Oluwaseun Olayiwola Reviews John Challis, Shara McCallum, and an anthology of poems from Malika’s Poetry Kitchen

McCallum’s impeccable ear, peppering Old Scots with a dramatic tone [...] makes the language as symphonic as it is historically situated.

If history is one type of form, McCallum achieves with this book an entering into it, recharging it with an imagination and urgency that speak to contemporary realities and the effects of colonialism and slavery. McCallum delivers compelling characters whose language may be of an older time, but whose motives staggeringly mimic modern minds.