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Books for your Beloved | Valentine’s Poetry Sale

valentines sale 2016

Poetry is food for the soul, and the gift of a carefully-chosen collection of poems is the perfect romantic gesture.

For Valentine’s Day, we at Seren have hand-picked a few poetry collections your partner will fall head-over-heels for. All our Valentine’s picks are 35% off until midnight on that most magical day, February 14th, so take a look below and find the perfect book for your beloved.

My Family and Other Superheroes by Jonathan Edwards
my family and other superheroes jonathan edwardsWinner of the Costa Poetry Award 2014, this vibrant and dynamic debut introduces one of Wales’ most intriguing new voices. The superheroes in question are a motley crew. Evel Knievel, Sophia Loren, Ian Rush, Marty McFly, a bicycling nun and a recalcitrant hippo – all leap from these pages and jostle for position, alongside valleys mams, dads and bamps, described with great warmth. This is a post-industrial valleys upbringing re-imagined through the prism of pop culture and surrealism.

£9.99 £6.49

 

The Man at the Corner Table by Rosie Shepperd
the man at the corner table rosie shepperdRosie Shepperd’s debut poetry collection crackles with the unexpected. The voice is one of urban sophistication; a merciless charm that teases and tempts us with sensual evocations of food and place. The reader is surprised with tastes, scents, colours and textures. There is a winning insistence on detail offered with an irony that blends into satire.
These poems are exquisite meals, to be devoured amidst surprising intimacies.

£9.99 £6.49

 

Infragreen by Kate Bingham
infragreenPerceptive, persuasive and intricately made, these poems take the reader on a startling and unfamiliar journey through everyday experiences and phenomena. Her keen eye, reflectiveness and quiet wit endow her subjects with a shimmering freshness.
In Bingham’s hands, the familiar sights and hypnotic routines that normally lull the brain into unthinking acquiescence are the starting points for finding new richness in the world around us and our participation in it.

£9.99 £6.49

 

Masculine Happiness, David Foster-Morgan
Masculine happinessThe thoughtful and winning debut collection from Wales-based David Foster-Morgan. Complex, ironic, layered, fashioned with an acute and subtle intelligence, these poems are as likely to reference Elvis as Borges.
Humour, astute satire and insightful character poems are combined here in this collection of beautiful, multi-layered poems.

£9.99 £6.49

 

 

Playing House by Katherine Stansfield
playing house katherine stansfieldA concise wit, a distinct voice and an unsettling view of the domestic characterise these poems whose subjects are the ordinary as viewed through the author’s satirical yet sympathetic eye. John Lennon’s tooth, an imaginary ‘Canada’, bees in Rhode Island, cats and office politics are all peculiar grist to this author’s mill. She presents both historical subjects such as Captain Scott of the Antarctic, and common objects, such as household bleach, from a skewed perspective, adding humour, drama and a quietly distinctive pathos.

£9.99 £6.49

 

Cohabitation by Kate Bingham
cohabitation kate binghamA brisk wit and intelligence characterises these poems by Kate Bingham. Her subjects are friends, family, work, the experiences of any day, but her keen and compassionate focus brings these moments vividly to life. Her gift is a point of view that is startling, moving and humorous.
Reflective and playful, intimate and exuberant, these poems have a wry, deliberate logic of their own which makesCohabitation an engaging as well as an illuminating first collection.

£6.95 £4.52

 

For Valentine’s deliveries, we recommend ordering before Thursday 11th February.

Why not share your love for poetry with us on Twitter? Use the hashtag #BooksForMyBeloved to tell us what you and your partner will be reading on Valentine’s Day.

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50% Off All Books: Editors’ Picks

50% off all books this week

2016 has arrived and with it, our January sale. For one week only, enjoy 50% off all books available on our website!

That being said, we know choosing which books to buy can be a little tricky so our three editors are on hand to give their book recommendations. Be it poetry, fiction or non-fiction that tickles your fancy, we have suggestions for one and all.

Mick Felton Non-Fiction Editor
Mick Felton – Non-Fiction Editor

As our non-fiction editor, Mick sees a wide variety of books each year, including everything from history, crime, autobiography, music and sport. So which two books does Mick think you need most on your shelf?

 

The Road to Zagora by Richard Collins
The Road to Zagora

After being diagnosed with Parkinson’s Disease, Richard Collins sets off with his partner Flic on a once-in-a-lifetime adventure. The Road to Zagora is a singular travel book which takes in India, Nepal, Turkey, Morocco, Peru, Equador and Wales.
Though not shy about the hardships of the disease, any sentiment of self-pity is denied through Collins’s resolute and independent-mindedness and the quality of writing.
£9.99  £5.00

Losing Israel by Jasmine Donahaye
Losing Israel

After discovering by chance that her family had colluded in the eviction of Palestinians in 1948, Jasmine Donahaye set out to learn the story of what happened. Her discoveries challenged everything she thought she knew about the country and her family. Losing Israel is a moving and honest account which spans travel writing, nature writing and memoir. Jasmine explores the powerful and competing attachments people feel for their country and its history, by attempting to understand and reconcile her conflicted attachments, rooted in her family story – and in a love of Israel’s birds.
£12.99 £6.50

 

Amy Wack Poetry Editor
Amy Wack – Poetry Editor

Amy has read and enjoyed a dazzling array of poetry over the twenty-plus years she’s been with us. Trying to narrow down her choices to just two books was hard, but here goes…

 

A Formula for Night: New and Selected Poems by Tamar YoseloffTamar_quicksand cover

The eagerly awaited summation of Tamar’ work, encompassing selections from four published print volumes: Sweetheart, Barnard’s Star, Fetch and The City with Horns; and poems from her collaborations with artists: Formerly, Marks and Desire Paths.
The book also includes a generous selection of beautiful new poems, which are often artful explorations of paradox: death/birth, dark/light, clarity/mystery.
£12.99 £6.50

House of Small Absences by Anne-Marie Fyfe
House of small absences
Anne-Marie Fyfe’s poems have long dwelt on the role that the spaces we inhabit, the places in which we find security, play in our lives: House of Small Absences is an observation window into strange, unsettling spaces—a deserted stage-set, our own personalised ‘museum’, a Piedmont albergo, underground cities, Midtown roof-gardens, convent orchards, houseboats, a foldaway circus, a Romanian sleeper-carriage—the familiar rendered uncanny through the distorting lenses of distance and life’s exigencies, its inevitable lettings-go.
£9.99 £5.00
Penny Thomas

 

Penny Thomas – Fiction Editor

Which fictional words would Penny have you delve into first? We’ve published a beautifully varied range of books, and below are just two of Penny’s favourites.

Swimming on Dry Land by Helen Blackhurst
swimming_on_dry_land_72
Twelve-year-old Monica Harvey is looking for her sister Georgie, who has disappeared. The Harvey family has recently moved to Akarula, south-west Australia, having been persuaded to set out in search of a new life by their rich Uncle Eddie, who owns the town. Unbeknownst to them, Georgie isn’t the first person to vanish.
As their dream-like vision of life in outback Australia begins to be tainted my mystery and deceit, the history of the land unfolds and answers to the strange disappearances slowly suggest themselves.
£9.99 £5.00

Foreign Bodies by Candy Neubert
foreign bodies
Fresh from the UK, Emma thinks she has fallen in love with a place, a person, and pursues the man of her dreams with a colonial zeal. But for all her poetic sensibilities, she seems unaware of the destruction she is capable of leaving in her wake.

A beautifully written first novel, Foreign Bodies explores the spaces between people, and the nature of encounters in romantic idylls on the other side of the world.
£7.99 £4.00

 

Don’t forget, absolutely everything on our website is 50% off– so if you’re eager to see beyond our suggestions, then go forth and discover a new read for the New Year on our website.

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Half price offer ends midnight, Sunday 10th January. Happy book hunting!