That awkward age - Roger McGough

Roger McGough's eagerly-awaited new collection is a powerful testament to the miraculous in the everyday. Here he builds us his world: one of chance encounters and embarrassing moments, of big questions and small wonders. 'At that awkward age now between birth and death,' he addresses Alzheimers and wrestles with mortality. He resolves (and fails) to live every day as if it were his last, joins the Foreign Legion, jives in Macca's trousers, shares the pain of Mr Sappho and Lord Godiva and plans a prison break.

With his inimitable warmth, wit and wordplay, Roger McGough affirms his position as the pre-eminent poet of the magic moment - the happy collision of life, language and the imagination.