Blueberries

This is intelligent and probing as Savage confronts her life: as a woman living in a vulnerable female body, as a writer, as an interrogator of patriarchy. She experiments with form from journal entries to free verse, and can be dryly witty: how seeing Mary as a single mother might make some forms of Christianity more humane. The most powerful pieces tackle the aftermath of rape and trauma. Another important female voice.

A strong collection of personal essays focusing on topics including relationships, home and the female body as well as the art of writing itself. This collection reads quickly but (as is often the case with collections of essays) these would be better read individually in order for the reader to fully process the content and get the most out of them. 

The first essay (Yellow City) was the best in my view, but there aren't really any weak ones in this collection. Recommended!

What a unique, intelligent and interrogative voice. Brilliant. Ellena astutely articulates a lot of thoughts and anxieties I've had, so it was very easy to connect with her story. Thank you ever so much for sharing your experiences with us.

I really enjoyed this collection of essays, and would absolutely read more by this author. The essays observed both the mundane and the theoretical with the same degree of self-awareness, boundary pushing analysis and wry irony. Essays that begin about one thing - rape culture, blueberries, a literary journal launch - take meandering turns into discussions of privilege, choices and responsibility. I definitely see similarities with Jia Tolentino's Trick Mirror but also the work of Sheila Heti and Alexander Chee.

Intimate, expansive, tender, lyrical, poignant;  Savage's intellectual rigour is on full display and strongly brings to mind the writing style of Cusk and Levy.

This is such a smart, intimate, touching collection of essays. I loved... all of them, but some more than the others - there were a few where I thought, maybe this is too smart, she is trying too hard to be too clever. But mostly I loved them - loved her comments about being female, about writing, and about stability and money. Her thoughts about money and making it and having dreams and goals in a capitalist society were so interesting and insightful.