“Ok in her refreshing debut uses language to push against the staid edges of the status quo, exposing the tenuous and often contradictory beliefs that seemingly undergird reality. With their capacious perspective, these verses bear witness to the hypocrisies of convention on the personal and global scale.”
—Publishers Weekly (starred review)

“In Ward Toward, Ok takes language apart: questioning its origin, proposed syntax, and meaning to separate the form from its built-in rules.”
—Chloe Xiang, Los Angeles Review of Books

“Cindy Juyoung Ok’s debut moves through spaces seamlessly—psych ward, hospice care, nation upon nation—and unites them through an impressive articulation of their violences.”
—Summer Farah, The Millions, “Must-Read Poetry: Winter 2024”

“With a candor bolstered by curiosity and experimentation . . . Ok’s poems challenge the reader to see beyond what is.”
—Poetry Foundation

“With brio and sorrow, Ok’s book investigates such subjects as hospitalization for a major depressive disorder, the anti-Asian Atlanta spa shootings, and the failures of romantic and familial love. . . . Ok’s métier in this lovely debut is an elegantly discursive, analytical style studded with ironies.”
—David Woo, Literary Hub

“With bleak humor, an eye for the absurd, and careful attention to the line, the poems offer a window into the Kafkaesque labyrinth that is the U.S. medical establishment, elegiac analyses of racist violence, and critiques of popular culture.”
—Poets & Writers