Review: Broetry

Broetry by Brian McGackin

Official Website

Description: As contemporary poets deliver entire volumes on subjects like incest, menstruation, and pine cones, regular guys are left scratching their heads. Who will speak for Everyman? Who will articulate his love for Xbox 360, for Mama Celeste’s Frozen Pizza, for any movie starring Bruce Willis?

Enter Broetry—a stunning debut from a dazzling new literary voice. “Broet Laureate” Brian McGackin goes where no poet has gone before—to Star Wars conventions, to frat parties, to video game tournaments, and beyond. With poems like “Ode to That Girl I Dated for, Like, Two Months Sophomore Year” and “My Friends Who Don’t Have Student Loans,” we follow the Bro from his high school graduation and college experience through a “quarter-life crisis” and beyond. Packaged in a small gifty hardcover and illustrated with tasteful black and white illustrations, Broetry is a funny and sly look at modern masculinity.

Review: Just looking at the cover makes me laugh. And in a good way, I'm not mocking the book or anything. Broetry is funny, really funny. Some of the poems are really fabulous. Like, for instance, there's this poem titled, 'Ode to Taylor Swift'. It's about how the poet is in love with her, and how she's an angel, and it could have been very creepy, but the author makes it funny. And he quotes her lyrics, which I thought was hilarious.

Broetry is poetry in the mind of a guy. It's poems about drinking, having one-night stands, girlfriends, weird things you do for girlfriends, college, and growing up, something McGackin has not done. That makes the book better, because it's not a grown man with kids and stuff writing about the thoughts of a bachelor, it's an actual kid who went through these things, and is writing from experience.

Not all poems are funny and loose, though. There's this poem called, 'And You'll Be Way Cooler in College', that talks about hurting and nobody giving you a chance. And if they did give you a chance, you'd be able to shine. That poem hit home and it got some deep thinking, but then I saw the picture accompanying it, and thought, Is this supposed to be deep? Because the picture is of an older man giving a younger boy a wedgie. What I got from it is that high school and all these years suck, and when you get to college, you can be yourself, and you're not under the light of your parents, and the people your grew up with.

The index is beautiful. I thought it was a normal index, like you know, it says a word, and where that word is located in the book. There's some things like that, but the other words and references are hilarious. For instance, it says Answer, 42. And that's a reference to Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy because 42 is the answer to everything. And then he writes

Eon

-Vapor, 134

-Esp, 196

-Leaf, 470

And there are a bunch more. These are all the evolutions of Eevee. Yes, the Pokemon. It evolves into Vaporeon, Espeon, Leafeon, and about three or four more. But it's funny. And those numbers aren't page numbers, it's what number Pokemon they are. And there is soo much more like that.

Overall, this book is beautiful. It's a short, quick read (115 pages) and it's funny. And it makes a lot of Harry Potter references. And the author loves Emma Watson. He even thanked God for her. Also, McGackin has a fan in me.

Expert from 'Part-Time Job Search'

Wake up, log on, you're life's a mess:

you're on Craigslist hitting refresh.

It is boring you to death,

this part-time job search. 

Though all your savings have been spent,

you know your 'rents won't help with the rent

Feeling it'll never end,

your part-time job search

-Broetry;Brian McGackin