The seventeen poems in Back to Back, a chapbook of poems, form a tribute to the women in Debra’s extended family.

“Debra Kang Dean’s poems are clear and convincing…. Her language carries painful and even mundane subjects with great delicacy, and at the same time, her poems have a fresh spontaneity with here and there a light slant of humor. [Back to Back] is a delightful book.”

—Ruth Stone

“The poems in this beautiful little book give a clear, simple, and loving picture of the author’s childhood. Their simplicity, though, is about as ‘simple’ as a Zen Buddhist arrow shot or, for that matter, a Shaker arm chair.”

—Patricia Goedicke

“You will remember these poems, each as carefully made as the platter of perfect makizushi that sits beside the bowl of untidy American potato salad in ‘Matters of Faith: Easter 1968.’ Debra Kang Dean is unusually gifted and wise.”

—Betty Adcock