Reviews of Less of Her
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"In Paula McLain's book Less of Her, the soul steps forward and sings a torch song. The song is both fevered and measured, bearing the double burden of an almost unforgivable past and the possibility of mercy in the future. And the voice is naked, urgent, unflinching, a girl's voice in the mouth of a woman or a woman's voice in the mouth of a girl. This is a first book to listen to again and again."

—Bruce Smith

"Whether she is 'lost in space' among the 'forbidden planets' or staking her claim at 'ground zero,' Paula McLain writes with an alert sense of place and self. Less of Her is a cosmology of touch and warning––of erotic entanglements and the complex grace and waste wrought from nurturing those relationships. Few poets in their first books are so able to balance irony with glad acceptance. I much admire the crispness of her technique and the adroit result of her aggregate vision."

–David Baker