"The Occupied World is Alice Major's seventh collection, and it eloquently connects the public and private worlds of poetry. As a public poet, Major is completing a two-year term as the first poet laureate of Edmonton. Much of the book revolves around her private interest in subjects like ancient folk traditions, quantum physics, and number and string theory. Major uses simple declarative sentences as ways of framing poems, and unsentimental precision marks her style. "I Never Thought I'd Write a Hockey Poem" is perhaps the most public poem in the book, having been commissioned for public performance by the mayor of Edmonton and published in the Globe and Mail. It's about the Oiler's joyously improbable playoff run last spring." Maurice Mierau, Winnipeg Free Press, November 26, 2006