*I received an ARC of this book through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review*

I came into this book not knowing Akif Kichloo or his work, and I was pleasantly surprised by a volume of haunting poetry, accompanied by a handful of beautiful, black and white illustrations. The drawings are truly as gorgeous as the verses, and they fully capture the spirit of “Falling Through Love”.

The book is divided into three sections, but a cohesive tone unifies the whole work. Each poem seemed to explore a different version of love —familiar love, romantic love, self-love, love for God, a god, some god— and its intricate relationship with the sadder, nastier emotions humans are capable of. It made me think of a Venn Diagram: Love and Grief, or Love and Anger, or Love and Something Else, and every poem took form right in the middle, where both things tangled into a jumbled amalgamation of feelings and thoughts, falling through and dragging the reader with. The product, overall, is powerful.

There were moments when I thought Kichloo was too clever for his own good. Some allegories were crafted with such care, the artifice became obvious. Like the trick reveled before the illusion, this thought cooled my enjoyment of some sections. This, however, was a minor, personal grip. Too-experimental pieces tend to lose me, but I know there’s a giant audience for them.

Fans of Kichloo will adore this collection, and newcomers like me will find plenty to like and ponder over. After all, perhaps poetry is just a “proper” name for the arrangements of words that make us feel. Kichloo achieves this with tantalizing ease.

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“I never see approval in my father’s aging face. And I write a poem.
I never spot peace in my mother’s beautiful eyes. And I write a poem.
My brother keeps forgetting my name. And. I write a poem.”

“All that scares me makes me lighter.
Will you float away with me? To a

town where the sun’s slow exile doesn’t
threaten our days. Where the counting of

hours is simply an exercise in futility.
Where wasting away years is the norm of

the place…”

"...there is this tender place
between something & everything.

now that's where I see myself.

someone's something
in the everything of their world."

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I believe all books are voyages to new lands; poetry, in particular, becomes a window into the machinations of someone else’s heart. Kichloo’s culture —so different from mine, born in a tiny Caribbean island— was a joy to discover. I adored the bits of Arabic, Persian and other languages used throughout the book; that the words were sometimes explained and sometimes not. The chance to weight and consider our differences, to find our similarities are always heavier, is one of the reasons I love reading. I thank Kichloo for the opportunity.

“Sometimes, timing can be wrong, but if you stay wrong, the right time will come”

Lately I´ve been into poetry, mainly because of my lack of time. So I picked this up mainly because the author used to be a doctor and because it had to do with love.

I really enjoyed this book many of the sections resonated with me. Specially because he used to be a doctor and some of the things he said about the work felt close to my heart. The writing means what you need it to mean in the moment and circumstances you need them to be. And I feel I needed to read this at the time I did. I wasn’t the best poetry collection I have ever read, but it made me feel complete, it made me feel hopeful. The black and white drawing were beautiful and they really helped portray the authors message.

My only critique would be that I had a hard time trying to understand everything he was trying to portray and I though in some parts he put more attention to the way the poem looked rather than the way it was written. But other than that I really liked it and I will be looking for new things this author writes.

“An unrealized dream is what makes us act like monsters”

Deeply moving, profound, and heartbreakingly sharp at times. About love, loss, grief, and survival.

*I received a copy of Akif Kichloo’s Falling Through Love for review purposes. As always, this review reflects only my honest thoughts on the book.*

Reading Falling Through Love felt like what I imagine Alice felt like falling into Wonderland. It’s beautiful—almost overwhelmingly so. It evokes a remarkable variety and amount of emotions, and ultimately causes you to look inward towards yourself.

*full review at Pencils & Pages*

2.5 stars.

"How do you build home sour of defeat?" asks my intrepid heart.

"You don't," I throw my answer back. "You live out on the streets, with other lonely folks, or you spit spiderwebs and reside in them hoping for someone to walk through and get caught up in your gateless home."

I didn't enjoy this much to be honest. I could feel the sorrow and loss of the author's in some of the poems but I didn't like the writing style very much. I enjoyed around 20 poems while not so much for the rest. Some of them were repetitive and some were kinda messy. There were a few that I found to be vulgar and uncomfortable.

Thank you Netgalley for providing me with the digital copy for an honest review.