for “close but no cigar” contest entries:

“A meditation, as the title tells us, on the weight of the church measured in granite, until the poem slips into an elegy for a mother, who ends the poem beautifully, almost hypnotically, with her endless peeling.”

— Billy Collins

“Outstanding and eminently publishable.”

— Naomi Shihab Nye

“Tightly crafted and hauntingly evocative.”

— Georgia Wall

for Every Day We Disappear:

“Angela Long writes of hash dens and tulip fields, avocados dropping like bombs in Guatemala, plotting to free an elephant in the cardamom forests beyond Madurai; she writes with a clear eye, a big heart, a wry wit. She offers tender hope for the f-word (the future) in this engaging, endearing, life-affirming book.”

— Susan Musgrave

“The writing is so unaffectedly deft and alert that it would be tempting to race through this chronicle at one sitting, as if it were a deck of soothsayer’s cards laid out one after another. That would be a mistake, for each card has a revelation that lingers like a poem.”

— Séan Virgo

“Engaging, insightful, and delightfully entertaining. Every Day We Disappear takes memoir to a whole new level.”

— Andreas Schroeder

I am a firm believer that the best writing – or at least the most entertaining writing to read – comes from authors who hold nothing back. Those that dig so deep that they must’ve felt like they were laying in the gutter after they poured out their words are my favourites. Long is one of those writers.

— SaskBooks

for Observation from Off the Grid:

“Long is such a keen storyteller that I almost forget that I’m reading poetry. I learn continuously from the balance she strikes between the personal and the political, between observer and participant, how she offers recognitions, sometimes horrifying truths, by way of simplistic, child-like lesson plans or apparently innocuous details of an afternoon.”

— Daniel Burgoyne

“Angela Long’s collection of poetry makes me want to leave town. ‘I have travelled the spine of a nation,’ she writes. In fact she has travelled the spines of many nations: Canada, India, Ireland, Italy, Guatemala and many other countries inform the poems in this collection. Her writing is full of fleshy, vibrant imagery. Sometimes it is heartbreaking. Sometimes it is so vivid it makes you feel as though you’ve just bitten into a ripe mango.”

— Leah Rae

“Absolutely devastating.”

— Louise Dumayne