Rosa Gevaux

Nicholas Ryan Howard’s collection is at times unconventional and often emotionally raw-edged, all while revealing a lithe earnestness. Taking turns being conversational and directional, the poems collect into a kind of novena, a recurring group of prayers venerating the author’s experience in the realms of love and lust, of creation and destruction, of heaven and hell on earth. His choice to weave the fantastical into the explicitly temporal gives the reader a chance to reflect on their own experiences and emotions following along with the wry spirit of the inherent storytelling. Mercenary at Midnight is at once a dark path in a deep forest and a cocktail on a streetside patio in a busy metropolis—and wherever you find it takes you—that is expressly where you are meant to be.