The Estate Agent's Daughter

by Rhian Edwards

The Estate Agent’s Daughter is Rhian Edwards’ eagerly awaited follow-up to her multi-prizewinning debut Clueless Dogs . Her voice is both powerfully personal, local to her Bridgend birthplace, and performative, born to be read aloud. In the title poem, the protagonist has become a surrealist house, with dream-like details ‘carpeted with sycamore seeds and cherry blossom throughout’; the sturdy realism of a writing desk ‘nudged/ to the brink of the bay,’ as well as points of sharp ‘all mod cons.’ This poem foreshadows both the heartbreak (a shattered first marriage) and joy (the birth of a daughter) that feature in the work that follows. We also have pieces of sly irony, of disillusioned dating. There is an engaging diptych devoted to a recently deceased grandmother and grandfather, who died within months of each other, and whose vivid personalities, with all their tragi-comic elements, shine through. The author combines her visceral skill for description, for these are poems based in the body, with a feminist, forthright courage to speak of difficult things.

72 pages, Paperback

Published August 1, 2020

About the author

Rhian’s first collection of poems Clueless Dogs (Seren) is shortlisted for Wales Book of the Year 2013. It was also shortlisted for the Forward Prize for Best First Collection 2012, while her pamphlet of poems Parade the Fib, (Tall-Lighthouse), was awarded the Poetry Book Society Choice for autumn 2008.

Rhian is the current winner of the John Tripp Award for Spoken Poetry, having won both the Judges and Audience award, which is the highest accolade for a performance poet in Wales.

Rhian’s poems have appeared in the Guardian, Times Literary Supplement, Poetry Review, Arete, the Spectator, Poetry London, Poetry Wales, Prague Revue, the London Magazine, Stand, Planet Magazine and the Lampeter Review.

Rhian is currently the first Writer in Residence at Aberystwyth Arts Centre from March to June 2013. She is also working again with Sculptor David Annand to compose a poem to be engraved into the new sculpture at Ynysawdre, further to their recent collaboration in Bridgend Town Centre.

Rhian is a poet and musician and has delivered over 300 stage, radio and festival performances world-wide. She lives in South Wales with her husband Blake and their dog Lola. They are expecting their first child.

Reviews

[Tôpher Mills · Rating 5 out of 5]

Whatever she takes aim at Rhian Edwards scores a bullseye. From writing an estate agents ad for herself, 'Juliet balcony in state of disrepair', to simply wandering around Tesco's just for an excuse to get out of the house. This book has a wonderful range of subjects; magpies, flower women, an Argos wedding, poems on trial (used in a divorce and not to decide if they are any good or not!), elegies for grandparents and Bridgend's Embassy Cinema. Her portraits of people, including her parents, are so acute you are almost embarrassed to read them.
The last section ends the book with a bang as she explores the travails and hilarious pitfalls of modern relationships. These were the most enjoyable part of this collection for me and I found myself hoping she finds many more unsuitable and incompatible men in her life so we can read more of these scathingly honest and blisteringly funny poems.

[Siân Ffrainc · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have followed the poet Rhian Edward’s since her breakthrough with Clueless Dogs and yet somehow she gets better and better. Magnifique. Bendigedig. All of the superlatives. A collection to read in a hot bath, in front of a roaring fire, or out on the veranda in the late evening sun. Our best poet, bar none.

[Judith Johnson · Rating 3 out of 5]

These poems are not my cup of tea really, but poetry is very subjective, of course, and in the author's favour, Welsh poets Joe Dunthorne, Zoe Brigley and Robert Minhinnick have all sung its praises on the back cover.