The Radio by Leontia Flynn review – sheer pleasure, no slog

Anybody with an interest in poetry should be reading Leontia Flynn. Those with no interest should be reading her too: she has what it takes to overcome resistance. All mothers – especially new mothers – should read her. Her understanding of what it is to be a woman is one of the things (by no means the only thing) that makes this collection so powerful. Her thinking is complicated but never arrogantly inaccessible. I was bowled over by this, her fourth collection. I kept returning to poems for the sheer pleasure of them – no slog involved.

The title poem describes a Belfast childhood in which the news was broadcast by a radio that, at other times, kept trouble at bay:

She wants to know what goes on beneath the skin, in the brain, behind the scenes. She wants to see what is beyond her

Related: Profit and Loss by Leontia Flynn – review