POET AS PROTAGONIST: JILL BIALOSKY’S THE DECEPTIONS
Jill Bialosky’s latest novel is driven by a poet narrator—her ambition, her intelligence, her desire and all that has been squelched. This protagonist will fascinate any reader who has felt marginalized, belittled, and erased by the patriarchy. THE DECEPTIONS unfolds as a narrative of awakening, an education in Greek gods and goddesses (including photographs from the Metropolitan Museum of Art), and a literary critique. The poet is a spouse and mother (a new empty nester), a teacher, a daughter to an ailing mother, and a mentor to a young literary neighbor. The poet’s world is upended when a more famous Visiting Poet comes to the all-boy’s school where she works. She shares with him her ambitious book manuscript, sonnet crowns which reimagine Leda and Zeus. Bialosky’s protagonist is in conversation with Yeats’ “Leda and the Swan” (with which the books opens) and, in many ways, also with Maxine Kumin’s “Pantoum, With Swan.”
https://www.poemist.com/maxine-kumin/pantoum-with-swan
I’m hesitant to say much more than this as the twists and turns lead to an explosive conclusion of THE DECEPTIONS. I can’t recommend this book enough.
Congratulations, Jill! — Denise Duhamel