The format of the book threw me off. I don't mind the prose poetry; in fact, I prefer it over conventional poetry. But I think sending this to my Kindle messed with the way the book was set up. It felt endless and short at the same time (if that makes any sense). I'll have to pick up a physical copy when it's released. Hopefully, I can give it an honest review after that.

This poetry collection is unlike anything I've read before. It integrates the Chinese-American background of the poet and all the hardships they face. the gender roles and racism really struck a chord and I am so glad I requested this. Highly recommended!

This collection of poetry, prose, and prose poems was not my cup of tea. I'm not a fan of prose poems for the most part, and this was not exception. It was a short collection, but not necessarily a quick read. The author's experience as a trans person make it worthwhile, but it was not what I expected. I felt there was something missing In this collection, a lack of cohesiveness, maybe? Still would recommend for others to give a chance.

From iphelia.com's Editor's Bookshelf review: The Year of Blue Water is a phial of medicine for the soul.

As with any prospective remedy, I approached the book with nervousness, which was kicked into high gear as soon as I learned it was written by a trans author. That alone brought up a lot of energy for me. Even as I’ve acknowledged that, like many of us, I was raised in an implicitly homophobic and transphobic environment, I felt the power of those seeds having been buried deep and wondered if I had a place entering into relationship with Yanyi’s work as a reader.

But rather than an opportunity to confront and wrestle with shame, The Year of Blue Water turned out to be a poignant and soothing chance to relate to self, and a reminder that I can become more myself day by day. Yanyi’s openness and ability to document feeling-states in words is a gift given again and again on each page.

While one of the book’s official descriptions highlights its presentation of the author’s “long journey self‑guided through tarot, therapy, and the arts,” The Year of Blue Water is just as much about childhood memories, food, and friendship.

The Year of Blue Water will most interest those who want to connect more deeply with self. It will inspire those who want to start or maintain a journaling practice or embrace solitude or begin devoting higher-quality attention to life’s details, from the beauty that surrounds us daily to the intricacies of our memories and dreams. Regardless of what internal energies the reader meets in committing to Yanyi’s words, The Year of Blue Water is a potent reminder that we are all perpetually in progress.

This poetry book has a spin on it, different then most poetry books but I still enjoy it. I like the writing style and the messages that’s within these pages. It’s very personal, close to the writers heart. These words filled with heardness that made me feel sad, but also powerful by story writing in these prose and poetry.

It does seem appropriate that some of this book appeared as Diary since that is how this series of memoirish prose poems seemed to me. Yanyi does open the door and allows the reader to enter their inner conversation for a short burst of time, but it felt superficial. There was a lot of namedropping that took away from the writing and left me feeling like I was only allowed to go so far into the shallow water. The writing itself should be the anchor, and I was looking for something more from an award as significant as the Yale.

Its a very genuine attempt. I appreciate the different approach to explaining a dream in a poetic yet prose form. But when one says poetry, I expect haiku, Limerick, ode etc. This was a good prose written with a poetic touch. Hence I am disappointed.

I’m not too sure what to say here, I did enjoy this little collection, however I’m not entirely sure where to place it and I honestly felt a bit discombobulated when I read through it. I loved the rawness of it and the honesty, but I felt like something was missing, and I’m not entirely sure what it was. Maybe I wanted more? Maybe I wanted some more structure of the collection. But nonetheless it was good, and I would like to thank NetGalley for giving me the chance to read this on my flight home!

A deeply evocative, personal and raw collection of poems, of feelings rather, this collection touches on many issues and topics despite its short length. Issues of identity (both racial and gender), belonging, anxiety, musings on the usefulness of art and writing as therapy are infused throughout the poems, which are more like stream of consciousness prose poems than traditional poetry. I enjoyed reading this and some passages, especially those related to anxiety, hit a bit too close to home for me.

*Disclaimer: I received this book for free from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

I don't usually read much poetry but one of my goals this year is to diversify my reading, whether that be in terms of genre or the authors themselves, so I was curious to try this collection.

The foreword really hooked me in and then several of the poems were very effective but overall I felt that there was something missing to me. I can't quite put my finger on what it was but I feel that this may have worked better as a collection of vignettes, which many pages felt like anyway, that told one whole story. The way the book is edges towards this style but the book ends abruptly.

The themes discussed were handled well; the idea of being a stranger in your own body due to both mental illness and being transgender, was an interesting one that I think a lot of people could relate to on certain levels.

Overall I was a little disappointed in this but I'm glad I gave it a go. The style reminded me a lot of Maggie Nelson's Bluettes so if you liked that, definitely check this out.

Formatting of this ARC let this down as I struggled to read the poetry as it’s just one long text rather than individual poems. It was emotional and thought provoking but at times I felt out of my depth I think. But unfortunately due to the ARC formatting I did struggle

Thanks to netgalley and the publisher for a free copy for an honest opinion

Discernible talent, raw writing and a crystalized style - Yanyi's writing is already very well formed, his sense of poetics and the mood these prose poems evoke are recognizable and unique; yet something prevented me from fully 'clicking' with this collection. Might have been just bad timing.

Nevertheless, I would gladly recommend this as a refreshment to anyone disappointed in modern poetry which equals Tumblr entries more often than tolerable, and will be happy to read any next offering by the author.

ARC from NetGalley.

(Three stars on Goodreads, but four here because of the different criteria.)

A bit too far over my head.

The formatting really let this down as it reads a just one long piece of writing so it's disjointed and very hard to follow.

*I received an ARC via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. Thanks for the free book.*

Yanyi is a young trans*-poet at New York University. This very short mix of poetry and prose is his first book. It deals with sexuality, mental health, identity struggles, family and coming out / living with oneself as a trans*-person.

I personally enjoyed parts of it a lot, other parts were a bit too enigmatic for me. But as I am not a trans*-person, I may lack knowledge. It was very well written, a beautiful use of language. Some poems were very sad, others were more hopeful.

I wish the young author and winner of the 2018 Yale Series of Younger Poets prize all the best.

"For a long time, I was attached to she/her as my pronouns, even when I was nonbinary. They didn't seem as sharp as I wanted it to be. And I like precision. Diana tells me that to be trans or nonbinary is not be a woman but to be of women. That seems a more useful gesture. I never want to disappear unequivocally into masculinity. Womanhood is the country I come from, a home I reach back for to reproduce, recreate, replenish."

Although I could see the potential in this text, I was not able to sustain my attention and finish the narrative.

The Year of Blue Water puts you in the shoes of a Chinese American transgender. It also describes mental illnesses and trauma. It was a passionate book but sometimes I felt some words were out of place. I couldn’t understand many things, maybe with a little context it would be great.

The Year of Blue Water by Yanyi reads like a diary and indeed, I believe the author had intended it to be written and read that way. I'm not very familiar with the prose poem format and sometimes I got confused with the flow of the poetry. There are plenty of quotable sentences and it is definitely a book that invites you to reread and ponder in silence.

"then, what is so unnatural to me: to believe that what i can't control will be kind to me. when you walk away from me, i hear you saying that you will always be with me. when i wake up. i hear you telling me it's okay. things eventually happen. it's not always true that when someone disappears, they never come back, even if that has been my experience."

this book was very eye opening, heart opening, to the life and struggles of someone who is transgender. but also of the greatness their life can be even amidst it all once they find that comfort and ability to show themselves, sometimes losses will exist, but it will also show you who cares about you for you, who accepts you as you are and not what they choose to view you as just because it may be what they had previously known. everyone has a right to present as they know they're meant to and not uphold others expectations that will only damage them.

The Year of Blue Water by Yanyi is a collection of mostly prose poems covering a variety of current identity issues. Yanyi is a poet and critic who has received fellowships from the Asian American Writers' Workshop, Poets House, and the Millay Colony for the Arts.

Racism, gender identity, orientation, and the idea of duality come into play in the poems. The poems themselves flow like stream of consciousness, but the stream seems much more polished with a natural structure and refinement.

What you touch will come to life: a whole room sprung in backwards words of people untalking to you.

The topics gently shift and flow. Being poor as a child and longing for Cherioes because they were so much better than the cheap copies. Later in life depression -- being trapped in one's self and part of the self not wanting to go on or taking personality tests to find out the person you are supposed because you are unable to or confused by what you think of yourself. Boundaries of one's self are more complex than nineteenth-century French cities whose boundaries were set by the reach of the church bells peal.

The Year of Blue Water is a deep and exploratory account of one person's life and confusion when examining one's self and the world around. Masculinity is no longer driven by the male John Wayne figure and feminity no longer constrained by either June Cleaver. In the seventies, one British band would explain that "It was a mixed up, muddled up, shook up world." Then it was a fringe idea today the grey areas become much more substantial than in the old duality. The order of a binary system has seemed to fade in everything from health and unhealthy to the world locked in as capitalist and communist systems. Yanyi explores the complexity of his own life in this fluid collection of prose poetry.

These prose poems from trans poet Yanyi explore identity and anxiety, examining the relationship between the cerebral and the emotional. As Carl Phillips notes in the introduction, the prose form gives the book a diaristic feel, and that suits the central concern of the book (which I interpreted as the desire to bridge a divided external and internal self) as well as the tone of the poems, which I found to be tender and intimate, a speaker writing with patience and compassion as he works to understand and assert a developing sense of self.