Yvonne Reddick's Burning Season reviews & features
‘This first book-length collection from Reddick is as lyrical as it is defiant. A collection that confronts climate change, a world in flames and societies on the verge of collapse, told through an exploration of family history. This is an incredible exploration of the oil industry.’ – Mairi Oliver of Lighthouse Bookshop, The Bookseller (Scottish books preview)
Yvonne Reddick’s first book-length collection Burning Season was published by Bloodaxe in May 2023. It won the Best UK First Collection category of The Laurel Prize 2023 for nature writing and ecopoetry and was shortlisted for Scottish Poetry Book of the Year 2023 in Scotland's National Book Awards. The title poem 'Burning Season' won third prize in the Ginkgo Prize for Ecopoetry 2022.
Burning Season is a book about fire and survival, climate change and nature’s defiance. Yvonne Reddick’s understanding of climate change is uniquely personal: her father was a petroleum engineer, and many members of her family worked in the fossil fuel industry. The collection speaks of the paradox that her Dad’s gift to her was her love of nature and mountain landscapes. Burning Season includes a series of vivid, moving and heartfelt poems that explore her grief following her father’s death in a hiking accident.
‘This collection is born of deep feeling and scientific knowledge. Powerful, beautiful poetry in itself, it will also illuminate discussions on the environment and climate change.’ – Frank Startup, The School Librarian, on Burning Season
A video of Bloodaxe's live-streamed launch reading and discussion event of May 2023 with Yvonne Reddick, Kris Johnson and Jane Clarke can be seen below.
Burning Season is distributed in the US by Consortium Book Sales.
POETRY BOOK OF THE MONTH FEATURE ON POETRY EXTRA
Poetry Extra: Poetry Book of the Month, BBC Radio 4 Extra, Sunday 21 January 2024, 11am & 5pm
Yvonne Reddick’s debut collection Burning Season was featured as Poetry Book of the Month for January on Poetry Extra, chosen and introduced by poet Daljit Nagra. He read her poem ‘On the Alaskan Peak We Never Climbed’ on Poetry Extra on 21 January and spoke about why he chose to feature the collection.
‘January’s book choice is a debut collection by Yvonne Reddick, Burning Season. The poetry about our burning planet is always artfully executed with a documentary authority about the crisis as it engulfs the planet. Alongside these serious poems are those heartfelt recollections about Yvonne Reddick’s father, who died in a hiking accident. This makes for a tender, intelligent, tricksy yet polemic collection which I greatly enjoyed reading.’ – Daljit Nagra, Poetry Extra (Book of the Month)
Available on BBC Sounds until 20 February 2024. Burning Season is introduced at 30:37.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001vk56
US ONLINE REVIEW COVERAGE
Harriet Reviews, Poetry Foundation USA, online 8 August 2023
Burning Season was well reviewed online in the Poetry Foundation’s Harriet Reviews feature on US publication day, 8 August 2023.
‘Oil and fire run through Scotland-born Yvonne Reddick’s debut, Burning Season, an ecopoetical elegy for a father who worked oil platforms of the North Sea and oil fields across the Middle East ... Reddick captures the paradox of our unbreakable intimacy with this doomed planet through the wit of song and lament.’ - Rebecca Morgan Frank, Harriet Reviews, Poetry Foundation USA
Read in full on the Poetry Foundation's website here.
POEM OF THE WEEK IN THE SCOTSMAN
The Scotsman, Poem of the Week, Saturday 15 July 2023
Yvonne Reddick’s poem ‘The Flower that Breaks Rocks’ from her first full collection Burning Season was featured as Poem of the Week in The Scotsman Magazine on 15 July.
'Yvonne Reddick's poetry engages with survival on a burning planet, climate loss and nature's defiance ... In her work she explores a deep love of mountains and nature, encouraged from a young age by her petroleum engineer father.' - The Scotsman, Poem of the Week
In print only.
INTERVIEW & REVIEW COVERAGE IN MSLEXIA
Mslexia, Summer 2023
Yvonne Reddick’s first full collection Burning Season was very well reviewed in Ellora Sutton’s ‘What’s new in poetry’ column in the summer edition of Mslexia magazine. The review covered subject, style, signature and a summing up. An interview with Yvonne ran in the ‘How I Did It’ feature on the same page, illustrated with a colour author photo. Yvonne spoke to Ellora about the process of putting together her debut collection.
‘Reddick takes the deeply personal and maps out a geography of grief, for both father and planet: near and elusive as a hare, distant and huge as an oil rig. Loss illuminates loss, reminding us exactly what it is that we, and our descendants, stand to lose in the face of climate crisis.' - Ellora Sutton, Mslexia, on Burning Season
In print. Digital edition available to subscribers.
ONLINE REVIEW COVERAGE
New Writing North: New & Recent Poetry from the North, Summer 2023
Yvonne Reddick’s Burning Season was included in the summer edition of Will Mackie’s New & Recent Poetry from the North feature for New Writing North. Yvonne is a winner of a Northern Writers’ Award for Poetry.
‘Yvonne Reddick’s much-anticipated Burning Season is a lyrical and personal collection that tackles challenging ecological questions in dextrous and elegantly crafted poems.’ – Will Mackie, New & Recent Poetry from the North, New Writing North
Read the feature on NWN's website here.
YVONNE REDDICK IN THE BOOKSELLER’s SCOTLAND FEATURE
The Bookseller: Category Spotlight: Scotland, Friday 12 May 2023
Yvonne Reddick’s Burning Season was included in The Bookseller’s preview of Scottish books published between May 2023 and April 2024. The books were chosen by Mairi Oliver of Lighthouse Bookshop in Edinburgh. This was part of a special Scotland Focus edition of The Bookseller.
‘This first book-length collection from Reddick is as lyrical as it is defiant. A collection that confronts climate change, a world in flames and societies on the verge of collapse, told through an exploration of family history. This is an incredible exploration of the oil industry.’ – Mairi Oliver of Lighthouse Bookshop, The Bookseller (Scottish books preview)
In print and online by subscription.
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LIVE-STREAMED LAUNCH EVENT, 23 MAY 2023
Yvonne launched her first full collection Burning Season alongside Kris Johnson, who was also launching her first full collection Ghost River, and Irish poet Jane Clarke, who was publishing her third full-length collection A Change in the Air. This wonderful reading and discussion event was livestreamed on 23 May 2023, hosted by Bloodaxe editor Neil Astley.
Yvonne, Kris and Jane joined from Manchester, North Shields and Co Wicklow. They read from their new books and discussed them with each other and with host Neil Astley. Stunning readings and fascinating discussion of poetry, nature, home and memory. Yvonne read last in each set.
Now available on YouTube. Click on the arrow below to view the video.
[13 July 2023]
