{"id":7500,"date":"2020-04-14T14:10:02","date_gmt":"2020-04-14T18:10:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/?p=7500"},"modified":"2020-04-14T14:10:02","modified_gmt":"2020-04-14T18:10:02","slug":"book-review-the-apocalyptic-mannequin-by-stephanie-m-wytovich","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/book-review-the-apocalyptic-mannequin-by-stephanie-m-wytovich\/","title":{"rendered":"Book Review: The Apocalyptic Mannequin by Stephanie M. Wytovich"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/a>\"\"<\/p>\n

The Apocalyptic Mannequin: Poetry <\/em>by Stephanie M. Wytovich<\/p>\n

Raw Dog Screaming Press, 2019<\/p>\n

ISBN: 978-1-947879-13-3<\/p>\n

Available: Paperback, Kindle<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

It is shocking and deeply disturbing to know that in the aftermath of the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki and after the nuclear accident at Chernobyl, many people continued to survive, suffered through radiation poisoning, and then<\/em> died. This living death is the theme of a relentless catalogue of ugliness in The Apocalyptic Mannequin: Poetry <\/em>by Stephanie M. Wytovich.<\/p>\n

Wytovich intends this collection to be a warning about the end of the world, or the end of the world as we know it, through war, violence, disease, and finally death. The images in these poems accomplish this goal by painting a setting littered with bloated dead bodies, twisted metal and ashes. Bodies transform into \u201cmeat,\u201d clothing into \u201cgasmask couture,\u201d and survivors into \u201cmannequins\u201d who wander the apocalyptic landscape crawling with plague and vermin, barely able to survive or inevitably wanting to commit suicide.<\/p>\n

The poems build a narrative in snapshots from the chaos of the first post-impact days, through the struggle to find relief, and, ultimately, to what will be the new normal. Wytovich deftly uses sensory details to create transitions between groups of poems. The initial poems are extremely dark with scenes of destruction that reduce the imagery to a handful of repetitive words that mirror the setting in a literal way.<\/p>\n

The next group of poems represents a middle stage in which the survivors struggle to make sense of a world in which they have lost communication. They feel left alone to make sense of a situation in which they must now protect themselves from other people in need who bang at their doors and windows. The speaker in these poems recognizes that the survivors must start over and \u201cre-make Eve\u201d \u201cwith the tree of knowledge growing\u201d in their \u201cwombs.\u201d\u00a0 However, this is not to say that there is much hope because in the final group of poems, instead of new plants growing, there are\u00a0 \u201dblossoms of collagen\u201d with \u201cthe forest floor\u201d growing \u201cfemurs.\u201d The imagery in this section involves shape and color to describe the poisoning of the environment.<\/p>\n

In the final group of poems, the imagery becomes more familiar and symbolic because its origin is memory. The speaker\u2019s heart is hidden in \u201ctrunks of abandoned cars\u201d and \u201cempty cafes,\u201d and she feels like a \u201cbroken doll.\u201d But the world has changed, and so has she. After experiencing tragedy, hunger,\u00a0 anger, and abandonment, she has turned into a scarred \u201cscavenger\u201d and a witch who has \u201cwoken.\u201d Meanwhile, the new world is, ironically, still full of impending death. That is its toxic message to us in these poems.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Contains: body horror<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Reviewed by Nova Hadley<\/p>\n

Editor\u2019s note: <\/strong> The Apocalyptic Mannequin<\/em>\u00a0<\/em>was nominated to the final ballot of the 2019 Bram Stoker Award in the category of Superior Achievement in Poetry<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Apocalyptic Mannequin: Poetry by Stephanie M. Wytovich Raw Dog Screaming Press, 2019 ISBN: 978-1-947879-13-3 Available: Paperback, Kindle   It is shocking and deeply disturbing to know that in the aftermath of the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki and after the nuclear accident at Chernobyl, many people continued to survive, suffered through radiation<\/p>\n

Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[907,2594,357,3503,2093,1178,4414,2936,4413,4412],"class_list":["post-7500","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-apocalyptic-fiction","tag-body-horror","tag-bram-stoker-awards","tag-environmental-horror","tag-horror-poetry","tag-human-horror","tag-nuclear-disasters","tag-post-apocalyptic-fiction","tag-stephanie-m-wytovich","tag-the-apocalyptic-mannequin"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7500","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7500"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7500\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7509,"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7500\/revisions\/7509"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7500"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7500"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7500"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}