Air Ball by Molly Ledbetter

Molly Ledbetter’s debut book, Air Ball, is a tragicomedy of poetry and prose. Channeling comedians like Lenny Bruce, Mel Brooks, and Jack Handey, Ledbetter conjures through their humor—and her own—the sadness that can underpin comedy, reminding us how both are scaffolds for our collective experience. Staring this down with a gaze that doesn’t flinch so much as deflect, Air Ball is as sincere as it is discerning. The poems are switch-hitters, riding the edge between sentimentality and cynicism. Here is a fresh voice deadpanning an experience of privilege and otherness, inviting the reader to laugh lest they cry.