"Under this celebrated poet's intense microscope, with precise, startling, spike-like language, energized poems butterfly upstream against the current of self-deprecating humor or float in the Atlantic on a big fat existential doughnut. Rusty Barnes isn't afraid to jump into raging floodwaters, slamming into broken dams of memory to display his vivid wounds & scars."
—Ron Androla, author of Confluence
"The poems in Rusty Barnes' On Broad Sound reflect on family, place, and the senses. They offer a true feeling of loneliness that I think we all go through, filled with the author's own fears and personal history. I've often said that we are living through a very lonely time, isolated by our own technology, shielded from our hearts by the regrets of past generations. These poems aren't afraid to be alone, to wash themselves in a very sincere sadness–mixed with years of steady craft, as cool as an ocean breeze coming off the water. What they offer is another voice in the room and sometimes that's all you need to make it through the night. Rusty Barnes is right there with you, he has been all along and his words feel like home."
—John Dorsey, author of Appalachian Frankenstein
"Welcome to Rusty Barnes' Revere, a seaside city on the outer bounds of Boston. In On Broad Sound, we're whisked through the Springsteen-like backstreets; through the bakeries and beach fronts; through Shirley Street and city hall and invited to pull up a stool at The Shipwreck Bar. And our guide is a big "bear" of a family man, one whose big heart "breeds [love] in the open spaces of [his] being."
—Nathan Graziano, author of Hangover Breakfasts and My Next Bad Decision.
Visit Amazon to purchase On Broad Sound.