A first poetry collection full of telenoid daydreams and androids in the bureaucracy.

I was born this way.
I was made to be soft and pleasant to touch.
It’s the silicone. Father is considering
polyvinyl chloride for my future siblings
because it’s cheaper. I hope you understand
how special that makes me.

Were you born this way too?
Your body is not smooth but it is warm.

Exploring the ambiguities, paradoxes and kinships between human and machine in this first poetry collection, Jiaqiao Liu conjures passionate robots and open-source body hacking, password managers and fuzzy moon rovers, missed communications and learned sensations. Drawing on Chinese mythologies and experiments in form, Liu pulls us into a world that feels familiar to twenty-first-century cybercitizens, yet is new and strange to inhabit.

Is it natural to grow up?
Are you growing down?
Where will I grow up to?

Author

Jiaqiao Liu (they/he) is a poet from Shandong, China, who grew up in Tāmaki Makaurau. Their writing has been included in journals including The Spinoff, badapple and OF ZOOS, as well as in anthologies such as Ōrongohau | Best New Zealand Poems 2017 and A Clear Dawn: New Asian Voices from Aotearoa New Zealand (Auckland University Press, 2021). Jiaqiao has an MA in creative writing from the International Institute of Modern Letters at Te Herenga Waka Victoria University of Wellington. Dear Alter is their first book.

Endorsements

‘Dear Alter has something new to say about that state of in-betweenness, of flux, that particularly defines a young, queer person’s life. The collection is preoccupied with devices: black boxes, Roombas, phones, cameras, and especially those robots that can’t really be spoken of as devices anymore – so aware of their loneliness and full of desire they have become. It’s an innovative and thrillingly fresh debut.’
— Sophie van Waardenberg

‘From the opening pages of Dear Alter, we step into a strange but familiar world, where androids and goddesses rub shoulders, and old souls find new worlds to inhabit. Jiaqiao Liu’s debut poetry collection is a tender and surprising exploration of how memory and language forge the paths we take to find our past and future selves, utilising poetic forms as varied as the technologies it draws inspiration from. These poems seek to understand the circuitry that connects and defines us, often with emotionally devastating effect. Dear Alter is a one-of-a-kind book that signals the arrival of a striking new voice in New Zealand poetry.’
— Chris Tse