Get Free Shipping on orders over $79
Bright Dead Things - Ada Limon

Bright Dead Things

By: Ada Limon

Paperback | 7 February 2019 | Edition Number 1

At a Glance

Paperback


$29.75

or 4 interest-free payments of $7.44 with

Ships in 15 to 25 business days

A book of bravado and introspection, of feminist swagger and harrowing loss, Bright Dead Things considers how we build our identities out of place and human contact - tracing in intimate detail the ways the speaker's sense of self both shifts and perseveres as she moves from New York City to rural Kentucky, loses a dear parent, ages past the capriciousness of youth and falls in love.

In these extraordinary poems Ada Limon's heart becomes a 'huge beating genius machine' striving to embrace and understand the fullness of the present moment. 'I am beautiful. I am full of love. I am dying,' the poet writes. Building on the legacies of forebears such as Frank O'Hara, Sharon Olds and Mark Doty, Limon's work is consistently generous, accessible, and 'effortlessly lyrical' (New York Times) - though every observed moment feels complexly thought, felt and lived.

About the Author

Ada Limon is the author of four books of poetry, including Bright Dead Things, which was named a finalist for the National Book Award, the National Book Critics Circle Award and the Kingsley Tufts Award. Her work has appeared in the New Yorker, the New York Times and American Poetry Review, among others. She lives in both Kentucky and California.
Industry Reviews
I am thankful for this collection, for its wisdom and generosity, for its insistence on holding tight to beauty even as we face disintegration and destruction

In Ada Limon's Bright Dead Things, there's a fierce jazz and sass ("this life is a fist / of fast wishes caught by nothing, / but the fishhook of tomorrow's tug") and there's sadness - a grappling with death and loss that forces the imagination to a deep response. The radio in her new, rural home warns "stay safe and seek shelter" and yet the heart seeks love, risk, and strangeness - and finds it everywhere.

A masterpiece. - Shondaland

Effortlessly lyrical. - New York Times

The best compliment one can give a book of poems is that the book loves the reader. Bright Dead Things doesn't just love poetry; it loves the reader. My hunch is, Reader, you'll love it too. - Huffington Post

Bright Dead Things breeds a particular mixture of wildness. The mixture is by turns melodious and tight. Limon's poems are like fires: charring the page, but leaving a smoke that remains past the close of the book. - The Millions

Belongs to [...] a new poetry that is readable, heartfelt and full of vivid imagery - the Times

More in Poetry By Individual Poets

the love of my life : poetry for rediscovery - Whitney Hanson

RRP $32.99

$24.99

24%
OFF
Dropbear : Winner of the 2022 Stella Prize - Evelyn Araluen

RRP $24.99

$20.75

17%
OFF
You're Going to Be OK : (Because You're F*cked No Matter What) - Darby Hudson
Heroes : The myths of the Ancient Greek heroes retold - Stephen Fry
The Complete Poems of John Keats : Wordsworth Poetry Library - John Keats
Tender : 100 poems for the first 100 days of life - Harry Baker

RRP $34.99

$24.99

29%
OFF
Poems of Henry Lawson : Illustrated by Pro Hart - Henry Lawson

RRP $24.99

$21.75

13%
OFF
The Essential Rumi : New Expanded Edition - Coleman Barks

RRP $32.99

$25.75

22%
OFF
The Iliad : Penguin Classics - Homer

RRP $24.99

$21.75

13%
OFF
Whisper Songs - Tony Birch

Paperback

RRP $24.99

$20.75

17%
OFF
The Odyssey : Penguin Classics - Homer

RRP $24.99

$20.75

17%
OFF
The Epic of Gilgamesh : Penguin Classics - Andrew George

RRP $26.99

$20.75

23%
OFF
The Odyssey - Homer

Paperback

RRP $31.95

$20.99

34%
OFF
The Iliad : Penguin Clothbound Classics - Homer

RRP $39.99

$31.75

21%
OFF
Loves of Our Lives : Poems for hopeful hearts - Josie Balka

RRP $39.99

$31.99

20%
OFF
The Iliad of Homer - Richmond Lattimore

RRP $29.95

$22.75

24%
OFF
Button Poetry : Button Poetry - Andrea Gibson