Ed Skoog, who worked for years in the basement of a museum in New Orleans, developed personal connections to objects and paintings. “Working on an exhibition about the building trades was important to this book,” he writes. “Spending weeks listening to the oral histories of plasterers, steeplejacks, and carpenters connected me to my own family’s stories.” Marked by uncommonly intense and considered use of language, Skoog demonstrates a rich attention to form and allusive narrative as he attends to the details of contemporary politics, culture, place, and relationships.

“Ed Skoog's poetry is so ambitious it takes my breath away. In it, he creates dense narratives, sees patterns, sees dissimilitudes, knows how to fishtail with images and turn with ease, knows how to braid pop culture into small personal melancholies and into large generosities.” The Stranger