“Glenn Shaheen is claiming new ground for American poetry. His poems are about the nightmares of information overload, collapsing infrastructure, ubiquitous violence, and other ills of late empire. The subjects are not happy, but Shaheen's clear vision and crisp—often witty—language offer the pleasures of surprise, discovery, and recognition.”
—Ed Ochester

“Glenn Shaheen is sort of a genius at jimmying his spatula into the cracks of contemporary America—the places where the edges don’t quite fit together, where the not-so-funny throbs and baffles, a place where ‘the city grass is killed / by the same chemical in the water designed to keep / our teeth strong.’ And where a surgeon opens a patient’s heart and says ‘there's a place a lot of love could exist.’ Shaheen’s comedy often goes beyond slapstick and the personal, into a realm of ominous narrative ambiguity that catches, in fact, the tragic nature of our time. Predatory makes a surprising and substantial addition to our literary tradition of the reckless, dead-serious-funny.”
—Tony Hoagland

“The narrator of these poems is subversive, vulnerable, maybe brilliant, seemingly offhand—he’s your best friend, he is what you fear. Each poem is thrillingly restless, yet the world revealed all seems so apocalyptically familiar, if you have been paying attention, if you have been even half awake. Predatory is a phenomenal first book—who knew a complete guide to catastrophe and mayhem could be so engaging?”
—Nick Flynn