"Haibun at its best is the gentle telling of a story with a 'twist' of lime in the form of haiku for flavor. There is a wonderful tang to the work in this volume. Charlotte Mandel has let us look over her shoulder as she pens her own personal journal. Full of the memories of a life spent in observation and perception we peek into her thoughts. It is a journey we can take simply by reading her words. Light a fire, put your feet up and let the poet take you with her. This is a collection worth reading to the end."
-Michael Rehling
"Charlotte Mandel's haibun in Alive and In Use present careful natural observations that prepare us for the human truths flowing freely from them into deceptively simple haiku. The world is in need of such compassion, courage and empathy as these poems offer."
-Sander Zulauf, author of Basho in America
"The English poet Ted Hughes said, 'The only calibration that counts is how much heart we invest . . . Nothing else really counts at all.' Reading Charlotte Mandel's haibun one is immediately struck by 'how much heart' there is in her keenly observed descriptions and her heartfelt thoughts. In this collectionof haibun Charlotte covers a wide range of emotional and physical landscapes with deftness and eloquence."
-Sonam Chhoki, Principal Editor, Cattails-Journal of the United Haiku and Tanka Society
