Ocean Vuong, one of my favourite contemporary poets, expanded his body of work beautifully in Time Is a Mother

A remarkable return: Vuong's unparalleled luminosity of phrase, his perfected pinpoint accuracy of image is here placed alongside a thrilling expansion of voice and gaze which further confirms Vuong as one of the most important poets of his generation

Haunting, inconsolable, and at the same time a playful, generous in spirit, tender, inimitable book. The poet’s late mother is these pages’ muse and guardian spirit, as poem after poem Vuong redefines our idea of what an elegy can do it, what it is for. But from all of this intersection of tragedy and tenderness, true wisdom comes: Vuong teaches us not just how to grieve, but how to live

This summer, I'll be packing his poetry collection... I'm looking forward to being still and having the space to read and reread his powerful words

These 28 accomplished poems explore grief, trauma, family... Language itself, in all its power and violence, falls under Vuong's incomparable scrutiny

Tender and heartbreaking... Delving back into the visceral themes that made his 2019 novel On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous a revelation, Vuong traverses the intensely personal and the broadly political with grace and courage

Vuong's poems passionately and inventively articulate the difficulties of understanding and accepting selfhood alongside the varieties of life beyond it

There's something about Vuong's writing that demands all of your lungs. The succinct line arrangement and absence of full stops in poems... force you to breathe heavy

Not since Emily Dickinson has poetry found such an oceanic openness of the self's quiet laceration and cautious resilience. In Time Is A Mother Ocean Vuong's words are bullets travelling through the page and hitting us with debris resembling our memory of art, love, grief and acts of survival... We find ourselves being salvaged and released into a world where a word, a turn of phrase, or a line makes a difficult moment bearable. There is a violent process of fermentation in Vuong's poems that keeps poetry pungent, truth-seeking and unerasable

Vuong writes with such a sensitive scrutiny, breathtaking in its expression

A stirring collection of poetry. Vuong experiments with language and form while probing the aftermath of his mother's death and his determination to survive it. Take your time with these poems, and return to them often

Through these poems, Vuong sings loud and clear of everything worth living for and discovering - just as vividly as he did in his critically acclaimed titles On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous and Night Sky With Exit Wounds

An incredibly impactful collection, there's no doubt Time Is A Mother will strike a chord with most

A profound and accomplished collection

Heartbreaking and perfect

A gorgeous, moving and awe-inspiring gathering of poems that feel like award-winning short films. These vignettes of loss, grief and love will take your breath away

An indispensable collection

Ashley Audrain writes about motherhood and how it feels to be a woman today with a fearlessness few can muster. Every time I turned a page, I thought: yes! This is why I read--to connect, to feel seen, to be confronted with my deepest fears, and, of course, to go on a breathtakingly suspenseful ride while doing it

Ashley Audrain has a profound understanding of how thin the line between good and evil can be. THE WHISPERS leads readers past the carefully composed facade of Harlow Street to dig, unflinchingly, into themes of motherhood, fidelity, privilege and complicity, resulting in a novel that not only delivers on the promise of its taut, explosive and page-turning plot-but redefines the very idea of what a thriller is and can be. Daring, incisive, and exquisitely written, Audrain has proven herself a force like no other

A cracking psychological thriller that keeps you guessing to the final pages. Thought-provoking, gripping, worthy of all the praise

A chilling psychodrama about motherhood and community

The Whispers held me in its grip from the first page until the final, gasp-worthy line - a raw, provocative, mesmerising thriller, charting the darkest psychological contours of motherhood with devastating precision. Audrain writes with such unsettling honesty and I found it impossible to tear myself away from her characters. Fans of The Push will not be disappointed!

A tense tale about motherhood, friendship and betrayal

I was blown away by The Push, and found myself equally enthralled by The Whispers

A brilliant beach read of a thriller that you're likely to chomp through in a single sitting

Her books are quickly becoming a must read

Astonishingly powerful... Truly stunning