A series of interconnected short stories recount the highs and lows of a teaching career.

Scott Robinson, an apprehensive young Midwesterner, transplants himself to West London to teach high school English and American literature. In 20 tightly linked but meandering tales, Newton (Poetica Rex, 2013, etc.), a poet and retired high school teacher, highlights Scott’s struggles in and out of the classroom as he adjusts to life in bustling London: “[The] city tempo infused Scott with a certain amount of élan, some bravado and new zest for risk….He was plugging into the juice of the metropolis and enjoying close proximity to the glitterati, the glamour of major players.” In fact, Scott is just scraping by, constantly questioning his profession but having invested himself too deeply to turn back. During a “Parents Night” event, he sits alone at a table in the hallway, grading papers, when “suddenly he wanted to be left alone, to day-dream about the weekend coming or a nice hot whiskey drink before bed.” The generally unfocused stories tend to spiral into digressions without context, including a sudden revelation that Scott, despite his overt bachelorhood, has a daughter. A characteristic story, “A Season Travel Pass,” opens with Scott reflecting on the London Tube before straying into thoughts on the Magna Carta, his realization that he’s attracted to the French teacher, and memories of a student field trip to the Globe Theatre. The frequently redundant tales emphasize Scott’s near-misadventures, but they might have been more engaging if they’d driven Scott to make important decisions; instead, the stories are often cut safely but unsatisfyingly short. Punctuation and grammar errors, including misused semicolons, add to the confusion—particularly in a book about an English teacher. That said, Scott’s lyrical insights into the awkwardness of standing speechless before an unruly class, his triumphs as a teacher and father, or even his eagerness to get something to drink, make this collection worth reading. Taken together, the stories singularly depict the inherent snags that many teachers face but few discuss.

A frank but discursive fictional look at an underappreciated profession.

Short, free verse poems on the psychological and sociological complexities of life in London.

Wendell Berry once suggested, “If you don’t know where you are, you don’t know who you are.” In this tightly focused collection, Newton (Tales out of School, 2009, etc.) seeks to demonstrate the difficulty of knowing either half of that conditional. With a nod to Dickens’ famous opening, Newton launches his tour of self and city with dichotomous uncertainty: “London is old and new, good/bad, / great and small…/ It is rich and poor, work/play, dull and / vivid.” Later, he suggests that “LA is the city of angels, Paris the city of light; / London is toy town, with puppet rulers/ raggedy / dolls/tin soldiers / upon painted sets…set in / motion by clockwork make-believe; it is magical / and comical, silly and daring.” Like Bukowski, whose influence is unmistakable, Newton is most interested in the social divides and tensions that define the city, with a clear sympathy for the ordinary, workaday resident. London is a place where the “Princess waved/smiled/gestured” at a narrator taking a walk and is the place “where cats and / such can look upon a queen,” but it’s also the place where narrators stumble across absurdly petulant and oblivious royal correspondence, where the social pressures weigh so heavily that those who fail are apt to fall “thru the modern world to a stone- / age period in full view of everyone” and where death is “shocking, raw and / untold.” Despite London’s many charms and majesties, Newton resists the allure of topographical verse. London is too perilous: “The taxis— / a heavy black mass running / across my paths, across all / the ways of my days. / Quiet and ugly, ugly and / dangerous; tearing past my / shins as I slip past.” It’s also confusing, as the traveler looking for Talbot Gardens finds when a local points him to Talbot Court, Talbot Road, Talbot Avenue and Talbot Crescent before admitting, “Sorry, can’t help anymore.” At least for those readers confused by all the specific references, Newton provides an arbitrary, but helpful, set of notes.

Perceptive and honest, Newton manages to be profound without being abstruse. Though stylistically unremarkable, this is clear-voiced and self-aware poetry that any city dweller will appreciate.