Joanna Boulter's quiet and lovely poems that hymn (for she can sing) the life and music of Shostakovich are an excellent experience. I always quail a bit when I hear that a book of poetry is well 'researched'; for there is a great difference between the scholarly mind and the poetic. But I need not have worried: by whatever steps Joanna Boulter has come to her subject, it is all wrapped up in the cling film of poetry and, like I say, it sings. The refrain, the repetition, the da capo are her particular phonic attributes; she also rhymes well and unobtrusively... A book to be warmly recommended.