The second line of the first poem (The Mist Lifts) indulges in the words ‘higgeldy-piggeldy.’

That’s an expression of whimsy, but a special kind of whimsy.

A sing-song mood of dark, Dickensian whimsy (think of the lingering descriptions of the yellow fog from the opening passages of Bleak House).

Even though the poems make frequent use of surrealistic association games, their influence is kept low key and does not interfere with the anachronistic avalanche of faint and constant archaicisms (see what I did there? that’s called ‘alliteration’).

The book is divided into three parts and part I and II are by far the best, because they make use of a sonnet-like form. While not rhymed (at least, not in any traditional sense), they have a musicality and the use of a thirteen line and then and eight line stanza clearly references the sonnet.

The middle section consists of longer poems, each longer than a page and most running on for three pages or more. They are broken up into stanzas, but the music is diminished by the lack of order the sonnet-esque form imposed.

But the stuff that works… really works. I saw last year’s winner, too, and was singularly unimpressed. Not so this year. Andrews is someone whose second collection I would buy, no question, just to see what he does next.