In this ambitious new book of poems, Duncan Bush uses a glittering variety of voices and poetic personae. His characters include a South African ex-mercenary, a Welsh hill farmer's widow, a Cardiff garage mechanic, tourists, and, most memorably in his long poem sequence for two voices, , a tragically disturbed American Vietnam War veteran and his wife. Not only do these poems show a novelist's flair for creating worlds rich in detail, they present us with characters who are wrestling, to varying degrees of success, with the compelling moral dilemmas of our day. The author's darkly ironic precision in such poems as , (a response to Bosnia), and keep us riveted throughout this new collection.