Title: To the Monsters of my Past
Author: Cameron Crews
Publisher: XlibrisUS
ISBN: 978-1664128422
Pages: 146
Genre: Poetry
Reviewed by: Aly Avina

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For creative souls, particularly writers, one of the most therapeutic ways to cope with tragedy, sadness, and heartbreak is to put a pen to paper and let the emotions spill out. This is what transpires all throughout this incredibly written book of poetry, To the Monsters of my Past by Cameron Crews. She beautifully puts every emotional experience that left a mark on her into prose within these pages for the world to see, unashamed, and powerfully proves how important it is to work through any trauma in your life in a way that makes sense to you. I relate to this on a personal level, for I have also been through my fair share of traumatic experiences that have shaped me into the woman I am. And I know that one of the best ways to express my feelings and emotions was through the power of art, or in this case, the written word.

Author Cameron Crews is a young writer based out of Los Angeles, though she is from Texas and studied Art History and Modern History in Scotland. After her time at Cambridge University, she realized her true passion was writing, which had always been a prominent aspect of her life since childhood. This is why she is now pursuing this career with her debut novel filled with deeply personal poetry that will leave you breathless. The way she eloquently captures life’s struggles and hardships on a personal level through her gorgeous writing style left me captivated by her words.

Her ability to relate to her audience while discussing some of the most difficult times of her life through prose and poetry is awe-inspiring. She touches on subjects such as addiction and families being torn apart because of it in poems like “Not My Fairytale.” She also brings up failed

relationships and the heartbreak that rises up from them in poems like “Go, Girl” which I must say, was one of my personal favorites that I could highly relate to. Without a doubt, this book of poetry will inevitably evoke emotions from you that may have lain dormant for some time but are now at the surface, waiting to take over and make you truly feel the pain she went through to eventually get to a happier place in her life.

Whether or not you have experienced similar situations to this author, you are bound to feel a sense of kinship because every person has their own story, filled with love and loss, pain and joy, heartbreaks and failures, and of celebrations. This is why I cannot recommend To the Monsters of my Past by Cameron Crews enough. She put it all out there for audiences everywhere to read “a young girl’s heartbreak diary” and it needs to be next on your reading list so you, too, can work through your struggles through this author’s beautiful poems. Pick up your copy today!