"Anyone in the mood to be enchanted by a collection of prose poems that celebrate the quotidian, the commonplace, the ordinary things of this world-those "dumb beautiful messengers," as Walt Whitman famously referred to them in "Crossing Brooklyn Ferry"? Then you best pick up a copy of Gerry LaFemina's book Baby Steps in Doomsday Prepping.... [LaFemina offers a] kind of precision with language-making a "place" into a "thing" and conveying its feel, look, and impression on the soul with such searing clarity.... [his poems] enchant the senses and succeed in stopping time . . . so that we might examine the things of this world with love and intelligence, so that we might hear them speak to us again"--