Platinum Blonde is Phoebe Stuckes' debut collection. Whether wildly or wryly funny, each poem presents an episode in the up-and-down life of the wise-cracking party girl. On the surface, this is a world of dance floors and bathrooms, glitter and girls, love and disappointment, but beneath the laughter and antics these are self-questioning poems. Poems about self-belief, self-image, vulnerability and insecurity, loneliness, trauma and survival. Phoebe Stuckes has been a winner of the Foyle Young Poets award four times and is a former Barbican Young Poet and Ledbury Poetry Festival young poet in residence. Her debut pamphlet, Gin & Tonic, was shortlisted for the Michael Marks Award in 2017, and she won an Eric Gregory Award in 2019.
***
***
(@BloodaxeBooks, 21 May 2020, ebook, 64 pages, copy from publisher via @edelweiss_squad)
***
***
This is the poet's debut. It's a terrific collection and I can't wait to see what she comes up with next. The poems are quite short, most well under a page so a lot is packed into this collection. Bloodaxe are one of my favourite poetry publishers and they've outdone themselves here. These are fierce poems about fierce women in a fierce world. Stuckes' writes about familiar subjects such as self-belief, self-image, feminism and trauma in a way that feels fresh and brand new. The women in Stuckes' poetry are bad-ass, aware of their own power and vulnerability and aren't afraid of speaking out. I loved all of the poems but my favourites include Bleach, Ba Girls Club, Hell Is a Bus Full of Men I've Unsuccessfully Tried To Date, Blood, Gold Hoop Earrings and Wolfish.