SCHOOL days and memories of family holidays are among the subjects touched upon in John Mole's latest poetry collection.

The book is a mix of soulful recollections which leave a bittersweet and deeply tender impression on the reader, interspersed with joyfully surging poems that capture the fun times and hopes of youth.

Among the highlights is the title poem, The Other Day, which recals an improbably chance encounter with the author's hero, US writer John Steinbeck; a passage called The Way it Was from Sonnets From My Father's Side, which details his father's youthful desire to be a doctor offset against his eventual career as an accountant and The Gift, an incredibly warm, nostalgic and affecting poem where the author is saying a last goodbye to his mother.

By contrast Children at a Daffodil Planting and Summer Song are about the energy of a life that's just starting out and hopes for the future. A well-crafted and intelligent volume to dip into time and again.

The Other Day by John Mole is published by Peterloo Poets, priced £7.95