Review

Hello all,

I have been taking a few days off as I am feeling a little negative lately and don’t want to write with all that angst in my blood. Work is better in so many ways due to a team effort, but only certain people have seen any reward (I guess they’re the only ones with bills to pay). I realized a long time ago that I’m not enough of a sycophant or a liar to get a decent salary in this or any company, and I have no degree either so, are you starting to sense the frustration?

But then I received some great news that I was in the final eight for a John Lennon Poetry Contest sponsored by The Beatles Story, and I was ecstatic to a degree. I haven’t sent anything out in a while because I was picked second in the Poetic Genius Society’s last contest, then I got a bunch of rejections in a row with letters saying “You were on the short list.” This just said to me that my stuff was good, but not good enough. So I take a chance and send my poem in and what do you think happened? Yes, I came in second, and to top it all off they misspelled my name as Haselton on the web site.

Sooooo anyways, I received an email last week from a Luke Armstrong that is generous enough to follow my blog, and he asked me to check out his book and give it a review if I wished to. Normally I shy away from such endeavors because I feel it will expose how truly ignorant I am, but since my writing is only serving to irritate me at the moment, I figured I’d give it a shot. Luke is currently in Guatemala and in his own words—

I live and work in Antigua, Guatemala. Here I am the director of an educational development organization called Nuestros Ahijados. Through schools, clinics, sustainable micro-financing programs, social work, anti-human trafficking efforts, and other programs; we work to "break the chains of poverty through education and formation" for our 12,000 dependents.

As a writer my poetry, fiction and non-fiction has been published in scores of magazines including, Outside, Perspective Travel, Foliate Oak, Long Story Short, The Sheltered Poet, Intrepid Travel, and CNN Traveler, among others. My just finished novel, How One Guitar Will Save The World, will soon be looking for an agent. I am a contributing editor for TheExpeditioner.com. This fall our book, The Expeditioner's Guide to the World will be released. My first book of poetry iPoems for the Dolphins to Click Home About, was published March of this year.

Well Luke, all I can say is that I loved your book and would have bought one had you not been kind enough to send me a copy. Luke’s style is very edgy and irreverent at times, which I really enjoy, and his use of words is spectacular. He uses many poetic tools adeptly, and really has a great sense of humor. The name of the book is iPoems for the Dolphins to Click Home About, and you can buy it at Amazon right now.

I would like to close by thanking everyone and anyone (except spammers) that has left a comment here over the 5 years I’ve been blogging, hopefully I’ll have something in print soon.