the night trotsky came to stay

"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

"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 so intensely and imaginatively that the dark anecdotes are outweighed by anecdotes of humour and tenderness."
Vicki Feaver

“In Allison McVety’s hands we’re in an entirely different, witty and weird world.”
Anne-Marie Fyfe

"The Night Trotsky Came to Stay is an impeccably clear and sculpted collection. Allison McVety’s first book shines."
David Morley

“Here are ordinary lives made extraordinary, illuminated by the piercing light McVety’s poems shine on them.”
Susan Utting