“Poetry. Latinx Studies. Women's Studies. LGBTQIA Studies. Film.
Music. Big Feelings is a grand tour of love and loss,
femininity, and the nuances inherent in the simple messiness of being
alive. Bella masterfully works within the ambiguity of feelings that
do not ever truly end, of what it feels like to be a ghost within
those feelings, and she guides the reader through the origin point of
every haunting. She navigates the tragedies of heartbreak, the
experience of brown girlhood, the loneliness ingrained within
artists, and the courage it takes to get back up again even when it
feels like you have already died many times before. With compassion
and much needed humor, Big Feelings allows us the necessary
space to be alone with one another.
At once a time
capsule of love and loss, and a hymnal book of protest songs against
the current political regime, the reader becomes a lucky passenger in
bella's car, driving the scenic route through her brilliant and
expansive mind. The book reads as a memoir in verse. The poems travel
both physical and emotional landscapes, journeying through vibrant
New Mexico and through the often lonely road of living as someone
with 'big feelings.' We get to meet bodega cats, Ariana Grande, her
family and her loves, but most importantly we get to meet gigi;
wholly human and wholly herself. This book is as tender as it is
fierce, and will be opened like a gift by the hearts of so many.”
-Andrea Gibson
