‘The Inconvenience of Grief’ by Lannie Stabile

In Lannie Stabile’s latest collection of poetry, The Inconvenience of Grief, we find a writer who has come
into her own. Stabile builds upon the themes previously explored in her chapbooks, Little Masticated
Darlings, Strange Furniture, and Hi Lonely, I’m Dad – family, intergenerational trauma, poverty, abuse,
and loss – and brings a new perspective and maturity to her craft. Now with a family of her own and
reeling from the sudden loss of her mother, we find an evolution from (understandable) anger,
resentment & blame to something more tender, more vulnerable, more forgiving. The scope of this
collection is immense & complex and asks the reader to reimagine the definition and nature of grief.

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“Lannie Stabile’s The Inconvenience of Grief is one of those books I could describe as the point of contact between the waters of Styx and Charon’s boat—a place where raw grief bumps against the quotidian. Or I could say it possesses that rare honesty and dark humor known only by those who’ve lost a parent. I could say it’s a book steeped in a simple truth: the inconvenience of grief is that we are alive to feel it. I could say this, and so much more, because Stabile has written one of those perfect books that is huge and all-encompassing, a book in possession of a thousand horizons. But the biggest endorsement I can give is also my bluntest: I wish, in the years after my mother died, I’d owned this book. Stabile’s The Inconvenience of Grief is the kind of poetry you’ll think about before you fall asleep, or on the long silences driving to a family barbecue, or in those moments when a winter wind braids through your laughter. Buy this book, read it, and you’ll find yourself returning to it over and over for the rest of your life.”
—Todd Dillard, author of Ways We Vanish

“Lannie Stabile’s The Inconvenience of Grief is the old, locked trunk hidden in your parents’ closet, the one that holds every secret, every memory and keepsake. And moving through this collection, we are privy to the experience of rummaging through it all. Stabile’s speaker plucks each memory from the pile, examines them with the emotional dexterity of the adult daughter who finally understands how her childhood trauma has shaped her. Witnessing this emotional archiving is to witness how we reclaim power over our histories—on the other side of understanding it is the power to remember it, to forget it, to forgive those who authored it.”
—Dr Taylor Byas, author, instructor, freelance editor

““We have mourned enough, gone visiting too many traveling carnivals”, Lannie Stabile writes in her newest collection The Inconvenience of Grief. And her poems hit hard, beat after beat in that search for closure. Stabile approaches loss in the most honest, unadorned way—and yet somehow never sinks, even in the deepest, most vulnerable waters. She invites us to take a deep breath and dive in, too, and I’m so glad I did. What a marvel this collection is!”
—Hannah Grieco, editor of Already Gone and And If That Mockingbird Don’t Sing

***Available now!***
Official release date August 15, 2023

USD$20 plus shipping