Book Reviews

Black background with the face of a china doll, cracked, with piercing blue eyes.

Your gift living on in cracked pots carried from garden to garden

Maggie Mackay reviews The Doll's Hospital by Jenny Robb (Yaffle, 2022)

Naive painting of the backs of two people sitting on a wall, one has a red headscarf and orange skirt, one is dressed in black

The cruelty and largesse of high water

Mat Riches reviews Summer / Break by Richie McCaffery (Shoestring, 2022)

A fifties-style graphic showing the rocky surface of a planet with coloured moons and asteroids. The words 'Space Baby' are superimposed in white.

Maybe it’s already gone supernova

Carl Tomlinson reviews Space Baby by Suzannah Evans (Nine Arches, 2022)

Part of a painting which shows a foot on a tightrope.

Ready to catch light

Emma Simon reviews the small manoeuvres by Kathy Pimlott (Verve, 2022)

The word Orlam in black script on a parchment background. The "O" is enormous and is surrounded by small line drawings of birds and insects in red. White lines like trees are in the background, and a black line-drawn lamb hangs in the centre.

Your death opens gates to the dark world

Bruno Cooke reviews Orlam by PJ Harvey (Picador, 2022)

A a detail from Hieronymus Bosch’s ‘The Garden of Earthly Delights’. It's a night scene showing fires and silhouettes of houses. At the bottom right light shines through an archway.

An empty room

Charlotte Gann reviews Towards a General Theory of Love by Clare Shaw (Bloodaxe, 2022)

An image taken from the book cover, Its shows a bit the the name Emily in yellow text and the first six letters of the word "unexhausted" in blue text. The background is shocking pink

Strung like an archer’s bow

Steven Lovatt reviews Unexhausted Time by Emily Berry (Faber, 2022)

Slightly blurred mostly blue picture of a white lighthouse on the end of a pier.

Life and love

Matthew Paul reviews Lanyard by Peter Samson (Carcanet, 2022)

The words "We're all in it together" in white bold text on ragged red and blue triangles (a bit like flags) on a white background.

What lies ahead may cause upset

Chris Edgoose reviews WE’RE ALL IN IT TOGETHER: poems for a disUNITED KINGDOM edited by Michael Stewart, Steve Ely and Kayleigh Campbell (Grist, 2022).

A background of the stock exchange with the words "The economist can tell you about your bank balance, but the poet has a window into your soul" superimposed

Like worms on the corruption in which they are bred

Hilary Menos reviews The Poets’ Guide to Economics by John Ramsden (Pallas Athene, 2022)

Part of a painting of an Old Testament scene where white-bearded patriarch Methuselah has instructed Noah to open a prophetic scroll which foretells the flood sent by God. Circling ravens add to the sense of foreboding, while antediluvian revellers continue their dancing in the middle distance, oblivious of the devastation to come.

The end of history?

Mat Riches reviews You have no normal country to return to by Tom Sastry (Nine Arches, 2022)

A painting of a woman shelling peas, the clouds are bright, she has red hair and a blue blouse with small white flowers on it

Woods, words, a sword of spells bunched up on a larch

Maggie Mackay reviews Shelling Peas with My Grandmother in the Gorgiolands by Sarah Wimbush (Bloodaxe, 2022)