Cometary Phases is Christine Evans' first collection of poetry for six years. It builds on the lyrical and unsentimental portrayal of rural life which is a feature of her work, but includes a striking new imaginative power.

Ageing, change, the environment and the position of women are her subjects now, in poems often shot through with darkness and foreboding.

At the centre of Cometary Phases are a group of remarkable poems from the small hours, the time 'between wakings': the poems of a gifted insomniac, as they have been called. Other poems imaginatively enter the world of animals, like the unforgettable 'Whale Dream', while the long title poem searches for meaning in change and death, a search lit by Halley's Comet.

Christine Evans taught English on the Llyn Peninsula, where she lives with her husband and son on a farm. Her first collection, Looking Inland, was described as having 'something to say that is worth saying...a sane response to experience' . Her work is widely pubished; Seren produced four collections: Looking Inland, Falling Back, Cometary Phases and Island of Dark Horses.