Inheritance, Paul Bailey's first book of poems after a lifetime of writing fiction, was acclaimed by Carol Rumens in the Guardian as 'a collection to engage everyone who appreciates elegant craft, shapely storytelling and delicate love lyrics, with a touch of acerbic mischief to offset melancholy and no "poetic" pretentiousness whatever'. In Joie de vivre, Bailey continues to celebrate the living and the dead with 'measured sorrow and delight'. The poems both mourn and laugh, giving age and illness more than a good run for their money.