Blameforest

Overview

Finalist in the 2024 American Legacy Book Awards

In Blameforest, Jason Stocks captures the rhythms of a vibrant vernacular that is original and authentic. He builds a distinctive world that often turns violent and lovelorn, his rendering clear-eyed and voiced like a blade -- and does so while displaying the expansive range of a skilled craftsman. Far more than a sequence of individual poems, Blameforest is a layered and nuanced work of innovative literature to be read in one sitting, and then over and over again.

-- Jacob M. Appel, author of The Cynic in Extremis

Fierce, bold, and self aware, Stocks's debut poetry collection is steeped in the Gothic hauntings of Deep South life, like "Wasps, with their legs crossed [that] hover in the uppermost angles of gables like ghosts with terrible news they can't wait to deliver".

-- Jenifer DeBellis, author of Blood Sisters and editor of Pink Panther Magazine

Jason Stocks is a father, husband, teacher, and writer living in south Florida. He grew up listening to rock and hip hop and much of his work references his favorite groups. His work also mirrors the hard-knock life he's accustomed to, broaching topics like domestic violence, poverty, and demasculinization. When not completely alienated and writing, he teaches English in West Palm Beach. Blameforest, his first book, was recently named a finalist for the 2024 American Legacy Book Awards. His second book, Laughing is Forever, will be released in May. Find him on YouTube at Sunnyvale Reject.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781736841020
Publisher:	MindStir Media
Publication date:	11/11/2021
Format:	Paperback
Pages:	122

Editorial Reviews

2022-08-08
Debut author Stocks’ poems address issues of poverty, masculinity, identity, and more.

In the poem “Fair Play,” the Arkansas-born, Mississippi-raised author describes boxing with a reverence that’s reminiscent of Ernest Hemingway’s attitude toward Spanish bullfighting, making the violent sport seem almost ennobling: “It’s exciting to see men fall in the ring, after giving their all, instead of on battlefields, or murdered in the streets without a choice.” Indeed, the collection is replete with images referencing violence and desperation: “We kill each other over parking spaces / Shoot-up schools, malls, churches / ’cause our little feelings get hurt,” the speaker of “The Emerald City” says in despair, knowing that “Fury runs deep for no real reason” in him and many of his peers. Each poem is written with an almost brutal honesty and directness, exploring such topics as yearning to be a professional football player, being a victim of a stabbing, and coming to terms with an impoverished upbringing in ways that don’t feel confined to the South; when a speaker affirms in “Conjecture” that “Boys grow up to be bastards. Ruthless amnesiacs, / more snaggletoothed and snarling / than any starving beast (indoctrinated into the system),” he could be talking about people anywhere in America. Stocks’ writing has a powerful immediacy, and his poems are packed with both profanity and pop-culture references, as when a speaker notes his aspiration to “feel like Elvis Presley, Marilyn Manson & Judas Priest during their peak touring years.” Occasionally, the language can feel problematic—especially speakers’ occasional use of the N-word. Its apparent aim is to capture the complex rhythms of how his characters talk, think, and feel and to challenge the reader to sort it all out themselves.

Provocative, explicit poetry, written with muscular swagger.

Kirkus Reviews