A Conjoined Book

Karla Kelsey'sA Conjoined Bookhinges togethertwo texts-AftermathandBecome Tree, Become Bird-to create a meditation on the nature of aboutness. Aftermath unfolds after an unnamed ecological/emotional fracture, creating a landscape of rift where the I imagines herself as she, and perceptions weave into memory and fiction. Become Tree, Become Bird grafts the Brothers Grimm'sThe Juniper Treeto the body ofAftermath, reworking what has splintered into a variation of fairy tale. Throughout A Conjoined Book, Kelsey’s condensed imagery, shifting viewpoints, and interwoven formal structures set lyric and narrative a-shimmer. Blending experiment and tradition, this book will appeal to a wide audience interested in seeing how fairy tale, philosophy, ecology, narratology, history. As Julie Carr writes: horror, elegy, mystery, fairy tale, lyric, treatise, fragment meet one another with all their intensities of emotion and intellect.