Hollering Spell: 193

Like the distinctive hum of a cicada, the poems in Hollering Spell emerge curious but urgent, taking readers to the edge of Appalachia to revel in a girl's story of growing up in the Deep South. Alyx Chandler delves into family lore, landscape, maternal lineage, sexuality, accent, and the dissonance of a place with "so much sweet paired with sting," and a hometown where bless your heart is an insult if you use it right. All the way from Alabama's backroads past the GO TO CHURCH or the Devil Will Get You billboard to the "mannequin land" of cash-only flea markets to the messy piles of shrimp shells at Gulf Shores, Hollering Spell devours memories like a plate of southern comfort food. The poems in her debut collection move between domestic spaces and wild terrain, from porches with rocking chair ghosts to beaches where jellyfish emerge, revealing just how close tenderness can be to violence. With every holler, Alyx Chandler reminds us how we remain spellbound by who and where we come from, and how we're never quite able to forget our first home.