To the God of Rain (Poetry Book Society Recommendation)

In Tim Liardet's fourth poetry collection, his complex, intricate, and fascinating poems are like miniature novellas, full of incident and atmosphere. Their titles set scenes, such as “Whisky Drinker Considers his Skirmish with Death,” “A Futurist Looks at a Dog,” and “Re-reading Lolita in a Tropical Climate.” Characters are delineated in swift, ironic strokes, and strange coincidences are celebrated. The peculiar vertigo of travel, a mixture of fear and excitement, permeates many of the poems. Love also induces dizzying states in poems such as “Tremble” and its companion piece, “Tremble, Tremble.”