“Slamming Open the Door is an intensely individual book that takes a steadfast look at what is probably one of the most traumatic events a parent can experience—not only the death of a child, but her violent murder.”
—Poetry International

“Throughout Slamming Open the Door, words are a mother’s weapon against not only her daughter’s assailant, but also the potentially lethal opponent that is grief. . . . Its intimacy and rawness are undeniable, as is its author’s unflinching candor.”
—West Branch

“Readers will have to step outside of a familiar, comforting tradition of poetic grief while reading this book. . . . To read [Slamming Open the Door] is to stand onstage with a writer who finds herself in the middle of a story in which she has been reluctantly cast.”
—The New York Times Book Review