Samantha Wynne Rhydderch is a young poet of startling promise. Her intense, uncompromising style recalls the confessional poets but her vivid narratives often conjure dark personas: men on the edge of breakdown or women in the midst of ecstasy.

The poet's fascination with the ferocious and marginal lead her to daring risks with language. This is poetry with a dangerously high temperature. This is one of those rare books that feel as if the author was not merely inspired, but compelled to write.

Rockclimbing in Silk is a collection of strong, angry, intensely lyrical and demanding poems. Readers will be intrigued, annoyed, possibly shocked. It is not for those looking for nice anecdotes or attractive natural scenery. It is not for the faint-of-heart.

Samantha Wynne Rhydderch was born in 1966 and comes from a seafaring family in New Quay, West Wales. She studied Classics at Cambridge and Creative Writing at Cardiff University. In 1996 she received an award to write her first pamphlet, Stranded on Ithaca (Redbeck Press, 1998). Widely published in periodicals, she has read her poems at a number of venues including the Hay-On-Wye Literature Festival and a recent Poetry Wales Launch in Amsterdam.