Title: The Princess Saves Herself In This One
Author: Amanda Lovelace
Publisher: Andrew McMeel Publishing
My Rating: 4/5 Stars
Paperback, 156 Pages
Originally Published April 2016
Summary: A poetry collection divided into four different parts: the princess, the damsel, the queen, & you. the princess, the damsel, & the queen piece together the life of the author in three stages, while you serves as a note to the reader & all of humankind. Explores life & all of its love, loss, grief, healing, empowerment, & inspirations.
I was never a big fan of poetry, so I wasn't sure what to expect when it came to this book. I heard of Amanda Lovelace through Twitter somehow (I don't quite remember), and I found it interesting that her self-published book gained so much traction that it ended up getting picked up by a traditional publisher. And the title of itself already gives the reader a clue as to what a badass feminist book it is: The Princess Saves Herself In This One. I mean, come on. I absolutely love it. And I love the simplicity of the cover, too -- it's clear that the entire story is about the words and emotions rather than showy things such as the cover or an extensive summary or blurbs from other famous authors.
For starters, this book was a quick, easy read, so if you don't have a lot of time on your hands, that still isn't an excuse to avoid picking this book up. I finished it in a little less than 24 hours, and I would've finished it sooner if work and sleep and sickness hadn't gotten in the way. Each poem is only a few lines at most, very rarely more than a page long, but each one packs just as powerful as a punch as the previous one. Seriously. There were several poems in this book that left me stunned or shocked, and I had to go back and reread it and dissect it line by line, word by word, to make sure that I got the meaning correctly. Seriously. It's amazing that such short poems can do so much to do, but Lovelace's do.
Another thing that really surprised me about this book was that there was an actual sequence to it. This may be something that is totally common with poetry books, but like I said, I had not previously been a huge fan of poetry and therefore I was just expecting a book filled with jumbled poems about all sorts of topics with no "logical" (meaning linear) sequence to it. But boy, was I wrong. This book starts with poems that explains the narrator's rough childhood and her relationship with the members of her family, as a small and hopeless girl who felt the pressure of everyone around her and caved to it easily. As the book goes on, the princess manages to break past her misconceptions about herself and those around her, and she finds inside of her a fury and a power and a thirst for independence that she totally ends up rocking.
This book covers a lot of different topics, which I also really liked. Amanda Lovelace writes about everything from self-harm to cancer to losing loved ones, losing friends and falling in love, heartbreak and heartwarming moments, and pretty much everything in between. Most poems are told through the analogy of a princess learning to rescue herself from her dark tower, defeating her dragons and all those who had ever wronged her. It's a great book about feminism and self-empowerment and just learning how to exercise your total badass potential as a human being.
Overall, I really enjoyed The Princess Saves Herself In This One. I wasn't expecting to fall in love with this book nearly as much as I did, but that was certainly a pleasant surprise for me. For someone who isn't a big fan of poetry, it's safe to say that this book may have changed my mind a little bit. It's safe t say that I'm eagerly awaiting Amanda's next book, The Witch Doesn't Burn In This One, which will be out in 2018. Amanda Lovelace has officially gotten me hooked on the world of poetry, in the most epic of ways, and I think that her first book was an excellent work of art that any woman should read to teach herself to love herself first. Hats off to Lovelace's first book, because I'll be eagerly awaiting the next one!
For starters, this book was a quick, easy read, so if you don't have a lot of time on your hands, that still isn't an excuse to avoid picking this book up. I finished it in a little less than 24 hours, and I would've finished it sooner if work and sleep and sickness hadn't gotten in the way. Each poem is only a few lines at most, very rarely more than a page long, but each one packs just as powerful as a punch as the previous one. Seriously. There were several poems in this book that left me stunned or shocked, and I had to go back and reread it and dissect it line by line, word by word, to make sure that I got the meaning correctly. Seriously. It's amazing that such short poems can do so much to do, but Lovelace's do.
Another thing that really surprised me about this book was that there was an actual sequence to it. This may be something that is totally common with poetry books, but like I said, I had not previously been a huge fan of poetry and therefore I was just expecting a book filled with jumbled poems about all sorts of topics with no "logical" (meaning linear) sequence to it. But boy, was I wrong. This book starts with poems that explains the narrator's rough childhood and her relationship with the members of her family, as a small and hopeless girl who felt the pressure of everyone around her and caved to it easily. As the book goes on, the princess manages to break past her misconceptions about herself and those around her, and she finds inside of her a fury and a power and a thirst for independence that she totally ends up rocking.
This book covers a lot of different topics, which I also really liked. Amanda Lovelace writes about everything from self-harm to cancer to losing loved ones, losing friends and falling in love, heartbreak and heartwarming moments, and pretty much everything in between. Most poems are told through the analogy of a princess learning to rescue herself from her dark tower, defeating her dragons and all those who had ever wronged her. It's a great book about feminism and self-empowerment and just learning how to exercise your total badass potential as a human being.
Overall, I really enjoyed The Princess Saves Herself In This One. I wasn't expecting to fall in love with this book nearly as much as I did, but that was certainly a pleasant surprise for me. For someone who isn't a big fan of poetry, it's safe to say that this book may have changed my mind a little bit. It's safe t say that I'm eagerly awaiting Amanda's next book, The Witch Doesn't Burn In This One, which will be out in 2018. Amanda Lovelace has officially gotten me hooked on the world of poetry, in the most epic of ways, and I think that her first book was an excellent work of art that any woman should read to teach herself to love herself first. Hats off to Lovelace's first book, because I'll be eagerly awaiting the next one!
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