3 for 2, sort of

I got sent eight Faber poetry books today: Ian Hamilton, Collected Poems; Stephen Spender, Selected Poems; Lachlan McKinnon, Small Hours; Frederick Seidel, Ooga Booga; Andrew Motion, The Cinder Path; Don Paterson, Rain; Valerio Magrelli, The Embrace, trans. Jamie McKendrick; Hugo Williams, West End Final. Page extents between 64 and 160 pages, cover prices beween £9.99 and £14.99: each a bargain relative to 40 cigarettes, and ridiculously expensive relative to the CBe books.

They keep coming. A year ago I called up to say thank you but really I don’t need all these books, and shelf space is finite; and was told I’m on a list, and it would be more trouble to take me off the list than let things ride; so here are these eight ...

Usually I take some of them down to Notting Hill Books (W8 4RT), a lovely place. But for the above, here’s the deal: order two CBe books from the website and get one of the Faber lot thrown in free (say which you want in the ‘instructions to merchant’ box in the PayPal routine). Or, if poetry isn’t your thing, a copy of the hardback US edition of Jennie Walker’s 24 for 3, retitled The Rules of Play, of which I seem to have a lot of copies.