the night trotsky came to stay
The Night Trotsky Came to Stay
Publisher: smith|doorstop
ISBN-13: 978-1-902382-90-6
Available from all good bookshops
£9.95
Shortlisted for the Forward First Collection Prize
reviews
"The Night Trotsky Came to Stay is that rare event, a book in which every page
seizes the reader's attention. Partly it's a narrative talent, but Allison McVety's
particular skill is in converting the feel of day-to-day experience past and
present – whether ordinary, intriguing or alarming - into genuine poetry."
Alan Brownjohn, Forward judge 2008
"Sensuous detail, intellectual curiosity and an echoing, confident music all make this a
fully-imagined poetic world."
Jane Draycott
"The territory of these vivid and sensual poems is a childhood shadowed by a family’s
memories of war and persecution and displacement. But paradoxically the effect of the
collection as a whole is of lives lived intensely and imaginatively."
Vicki Feaver
"The Night Trotsky Came to Stay is an impeccably clear and sculpted collection.
Allison McVety’s first book shines."
David Morley
"Allison McVety’s shrewdness, powers of sympathy and clarity of expression come together
in a way that promises much more for the future."
David Morphet, Magma
"Her conversational unemphatic tone refuses the clichéd or the commonplace, and yet its
syntactical simplicity is fresh, vividly accurate."
RV Bailey, Envoi
"The quality of her ear invests commonplace things with resonance, and the intensity of
her focus conveys sometimes abject tenderness."
Stride Magazine
"McVety writes extremely well. She has the ability to get behind the ordinary in order to
illuminate it. Her work is honest, thoughtful and also heartfelt. It is not surprising
that her name is rapidly becoming better known. "
Staple