The Guilt Gene

Diana Raab will write anywhere about anything to not only rid herself of childhood "ails" but to enjoy herself completely, even poking fun at her foibles. She takes a close and courageous look at all her life's experiences, and in so doing, shares her wisdom and forgiveness of self and others with a raw honesty that is both refreshing and inspirational. Her poems are, as she writes of her ancestors, "bright candles trembling in their own wax."
Perie Longo,

Santa Barbara Poet Laureate Emerita,
author of With Nothing Behind But Sky



The poems in Diana Raab's The Guilt Gene deftly delineate the stages of a woman's life. From the quotidian chores of walking the dog and picking up dry cleaning to the small miracle of finding three whole watermelons on the beach, Raab savors her American life and invites you to join her.

Molly Fisk,
Listening to Winter



The Guilt Gene is a prism with a hundred facets offering glance and glimpse
and deep seeing into encounters with love, loss, longing, and epiphany. From an
author who has taught us the power of memory and story, these poems take us
along the road from a World War II typewriter to the eyes of an old dog. Poetry here reminds us to heed what calls to us daily.

Kim Stafford,

The Muses Among Us: Eloquent Listening
and Other Pleasures of the Writer's Craft



The Guilt Gene, Diana Raab's second book of poetry, has the straight-forward confessional tone that distinguishes her best work whether in prose or poetry. Eschewing high flying metaphor and dressed up formality, she confines her subject matter to her inner life and her journal-keeping voice and makes her poems through an emphasis on the line. Her poetry does not pretend to have figured things out; rather, this work is her process of figuring them out, of sorting her past and contemplating her present. The best of these poems derive their beauty from a disarming frankness and a heart that is open, willing to find a personal truth and say it.

Philip F. Deaver,
How Men Pray