Driving through the Country before You are Born

Ray McManus's incantatory rhythms, his catalogs of nouns (and sometimes verbs), carry us into the liminal territory between experience and music, which is to say, the territory of dream. — Susan Ludvigson

The poetry in Ray McManus's first collection is touched by a light hand that points to and illuminates its sparkling surfaces and deep interior spaces. The work searches out, mourns, and celebrates place, family, love, and death—at all times asserting the continuity between what can be seen and what must be imagined…. This book is full of fervor and grace and is driven by a fierce regard for language and an understated moral vision. A terrific debut. — Eamonn Wall

What we take away from this book is the poet's solace in the quiet solitude of the writer at work, searching for the temporary consolations of the right word in the right place, and the power of that small act—made over and over again—to keep us alive and to keep us writing. — Kate Daniels