Glitter Road - by January Gill O'Neil (Paperback)

About the Book

"Glitter Road reflects on the end of a marriage, loss, and a new relationship against the backdrop of a Mississippi season. She explores the history and legacy of Emmett Till, how his story is braided with hers, and how race binds us all together. These poems reclaim the vulnerable, intimate parts of a life in transition and celebrate womanhood through awakenings, landscapes, meanders, and possibilities. She declares, 'I am done telling the kinder story. I am a myth of my own making'" --

Book Synopsis

A beautiful portrait of how joy is an act of resistance.

"My poems brought me to Oxford, Mississippi a.k.a. the velvet ditch: / a place you can fall into, get comfortable among confederate rebels," writes January Gill O'Neil in her stunning new collection, Glitter Road. The poems in this book look back at the end of a marriage, a heartbreaking loss, and a new relationship against the backdrop of a Mississippi season. O'Neil reflects on the history and legacy of Emmett Till, how his story is intertwined with her own, and wades through the incredible grief she feels for herself, her children, and the Black children who won't come home tonight. These poems reclaim the vulnerable, intimate parts of a life in transition and celebrate womanhood through awakenings, landscapes, meanders, and possibilities. She declares, with both self-love and conviction, "I am done telling the kinder story. I am a myth of my own making."

Review Quotes

"The speaker, like we are, is experiencing dichotomy. Love and lament, offered in poems so sonically pleasing that the ugliness they confront is doubly staggering. And the speaker doesn't allow anyone to look away from it--herself included. In 'Rowan Oak, ' she drinks wine and dines on oysters at an estate that once depended on the labor of enslaved people. 'Praise every / complicated bite, ' she says of a stew made from the meal's leftovers. 'Each spoonful becomes a memorial, a reckoning.'"
-- "Electric Literature"

"These poems memorably navigate the braiding of love, tragedy, resilience, and parenthood."-- "Publishers Weekly"

"In Glitter Road, the brilliant and beautiful collection of poems by January Gill O'Neil, we are taken from truth to tenderness, old love to new love, the Northeast to the deep South, and everywhere in between. O'Neil is an engaging lyric storyteller who moves us seamlessly from Tina Turner to the legacy of Emmett Till to cartwheels, a Hallmark card that hasn't been invented yet, and into John Grisham's bed. O'Neil writes, I'll take my miracles however they appear/these days--and how can we not praise the wounded world with her? Whether writing about Blackness, body, family, nature or nurture, love or loss, O'Neil always keeps a sense of hope and humor. Glitter Road sparkles and dazzles me, then wrings out my heart in the very best way. And as O'Neil writes, If at 4 a.m. you find yourself awake and alone, /curled up in your half-empty bed under a flashlight's white light reading a poem...regret nothing, I will tell you--you won't--as these are the poems you need on your nightstand because this is the book you won't be able to put down. Rich with history and herstory, these stunning and striking poems are intimate, honest, and always engaging. I cannot say or recommend this collection enough; Glitter Road is O'Neil's most powerful book yet."
-- "Kelli Russell Agodon, author of 'Dialogues with Rising Tides'"

"The alluring poems in Glitter Road delve into past heartbreaks and the exquisite joy of family and new found love in a constantly changing world. In sure and talented hands like O'Neil's, vibrant landscapes whirl, take root, and break bread with ghosts. It's clear these heart-filled poems will have a full and magnificent life of their own."-- "Aimee Nezhukumatathil, author of 'Oceanic'"

About the Author

January Gill O'Neil is associate professor at Salem State University, and the author of Rewilding, Misery Islands, and Underlife, all published by CavanKerry Press. The recipient of fellowships from the Massachusetts Cultural Council, Cave Canem, and the Barbara Deming Memorial Fund, O'Neil was the 2019-2020 John and Renée Grisham Writer-in-Residence at the University of Mississippi.