‘In Moon Base One, Jemma L. King transports the reader between the sea and the stars; between mother and child; between the body and the vastness around it, so these are not separate spaces but part of the same orbit. King has a gift for writing in a way that’s relentlessly inventive and so often breathtaking. Raw heart, electric imagery and undeniable skill – Jemma L. King’s best yet.’ – Natalie Ann Holborow
'A masterclass in metaphor. From foetal spacemen to the ever-shifting landscape of the maternal body, here is poetry microcosmic and macrocosmic, intimate and vast, gorgeous and visceral. It moved me; it made me want to write; it was brimful of loss and hope and complexity. I loved it.' – Emily Blewitt
'Jemma L. King’s Moon Base One is bold, strange, gorgeously wrought – full of static and starlight, as well as strange beings and interactions along the way ... As a collection, it is impetuously imaginative, taking bold and daring leaps across space and time, which makes for a very thrilling read indeed. And, altogether, it is highly – very highly – recommended.' – Mab Jones, Buzz Magazine
‘Jemma L King’s Moon Base One is about ‘the galaxy, its vast womb-like churn/ of bloody structures and screwed-up timelines’ (‘Night Sky at Otter Cottage’). Not just the moon, but all of it, bouncing around time and space like a TARDIS, from Mars to Milan, from the prehistoric impact of the ‘Chicxulub’ meteor to ‘The Valley’ in Wales flooded in 1896 to create a reservoir for Birmingham, but always returning to the contemporary hospital rooms where a pregnant woman waits on the precipice of tragedy. She looks to the past not for reassurance, perhaps, but for understanding as ‘our many futures / burn’ (‘The God Machine’)… As far and fast as Moon Base One travels, it’s the delicacy of human life that makes it shine – the ‘nurse’ who ‘smooths my hair, wipes my tears’ (‘Moon Base One’). It is a cosmic cabinet of curiosities with a ‘birth cry / a bale of ashes’ (‘Eduardo Paolozzi's ‘Vulcan’’) at its heart.’ – Ellora Sutton, Mslexia Magazine
'Jemma L. King’s Moon Base One is bold, strange, gorgeously wrought – full of static and starlight, as well as strange beings and interactions along the way ... As a collection, it is impetuously imaginative, taking bold and daring leaps across space and time, which makes for a very thrilling read indeed. And, altogether, it is highly – very highly – recommended.' – Mab Jones, Buzz Magazine
‘Jemma L King’s Moon Base One is about ‘the galaxy, its vast womb-like churn/ of bloody structures and screwed-up timelines’ (‘Night Sky at Otter Cottage’). Not just the moon, but all of it, bouncing around time and space like a TARDIS, from Mars to Milan, from the prehistoric impact of the ‘Chicxulub’ meteor to ‘The Valley’ in Wales flooded in 1896 to create a reservoir for Birmingham, but always returning to the contemporary hospital rooms where a pregnant woman waits on the precipice of tragedy. She looks to the past not for reassurance, perhaps, but for understanding as ‘our many futures / burn’ (‘The God Machine’)… As far and fast as Moon Base One travels, it’s the delicacy of human life that makes it shine – the ‘nurse’ who ‘smooths my hair, wipes my tears’ (‘Moon Base One’). It is a cosmic cabinet of curiosities with a ‘birth cry / a bale of ashes’ (‘Eduardo Paolozzi's ‘Vulcan’’) at its heart.’ – Ellora Sutton, Mslexia Magazine
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