MICK MCSHANE is roused by a band whose socialism laces every line of every song with commitment and raw passion
Letters From Latin America
Reviews of poetry collections by Maia Elsner and Andres N Ordorica

OVERRUN BY WILD BOARS (Flipped Eye, £6,95) is British Latinx author Maia Elsner’s debut poetry collection. Multilayered and ambitious, it explores the nuances of family histories, migration, belonging, genocide and love.
The poet, who was born in London to Mexican and Polish Jewish parents, manages to create a work that is as lyrically beautiful as it is formally exciting — it encompasses elegies and ghazals to sestinas, sonnets and poems inspired by art and architecture.
The book is filled with vibrant coloured birds, with Polish and Mexican stories of loss, strength and redemption, as well as explorations of what it means to live between cultures and languages.
More from this author

Travelogue/reportage by Argentinean Maria Sonia Cristoff, and poetry by Peruvian Gaston Fernandez and Puerto Rican Cristina Perez Diaz

A pamphlet by British Latinx poet Patrick Romero McCafferty, poetry by Anglo-Argentinian Miguel Cullen, and a book of conjuring poems by Mexican Pedro Serrano

LEO BOIX selects the best books of fiction, poetry, and non-fiction written by Latinx and Latin American authors published this year

Mexican Yuri Herrera’s novel about Benito Juarez in New Orleans, and poetry by Mexican Fabio Morabito and Argentine Sergio Chejfec