Rating: Summary: Its not Shakespeare ... Review: Jewel Kilcher is a fine musician, but leaves something to be desired as a poet. Some of her work is touching, many perhaps personally relevant, but most are, well ... substandard. As a previous reviewer mentioned, this work needs to be judged on its own merits. And in doing so, I found it lacking.
Rating: Summary: Shame on you HarperCollins and Jewel Review: Poetry?
Rating: Summary: great book! Review: This book of poetry is one of my favorites..and I am one who tends to dislike reading poetry! She touches on many things in a way that truly affects you, and remain with you. She is a true artist, and a great one at that!
Rating: Summary: Not since William Shatner entered the recording studio... Review: Fairness demands that we judge this work on its own merits. So put out of your mind the platinum certifications for "Pieces of You". Even go so far as to remove the dust jacket with its enormous, glamourously lit photograph of the poet. (Now if Emily Dickinson had had the sense to do something like that, she might have had more readers.) Open to a random page and see for yourself what verbal deftness, what metric skill, what artistic insight the author commands:"A father and son bond / by ogling my breasts" Hmm. Maybe you better hang on to that dust jacket...
Rating: Summary: I'm not trying to defend... Review: but I thought this book was absolutely awesome, beautiful,unique, and inspiring. After reading some of these harsh reviews I had to write this. This is one of the most inspiring books I have ever read. Jewel is simplistic, honest, innocent, pure, but most importantly I think, she talks about what matters... What life is about, what we forget in our every day hustle and bustle. Jewel reminds me of the important stuff: love, spirit, freedom, happiness, family... the earth and nature, not shopping malls and offices. Personally, I like to be reminded of this. I'm not a huge fan that's here to defend her, I like her music,but I loved her book much more. I do not believe she was published because of her stardom, but because she is a good writer. I 've read Rumi, Maya Angelou, Pablo Neruda, Whitman, Kerouac, anything I could get my hands on, and this is one book I will not part with. Yes, she writes in free verse, and yes, she is sincere and simple, but what is wrong with that? She has great imagery, ideas, thoughts, insights, and feelings that inspired and enlightened me. I know I must sound like a fanatic, but you folks really have'nt a clue. Get some depth. If you are a poetry fan I urge you to buy this book. I really think you will enjoy it.
Rating: Summary: Like paying for scraps of paper Review: Much of the poetry in Jewel's book is beautiful and moving. She clearly has a way of turning word into image and emotion. However, I could not help but get the feeling that Armor was put together from discarded ideas for song lyrics and unfinished thought, as a way to wring a few extra bucks out. This was only reinforced when I heard some of the same lines in the songs on her second studio album. Save your money - even if you like it, you won't find yourself missing it after.
Rating: Summary: How? Review: After reading this one question lingures in my mind: How ever did Jewel manage to get this published? Jewel seems nice and has great music, but her poetry can not live up to that, I write better: "What werer you thinking? Seems like you were drinking, After writing this book, You sure had good luck, Could the publisher read? Because your poetry we do not need!" So im not a world famous poet, but if you think that was bad, then you realy dont want to read this, if you want to get inside Jewels mind then you want this, but if your looking for poetry, look else where.
Rating: Summary: Don't quit your day job Review: Maybe one metaphor in this book is fresh, the rest is cliched. The stuff can be argued to be song lyrics or prose divided badly into lines, but they are not poems. She is like one of those incorrigible girls in my creative writing class who is constantly castigated by our teacher but maintains she'll become a successful singer.
Rating: Summary: Wonderfully unpolished, true and recognizable emotion Review: I can't believe the negative reception this book got. Jewel reveals herself through her poems as an extraordinaryly perceptive and sensitive person. Yes, the poetry is unrefined, unpolished, raw...it's completely real. Critics take this certain superiority standpoint, as though poetry has to be cryptic and carefully planned to be valid. Here, I recognize actual emotions, atmospheres, and circumstances in her beautiful, unbridled, uncensored writing. Jewel puts you in exotic places and while providing the picture of the situation, still adds the universal human feelings that not only let you picture the place she is at, but feel it as a part of your experience as well. I recommend it to anyone, women especially.
Rating: Summary: Terrible Review: Okay, I bought this book because I really enjoyed Jewel's songwriting. But after reading just a few of the poems, I wondered why I had bought the book at all. These poems are absolutely terrible. Yes, they are from the heart, but that doesn't mean that it's going to be good poetry. I kept reading the book, hoping to find a good poem, but I really couldn't. She wrote poems about goldfish swimming in her stomach, a father and son ogling her breasts, and an old gypsy lady that stole her luggage at an airport as sausages fell out of her pocket. That is not poetry. Honest words that came from her heart, but it is not good poetry, let alone poetry at all, if you ask me. I am an avid poetry reader and write poems myself, so seeing that these kinds of poems could get published made me sick. As she said herself, they were only published because of her music selling millions. If she wasn't a name, there is no way that she could have gotten her poems published. It just makes me want to try all the harder to get my poems published, since horrible poems like these can get published so easily. And to compare her poems to Shakespeare, Frost and Dickenson, is just absolutely unreal. They were great poets and will forever be cherished over time. But Jewel is just an amateur writer who never deserved to have this book come out. Let the thoughts that she has stay to herself. If you want to read a good book, read Lord Byron, a brilliant poet, or Poems That Come From The Heart.
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