Also A Poet

“Also A Poet covers turf that is delicate, fought-over, and sacred. What poet is NOT one complicated creature? Whose father is NOT a confounding mystery to a daughter? What era of New York was NOT a fevered, fervent time? Let Ada Calhoun be our guide through all, but hold her hand tight—the journey is wild!”

—Tom Hanks, New York Times–bestselling author of Uncommon Type

“In Ada Calhoun’s hands, this one-of-a-kind story of a mercurial father, a conflicted daughter, and the artistic idol they both share is marvelously universal — by turns touching and laugh-out-loud funny and endearing and wise. If you are interested in parents or children or New York City or poetry and art — or have ever wondered about the legacies we leave, the lives we touch, without even knowing it — then ALSO A POET offers observations and insights that you'll carry with you for a long time to come.”

—Robert Kolker, New York Times–bestselling author of Hidden Valley Road

“Also A Poet contains multitudes. I’ve never read anything like it. The mind boggles at how much brilliance Ada Calhoun has managed to pack into this slim volume: a celebration of one of America’s greatest poets, an ode to New York of today and yesterday, an investigation into legacy and memory, a meditation on art and writing, a humane yet fiercely candid look at the anxiety of influence, a memoir about her fraught but fruitful relationship with her father, who put his art above all else. What does it take to be a truly great artist? This extraordinary book, full of wisdom, beauty, and generosity of spirit, proves that we can be ‘good’ and also great. Here in your hands is non-fiction at its most marvelous, a book that moved me in ways that the best fiction and poetry does. I’ll sum up my feelings in a word: Exceptional.”

—Susannah Cahalan, New York Times–bestselling author of The Great Pretender

“Through moving feats of narrative magic, Ada Calhoun tells the story of the lives of Frank O’Hara, the New York School poets and painters, her father’s, and her own, and what passes between them in this vulnerable, insightful, and, ultimately, forgiving book. Also a Poet is a marvel!”

—Jeff Deutsch, Seminary Co-op Bookstores, Chicago and In Praise of Good Bookstores

“This book is a gift to fans of Frank O'Hara, fans of downtown New York, and fans of queer history. It’s also a gift from one writer to another. The fact that that writer is a daughter paying tribute to her complicated father makes the work all the more resonant and beautiful.”

—Alysia Abbott, author of Fairyland: A Memoir of My Father

"Also a Poet, by Ada Calhoun. Oh, Ada Calhoun. Ada is wonderful and prolific and smart and funny and her new book, Also a Poet, is about her father, and about Frank O’Hara, and being a certain kind of New York City kid who turns into a certain kind of New York City adult. If you love the New York School poets and have ever imagined yourself part of a very cool crowd of painters and poets full of artistic cross-pollination, you will love this book. I love this book. I think that being the child of artists forces you to see your parents as flawed pretty early on, or maybe just as differentiated humans who have desires independent of their lives as parents, and this book is really speaking to me."

—Emma Straub

"Nothing goes as planned in Ada Calhoun’s Also a Poet: Frank O’Hara, My Father, and Me(Grove, June), but that’s precisely why it captivates. When things became difficult while she was writing the book, Calhoun stuck to her journalistic instincts and dove deeper. What she landed on was something more distinct and remarkably richer than what she’d originally envisioned..."

—Publishers Weekly profile

[STARRED REVIEW] "Absorbing and insightful."

—BookPage

[STARRED REVIEW] "Deceptively tender and cleverly conceived...Calhoun seems to have created a new nonfiction genre."

—Shelf Awareness

"Sometimes there are books written because the author needs to write them, and sometimes there are books written because the audience needs to read them. Also A Poet is both."

—The Village Sun

"Uniquely crafted, moving, and candid"

—Lansing State Journal

"Ada Calhoun entwines memoir, literary history, and biography into gorgeous narrative [with] capacious curiosity, journalistic acumen, and poetic sensibility."

—The National Book Review

"Fascinating... Our reading lives aren’t separate from our affective lives; the books we love (and hate) are always shaped by the people we love (and hate). Also a Poet gets this truth across with clarity and force."

—Commonweal Magazine

"Part biography, part memoir, it reflects the half-spoken belief that writing about the things and people we love is often a lot easier than living with them."

—The New Republic