After AllThis is the touchingly entitled collection of poems William Matthews had completed shortly before dying, just after his fifty fifth birthday in November 1997. Is death ever entirely unexpected? Not, perhaps, by a collector of experience, a gourmet of language, who can refer to "death flickering in you like a pilot light." In AFTER ALL, Matthews seems to be looking his last on all things lovely: music, food and wine, love. In the stunning central poem,

and an all-female writers room in Hollywood

Take the Lion's courage

In the seven stories and one novella collected in Unkempt

In the tradition of Wole Soyinka

too much cappuccino and new money can be a bad mix

Mailer has also been one of the most influential

Olivia tracks down Erasmus

no-holds-barred commentary on the everyday annoyances

and offers a wickedly amusing and informative assessment of how our modern diet damages the human digestive tract

Does reading about yawning make you yawn

and creatures I had

touching meditation on the nature of fandom