“Amanda Nadelberg’s poems . . . are jumping, funny, romantic, and frequently lyrical. She repeats words within a stanza, looping back to what you can later recognize as a theme, but which in the immediate reading is almost pure music.”
—Ken Tucker, Entertainment Weekly
“With an array of interwoven free verse poems enacting a strong sense of voice and character, Bright Brave Phenomena . . . employs a tight, quick line to carry this fairly substantial volume.”
—Los Angeles Review of Books
“Clever and complex, convoluted and clear. . . . The poems all work, and they work together beautifully.”
—The Volta
“Nadelberg’s touch is nimble without being precious, colorful without being tacky, and she confronts loneliness without dwelling, making her sorrow sting all the more with its deftness.”
—Publishers Weekly
“The elegant bomb-blasts that litter Nadelberg’s poems have my attention.”
—Vouched Books
“Tender without being saccharine. Astute without pomp. A solid and unexpected collection.”
—Ostrich Review
“Where others might succumb to the doldrums of skepticism or even madness, Nadelberg finds innumerable ways of pulling herself together. This is a beautifully affirming book.”
—Timothy Donnelly
“Bright Brave Phenomena gives us a poetic speaker so youthful and mercurial that we immediately want to call her charming—except that she also warns, ‘I will spit / in the face of anyone who says I’m / charming.’”
—Ange Mlinko
“What we have here is a lovely collection of Nadelberg inventions. These inventions are for telling it like it is. . . . These are indeed very Bright Brave Phenomena, that’s right.”
—Rod Smith
