In Recovery Community, physician-poet Conor Mc Donnell explores the complexities of trauma, illness and loss. Shot through with personal and professional experiences, Mc Donnell's poems recruit actors, addicts and artists to a Greek-chorus rallying call: drug users are serenaded by the medications that seek to trap them, Laura Palmer is released from TV to be replaced by her captive audience, Shelley Winters is raised from a succession of pre-dug Hollywood graves, and noir cinema retreats to the shadows under the glare of a 21st century lens. The poems in Recovery Community reinforce doubt and conflict as necessary tools to navigate existence, and Mc Donnell sketches a map of resilience with lines of caution that linger long after reading.

Conor Mc Donnell is a physician and poet. He has published two chapbooks in Canada, The Book of Retaliations (Anstruther Press), and Safe Spaces (Frog Hollow Press). He received Honourable Mention for The Fiddlehead's 2018 Ralph Gustafson Poetry Prize, was shortlisted for The Raw Art Review's 2019 Charles Bukowski Prize, and was runner-up for the 2019 Vallum Poetry Prize. His work has featured in Grain, Carousel, the Journal of the American Medical Association and many others. He lives in Toronto with his wife and two dogs.

Conor Mc Donnell's profile page