Praise for UNMET

One emerges from the agile linguistic theatrics of this book UNMET feeling requited met seen and inspireda sensation that moves from writer to reader From daring to darling

Lisa Russ Spaar The Adroit Journal

In alternately nervous and incisive modes roberts explores the profound contradictions behind even the most cleareyed criticisms or desires With a resolute inward stare roberts reveals the cumulative nature of life

Emily Mernin Literary Review of Canada

UNMET reads as thrillingly unconcerned with what poetry should be Poems veer fearlessly across lyricism and experimentalism pain and humor vulnerability and standing ones ground

Madelaine Caritas Longman Montreal Review of Books

roberts admirably permits wide swathes of herself on the page yet without being didactic or maudlin and without overwriting

Pearl Pirie The Miramichi Reader

roberts language is surprisedrenched this fantastic book is a piling on of surprising images and poetic structures and creative desires allowing both reader and poet the opportunity to rise above the Dollar Store desolation and grief and human injustice that plague our society

Chris Banks The Woodlot

Restless unsatisfied deeply felt and vividly accomplished UNMET crackles with striking lines and images Like the books title these poems document divisive experience with forceful aspiration remaining defiant in the face of complacency and injustice Personal and political this book is a journey and a love affair Through shorter lyrics and remarkable sustained poems like Soup I Taste Good and Bad or the tour de rflexion of A Lefthanded Scissors for Paul McCartney UNMETs rich language passionately argues for a tower of honest affection Its a feat that requires poise and roberts is up for the task nimbly travelling a hairraising wire between desolation and beauty

David OMeara author of Masses on Radar

In this rich collection of poetry stephanie roberts gets us to open up as to what the core of our emotions are telling us in fact she gets to what the evidence before us would have us conclude She points with deliciously layered language to the brutality absurdity and hypocrisy of the systems of society and to our collective and historical inheritances We are enticed and entrapped by her fluid writing cutting in all the right places daring us to wake up to the reality that surrounds stephanie roberts operates as a disruptor with this effective collection that points to the times in which we live

Leslie Roach author of Finish This Sentence

Praise for rushes from the river of disappointment

roberts speaks with clarity and certainty in a firm and haunting voice This is an author clearly driven by a need to articulate what is missed She is unafraid to end a poem abruptly and to let the quiet that follows do some of the speaking Shes also clearly having funwith physics with form with the second grammar of the line break and with memories joyous and shocking and neither and both

Quebec Writers Federation AM Klein Award jury

This collection enchanted mesmart thoughtful inventive unafraid poignant and engaging these poems are spot on How lucky are we in this heartbreaking world to have roberts compelling voice of beauty humor and depth allowing us to dip our toes in this exquisite river of poems

Kelli Russell Agodon author of Hourglass Museum

A moving and poignant book of poetry in which roberts exhibits tremendous range in both form and tone Easily one of the finest poetry titles out this spring

Annick MacAskill author Murmurations

A sweeping force of music pulsing images clear wit and tenderness Within beautifully formed poems there is extensive consideration of what we can understand about love and grief alongside faith and unbelief over time

Montreal Review of Books