Down the Rabbit Hole

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The poems in Down the Rabbit Hole, as the title suggests, take the reader on a spiralling journey through personal, social and global upheaval. Kate Maxwell's second collection explores the collective mood of uncertainty around the onset and disruption of the global pandemic years. Her poems focus on concepts of disturbance, loss and ultimately acceptance - on the world stage, in the home or in the heart. Maxwell's prose moves fluidly through powerful commentary, lyrical imagery and a touch of wry humour. A familiar place to many, Down the Rabbit Hole, leads us to doors, asks us to make choices and - just like Alice - wonder. 'Like Alice and her acquaintances, Kate Maxwell's personae in Down the Rabbit Hole face mind-bending choices and decisions. For many of them, illusion and moral inertia prevent any meaningful outcome, limiting them to a domain of hypocrisy, humbug and absurdity. Maxwell is a poet of social conscience, as she widens her horizons to expose the evils of first-world centrism and apathy. She is also a poet of quirkiness and irony, and her satirical sequence of poems on writing and linguistic creativity cannot fail to delight. Readers who've enjoyed her previous collection, Never Good at Maths, will look forward to delving into Maxwell's Carrollian world.' - Margaret Bradstock 'In her second poetry collection, Maxwell leads us down a rich and very contemporary urban rabbit hole where the strains of our ecologically precarious, science-saturated age rub shoulders with motherly love, peak hour traffic and dripping taps. Part social commentary, part personal exploration, the poems carry Maxwell's trademark astute eye and sardonic humour, adroitly leavening what might otherwise be at times a dark world view. An assured and fluid style liberally sprinkled with artful juxtapositions (such as "Vivaldi, vodka, and mother's crystal" or "ingrained with gravel and embarrassment") ensure that this is a captivating and highly stimulating read.' - Denise O'Hagan