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Press
"The bildungsroman, or coming-of-age story, is a literary category that contains some of the most well-loved books in all of literature: To Kill A Mockingbird, Jane Eyre, The Catcher in the Rye. But the roman part of bildungsroman tends to exclude poetry from this genre; after all roman is both German and French for “novel.” Corinna McClanahan Schroeder’s debut collection Inked, winner of the 2014 X.J. Kennedy Prize, crosses this genre barrier, giving readers coming-of-age poetry that charts a young woman’s adolescence and twenties and reminding us of the powerful role that narrative can play in poems."
—Colleen Abel, Book Review of Inked, New Orleans Review
"Corinna McClanahan Schroeder’s recent poems evoke apple orchards, Ohio rivers, and the bittersweetness of growing up. 'Follow the serpentine river roads / toward the Little Miami’s lip,' she begins, in 'Instructions for Return.' The poem makes good on its titular promise, landing the reader in the mild wilderness of Southwestern Ohio, in a time just distant enough to elicit an ache in readers of a certain age and inclination (the Cowboy Junkies clue us in). When she writes, 'That’s river musk on your teeth,' we know to believe her."
—Anna Lena Phillips, "Five Poets of Place," Vela Magazine
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