This book is the first to represent the full extent of the work of James Brown. With personal lyrics, narrative desire, short takes, anti-poetry, stolen lines, and hill-climbing, Selected Poems is a showcase of one of New Zealand's essential poetic voices. 'This is dazzling stuff.' --Hamesh Wyatt, Otago Daily Times 'Apart from the reflexive self-deprecation of the schoolboy nerd, two other things struck me as I worked through and around and back through this book. How gifted Brown is at the craft of poetry, the game of word and sounds on the page that are tidy and tight and clever and cool. And also how he lifts aside that cleverness to show us the tender inner self, the moist soft core of James Brown and his world.' --Anna Livesey, Academy of New Zealand Literature 'James Brown is the New Zealand poet laureate of torpor, resignation and exhaustion . . . with intermittent bouts of fanatical bicycle riding. The miracle is that he can make it all so interesting and darkly humorous and weirdly moving.' --Gregory O'Brien 'This is not a poetry book for the faint-hearted.' --Pania Brown (James's sister) 'The finding of poetry in unlikely places expands our concept of what poetry is