impermanence.
It is the smallest element that counts the most in Oliver’s poems because it contains so much in so little, stripping the poet’s and our powers of observation down to an essential moment. Who doesn’t love Mary Oliver’s work?
Maybe our world will grow kinder eventually. Maybe the desire to make something beautiful is the piece of God that is inside each of us.
In this stunning collection, Mary Oliver returns to the imagery that has defined her life's work.
Herons, sparrows, owls and kingfishers flit across the page in meditations on love, artistry and impermanence. Whether considering a bird's nest, the seeming patience of oak trees or the paintings of Franz Marc, Mary Oliver reminds us of the transformative power of attention and how much can be contained within the smallest moments.
This book follows the journey of a writer in search of wisdom as he narrates encounters with 12 distinguished American men over 80, including Paul Volcker, the former head of the Federal Reserve, and Denton Cooley, the world’s most famous heart surgeon.
In these and other intimate conversations, the book…
As a published author with an MFA in Writing, I know how hard writing can be in terms of how to find a muse, employ an elusive craft, and deal with the soul-shaking consequences of digging deep. But as a survivor of life, including multiple moves, broken relationships, alcoholism, illness, and debilitating grief, I've also experienced the transformative power of writing. I took that belief into the community, and developed writing workshops for cancer survivors, women facing domestic violence, and many other people wrestling with trauma and illness, often recommending some of these books in my workshops. And along the way, I’ve witnessed time and again what the written word can do.
This is one of those gems that can easily get lost in the literary shuffle. Poet-teacher John Fox gets into the craft of writing poetry in Finding What You Didn’t Lose, but it’s not one of those dry books that will get you all tangled up worrying about your iambic pentameters. Instead, he takes you on a beautiful journey, showing how such useful tools as imagery, sound, metaphor, and rhythm can help you express yourself. Quotes and poetry excerpts round out the rich content of this book.
