Running the Voodoo Down [Paperback]

Jim Mcgarrah (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0970934289 | ISBN-13: 978-0970934284 | Publication Date: July 2003

Poetry. RUNNING THE VOODOO DOWN by Jim McGarrah is one of the winners of the Elixir Press Third Annual Poetry Awards. "...a book of intense, highly crafted, and haunting poems in the voice of a wild man shouting the unflinching truth about the congested speedway of contemporary living he is roaring through"--Jack Myers. His work has appeared in such publications as Connecticut Review, North American Review, and Southern Indiana Review.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Jim McGarrah received his MFA in Creative Writing at Vermont College, and taught at the University of Southern Indiana before joining the Honors College. He teaches literature, creative writing, and composition. His poems, essays, and stories have appeared in many literary magazines and his first book of poems, Running the Voodoo Down, won a national book prize. Home Again: Essays and Memoirs from Indiana, was published in 2006 and his novel, Going Postal, in 2007. A memoir entitled A Temporary Sort of Peace, which reflects his experiences as a combat Marine in Vietnam, appeared in 2007. Mr. McGarrah also holds a Master of Arts in Liberal Studies with a concentration in American and Native-American literature.

Product Details

• Paperback: 88 pages
• Publisher: Elixir Press (July 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0970934289
• ISBN-13: 978-0970934284
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 5.8 x 0.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #4,714,605 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Jim McGarrah's poems, essays, and stories have appeared most recently in After Shocks: Poems of Recovery, Bayou Magazine, The Café Review, Connecticut Review, The DuPage Valley Review, Elixir Magazine, and North American Review. His play, Split Second Timing, received a Kennedy Center Award in 2001. He is the author of two award-winning books of poetry, Running the Voodoo Down and When the Stars Go Dark, a memoir of the Vietnam War entitled A Temporary Sort of Peace, which received the 2010 Eric Hoffer Award for Legacy Nonfiction and the novel Going Postal. McGarrah has been nominated for three Pushcart Prizes and a finalist twice in the James Hearst Poetry Contest. He is editor, along with Tom Watson, of Home Again: Essays and Memoirs from Indiana. McGarrah has a master's degree in liberal studies and an MFA in Writing from Vermont College of Fine Arts. He taught creative writing at the university level for several years, but he has also been a horse trainer, a janitor, a social worker, and a mailman.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Real Deal, July 28, 2003

By 

T. Dub (Michigan) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Running the Voodoo Down (Paperback)

Jim McGarrah's Running the Voodoo Down is the answer for those who ask the question, "What is modern poetry about?" More accurately stated, his poetry is the answer for the malaise in which too much modern poetry finds itself embedded. His poetry is not just fancy footwork written for a clique of fellow insiders who might "get it," as too much of what currently passes for poetry attempts to do. Running the Voodoo Down is timeless poetry that is carved from the soul of someone who has lived too much life, yet not enough. McGarrah's poems at once terrify us, force us to savor each second of life and stand up to our mortality. I read his book at dawn and by midnight that day I was still crying, laughing and shuddering at the emotions his work evoked in me. Weeks later I reread Voodoo and all of the poems hit me flush in the face as if I were reading them for the first time. Buy this book and beware: what you are about to read is the real deal, a collection of poetry that will make you be thankful there is at least one working poet who knows what he is doing.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars much needed, November 15, 2003

By 

"thejcain" (Windsor, CT) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Running the Voodoo Down (Paperback)

McGarrah's first book is a fearless yet tender examination of survival in the modern age. A quiet thankfulness, heightened by a relentless questioning, courses through these poems and tempers any cause for bravado while the forces of luck and chance clash with the mysteries of love and faith. By exposing how impersonal politics have very real consequences on the individual, McGarrah has created a collection which not only illuminates times past, but is crucial to times present. This direct, accesible and honest work announces, finally, the arrival of a true American poet.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Truth, October 14, 2003

By 

Robin (Evansville, IN) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Running the Voodoo Down (Paperback)

McGarrah's strong command of language combined with the raw energy of a life lived at the edge creates poems of brilliant intensity. He has the ability to merge beauty and brutality with stunning success. The emotions I felt from McGarrah's work stayed with me long after I closed the book. His work provides us with a modern-day hero whose truths resonate.