10 Questions with Poet peter bradley

Good morning!

Late last week I wrote a review of two poetry collections from internet poet peter Bradley.  Today I have my 10 questions with the new talent.  (Remember, peter doesn't use upper case letters...ever) Enjoy!









1)  Your new book,"Gravity" seems to take a harsher tone in general than your first collection: "a collection of writing from under my sheets" had.  Is this growth on your part, or more of a darkening of your world vision?

more growth on my part and the amount that i cared about this project,
sheets was somewhat rushed, and thrown together without nearly as much
time and thought as should have gone into it. during the early stages
of putting "gravity" together, a theme was slowly established and then
i built on it from there. sheets bounced around where as "gravity" has
a more stable sense of direction. it may have come out significantly
darker than was intended, but growing up means things don't always stay
as bright and cheery as they seem. it gets really dark until your eyes
start to adjust and mine haven't yet.

2)  What is it about the poetry medium that speaks to you?  Why not write fiction?

it's what i know and it's what i'm good at. i've been told writing
fiction is much easier and i'm not sold on that. i write what i know. i
write down whatever is going on in my head at a certain time and then
go from there. if i wrote fiction every character would have a
god-complex and severe mental issues, i'd be writing myself ten
different times. nobody wants that.

3)  Why the lower case letters for everything?

they just look nicer, uppercase letters often look harsh in comparison.
pick one and stick with it.

4) What is your favorite color and why?

grey. it's soothing.

5) When not writing, what's your favorite pastime?

sleeping or trying to figure out how to sleep, mostly.

6)  Who do you feel is your target audience?  Kids?  Adults?

honestly, i'm my own target audience. i'm my own biggest critic and
that's never going to change. 88% of everything i write ends up getting
scrapped. if it's good enough for me then that's all i care about.
7)  Clearly some of your work deals with break ups.  When it comes to love and romance, are you now a cynic or still hopeful?

i'm fairly cynical in almost all aspects of my life. however, at this
point on this particular topic i am not leaning either way. it's not
something i find myself over-thinking as much these days. as with
anything, time off is necessary. relationships are exhausting. i'm
taking a break. however, on many occasions i have found dating to just
be flat-out stupid. i don't recommend it.

8)  What's next for you, what can your fans expect next?

i'll probably have something in the works at some point later this
year. i'm not looking at another release until at least next year
probably.

9)  Promotion time!  What's your blog/website address?

uh, amazon.com/author/peterbradley
10)  If you could live in any time or place when or where would it be and why?

time-wise i'd stick with now, as messed up as everything on this planet
is, too many things are too convenient for me to give that up. i would
not do well pre-1990's.
as far as place, i'm not entirely sure. i'd spend a lot of time on the
road in cheap hotels and maybe a cheap apartment if i find a place i
like. i give myself five years to answer that in more depth.

Thank you, peter, for joining in.  Friends, if you're interested in reading the work of an emerging poet, check out his two collections by clicking HERE!

A Review You can Use: The Poetry of peter bradley

Good morning!

No, that isn't a misprint. peter bradley means to spell his name in lower case letters.  In fact, inspired by e.e. cummings, he spells  pretty much everything in lower case letters.  Today's author is part of that new breed of author...the kind who gets a following and then publishes a book.  While he might rail against the e-reader format, peter bradley is part of the digital movement.

But his online publishing politics aside, peter bradley is a poet, and he's a voice people should maybe hearing.  He has two collections of poetry available right now "a collection of writing from under my sheets (wish they were yours)" and "GRAVITY".  His poetry touches on topics the twenty-somethings of today, indeed the twenty-somethings forever, talk about:  Sex, breakups, long distance relationships, and alcohol.
He uses raw language...so beware...this is not a Dr. Seuss book by any stretch.  

Written in that rare space of time between the junior year of high school and his twentieth birthday, peter bradley reveals heartbreak, angst, and a longing for either a return to childhood or a fast forward into middle age, because 'right now' is too much to look at.

Publishing the two books quickly, there isn't a lot of time between them, and yet there's a definite shift, a darkening, between the first and second collections.  Questions about love, betrayal, and the emergence into a self reliant adulthood are raised in short, clipped verses and long, wandering soliloquies.  Like many of his generation, peter bradley does his best to wander away from the traditional rules of poetry, but in doing so writes haunting, approachable words that many could identify with and few would struggle to understand.  Where was this guy when I was being forced to dissect great poetry for one blah English class or another?

bradley speaks with the voice of his generation, which is to say, while he's looking for help, he's not asking anyone for it and he wouldn't thank you if you offered.  He lives in a world the generations before created and he's trying to make the best of it.

It's hard for me to give this a star rating for a couple reasons.  1)  I don't read enough poetry to compare these books to anything else.  2) Rating poetry on a hard 1-5 scale sort of defeats the whole idea of poetry, right?  BUT, if you love poetry, or if you are looking for a fresh new voice, this is a great place to start.  His books are available for Kindle and in print by clicking here.

Just call me a proud Mama!

Good morning!

So this is Mother's Day weekend...and if you want to hear my Mother's Day rant, go on over to It Can Only Happen To Sarah and check that out.

But here, as an author and more importantly a writer, I want to brag a bit about my son, Peter Bradley.

Peter finished high school early a bit more than a year ago.  Since then, he's struggled, as many kids his age do these days, with what he wanted to do.  At 19, there's a lot of pressure to just KNOW what you're going to be and then GO TO COLLEGE and be that. I'm almost 46, and I've known since I was five what I wanted to do with my life.  It just took me until I was 42 to figure out how to make any money doing it.

So Peter has spent some time traveling, working, really thinking about what direction he wants to go.  But most of all...the boy has been writing.

The fact that he has an interest in writing came as a complete revelation to me a year ago when I made the rounds at his school to thank his teachers.  His English teacher that year, a younger fellow who reminds me entirely too much of Harry Potter, told me that Peter should NOT take a long time out of school and that he should be writing books.

I was shocked.

I was also excited and proud.

When I was in high school, everyone knew I liked to write stories.  But no one, not one of my Language Arts teachers, which included my FATHER, ever told me I should be writing anything.  Maybe it was because it was a small parochial school, and the teachers there knew nothing other than other teachers...which is probably why my parents forced me to become a teacher.  Who knows why no one said, "She should be writing." 

In that moment, when that teacher talked to me about my son, it was as if I was seeing the boy for the very first time.  And the surprised did not end there.

It turns out, Peter is a bit of a poet...and has been sharing his poetry online for a couple years, with some success.  One of his friends told me his blog is followed by a lot of younger women.  (Which answers the question, "How do you know all these girls?"  I've been asking him that for two years.)

Well, that brings me to my Mother's Day brag:  My son, the poet, has just released his first book!

A Collection of Writing from Under my Sheets can be purchased for your Kindle or in print at Amazon or at Createspace.  I can't tell you how excited I am to hold this book in my hands.  It's like giving birth all over again...it's...it's a grandbaby book!

So all you moms out there...does your kid seem to be hiding in his or her room a lot?  Never fear...maybe they're writing a book!