Book Review - SOUL SONGS

“Soul Songs” - by Mili San

56 Pages – Outskirts Press

Reviewed by: Jeb Ladouceur

It isn’t often that an Arts Critic is choked-up (as they say) by the inspirational nature of a play, or book, that we are assigned to review. Those of us who have been engaged in this business for a number of years usually have, it’s become apparent to me, gotten rather blasé about the dramas and musicals we see … and especially the books we read.

I say ‘especially the books’ because, being reviewers, we are essentially writers ourselves. We must regularly prepare critiques for a public that expects our prose to be journalistically proper, and suitably descriptive of the production or volume under consideration. And when our reviews miss the mark, we hear about it—believe me.

Accordingly, book critics take an almost competitive (though hopefully not combative) approach to our assignment when picking up a book given us to absorb, then review. It’s almost as if (when doing so) we hold the subject authors to a higher standard than we would set for ourselves. In a real sense, we’re highly protective of our vocation.

This is understandable to most people, I imagine … it’s human nature, after all, to put one’s best literary foot forward when joining the company of other writers. We all, (particularly those of us who have authored books) are keenly aware that no work is ever truly completed until it’s read … and we do have some influence in that regard.

That said, I have recently been assigned to review a slim volume consisting of nine emotional essays and ten equally poignant poems. In these nineteen inspiring pieces, it’s almost as if the author is intent on displaying her literary versatility … such is the control over our heartstrings that she exercises with both genres.

Mili San’s obvious memoirs range from the brutal in her crushing DIFFERENT, NOT DANGEROUS: 

I instantly recoiled at the picture of a woman sobbing…a garland of two small decapitated heads around her neck.

To the tender, poetic expressions in BELOVED: 

I found me 

When I found you…

You fill all my dark places.

English is Mili San’s second language, and in some places one detects it. Her use of rhyme is occasionally less effective than the free verse that marks most of the book’s poems. But even so, I found only one instance of punctuation (in an essay) that I would have changed, such is this gifted woman’s impressive mastery of her working English vocabulary.

Above all, San is a writer whose boundless love of those who share her world, ranks her among the truly compassionate literary artists of our time. Her fine little book, ‘Soul Songs’ is appropriately titled indeed.

Award-winning writer, Jeb Ladouceur is the author of a dozen novels, and his theater and book reviews appear in several major L.I. publications. His recent hit, THE GHOSTWRITERS, explores the bizarre relationship between the late Harper Lee and Truman Capote. Ladouceur’s newly completed thriller, THE SOUTHWICK INCIDENT, was introduced at the Smithtown Library on May 21st. The book involves a radicalized Yale student and his CIA pursuers. Mr. Ladouceur’s revealing website is www.JebsBooks.com