"Douglas A. Martin is best known as a writer of luminous, brooding prose, but IN THE TIME OF ASSIGNMENTS shows him to also be a poet. The poems in this book tell about memory, loss, life’s complicated hurts and longings. And they show a wonderful trust in beauty to get us through all that."
-Juliana Spahr
"IN THE TIME OF ASSIGNMENTS begins in youth and sadness, and no matter the shifting boundaries of time, place, and love, we return again and again to Martin's ever-searching 'I,' an 'I' that wants us to want him, that seduces us to go into these rooms with him, to love him, to follow him."
-Jenny Boully
"Douglas A. Martin treks from a Georgia childhood to present day New York, maybe losing his accent a little, but always maintaining a fierce, magically intimate and expansive relationship with language."
-Brandon Stosuy
"These are great poems cause they’re such non-poems. Torn up pieces, patches of stuff like a guy on a train reminds you of someone you used to love. If the whole category of poetry emptied out and they opened something else next door that does what poetry did—by falling down, missing the train, missing everything, and you can almost hear it—like music—well this poetry (Douglas Martin's) is kind of like that. It's awkward and swift. I really like it."
-Eileen Myles
