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Jim Daniels, in his first book of poems, draws upon his experiences in living and working in his native Detroit to present a start, realistic picture of urban, blue-collar life. Daniels, his brothers, his father, and his grandfather have all worked in the auto industry, and that background seeps into nearly all these poems. The first of the book's three sections sketches out this background, then moves into a neighborhood full of people whose lives are so linked to the ups and downs of the auto industry that they have to struggle to find their own lives; in "Still Lives in Detroit, #2," Daniels writes, "There's a man in this picture. / No one can find him." The second section contains the "D...
In these linked stories, the constants are the places—from Eight Mile High, the local high school, to Eight Miles High, the local bar; from The Clock, a restaurant that never closes, to Stan’s, a store that sells misfit clothes. Daniels’s characters wander Detroit, a world of concrete, where even a small strip of greenery becomes a hideout for mystery and mayhem. Even when they leave town—to Scout camp, or Washington, DC, or the mythical Up North, they take with them their hardscrabble working-class sensibilities and their determination to do what they must do to get by. With a survival instinct that includes a healthy dose of humor, Daniels’s characters navigate work and love, cha...
A collection of poems that explore the issues surrounding race relations in American society, told from the experience of Black, Native American, Asian, Arabic, Hispanic, and white cultures.
Jim Daniels takes readers inside an auto factory to experience the frustrations, the dehumanization, and the small victories found there.
The stories in Detroit Tales are tales about urban, working- class America. People struggle both to remain in the city and to escape the city. The three central motifs of this collection are the city, the workplace, and the automobile. If these stories have one unifying theme, it is that escape is not the answer. When the pulls of friendship and love and personal responsibility draw us back to our ordinary homes and our ordinary jobs, we must trust those pulls, and we must lead those lives with as much dignity as we can muster.
Poetry. Of Jim Daniels, the Harvard Review writes, "Although Daniels' verse is thematically dark, the energy and beauty of his language and his often brilliant use of irony affirm that a lighter side exists. This young poet has already found his voice. And he speaks with that rare urgency that demands we listen." This is affirmed by Carol Muske, who identifies the "melancholy sweetness" running through these poems that identifies him as "a poet born to praise".
In The Perp Walk, his latest collection of linked stories, Daniels maps out the emotional capitals and potholes of coming of age in a blue-collar town in the Great Lakes State, though it could be any state where people work hard, play hard, and aren’t paid nearly enough for their efforts. Alternating flash fiction pieces with longer narratives, Daniels captures both the shooting stars and the constellations that build into earned insights and honest reflections. Sometimes we need both the long version of the short version and the short version of the long version, he suggests. Daniels invites his readers to settle on some truth in between the versions. Humor and heartbreak. Coming to terms, coming of age, or just plain aging. U-Haul trucks full of bad behavior and messy goodbyes. In Daniels’s work, the check is always in the mail but somehow never arrives, and honor is more than a certificate—it’s something we strive for, even while doing our various perp walks through life. Compromises are made, as they must be. Sometimes we get what we want for just a second or two, but for these characters, that has to be enough happiness to live on.
"moving, unflinching poems" -- Aimee Nezhukumathil, author of Oceanic
Poems that seek stability in family and community while coping with a country full of conflict and change. The poems in Gun/Shy deal with the emotional weight of making do. Tinged with both the regrets and wisdom of aging, Jim Daniels's poems measure the wages of love in a changing world with its vanishing currency. He explores the effects of family work—putting children to bed, leading parents to their final resting places—and what is lost and gained in those exertions. Childhood and adolescence are examined, through both looking back on his own childhood and on that of his children. While his personal death count rises, Daniels reflects on his own mortality. He finds solace in small mi...
While there have been countless books written about Detroit, none have captured its incredible musical history like this one. Detroit artists have forged the paths in many music genres, producing waves of creative energy that continue to reverberate across the country and around the world. This anthology both documents and celebrates this part of Detroit's history, capturing the emotions that the music inspired in its creators and in its listeners. The range of contributors speaks to the global impact of Detroit's music scene--Grammy winners, Pulitzer Prize winners, Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductees, and poet laureates all come together in this rich and varied anthology.