Unexplained Fevers is a book of poetry that was written by Jeannine Hall Gailey and published by New Binary Press in 2013. This collection, Gailey's third, deals again with issues that affect contemporary women, such as body image, illness, and how to deal with the limiting social norms and expectations of women. Familiar Grimms fairy tale characters make repeated appearances in this collection, including The Snow Queen, Rapunzel, Red Riding Hood, Snow White and Rose Red. Although the characters are classic, the point of view and tone of this book is both modern and universal. The poem "She Had Unexplained Fevers" from the collection was featured on Verse Daily.[1]
^Mori, Diane Severson (2013). "Review: Unexplained Fevers, by Jeannine Hall Gailey". Amazing Stories. Retrieved 2013-10-20. Jeannine Hall Gailey's characters feel real, like they could be us or someone we know. They speak with my (North American) voice. The emotional content is brought home by this combination of the real and the make-believe.
^Kirk, Kathleen (2013). "Diagnostic Mysteries". Escape into Life. Retrieved 2013-10-20. If you are entranced by Snow White, Rose Red, Sleeping Beauty, Rapunzel, the Snow Queen, the Swan Princess, Jack and Jill, and Hansel and Gretel, you'll want to re-see these tales and characters in the context of Unexplained Fevers.
^Peake, Robert (2013). "The Ex-Nun, The Soldier's Wife, And the Fabulist: Three Poets". Huffington Post UK Edition. Retrieved 2013-06-14. Jeannine Hall Gailey addresses the fantasy bodies of women like princesses and mermaids. Such fairy tales take on a sinister tone in the telling of the poet, where instead of 'happily ever after' the poem 'Once Upon a Time' concludes with the speaker almost hissing, 'it wasn't as they had told us.'
^Wyatt, Neal (2014). "Starting 2014 with Poetry - Wyatt's World". Library Journal. Retrieved 2014-01-08. This lively and addictive collection begins with "Once Upon a Time" and from there unfolds in a sharply observed commentary on fairy tale characters, from a sleeping princess who planted her own briar wall to a prince who wonders whom he rescued.
^Osborn, Alice (2013). "Unexplained Fevers by Jeannine Hall Gailey". The Pedestal Magazine. Retrieved 2014-01-08. Gailey infuses irresistible energy into her lines, placing her princesses in modern settings, as in "Sleeping Beauty Has an MRI," "The Mermaid Loses Her Voice," and "Red Riding Hood at the Car Dealer."
^Sarai, Sarah (2013). "Unexplained Fevers by Jeannine Hall Gailey". The Rumpus. Retrieved 2013-10-21. Gailey, the poet laureate of Redmond, Washington (a small town housing offices of Bill Gates' modest enterprise) pushes back on the received wisdom of glass slippers and damsels distressed like jean jackets in a consignment shop.
^Sarina (2013). "Unexplained Fevers by Jeannine Hall Gailey". Savvy Verse & Wit. Retrieved 2013-06-15. From Jack and Jill who vowed to stay together against all odds who find themselves in Ohio to Alice in Wonderland who merely gets lost in a coat closet, Gailey is poking fun at the fantasies that rely on women being beautiful and little else to prove their worth.
^Carty, Jessie (2013). "Jessie Carty, Review of Jeannine Hall Gailey's Unexplained Fevers". Wild Goose Poetry Review. Retrieved 2013-06-15. Unexpected Fevers is still concerned with many of those archetypes regarding womanhood [woman as sister, wife, mother, body], but I particularly note this collection's investigation of the body, the hero, and the mother.
