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Montara CA: River Bravo Publishing, 2020. Paperback. iv, 135p., illustrated only with an excellent cover painting (unidentified subject) and photoportrait of author. A clean sound copy, unmarked in any way. Varela's job, longtime public defender, informs much of these "commentaries" whether in verse or prose. He is especially concerned with mass-shootings, the killing mania of our current era; it was his work at times to represent a mass murderer to a courtroom and to think up mitigations. "Brushes with Life" is in large part a mental diary of these encounters. One central story relates his interviews with the deranged child of a celebrity, whom he was able to sort out a little, before her eventual suicide.