Coming in 2016

You could do worse than put down your mug of cocoa or goblet of gin for a moment and spend time on the CB editions website whereon appears a list of current and forthcoming publications, all (dare I say it) essential reading:

Available now: 

Jack Robinson, by the same author: ‘a kind of portrait of the contemporary committed reader: oh, you think, reading it, is that what I’m like?’ – Jonathan Gibbs. (I've just read this for the second time and think it's a brilliant example of what I call 'occasional prose' (as one says 'occasional poetry') - something tangy and zeitgeisty, something that salvages moments from the wreck of time and fixes them for the future. A quietly dazzling reflection on what it means to read, to be read. Gibbs is bang on the money, as ever.

Coming in February/March: 

Will Eaves, The Inevitable Gift Shop: ‘surprising, tender, funny and profound’ – Michelle de Kretser.

This will get me through the dog days - it's a blend of poetry and prose (apparently) from a reliably unpredictable writer whose polyphonic anti-novel The Absent Therapist was one of my favourite books of last year

Julian Stannnard: What were you thinking?: ‘one of the most distinctive British poets writing today’ – Deborah Levy.

I don't know Stannard's work - yet - and the pleasure of discovering a new poet is one of the gifts reserved for all ages. CB editions were the first to publish J O Morgan, whose Interference Pattern will be published by Jonathan Cape in Spring and is - trust me on this - a polyvocal 21st century equivalent to The Waste Land.)

David Collard: About a Girl: a reader’s guide to Eimear McBride’s A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing.

Of the many books published in 2016 this is sure to be one of them, but I shall say no more for now.

April/May:

Patrick Mackie, The Further Adventures Of The Lives Of The Saints;

Beverley Bie Brahic, Hunting the Boar.

Patrick Mackie has been published by Carcanet - a good sign - and I like the title, with its easy conflation of pop culture and something less ignoble. Beverley Bie Brahic's brilliant translations of Apollinaire (winner of the 2014 Scott Moncrieff Prize) and Francis Ponge have been a constant pleasure since my son (after some diplomatic prompting) gave me both volumes for my birthday last year. Her previous collection of poetry White Sheets is as fresh and crisp and appealing as its title.

September: 

Fine, fine, fine, fine, fine by Diane Williams: ‘one of the true heroes of the Amercian avant-garde’ – Jonathan Franzen; ‘one of the very few contemporary prose writers who seem to be doing something independent, energetic, heartfelt’ – Lydia Davis.

I'd follow Lydia Davies wherever she cares to lead me. The title (and I'm reasonably sure it has nothing at all to do with The Goon Show's Eccles) sounds like a reason to stick around until Autumn.

Fine, fine, fine, fine, fine by Diane Williams: ‘one of the true heroes of the Amercian avant-garde’ – Jonathan Franzen; ‘one of the very few contemporary prose writers who seem to be doing something independent, energetic, heartfelt’ – Lydia Davis.

Also forthcoming from this publisher is the keenly-anticipated second issue of Sonofabook. Perhaps 2016, despite the horrible losses of Lemmy and Bowie, won't turn out to be the shittiest year since records began. Onward!