Other books that might interest you

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  Soundness of Mind

  Angel Hunter

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  This collection of poetry explores the emotional and psychological weight of lived experience. Through reflections on trauma and transformation, each poem traces how hardship shapes us, gradually revealing the inner balances that make us who we are.

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  Bleak Expectations - (West End...

  Mark Evans

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  The story Charles Dickens might have written after drinking too much gin…
  Follow half-orphan Pip's extraordinary exploits with sisters Pippa and Poppy and best friend Harry Biscuit, as they attempt to escape the calculating clutches of the dastardly Mr Gently Benevolent, defeat the hideous Hardthrasher siblings, and deflect disaster at every turn! Will evil be vanquished by virtue? Can love triumph over hate?
  Mark Evans' stage play Bleak Expectations is a hilarious, chaotic caper, featuring dastardly villains, preposterous names, pulse-quickening romances, heart-rending death scenes, and definitely, probably, hopefully a happy ending.
  Based on the award-winning BBC Radio 4 series, the play opened at The Watermill Theatre, Newbury, in 2022, directed by Caroline Leslie. It transferred to the Criterion Theatre in London's West End in 2023, where it featured a medley of many well-known actors and comedians.
  It offers rich opportunities to amateur theatre companies looking for a gloriously daft Dickensian romp which will have their audiences joyfully transported and begging for more.

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  Top 10 Poets The - The War Poets...

  Wilfred Owen

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  The language of Poetry is an art that most of us attempt at some point in our lives.  Although its commonplace exposure has been somewhat marginalised in today’s often fast-paced lives we all recognise good verse that can empathise with our thoughts or open us up to experience new things in new ways, to better understand and to enjoy the many strands of our lives. 
   
  But finding a starting point can be overwhelming, even off-putting, so in this series we offer up our Top 10 classic poets, who brim with talent and verse, on a range of subjects and themes that we can all enjoy. 
   
  War may be called diplomacy by other means but for the youth of a nation, pressed into service for that nation, its effects are horror, terror, injury, trauma and the likelihood of death.  Within the words of these 10 poets, dreams, ambition and reality collide into some very vivid and moving words. 
  1 - The Top 10 Poets - The War Poets - An Introduction 
  2 - Soldier's Dream by Wilfred Owen 
  3 - Anthem For Doomed Youth by Wilfred Owen 
  4 - Futility by Wilfred Owen 
  5 - From My Diary July 1914 by Wilfred Owen 
  6 - Sonnet - On Seeing A Piece of Our Heavy Artillery Brought into Action by Wilfred Owen 
  7 - This Is No Case of Petty Right or Wrong by Edward Thomas 
  8 - These Things That Poets Said by Edward Thomas 
  9 - The Trumpet by Edward Thomas 
  10 - Cock Crow by Edward Thomas 
  11 - Adlestrop by Edward Thomas 
  12 - Libido by Rupert Brooke 
  13 - Dead Men's Love by Rupert Brooke 
  14 - Desertion by Rupert Brooke 
  15 - The Funeral of Youth. Threnody by Rupert Brooke 
  16 - Soldier by Rupert Brooke 
  17 - Killed in Action by Isaac Rosenberg 
  18 - August 1914 by Isaac Rosenberg 
  19 - Spring 1916 by Isaac Rosenberg 
  20 - Isolation A Fragment by Isaac Rosenberg 
  21 - Break of Day in the Trenches by Isaac Rosenberg 
  22 - The Lost Ones by Francis Ledwidge 
  23 - A Soldier's Grave by Francis Ledwidge 
  24 - Lament for the Poets, 1916 by Francis Ledwidge 
  25 - Growing Old by Francis Ledwidge 
  26 - The Call to Ireland by Francis Ledwidge 
  27 - Blighty by Ivor Gurney 
  28 - Sonnets 1917 - V - England the Mother by Ivor Gurney 
  29 - On Somme by Ivor Gurney 
  30 - Strange Hells by Ivor Gurney 
  31 - In Memoriam (Easter 1915) by Ivor Gurney 
  32 - The Dying Patriot by James Elroy Flecker 
  33 - No Coward's Song by James Elroy Flecker 
  34 - Pillage by James Elroy Flecker 
  35 - Destroyer of Ships, Men, Cities by James Elroy Flecker 
  36 - Epithalamion by James Elroy Flecker 
  37 - The English Graves by Laurence Binyon 
  38 - The Distant Guns by Laurence Binyon 
  39 - For the Fallen by Laurence Binyon 
  40 - England's Poet by Laurence Binyon 
  41 - Ypres by Laurence Binyon 
  42 - A Call to Action by Charles Sorley 
  43 - A Letter From the Trenches to An Old School Friend by Charles Sorley 
  44 - Such Such Is Death by Charles Sorley 
  45 - German Rain by Charles Sorley 
  46 - To Germany by Charles Sorley 
  47 - Prayer Before Battle by Alfred Lichtenstein 
  48 - The Battle at Saarburg by Alfred Lichtenstein 
  49 - Monday in the Courtyard of the Barracks by Alfred Lichtenstein 
  50 - Soldiers' Songs by Alfred Lichtenstein 
  51 - The End by Alfred Lichtenstein

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  A Waiter Made of Glass - Stories...

  Verlyn Flieger

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  Award-winning author Verlyn Flieger takes readers through a series of insightful short stories exploring tragic aspects of human nature. A few of the tales are dark, others a bit lighter, but all celebrate the creativity of storytelling. The second part of the book is a collection of new poetry unearthing the wonders of language, the mundane, and grief and mourning as part of life—the dark spot within the light. Death is the inevitable, inescapable result of mortality, and grief is the price the living pay for that condition. Readers are invited to join in the journey, take some comfort in the knowledge of shared darkness, and know that even within the dark moments, there is always at least a speck of splintered light.

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  The Way I See It

  Sybil Woolmore

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  The inspiration for writing poetry came from Sybil's fathers' story, which he wrote after her mother passed. Having left home at 13 she knew very little about her parents and initially was so enthralled with his story that she believed it would make a great book, but as she started to write found that writing in verse flowed much easier. Her siblings were also grateful for the writing of this first poem as they also had no idea of the early part of their fathers' life. From there she found everyday life and happenings around her gave her material to continue writing. Now retired and not having a mind cluttered with work, it never ceases to amaze her how these stories come to her and just must be written, often waking in the night, mulling over new poems, and having to quickly write lines down before trying to get back to sleep again. The local pastor has also tapped into this gift and she is often asked to write a poem to go with a Sunday sermon.

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  My Grandfather's God

  David Somerfleck

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  In My Grandfather's God, David Somerfleck invites readers into a poetic journey through the vast landscape of human experience—where love and loss, spirituality and skepticism, pain and transcendence intersect. 
  Each poem is a revelation—sometimes tender, sometimes unflinching—exploring how belief, memory, and identity shape our understanding of self and the cosmos. Within these pages, the divine is questioned, confronted, and occasionally found in the quiet corners of everyday life. 
  Themes range from the generational weight of faith and family to the scars left by abuse, the solace of love, the ache of loss, and the elusive beauty of truth. These poems move between the intimate and the infinite, where personal wounds echo against the backdrop of cosmic thought and hard-won wisdom. 
  My Grandfather's God is at once deeply personal and universally resonant—a collection for anyone who has wrestled with the unseen, questioned what they were taught, or sought meaning amid both deception and revelation.

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