Throw in the Vowels is a new retrospective from Rita Ann Higgins: provocative and heart-warming poems of high jinx, jittery grief and telling social comment by a gutsy, anarchic chronicler of the Irish dispossessed.

‘A brilliantly spiky, surreal blend of humour and social issues. Her poems are a witty mix of the erotic and the upfront political from a female perspective, with wonderful rhythms that effortlessly incorporate direct speech’ – Ruth Padel, Independent on Sunday

‘A quite untameable poet. Higgins roams the provincial towns and countryside of Ireland fomenting rebellion and writing with unstaunchable energy of everything warm and unrespectable in Irish life. Her voice is like nobody else’s, simple but not naive, raucous but sympathetic’ – Peter Porter, PBS Bulletin

‘Higgins’s voices are so distinctive and real that a whole world of semi-rural Irish poverty rises around the reader with the jolting acuity of an excellent documentary…an hilarious, absorbing and thoroughly disturbing experience’ – Kate Clanchy, Independent

‘Rita Ann Higgins means a unique line in human warmth; and a unique colour of humour and a unique clarity’ – Paul Durcan

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An Awful Racket

An Awful Racket is the latest collection from Rita Ann Higgins: provocative and heartwarming poems of high jinx, jittery grief and telling social comment by a gutsy, anarchic chronicler of the Irish dispossessed.

'A brilliantly spiky, surreal blend of humour and social issues. Her poems are a witty mix of the erotic and the upfront political from a female perspective, with wonderful rhythms that effortlessly incorporate direct speech' - RUTH PADEL, Independent on Sunday

'A quite untameable poet. Higgins roams the provincial towns and countryside of Ireland fomenting rebellion and writing with unstaunchable energy of everything warm and unrespectable in Irish life. Her voice is like nobody else's, simple but not naive,
raucous but sympathetic' - PETER PORTER, PBS Bulletin

'Higgins's voices are so distinctive and real that a whole world
of semi-rural Irish poverty rises around the reader with the jolting acuity of an excellent documentary...an hilarious, absorbing and thoroughly disturbing experience' - KATE CLANCHY, Independent

'Rita Ann Higgins means a unique line in human warmth; and a unique colour of humour and a unique clarity' - PAUL DURCAN

RITA ANN HIGGINS was born in 1955 in Galway, where she still lives. One of 13 children, she left school at 14, and was in her late 20s when she started writing poetry. She has since published seven books of poetry, including Sunny Side Plucked: New & Selected Poems (Poetry Book Society Recommendation) in 1996 from Bloodaxe.