Blue Lipstick Concrete Poems by John Grandits

1. Bibliography:
Grandits, John. 2007. Blue Lipstick Concrete Poems. New York, NY. Clarion Books. ISBN 0618851321

2. Plot Summary:
This book of concrete poetry centers around the life of Jessie, a unique teenager. Whether she is practicing the cello, attending volleyball practice or pining away for Elton Simpson, Jessie describes her thoughts and feelings through a series of artistic and engaging poems. Along the way, Jessie gains insight into some of the people on the other side of “the wall” and in the end revisits the barriers she has put up between herself and the outside world.

3. Critical Analysis:
John Grandits does a remarkable job of creating concrete poems that entertain and engage an audience of any age. Each poem, although uniquely different in rhythm and format, contain the same attitude and thoughts of the female character, teenage Jessie. Using vocabulary fit for a typical high school girl, the poems elicit a myriad of emotions, from jealousy over a boy to embarrassment due to a hair mishap, frustration with adults to hilarity at her brother’s expense. The poem entitled Tattoo and the Tongue Stud does a fantastic job of wrapping the reader up in the experience. Reading that Jessie, pretending to have pierced her tongue, says “It’th a tattoo” lets the reader go there, to the kitchen, and feel like part of the story. The little details in Jessie’s personality shine through carefully chosen language.

The variety of fonts, text sizes and text arrangement is well suited to a young adult audience. The demand for physical twists, turns and flips of the book to keep up with the flowing poetry creates a hands-on experience not typical in most YA literature. Each page is so carefully thought out and different from the last. Action and emotion are artistically depicted in the movement of text, as in poems like Volleyball Practice, A Chart of My Emotional Day and Point A to Point B.
4. Awards and/or Review Excerpts:
• From Horn Book: "A cover that'll grab adolescent girls' attention--and the poetry inside is equally appealing."
• From School Library Journal, Starred : "This irreverent, witty collection should resonate with a wide audience."

5. Connections:
• Pair with TECHNICALLY, IT'S NOT MY FAULT by Grandits (2004) and compare Jessie’s point of view to that of her brother in TECHNICALLY, IT'S NOT MY FAULT.
• Have students create their own artistic, concrete poem about a topic they either really love or dislike.

6. Personal Response:
The title is what initially drew me to this book. Who wears blue lipstick?? As I browsed the titles in my library catalog and came across the cover art, I knew this was the book for me. It was fresh and modern, not what I expected from a poetry book. The content inside was just as interesting as the cover! I could empathize and at times feel Jessie’s annoyance. The design and structure kept me entertained as a turned the book round and round to finish the poems. I plan on asking the middle school librarian for a copy of TECHNICALLY, IT'S NOT MY FAULT because I am anxious to compare the works.