A man takes off for the moon in an engine drawn by geese, a poltergeist moves into a remote Welsh village, and a party of seventeenth-century Englishmen encounter the wonders of Russia – sledges, vodka, skating and Easter eggs. The scientist Robert Boyle basks in the newly discovered radiance of phosphorus, and the theme of light in darkness is taken up by the more personal poems in the book: phoneboxes, streetlamps, moonlight. Read a poem from my 2013 Faber and Faber collection here.

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"I was excited to turn the page." (Russell Jones, Elsewhere)

"These tales of the unexpected are a treat, melding modernist tricks of the light with the phosphoric glow of 'the long night called / the nineteenth century', full of suspense and charisma." (Aingeal Clare, The Guardian)

"Near the end the poet, mock-humble, declares this 'a poem of modest triumph: /I made this out of what does not last'. It does; it will." (Hayden Murphy, The Herald)

"There is a lyrical richness but also a shining clarity to Muscovy that renders even its most fantastical or marvellous excursions, simultaneously knowable and tangible." (Laura Wainwright, New Welsh Review)

"I loved Muscovy ... Brilliantly, he makes us experience this world both as if from inside and with a sense of its dislocating strangeness. " Edmund Prestwich, The North)

"These are substantial, ambitious poems fuelled by depth and dazzling syntactic energy ... a lovely book, and, it needs saying, head and shoulders above most collections published anywhere this year." (Conor O'Callaghan, Poetry Review)

"He is very good ... at both pinpointing in words exactly what he sees and imagining what he has never seen ... This poet's curiosity, keen eye and verbal exuberance should entertain and absorb most readers." (Sheenagh Pugh)

"Ghosts and lonely spirits haunt these pages but wordplay ... creates a sense of fun that increases the pleasure. " (Mark Sanderson, Sunday Telegraph)

"Not only an impressive collection but one which offers rich pleasures." (William Wootten, TLS)

"Inventive, unashamedly clever, beautifully exact." (Craig Raine, TLS Books of the Year)

"Muscovy ... should fire him into the front rank of contemporary poets." (Harry Cochrane, Varsity)