In Atrium, award-winning Palestinian-American poet Hala Alyan traces lines of global issues in personal spaces, with fervently original imagery, and a fierce passion and intense intimacy that echoes long after initial reading.
The book received the 2013 Arab American Book of the Year Award for Poetry, an astounding achievement for a first collection. In addition, Alyan was recently tapped as a finalist in the Nazim Himet Poetry Competition.
Already in her young career, Alyan has etched her mark on other award-winning poets who are universal in their praise: "Don't miss the dazzling Hala Alyan. Wow. When she says 'the poetry like a spear,' she isn't kidding." -Naomi Shihab Nye; "Hala Alyan's poems startle us with their beautiful, enigmatic images and capture us with their passionate engagement with the world. A powerful debut." -Chitra Divakaruni; "For all the stunning angularity in this vision, we do not doubt that what we are seeing and sensing here is a surprising, sharp-edged sense of the real, of a world that had been there all along, just waiting for this poet and these poems to reveal. Start to finish, these poems convey a singular vision and represent an important new voice in the international poetry arena." -Fred Marchant
Hala Alyan's Atrium is truly a remarkable debut by a poet of stunning virtuosity and range.