“Performance has always been at the heart of my work.” Eileen Myles projects up from the page, suspending language in a perpetually moving state. Inferno (A Poet’s Novel) is a coming-of-age, coming out paean—animated, salty, and fresh. Whether she’s worshiping broadsides by Bill Knott or calling Patti Smith a “Romantic messy boy,” she presents the real underground.

From a working class Boston to the hip haunts of St. Mark’s, Myles’s “distracted” style exudes immediacy. Hanging with heroes or down and out on speed, she takes us, like Virgil, on an epic tour. Sex, drugs and rock and roll share the stage with bohemian Pulitzer Prize winners on a poet’s burning pilgrimage. Inferno is an avant classic of vintage instants (OR Books).

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