Winner of the Hollingworth Prize for Poetry

Her Fault is the debut pamphlet of poems by NJ Stallard. Stallard’s work is cutting and tender in equal measure. It registers the ‘smallish tremors’ of everyday experience, recognising that it is these small adjustments, and not the seismic quakes, that make up a life. Stallard's poems are interested in the world and the way we fail to live up to it. The ‘faults’, then, are not only our flaws and mistakes, but the fissures between things—between times and places, between people, and between our senses of self. Language is important because it is one of the ways we can mend those cracks. Despite their faults, our words give us something to work with: ‘Here they are: stiff and trying.'

‘Not only are Stallard’s poems full of the richness and vivid detail of life, they seem themselves living things—sharp, evocative, almost tangible. This is a completely transportive collection.’ – Rebecca Perry

Winner of the Hollingworth Prize for Poetry

Her Fault is the debut pamphlet of poems by NJ Stallard. Stallard’s work is cutting and tender in equal measure. It registers the ‘smallish tremors’ of everyday experience, recognising that it is these small adjustments, and not the seismic quakes, that make up a life. Stallard's poems are interested in the world and the way we fail to live up to it. The ‘faults’, then, are not only our flaws and mistakes, but the fissures between things—between times and places, between people, and between our senses of self. Language is important because it is one of the ways we can mend those cracks. Despite their faults, our words give us something to work with: ‘Here they are: stiff and trying.'

‘Not only are Stallard’s poems full of the richness and vivid detail of life, they seem themselves living things—sharp, evocative, almost tangible. This is a completely transportive collection.’ – Rebecca Perry