Crab Orchard Series in Poetry Judge’s Citation: 

"Charif Shanahan's poetry lives and thrives at the risky intersections of race, class, religion, gender, and sexuality, giving full lyric expression to all the cadences and intimacies that make his work so profound.  His is the poetry of the traveling mind, the wandering soul, the poet as reporter and as fortune-teller, as confidant and soothsayer.  This book will not leave you, will not easily shake you free to move onto the next book. Moment by moment, Charif Shanahan builds worlds out of the most exquisite and tender images, makes searingly real human agonies and regrets we usually dare not speak. Into Each Room. . . is more than a debut collection of poetry—it's a revelation. It's the kind of book that in its beauty and force, makes us glad to be alive." 

 —Allison Joseph,
author of Imitation of Life