* A poetry collection from award-winning author Donald S Murray who is on a creative roll with a new novel, In a Veil of Mist, also due in March. * Powerful poems capturing a range of human experience and emotion during a summer spent in lockdown. * Murray taps into a connection with nature that many have rediscovered over the last year, writing about the pandemic through the lens of and side by side with the wildlife surrounding him.

Donald S Murray is widely recognised for his empathy and remarkable ability to convey emotion with restraint and poignancy. In this short collection of poems written during lockdown at his Shetland home, Murray explores the changing geography of the island and how it has, in turn, changed him. On his daily walks through the village, Murray found himself noting shifts in the wind and weather, the imperceptible widening of the sea, and the way time has slowed. Noting the way, too, in which flocks of sheep or birds congregated in a field in anticipation of the arrival of a storm. With beautiful imagery and lyricism, The Man Who Talks to Birds taps into a deep connection with nature, and its ability to ground us, that many of us have rediscovered during 2020.